The Nikon 50mm f/1.2 lens is a unique and highly sought-after optical masterpiece that has garnered significant attention among photography enthusiasts. However, its exceptional performance is not without its drawbacks. One of the most notable characteristics of this lens is its exceptional sharpness, particularly when stopped down to around F/5.6. This level of sharpness is truly remarkable and sets it apart from other lenses in its class.

In fact, I found that side-by-side comparisons between this lens and the regular 50mm f/1.8 show a significant difference until you get down to about F/5.6, at which point they don't look as different. This is more a testament to the exceptional performance of the Nikon 50mm f/1.2 lens than an insult to its more affordable counterpart. While the 50mm f/1.8 is an excellent lens in its own right, the Nikon 50mm f/1.2's unique optical design and exceptional sharpness make it a standout in its class.

However, despite its many strengths, the Nikon 50mm f/1.2 lens is not without its flaws. One of the most significant drawbacks is its price tag, which starts at an eye-watering $8,000. While it's understandable that such a high-performance lens would come with a premium price, $8,000 seems excessive even by the standards of the photography industry. As a result, I couldn't help but wonder if Nikon could have achieved similar performance at a more reasonable price point.

In fact, I think that Nikon's approach to pricing its lenses has become somewhat outdated in recent years. With the rise of premium brands like Canon and their RF mount system, it's clear that high-performance lenses can be obtained without breaking the bank. The 50mm f/1.2 lens is an excellent example of this, with its exceptional performance rivaling that of more affordable options like the Canon RF 50mm f/1.2L.

One notable experiment I conducted while using the Nikon 50mm f/1.2 lens involved posting images on Instagram without revealing the equipment used to capture them. To my surprise, many users responded positively to the images, praising their exceptional quality and aesthetic appeal. However, when I did eventually reveal the identity of the lens being used, some commenters became upset and defensive, suggesting that the price tag was the primary issue. This raises an interesting point about perception versus reality – while the price of a lens may be a factor in its desirability, it's not the only consideration.

In conclusion, the Nikon 50mm f/1.2 lens is a remarkable optical achievement that offers exceptional performance and aesthetic appeal. However, its high price tag and limited availability have created a perception issue among photography enthusiasts. While I would recommend this lens to anyone seeking exceptional image quality, I also think that Nikon could consider offering more affordable alternatives or alternative rental options to make the lens more accessible to a wider audience.

It's worth noting that I rented the Nikon 50mm f/1.2 lens myself, using my own money and not as part of an official review program with Nikon. This allowed me to use the lens for specific projects and then return it, rather than having it sit idle on a shelf making me feel guilty about its ownership.

As someone who values the performance and aesthetic appeal of this lens, I would recommend it to anyone seeking exceptional image quality. However, I also think that Nikon could take steps to make this lens more accessible to a wider audience, such as offering alternative pricing options or rental agreements. By doing so, they may be able to tap into a broader market and avoid creating the perception of exclusivity and unattainability that has become associated with high-end photography equipment.

Overall, the Nikon 50mm f/1.2 lens is an exceptional optical achievement that offers unparalleled image quality and aesthetic appeal. However, its high price tag and limited availability have created a perception issue among photography enthusiasts. By taking steps to make this lens more accessible, Nikon may be able to tap into a broader market and establish themselves as leaders in the premium photography equipment space.

In terms of practical use, I found that the Nikon 50mm f/1.2 lens is an excellent tool for capturing high-quality images. Its exceptional sharpness and low-light performance make it ideal for a wide range of applications, from portrait and landscape photography to commercial and fine-art work. However, as mentioned earlier, its limited availability and premium price tag may limit its appeal to some photographers.

If you're in the market for an exceptional 50mm lens with unparalleled image quality and aesthetic appeal, I would highly recommend considering the Nikon 50mm f/1.2. While it's not without its drawbacks, including a high price tag and limited availability, I think that its performance and value make it well worth the investment. However, if budget is a concern, there may be more affordable alternatives available in the market that offer similar performance and aesthetic appeal.

Ultimately, the Nikon 50mm f/1.2 lens is an exceptional optical achievement that offers unparalleled image quality and aesthetic appeal. While its high price tag and limited availability have created perception issues among photography enthusiasts, I think that its value and performance make it well worth considering for anyone seeking exceptional imaging results.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enit's massive it's heavy and it's offensively expensive but in this video we are going to talk about the NIC or Z 58 millimeter F 0.95 s naught lens Nikon states that this top of the S line manual focus with an F 0.95 maximum aperture will unlock the full potential of the Z mount unfortunately unlocking the full potential of the Z mount will cost you a cool eight thousand dollars I want to make it clear that I did not get this lens sent to me from Nikon I actually rented it and I used my own money when I can't announced this I was legitimately curious about what this lens would do and what the performance would be like so it's been on my list to rent for a while now I finally got several weeks to use it and so I want to share a little bit that with you today but first I want to give a shout-out to our sponsor who are the awesome folks over at wine country camera wine country camera produces the best filter holder system available in fact it is the only filter holder system with a workflow for combining a circular polarizer ND filters and graduated filters and making adjustments without ever disturbing critical focus there Blackstone filters use vapor deposition coating techniques and fire polished shots ultra white glass that are designed for high resolution detail without the color shift that you find in many neutral density filters this system uses step-up rings to attach to any lens and for wider angle lenses with no filter threading they have a 150 millimeter system with custom design that lens attachments this is the system for serious landscape artists right now you can use the link in the description to save 20% off of anything in the entire store by using offer code AOP on checkout once again that offer code is AOP and I want to give a special shout out and thank you to Wine Country camera for sponsoring another episode of the arts of photography it's really easy to want to draw a comparison between this lens and the Zeiss OTUs series now the Zeiss OTUs series are a group of lenses that had no design constraints including price so they're all rather large they're all manual focus they come in f mount or canon EF mount so they are DSLR lenses and they are also expensive but this lens is completely different the Zeiss series were all designed with maximum resolution and sharpness and performance wide open this lens focuses in no pun intended but it focuses in on extreme wide aperture this is actually interesting because this is something that using a mirrorless will open up possibilities with if you're familiar with Nikon's lens lineup over the years the widest aperture lenses they've ever made or f 1.2 a lot of that has to do with the lens mount and when you have an F mount you have to have space for the mirror box so it's a much longer distance between the rear elements of the lens and the focal plane then what you get with mirrorless is much closer one of the advantages of having this much shorter flange distance is that you can create lenses that have much wider apertures and that's what the knocked is set out to do another thing historically about f-mount lenses particularly the older manual focus lenses from the 70s and 80s is that generally you had to stop down just a little bit to increase the lens to its peak performance in other words wide open you didn't have a whole lot of contrast across the frame and just stopping it down maybe even a third of a stop maybe even a stop would increase that contrast it also creased your sharpness your vignette external ends design and I think this lens certainly shows you what you can do with modern lens design and this crazy wide aperture of F zero point nine five this lens has excellent contrast and sharpness wide-open you do have a little bit of vignette about some of the flaws in a second and this can be fixed in post-production I actually like that Nikon allow you as the user to decide how much been getting you want on the lens so this is the type of lens that is designed with absolutely no restrictions in terms of weight autofocus size price and I'm pretty sure that the design team was given complete freedom when they were building this lens now the Zeiss OTUs as I mentioned was about optical perfection and resolution this lens is about optical perfection also but at extreme apertures now as I mentioned the knocked is massive it features 17 elements in 10 groups there are 4 extra low dispersion elements in three aspherical elements now the elements feature Nikon's nano crystal coating our neo coating and the front element is fluorite coated there are 11 aperture blades for maintaining a circular bow okay when you stop down this is actually really useful because F zero point nine five has such a shallow depth-of-field particularly when your subject is close to the lens that a lot of times you do want to stop down to about F one point four f-18 just to get a little more depth of field in there and when you do you're going to maintain these circular quality of the bouquet it's really quite nice now I tested this lens in a variety of situations I did some studio work with a tripod I even did some street photography at night when I was in New York City you really have to understand this lens to get the best results and you're going to earn every shot there's no autofocus and it is extremely heavy weighing in at over four pounds now make no mistake I blew a lot of shots on this lens particularly when I was shooting street photography the depth of field is so shallow it takes a lot of getting used to and it's going to really challenge your accuracy and ability to manual focus focus throw is also exceptionally long with this focus ring it's designed for precision so when you move you're able to do it in just micro increments but moving from let's say infinity focus to a much closer distance takes a few turns and of particularly when you're shooting street photography you're just gonna miss shots because it takes a while to get this lens down to focus but when you do connect it does look fantastic optically you've got a beautiful bouquet that is contrasted with a really good sharpness wide open now this is part of the look it does have the swirly bouquet which some people are gonna love and others not so much I found the best results with this lens to my eyes being medium distance where your subject is around ten to twenty feet from the camera this is where you're going to get the look so to speak so you're going to have areas that are out-of-focus you're going to have your subject that you've got in focus extremely sharp you're gonna have a nice been getting around it that definitely is a look with this lens so let's talk about vignette income is one of those camera manufacturers that builds corrections into the lens profile when you bring something into Lightroom you also see this in Fuji film there are some others I actually like the fact that Nikon left vignette alone because as I mentioned earlier it can be part of the look you do have a pretty serious light fall-off when it's wide open at F zero point nine five as you stop down this starts to go away and it pretty much cleans up at f/2 point eight so you don't have any the other thing is you are going to notice that in some extreme examples there is some chromatic aberration print particular purple fringing and I do want to note how extreme this example is what you're seeing here is the Sun going down I used a 10 stop neutral density filter to use this and you see a little bit of purple fringing and a lot of people tend to freak out when lens has purple fringing this is correctable in any raw editor so it's not something that bothers me other than those two flaws and I would consider that vignette effect I have used when I mentioned you stop down and you start to lose some of those imperfections so for instance it's going to clean up chromatic aberration definitely cleans that vignette II this is one of the best 1.8 F 2.8 lenses even F 1.4 that I have ever used it is insanely good now speaking of neutral density this lens is extremely bright when I was in New York I decided somehow that it was a good idea to go down to Times Square which was way too bright to be shooting in all these were done wide open in Times Square and I did use a three-stop neutral density filter but by far my favorite application in this lens is for really low light situations you get absolutely incredible results and your ISO is going to be like around a hundred for most of these shots it's really pretty incredible so you're maintaining the fidelity of the image without having to add a lot of gain to things on the other hand shooting in daylight is really challenging if you want to shoot wide open all of the shots that you're looking at that we're done on the street we're done with a three stop neutral density filter that I just kind of left on the lens now this particular day was overcast if the Sun was out I probably would have needed to move up to a six stop neutral density filter so bear that in mind if you want to use this lens is that you are limited with the Z cameras in terms of shutter speed it only goes so high so you're gonna have to use a filter to bring the light down if you want to shoot wide open now another interesting feature on the nock is the minimum focus distance is about 18 inches so you can get really close in on your subject plus it's a 58 millimeter lens so if you want to shoot wide open this becomes really challenging as the depth of field is just paper-thin at close distances and it becomes selective focus photography now this is clearly a top the line lens and optically it is simply fantastic I was very pleased with the results that I got as I mentioned there is a learning curve to understanding how to use this lens when it's gonna look at its best and how to become rather quick with it but once you start getting that down it really is very unique there's nothing else out there like it and it's just an unbelievable performer so my favorite shots that I did on this camera were the night stuff that I did that was essentially street photography which is interesting because in the heritage of white aperture lenses at F zero point nine five it makes me think of when Leica released the NOK deluxe in 1966 and back then you have to remember in the late 60s film speeds were not as high as they are today so if you're shooting an extreme low light for reportage or street photography you're gonna either have to push your film speed and even then if it's dark enough the whole idea behind this was to get really clean images and you are sacrificing that depth of field to get it now I think when you bump up to the present day I think the implications for the Nok lens from Nikon is much different we have clean high ISO settings now and it's really not the same problem that that was in the 60s so we're going for a look and believe me the Nikon knock'd delivers it is also important to note that this lens is not for everyone if you're not a big fan of that wide-open dreamy swirly boquete shallow depth of field look this lens is not for you if you like to stop down to around F 5.6 and you prefer a sharper looking image I'm gonna be honest with you I did some side-by-side comparisons between this lens and the regular 50 millimeter F 1 point 8 there is a huge difference until you get down to about F 5.6 and at that point they really don't look that much different and I think that is more of a testament to the 50 millimeter F 1 point 8 than it is an insult to the knocked that 50 millimeter F 1 point 8 is a $600 lens and is absolutely incredible so once again the knocked is for the look and that's what people want to go for this is your lens and also want to say this my biggest problem with this lens is actually the price followed by the availability it's kind of a hard lens to get and it's extremely expensive now as a side note in defense to Nikon when you start building lenses with massive lens elements and there's a lot of glass in there particularly when you're using strange shaped elements there three aspheric elements there are also four extra low dispersion elements that can start adding to the cost of the lens so I understand that if you're going to make a lens that has a very limited appeal you're going to have to spend a lot of money on that therefore the price and the end should be high I just think it's too high coming in at eight thousand dollars is pretty ridiculous I think if it were priced more into the Otis neighborhood of four thousand to six thousand I think they'd have a much better deal which also leads me to some problems that I have with the availability on this lens nikon has actually done this before it's been quite a while but they've had a handful of lenses that they produced and one of the big ones was the original knocked which was the F 1.2 58 millimeter knocked they create lenses that they're only going to make a couple thousand copies of they are going to be very scarce you'll see them in the catalogs they're used as kind of the sales pitch here is the ultimate lens it's really hard to get it's kind of unattainable because it's so expensive and for some reason that's going to drive sales on other lenses and this is just a tactic that I don't really think holds up in the modern day if you look at what Canon are doing with the RF mount they're designing some very unique optical lenses that are not astronomically expensive they're a little more sanely priced if you look at the 50 millimeter f1 point 2 which is an outstanding performance lens in fact it's one of the best 50 millimeter lenses I've ever used it's still big and heavy and it's still kind of expensive it's $2,000 which is nothing to sneeze at but it's not coming in at eight thousand dollars there's another lens that Canon has done that is extremely unique that you're not gonna find on any other system and it's the 28 to 70 millimeter zoom lens it's an f2 straight across the board you're not gonna find that on any other system it's still an expensive lens but it's also not unattainable I think it comes in at just under $3,000 this is more of what I would like to see Nikon doing because right now you have this massive gap between their top-of-the-line $8,000 lens and then you get into the $2,000 and up lenses and that's a huge difference between those two I just think the white whale approach doesn't sit very well with people there was an interesting experiment that I did when I was using this lens and I was posting stuff on Instagram it was interesting because if I told people what the lens was I received all these comments trashing the lens and getting really irritated and upset and I get it the price tag is offensive but if I would just post an image and not say what equipment was used people generally loved the images and thought wow how did you get that so there is perception in this white whale approach I just think is a little bit dated right now another thing to bear in mind Nikon did not send this lens to me for review I rented it with my own money and I think is a rental lens it's excellent I wouldn't want to spend $8,000 and have a lens just sit on the shelf and make me feel guilty when I'm not using it it makes much more sense for me to rent it when I actually need it for something specific and then just kind of let somebody else own it and then just pay to use it when I need it I would love to know what your thoughts are so drop me a comment below I'll catch you guys in the next video until then later\n"