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You are here: Home / GFX 100 / CV, Leica, Zeiss, and Sigma macro lenses on GFX 100

CV, Leica, Zeiss, and Sigma macro lenses on GFX 100

September 6, 2021 JimK 3 Comments

This is one in a series of posts on the Fujifilm GFX 100. You should be able to find all the posts about that camera in the Category List on the right sidebar, below the Articles widget. There’s a drop-down menu there that you can use to get to all the posts in this series; just look for “GFX 100”. Since it’s more about the lenses than the camera, I’m also tagging it with the other Fuji GFX tags.

I’ve been posting a lot recently about the 120 mm f/4 GF macro lens for the GFX. I found it a good performer at 1:2, at minimum focusing distance (MFD) with no extension tubes, but that it had really soft edges and a lot of focus curvature at MFD with 36 mm of tubes. In this post, I tested it at 1:1 with a 45 mm tube,a and found it credible on-axis but soft on the right edge of the frame.  I reported those results numerically and visually, using the time honored sharpness target of a banknote. The 120/4 GF was soft in the corners and edges at MFD with 18mm, 36mm, and 45mm of extension by tubes.

I’ve been trying other macro lenses in combination with tubes that will let them get to about 1:1 with no vignetting on the GFX 100 sensor.

  • Zeiss 100 mm f/2 Makro-Planar at MFD, 45 mm GFX tube
  • Jenoptik (CO) UV-VIS-IR 60 mm 1:4 APO Macro at MFD, with 18 mm GFX tube
  • Leica 100mm f/2.8 APO Macro Elmarit-R ROM, 45 mm GFX tube
  • Cosina-Voigtlander (CV) 125 mm f/2.5 Apo-Lanthar at 1:1, with 18 mm GFX tube
  • Sigma 105mm F2.8 EX DG OS HSM Macro at 1:1, with 18 mm GFX tube

Here’s the setup:

 

Using a Cognisys rail, I made a series of 160 exposures with an 80 micrometer (um) shift between one. I brought the images into Lightroom, turned off sharpening. I exported the files as TIFFs, brought them into Helicon Focus, and stacked them with the default B algorithm at default settings.

Here are the full-format images:

120/4 GF, 45 mm tube, MFD,f/5.6

 

Zeiss 100mm f/2 Makro-Planar, MFD, 45mm tube, f/5.6

 

CO 60/4 UV-VIS-IR Apo, 18mm tube, f/5.6

 

Leica Apo 100, 45 mm tube, MFD, f/5.6

 

CV 125/2.5, 18mm tube, 1:1, f/5.6

 

Sigma 105/2.8, 18 mm tube, 1:1, f/5.6

Now, some center crops at about 150% magnification.

120/4 GF, 45 mm tube, MFD,f/5.6, center

 

Zeiss 100mm f/2 Makro-Planar, MFD, 45mm tube, f/5.6, center

 

 

CO 60/4 UV-VIS-IR Apo, 18mm tube, f/5.6, center

 

Leica Apo 100, 45 mm tube, MFD, f/5.6, center

 

CV 125/2.5, 18mm tube, 1:1, f/5.6, center

 

Sigma 105/2.8, 18 mm tube, 1:1, center

 

They are all reasonably sharp. THe differences appear in the corners and edges.

Here’s the middle of the far right edge:

 

120/4 GF, 45 mm tube, MFD,f/5.6, right edge

Lots of smearing and chromatic aberration here.

Zeiss 100mm f/2 Makro-Planar, MFD, 45mm tube, f/5.6, right edge

 

The Zeiss isn’t much better.

CO 60/4 UV-VIS-IR Apo, 18mm tube, f/5.6, right edge

This is a major improvement.

 

Leica Apo 100, 45 mm tube, MFD, f/5.6, right edge

Pretty good.

CV 125/2.5, 18mm tube, 1:1, f/5.6, right edge

Really pretty nice.

Sigma 105/2.8, 18 mm tube, 1:1, right edge

Close. Only the Zeiss and the Fuji lenses are bad.

In the upper right corner:

120/4 GF, 45 mm tube, MFD,f/5.6, upper right corner

 

Zeiss 100mm f/2 Makro-Planar, MFD, 45mm tube, f/5.6, upper right corner

Neither the Zeiss nor the Fuji lenses look good here.

CO 60/4 UV-VIS-IR Apo, 18mm tube, f/5.6, upper right corner

 

Big improvement.

Leica Apo 100, 45 mm tube, MFD, f/5.6, upper right corner

Not quite as good.

CV 125/2.5, 18mm tube, 1:1, f/5.6, upper right corner

Good.

Sigma 105/2.8, 18 mm tube, 1:1, upper right corner

Not quite up to the CV.

 

 

 

 

GFX 100, GFX 100S, GFX 50S

← CV 125/2.5 on GFX 100 at 1:1 and beyond CV 125/2.5 on GFX 100 at 1:1 vs Fuji 120/4 GF →

Comments

  1. Erik Kaffehr says

    September 8, 2021 at 5:05 am

    Jim,

    Excellent summary, thanks for doing this effort!

    A couple of observations:

    1) It is quite interesting that no one really noticed the issues with edge sharpness on the GF 120/4 macro in combination with external extension.

    2) Have you tested any lens that goes to 1:1 without extension? I am not really familiar with the lenses you have used.

    I am doing some macro work right now, although not on MFD but possibly at MFD :-), so your testing comes as inspiration.

    Best regards
    Erik

    Reply
    • JimK says

      September 8, 2021 at 5:15 am

      The CV and the Sigma go to 1:1 without tubes, but they vignette that way on the GFX sensor, so I used them with an 18mm tube.

      Reply
  2. Sean Dungan says

    November 4, 2021 at 9:00 am

    I’m fascinated to find these posts. I attempted to use a GF 120mm with tubes for a project recently, and was surprised by the awful CA. I asked Fuji about this and sent them samples to see if my lens was bad… they claimed there was no CA in my images (!).

    Reply

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