Zeiss-branded
ZF 50mm f/1.4. Made in Japan by Cosina.
It feels like
an off-brand lens from the 1970s, and it sort of is! Cosina
made a lot of the off -brand lenses of the 1970s, thus the
uncanny similarity.
The Zeiss-branded
lens has no rubber focus ring, just ribbed (not knurled) anodized
aluminum. It's not even scalloped like the first Nikkors of
the 1950s. It's the hardest to focus of any of these.
You have to use at least two fingers and grab it. It
feels a little uneven as you spin the focus ring. It does not
feel anywhere near as precise as any of the manual focus Nikkors.
There's
too much drag from grease and friction to allow one-finger focusing
as one can do with the Nikkors.
The aperture ring
has clicks at half stops. That drive me up the wall! I set
aperture by feel, one stop per click. Half stops are terrible:
I lose count, and it's confusing when used along with Nikkor
lenses with full stop clicks.
It has no good place
to grab it for mounting and unmounting.
Here's a look at the
depth of field scale. It's less elegant than the Nikkors' color
coding.
The AI coupling flange
seems to be chrome plated. On AI-s Nikkors it's superior
stainless steel. The taller screws keep more
light from the ADR scale (little f/numbers) than the smaller,
staggered screws used by Nikon.
The chrome plating
on the brass filter ring is uneven. I've never seen this on
any Nikkor.
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