If you export a raw-format photo (e.g. Nikon NEF and also Adobe DNG) into Topaz Photo AI for editing, it will often ruin the red colors. Ironically, opening up the same raw-format shot from inside Topaz Photo AI works without any problems. This color-shift problem only happens with my Nikon Z8 and Z9 cameras, using either raw with lossless compression or raw with the HighEfficiency formats. Using raw format on, for instance, my Nikon D500 camera, the colors are fine. This problem doesn’t seem to be the fault of the photo editor you use, but with Topaz itself. I recreated the same issue using both Capture One and Lightroom. When I tried On One Photo 2023, however, the problem wasn’t there! Others have reported color shift problems to Topaz regarding the Nikon Z8, but the problem hasn’t been resolved, at least through version 1.6.1 of Topaz. A raw-format loaded directly into Topaz Photo AI looks like you expect The red/orange feather colors look just exactly like they should when a raw photo is directly loaded into Topaz Photo AI. Topaz Photo AI ‘Open’ dialog to edit a photograph The dialog shown above demonstrates browsing for a photo to open directly inside Topaz Photo AI. You could also just drag a raw file onto the Topaz desktop icon to run Topaz Photo AI with the desired shot. The raw-format photo inside Capture One looks just fine Using “Edit With”| Process with Topaz Photo (Studio) Using the dialog to send the NEF file into Topaz after converting into the DNG-format is shown above. Disaster! The red/orange colors are ruined inside Topaz Photo AI As shown above, the DNG-format file sent into Topaz Photo AI is ruined. The colors are wrong. The view above is now inside Topaz Photo AI. Using “Edit With”| Process with Topaz Photo (Studio) as TIFF Instead of choosing DNG format, tell Capture One to convert the raw photo into 16-bit TIFF format before sending it to Topaz Photo AI. Colors look correct when sending a TIFF file to Topaz from Capture One As shown above, using a non-raw format photo such as TIFF will yield correct colors inside Topaz. You can then export the edited file from Topaz, retaining the TIFF format. DNG file sent into Topaz via Lightroom: ruined colors again From inside Lightroom, using the command: File | Plug-in Extras | Process with Topaz Photo (Studio) You end up with the exact same color problem as seen when using Capture One with raw-format shots. The same ruined colors happen when Topaz opens up the raw-format DNG file that was sent from Lightroom. Using TIFF, the problem goes away. I have seen this same problem in every version of Topaz Photo Studio (latest version 4.0.4) and Topaz Photo AI (version 1.6.1). The simplest fix to this issue is to merely drag your raw-format shot(s) into Topaz or use the “File Open” dialog from inside Topaz and perform any desired editing/exporting there before opening the edited file in another photo editor for further processing. This procedure lets you keep using raw format (via the exported DNG) in subsequent editors. If you don’t mind using TIFF, then that format has no color-ruining issues while using Topaz.

Are you missing a little drama in your life? Sometime when you’re bored, here’s something you can do for entertainment. Creative Picture Controls are available for the Nikon Z cameras, even shooting in raw format. This feature can only be understood with examples. Nikon presently offers 20 options here; some are extremely subtle and some are absolutely wild. I personally prefer the wilder options, since other photo editors can easily emulate the more subtle ones. Before you try this stuff with whatever photo editor you like, a word of caution. The versions that I am using for Lightroom and Capture One don’t support these controls. Zoner Photo Studio does support them, but not when selecting the ‘Raw’ editing tab (use ‘Editor’ tab). Nikon’s free NX Studio does support this, so you can experiment without having to incur any cost. The Binary picture control To access these options, you start by going into the PHOTO SHOOTING MENU | Set Picture Control | scroll down to Creative Picture Control. These are the options (numbered 1 through 20): 1 Dream, 2 Morning, 3 Pop, 4 Sunday, 5 Somber, 6 Dramatic, 7 Silence, 8 Bleached, 9 Melancholic, 10 Pure, 11 Denim, 12 Toy, 13 Sepia, 14 Blue, 15 Red, 16 Pink, 17 Charcoal, 18 Graphite, 19 Binary, and 20 Carbon. The 19 Binary control, for instance, looks exactly like Kodak Kodalith film. I think they stopped selling Kodalith somewhere during Aristotle’s time. The 13 Sepia closely resembles old black-and-white photos that were stained using the sepia toner, but with a little twist of added color. I actually used to do this when I had a darkroom. 19 Binary picture control: like old Kodak Kodalith film 13 Sepia. Sort of like old sepia-toned black-and-white 17 Charcoal, more conventional black-and-white 6 Dramatic 5 Somber 20 Carbon 8 Bleached These controls can really make some blah scenes look pretty cool. They’re kind of like eating licorice instead of your vegetables; once in a while you should try skipping the proper adult thing to do. If you’re worried about potentially ruining a shot by choosing one of these speciality color schemes, not to worry. In NX Studio, for instance, all you have to do is change the “Picture Control” value from the “Recorded Value”, which is something like “([CV16]PINK) into something more suitable like “[NL]Neutral” or “[SD]Standard”. That’s the beauty of shooting in raw format. If you’re still uncomfortable about shooting with these unusual picture control color schemes, then you can always do the job totally inside the editor, instead. In NX Studio, you can take your raw photo that was shot in maybe ‘Neutral’, and just select Picture Control | Creative Picture Control | [08] Bleached to perform the picture drama after the fact. What about other Nikon cameras (non-Z mount)? Using NX Studio, you can go to the Picture Control and select Latest Picture Control and then scroll down to Creative Picture Control and finally select from the same set of 20 picture controls! 3 Pop

I have tried out many features of the Topaz Photo version 1.6.0. Overall, it works very well. I have found, however, a few problems with it. The version 1.6.0 of Topaz Photo seems to have fixed the “Dust & Scratch” version 2 feature, and seems to do a really good job. Prior to this version, the program would leave some strange blotches in the picture. Don’t try this feature unless you have a really, really fast GPU, however, because it will take forever to complete. Dust and Scratch: before (left) and after (right) As shown above, all of the little spots of dust on the bird were automatically removed without having to guide the program in any way. ‘Remove v2’ fails after ‘Spot Heal’ I found a severe bug while using the combination of the “Spot Heal”, followed by the “Remove v2” feature, where the “enhanced” view will cause the enhanced image to be completely black. You can only see the image by clicking the little ‘eye’ icon to go back to the “Show Original” view. ‘Remove v2’ when not using ‘Spot Heal’ works well In the example above, I got rid of a distracting leaf in front of the bird using ‘Remove v2’. It worked very well in making the leaf disappear like magic; artificial intelligence is really remarkable. Red colors get shifted to orange with Nikon Z8 and Z9 raw format I still have the problem when sending a DNG-format into Topaz from another editor, where the bright red/orange colors get ruined. Using Topaz stand-alone with raw images doesn’t have this problem. Sending the image as 16-bit TIFF instead of DNG also works. This color-shift problem only happens with my Nikon Z8 and Z9 cameras, using either raw with lossless compression or raw with the ‘High Efficiency’ formats. Others have reported color shift problems to Topaz regarding the Nikon Z8, but the problem hasn’t been solved. DeNoise ‘Strong’, ISO 8000 The denoise feature is still world-class. In this Nikon Z8 example, I had to send the raw photo converted into 16-bit TIFF format from Capture One into Topaz for editing in order to retain correct colors. I could have directly used my Nikon Z8 NEF raw format if I just used the Topaz Photo stand-alone instead. Sharpen ‘Standard’ Sharpening is excellent, too. Be aware that Topaz will probably automatically place a mask on what it considers the subject and only sharpen that. You can always alter the mask, or tell it to sharpen everything. There are many types of sharpening that you can select, including an option to counteract image motion smear. ‘Spot Heal’ is simple The built-in intelligence in ‘Spot Heal’ works well; it figures out how to blend using AI. Just don’t combine this feature with ‘Remove v2’! Adjust lighting (and color) There are 3 versions available for lighting (plus color) adjustment, which includes automatic adjustment and sliders to customize it to taste. There’s also a separate control called ‘Balance color’ to adjust the color temperature, along with masking options. Be aware that using ‘Adjust lighting’ or ‘Balance color’ will then prohibit you from exporting the edited photo as DNG. Before and after Topaz I had to do a two-pass edit in Topaz to avoid the ‘Dust/Scratch/Remove v2’ bug. I also had to use TIFF editing instead of DNG to avoid the red-shift bug. High ISO shot after Topaz denoise and sharpening Enough features to be a one-stop editor? There are enough image manipulation options in Topaz Photo that some people might just use this program for all of their editing. Summary I’m willing to tolerate the shortcomings in Topaz Photo to get the fantastic end results. I’m hopeful that a future version can fix up these bugs. I will still combine use of this program with other editors, such as Lightroom and Capture One. I still need other features such as vignette control, cropping, distortion correction and image rotation.

Lenses usually behave very differently in resolving details that are in the sagittal versus meridional direction. Why is this? A target designed to separate sagittal and meridional measurements The sagittal direction is like the spokes of a wheel, pointing at the lens center (optical axis). Meridional direction is tangent to circles around the lens center. Test charts for checking resolution are available from the same site that provides the MTFMapper program, written by Frans van den Bergh. The test charts have been designed to separate out the sagittal and meridional measurements. Many of the charts also include the round ‘fiducials’ shown above, which help the program identify things like rotational errors for chart alignment issues. The name ‘sagittal’ comes from Latin, and it means “as the arrow flies”, and is meant to indicate an arrow shot from the optical axis toward a subject. That’s also why the zodiac sign of Sagittarius is the archer... The name ‘meridional’ is the same as ‘tangential’, referring to the meridional plane. MTF50 plot separating out sagittal and meridional measurements The pair of plots above show the measurements from a resolution target separated into meridional and sagittal. It’s obvious that the sagittal measurements are better than the meridional measurements throughout the photo. Typical MTF50 resolution measurements (lp/mm) In the image above, MTF50 resolution measurements are overlaid on the resolution target. The black trapezoid edges that are nearly vertical above are in the meridional direction, while the near-horizontal edges are sagittal (pointing toward the center of focus). Notice how all of the meridional measurements shown are much lower than the sagittal measurements. The lens optics are fairly weak in the meridional direction. This is very typical of camera lenses; very few lenses are equally adept at resolution in both directions. So, why are lenses sensitive to the direction of edges (light rays)? One of the main culprits in lenses is called ‘oblique astigmatism’, which causes the sagittal and meridional rays to focus at slightly different distances when off-axis from the lens center. Decentering or tilting of lens elements during assembly can exaggerate sagittal/meridional differences. Even a very tiny slop in manufacturing tolerances can yield assembly variation causing astigmatism, and the problem worsens the further you get from the lens axis. Designers favor making lenses that have better sagittal than meridional resolution, since they usually have to choose. Visually, lenses appear sharper with good sagittal resolution compared to equivalent meridional resolution. Light rays in the meridional direction cross many more lens element boundaries at steep angles, compared to sagittal light rays. Lenses with coma also affect meridional light rays more than sagittal. Meridional light rays are refracted more steeply, and this causes the image to get focused closer to the lens. Sagittal light rays pass through the lens at a flatter angle, and therefore focus further from the lens. Designers try to account for this effect, but the inevitable slight astigmatism in lenses usually causes the meridional rays to focus less well than the sagittal rays. All of these effects are just generalizations, and there are cases where lens designs actually cause meridional rays to focus better than sagittal rays. Designers are constantly faced with a very complicated balancing act. What to do? Not unsurprisingly, the resolution in both directions will get improved by stopping down the lens, and usually the meridional direction will improve slightly faster than the sagittal direction. Web sites that evaluate lens resolution almost never mention the differences between the meridional and sagittal resolution, or even discuss that such a thing exists. The best they will do is show the MTF ‘contrast’ plots, which are usually just a theoretical line plot of sagittal and meridional contrast. I think it’s important that the measurements are segregated from each other to better understand how a lens really performs. A single “edge resolution” measurement, for instance, is almost meaningless.

I have read some really glowing reviews of the Rokinon (Samyang) AF 85mm f/1.4 lens. They made it sound like it was better than my Nikkor 85mm f/1.4 AF-S G lens in every respect. I respectfully disagree with most of what I have read. I only have a single copy of this lens, but I would regard it as pretty disappointing. Rokinon 85mm f/1.4 on Nikon Z8 (with FTZ II adapter) Rokinon AF 85mm f/1.4 with AF/MF switch Rokinon AF 85mm f/1.4 with bayonet hood You buy an f/1.4 lens for its bright aperture and narrow focus depth. In the testing that follows, you’ll see that at f/1.4 it has terrible resolution, noticeable lateral chromatic aberration, red/green longitudinal chromatic aberration (LoCA), and huge spherical aberration. The lens looks nice, it feels solid, and the focus is smooth. It just doesn’t perform where it counts. By f/5.6, the lens is fine; unfortunately, this isn’t why somebody buys an f/1.4 lens. Specifications 9 elements in 7 groups, with 1 aspherical element 77mm filter thread 0.9 meter minimum focus 480 grams Dual Linear Sonic Motor focus Metal construction Weather sealed 9 rounded aperture blades, with minimum aperture f/16 Rokinon 85mm at f/1.4 on Nikon Z8 If you’re not very concerned about being sharp at f/1.4, then this lens could work for you. Backgrounds melt away just fine. Note that there is some color fringing around the out-of-focus edges of the neutral gray vase. Eye at f/1.4 (left), f/2.0 and f/2.8 (right) at 200% magnification Eye at f/4.0 (left) and f/5.6 (right) at 200% magnification Eye with sharpening at f/1.4 (left) and f/5.6 (right) Even with sharpening (I used Topaz Photo Studio), you can’t get sharp shots at f/1.4. If you like the wide-open effect, however, then this lens might work for you. Resolution Measurements This lens has some very unusual sharpness results. The location of maximum sharpness does some traveling around when the aperture is changed. Wide open, the lens looks like it has tilt to it, but smaller apertures make it go away. I consider a lens to look sharp at an MTF50 of about 30 lp/mm. This lens has some sharp aspects starting at f/2.0, but the edges are mostly dismal. MTF contrast f/1.4 actual measurement versus Rokinon claims The measured contrast results aren’t even close to the ‘theoretical’ predictions. I have included the 50 lp/mm measurements, besides the traditional 10 lp/mm and 30 lp/mm. f/1.4 MTF50 Results. Maximum is 29.0 lp/mm Sharpest results are at the bottom edge, in the sagittal direction. Very unusual. Not really sharp anywhere. f/2.0 MTF50 Results. Maximum is 36.1 lp/mm Sharpest results are still at the bottom edge, in the sagittal direction. Only a sliver of acceptable sharpness in the lens midsection. f/2.8 MTF50 Results. Maximum is 54.9 lp/mm f/4.0 MTF50 Results. Maximum is 55.3 lp/mm Now, the sharpest location has shifted to the top of the lens. This is the lens sharpest aperture. Still dismal results on the edges. f/5.6 MTF50 Results. Maximum is 54.3 lp/mm The sharpest zone is finally moving toward the lens center. The meridional direction is finally starting to sharpen. Edges are starting to become acceptable. f/8.0 MTF50 Results. Maximum is 52.4 lp/mm f/11.0 MTF50 Results. Maximum is 46.7 lp/mm f/16.0 MTF50 Results. Maximum is 37.9 lp/mm Field curvature 85mm f/1.4 field curvature It looks like there’s just slight field curvature.The red/green hue is indicative of the lens longitudinal chromatic aberration, with purple/red in the front and green behind the focused subject. Londitudinal Chromatic Aberration (LoCA) LoCA is noticeable: purple/red in front, green behind f/1.4 Longitudinal chromatic aberration is definitely there at f/1.4, but not terrible. Lateral Chromatic Aberration (CA) Lateral Chromatic Aberration (CA) will be noticed at f/1.4 9 lens elements in 7 groups, courtesy of Rokinon Bokeh Cat’s eye out-of-focus lights, not objectionable, f/1.4 Out-of-focus highlights are brighter around the edges, but not too severe. They seem slightly asymmetric, too. Vignetting and Distortion f/1.4 fairly heavy vignetting, but minimal distortion Spherical Aberration Spherical aberration causes focus shift I drew arrows showing how the center of focus changes as the lens gets stopped down. The lens was focused at f/1.4, and then subsequent shots were taken while only changing the aperture. Focus keeps moving away from the camera, caused by spherical aberration. This effect is very common for fast lenses. It shows how you need to focus at the shooting aperture to nail correct focus. f/5.6 looks sharp and vignetting has disappeared Summary This lens was a big disappointment, primarily due to its poor resolution. The edges of the frame are particularly bad until f/8. It’s always possible that I got the proverbial ‘bad copy’. I’m definitely not going to get another one just to see if that’s true. Needless to say, I got rid of this lens; I felt too guilty to actually sell it, so gave it away.

I tested this lens on a Nikon Z8 and Z9 camera with the Z mount, but the same optics are available for E, Z, L, and RF camera mounts. This is a full-frame lens with manual focus. This lens is only 0.23 stops slower than the fast f/0.95 lenses, such as the Nikkor 58mm f/0.95 Noct Z-mount and Leica 50mm Noctilux-M f/0.95 lenses. That Leica lens is selling for over $14,000 U.S.! This all-metal lens weighs just 632 grams, is 70mm diameter, and 84mm long. It’s a little larger than typical 50mm lenses. For comparison, the Nikkor 58mm f/0.95 Noct lens weighs 2000 grams, 153mm long, 102mm diameter, and it’s also manual focus without any built-in anti-vibration. Also note that the Noct costs about 26X more than this lens. There aren’t any electronics in this lens, so your camera has to be configured with “Non-CPU Lens Data” in the Setup menu. This will allow the camera IBIS system to correctly handle anti-vibration, and to know the lens maximum aperture. Unfortunately, the file EXIF data won’t record the aperture in use. Camera IBIS systems are good enough that in-lens vibration reduction features aren’t really much of a priority anymore. With really fast lenses like this one at f/1.05, I’d recommend that you shoot in ‘continuous’ mode when hand-holding and the focused subject is near the camera. The focus plane gets razor thin, and missed focus is really common. This way, you can just delete the missed-focus shots after the fact. For critical focus, it’s highly recommended that you configure your camera to use focus-peaking at “low sensitivity”, which is also the most accurate. I also programmed my camera “fn2” button for “Zoom on/off” at 100%. This way, I can toggle between normal magnification and high magnification for critical focus at the touch of a button. The Z9 and Z8 let you go all the way up to 200% zoom, if desired. Even at 100% zoom, the focus-peaking still works at f/1.05. The focus ring rotates about 135 degrees, which is a little tough to fine-tune focus when zoomed in at 100%. There’s no weather sealing, so stay out of the rain. And never, ever photograph those festivals where they throw colored powder at each other. Brightin Star 50mm f/1.05 with 15-blade aperture on Nikon Z8 Who makes lenses with 15 aperture blades? Even the Nikkor 58mm Noct lens only has 11 blades. You’ll need to look at the aperture scale on the top of the lens to set the aperture. The aperture ring is continuous (no clicks) and only stops down as far as f/11. The lens uses 58mm filters. You don’t get a lens hood included with this lens, but you can buy cheap screw-on hoods. I got a screw-on lens hood that has 82mm threads on its front end that accepts my 82mm filters and 82mm lens caps. I always keep the lens hood on while shooting. Lens aperture has no-click and range of f/1.05 through f/11.0 The lens focus scale shown above lets you focus down to 0.557 meters, where the lens front is 0.443 meters from the subject (which I measured). Both the focus ring (toward the lens rear) and the aperture ring (near the lens front) are pure metal with a black anodized coating. It takes a little getting used to the no-click aperture, although most of the time I leave the aperture parked at f/1.05. You need to look at the lens top to set the aperture. Spherical Aberration Most high-speed lenses suffer from spherical aberration. This effect causes focus to shift as you change the lens aperture. This Brightin Star has a very slight spherical aberration, and focus shifts away from the camera as you stop down. Longitudinal Chromatic Aberration (LoCA) LoCA at f/1.04 (top) versus f/2.8 (bottom) This lens has moderate LoCA when the lens aperture is wide-open, and it almost disappears by the time you stop down to f/2.8. The bright neutral subject fringes are reddish in front of the focused subject and greenish behind the focused subject. Lateral Chromatic Aberration The worst lateral chromatic aberration (CA) this lens exhibits is at f/1.05, where it has about a 5 micron shift. This is minor, but visible. You can correct for this in photo editors. Lens Elements Lens elements, via Brightin Star web site The lens has 10 elements in 8 groups. If that sounds complicated, the Nikkor 58mm f/0.95 Noct Z lens has 17 elements in 10 groups! Distortion There’s a very, very slight barrel distortion. I have never bothered to correct for it when editing, because it’s ignorable. Infrared This lens can be used for infrared, although it starts showing central flare when stopped down. At wide apertures, it’s just fine. The central light spot starts appearing at f/4 (using 850nm IR) depending upon your subject. At shorter infrared wavelengths, you should see fewer problems. I like shooting with very long IR wavelengths, including 850nm. 850nm infrared at f/1.05 850nm infrared at f/5.6 doesn’t have any central hot spot. Some subjects start to show a hot spot by f/5.6, but most don’t. MTF Contrast Plot Brightin Star claimed MTF versus my measured MTF The upper plot, from the Brightin Star website, shows their theoretical MTF contrast (at 10,20,30 lp/mm). I measured the MTF contrast at f/1.05 myself, at 10,30, and 50 lp/mm which I show in the lower plot. Reality is a tough mistress. Cat’s Eye Out-of-focus lights show typical cat’s eye. f/1.05 I really like the bokeh from this lens. It’s very easy on the eyes. Field Curvature Field curvature: none Photoshop "Find Edges" feature Flat lawn grass shot at f/1.05 was processed in Photoshop. This is a very effective way to visualize if the plane of focus stays flat or not. This lens shows no noticeable field curvature. Sharpness versus aperture f /1.05 edge-to-edge sharpness The small subjects above were shot at about 1 meter, including the left and right frame edges to observe loss of acuity on the frame edges. This lens did pretty well across the frame. Note how shallow the plane of focus is. Central sharpness crop at f/1.05, f/1.4, f/2.0 (top-to-bottom) Just looking up close at the middle bird in these crops. Central sharpness crop at f/2.8, f/4.0, f/5.6 (top-to-bottom) Even wide-open, this lens is acceptably sharp. It just keeps getting sharper as you stop down. Even the small fibers are resolved at f/1.05. Contrast takes a jump going from f/1.05 to f/1.4. Brightin Star 50mm f/1.05 1/200s ISO 140 Crop from the shot above The whiskers of this bunny are sharp, even though I shot it at f/1.05. Super skinny depth of focus. Bokeh Brightin Star 50mm f/1.05 1/500s ISO 64 The background melts away quite nicely. Resolution Tests f/1.05 MTF50 lp/mm peak values: Mid 35.4, Edge 35.0, Corner 26.1 There is a small amount of barrel distortion, which is easily corrected in an editor if it bothers you. The resolution chart photo shows what the vignetting at f/1.05 looks like. Again, this moderate vignetting can be easily corrected with an editor. I have always maintained that lenses start looking sharp at about 30 lp/mm, so this lens passes that criteria even at f/1.05. Corners are still slightly blurry, though. f/1.4 MTF50 lp/mm peak values: Mid 38.0, Edge 39.6, Corner 23.5 f/2.0 MTF50 lp/mm peak values: Mid 41.4, Edge 45.5, Corner 33.1 Starting at f/2.0, the corners are now acceptable. f/2.8 MTF50 lp/mm peak values: Mid 63.2, Edge 55.9, Corner 54.7 f/4.0 MTF50 lp/mm peak values: Mid 68.8, Edge 67.7, Corner 66.1 This is the sharpest aperture in general, but f/5.6 is about the same. f/5.6 MTF50 lp/mm peak values: Mid 68.2, Edge 68.1, Corner 64.9 f/8.0 MTF50 lp/mm peak values: Mid 63.1, Edge 61.8, Corner 61.2 Sample shots 50mm f/1.05 1/125s ISO 8000 50mm f/1.05 1/80s ISO 8000 A very rare 1936 Chrysler Imperial Airflow Sedan. These were actually designed with the help of a wind tunnel. Shot in very dim lighting. 50mm f/2.8 1/25s ISO 8000 Those 15 aperture blades make really nice subtle spikes on lights (with 30 spikes). No coma observed; just some bunnies doing lawn maintenance. 50mm f/1.05 0.5s ISO 8000, extremely dim lighting Summary I really enjoy shooting with this lens. Manual focus isn’t that much of a hardship when using focus-peaking combined with my camera’s zoom-toggle function button assignment. It’s liberating to be able to shoot in the dimmest of conditions. The corners of the images aren’t sharp wide-open, but that’s rarely a problem. Given the price of this lens, the optical performance is really remarkable. I’m not claiming that this lens is on the same level as the $8,000 Nikkor 58mm f/0.95 Noct or the $14,000 Leica 50mm f/0.95 Noctilux-M, but you could probably get this lens along with a used car to drive it around in for the same price. I have no idea about the manufacturing quality control that Brightin Star has, but this particular lens is a keeper.

In what should be a surprise to nobody, companies that make camera lenses have started turning to Artificial Intelligence for their designs. Have you ever wondered how modern lenses are getting so much sharper and lighter than even a few years ago? Figuring out how to combine pieces of glass to create a lens of a particular focal length (or a zoom) is unbelievably complicated. Until computers were available to help lens designers, camera lenses were really, really, bad. It used to take teams of lens designers many years to come up with a viable lens. They would have to begin by imagining the number, shape, and composition of the lens elements, and then do light ray-tracing calculations to find out if a decent image would get rendered onto the film or sensor. It was many decades before anybody even attempted a zoom lens design. It was another few decades before serious photographers would even consider buying a zoom lens. Nowadays, some zooms are within a whisker of being just as good as a fixed focal length lens. Combine lenses to rid chromatic aberrations (Image courtesy of phys.libretexts.org ) A typical equation used in light ray-tracing (Courtesy of phys.libretexts.org ) Try to imagine performing calculations like what’s shown above millions of times over as you adjust multiple lens element shapes, spacing, and glass materials with different refractive indices. It’s miraculous that any decent lenses exist at all. Next, consider focus. The light rays shown above no longer come into the lens in parallel, because the subject isn’t at infinity. For near objects, the light rays come in more like a cone, with the peak of the light cone at the subject. The lenses now require some moving elements to focus things that aren’t at infinity. A near subject: more complicated (Courtesy of http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/ ) Notice the “lensmaker’s equation” above has some “R” terms, that assume the lens shapes are slices from a perfect sphere with a well-defined radius. Modern lenses usually include aspherical shapes, with complicated functions replacing the simple “R” terms. Now, a designer’s job just got a whole lot tougher. Fresnel lens (courtesy EdmundOptics.com ) I’m predicting that in the future, companies will come out with lenses comprised mostly (entirely?) of fresnel lenses, including negative fresnel lenses (with concentric rings of troughs in glass instead of raised rings in the glass) and even the equivalent of aspherical fresnel lenses, where the concentric rings aren’t all the same height. This type of lens could be extremely light and well-corrected. Talk is cheap, however, since I have no idea how difficult it would be to manufacture the precision ‘troughs’ in glass. Companies and research efforts are increasingly incorporating AI (including machine learning and deep learning techniques) into ray tracing for camera lens design, simulation, and optimization. This isn't yet ubiquitous in every major lens manufacturer like Canon, Nikon, or Sony for their consumer camera lenses (based on public info), but it's an active and growing area in optical design software, specialized firms, and academic/industry collaborations. Ray tracing is the standard method for simulating how light rays propagate through lenses to evaluate aberrations, image quality, etc. Traditional ray tracing in tools like Zemax (now Ansys OpticStudio ), CODE V ( Synopsys ), or LightTools is computationally intensive, especially for complex systems or high-volume optimizations. AI helps by: Accelerating simulations (e.g., via differentiable ray tracing, where gradients enable faster optimization). Automating lens design (inverse design: specify desired performance, and AI proposes lens configurations). Enabling end-to-end optimization that combines optics with computational imaging (e.g., pairing lenses with AI post- processing). Here are some key examples of companies and approaches involved: Paraxial Optics offers an AI-powered optical design platform that uses differentiable ray tracing and hybrid AI tolerancing, claiming 10–100× faster workflows for optical engineers designing lenses and systems. Peak Nano developed HawkAI, a prompt-driven AI tool that leverages machine learning to test millions of lens permutations, configurations, and materials for optimized prescriptions—aimed at revolutionizing optics design while integrating with traditional tools. 3DOptix provides an optics simulation platform with GPU ray tracing and an "Optics AI search copilot" for design assistance. Anax Optics specializes in automated optical design using inverse ray tracing, topological optimization, and AI. Larger players like Ansys (Zemax OpticStudio) and Synopsys (CODE V, etc.) support advanced ray tracing for lens design, and the field is evolving toward AI integration (e.g., for optimization and multiphysics simulations), though not always strictly branded as "AI ray tracing." Research institutions have produced methods like DeepLens, which uses deep learning and differentiable ray tracing to autonomously design lenses (including computational ones with extended depth-of-field) from flat surfaces—highlighting AI's potential to transform refractive optics design. Tools like NVIDIA's OptiX enable GPU-accelerated ray tracing used in scientific optical modeling (including camera/lens sims). GPU hardware will immensely improve the speed of modeling, to allow vastly more what-if efforts. Artificial intelligence is a hot frontier in optics—AI doesn't fully replace expert designers yet , but it's making ray-tracing-based lens work faster, more automated, and accessible. The camera companies that most fully adopt artificial intelligence are going to be the winners, while companies that ignore this approach or wait too long to adopt it are doomed to wither and die.

Here’s a tool that applies sophisticated technology to remove atmospheric haze from your landscapes and bring out details in images that are severely back-lit. RawTherapee is a free editor found here . RawTherapee is an editor meant for raw-format photos. If your camera raw format isn’t supported (it uses the LibRaw library), then use the free Adobe DNG Converter to make a DNG file that it can use. A hazy valley Retinex in RawTherapee is an advanced image processing tool based on the Retinex theory  (short for Retina + Cortex). It models how the human visual system perceives color and lightness under varying lighting conditions, such as poor light, colored surroundings, or atmospheric haze/fog. What It Does The human eye adapts well to uneven lighting and haze, but cameras often produce flat, veiled, or low-contrast results. Retinex tries to mimic this biological adaptation by analyzing the image at multiple spatial scales (MultiScale Retinex or MSR algorithm). It estimates the "illumination" component of the scene and removes or reduces its uneven effects. This leads to better local contrast, restored details in shadows and highlights, reduced haze/veil, and more natural-looking colors without globally shifting the overall tone. In practice, it acts like a sophisticated local tone mapper  or dehaze tool . It can: Cut through atmospheric haze or fog. Reveal hidden details in backlit or high-dynamic-range scenes. Improve perceived depth and separation in flat-looking images. Preserve original colors better than some other contrast-boosting tools (unless you deliberately adjust chroma). It is not a simple brightness/contrast slider — it works by comparing each pixel to its neighbors across different scales (similar in concept to a Difference of Gaussians). Where to Find Retinex in RawTherapee Main pipeline  — Advanced tab → Retinex (appears early in the processing chain, right after demosaicing). Local Adjustments (Selective Editing / RT-spots) — Available as Dehaze & Retinex or Soft Light & Original Retinex (with simplified controls in some modes). There is also a version integrated with Wavelets (in older branches or specific panels) for more complex control. Common Uses Dehazing — Especially effective on landscape photos with atmospheric veil (e.g., distant mountains, foggy scenes). Recovering details in high-contrast or backlit scenes without creating an artificial "HDR look" (when used moderately). Local contrast enhancement that feels more natural than global curves or simple clarity sliders. Astronomy or medical-style enhancement (revealing faint structures), though most users apply it to everyday photography. Key Controls (in the main Retinex tool) Strength / Gain / Offset — Controls the overall intensity. Variance / Threshold  — Affects how aggressively local differences are enhanced. Transmission map  — Central to the algorithm (represents the estimated haze/illumination layer); you can adjust its curve for finer control. Chroma slider (in some RawTherapee versions) — Lets you decide whether to affect color saturation along with luminance. Method options (e.g., normal vs. inverse). There is also a Local Retinex  in selective editing with fewer sliders but applied later in the pipeline. Tips for Best Results Start with low-to-moderate strength to avoid halo artifacts or unnatural looks. Combine with Haze Removal (Detail tab) for stronger dehaze effects. Use alongside Wavelets (for multi-scale contrast) or Local Adjustments for targeted application. It works best on RAW files but can be used on JPEG/TIFF too. Watch for noise amplification in shadows — pair it with good noise reduction. Retinex vs. Similar Tools in RawTherapee Haze Removal  — Simpler dedicated dehaze. Tone Equalizer / Log Encoding — More modern tone-mapping approaches. Wavelets / Local Contrast — Good for detail-level contrast but less "perceptual" than Retinex. Dynamic Range Compression  — More global. Processed with Retinex. looks washed-out but less haze. Add Retinex to rid haze Add saturation, lighten shadows, increase color temperature In the same ‘Advanced’ tab, you might want to try out “Color Appearance & Lighting”. Adjusting Chroma and Temperature can really enhance and/or recover what Retinex does to the photo. Hazy mountains Mountains with just adding Retinex defaults Just activating Retinex really clears up much of the haze. Retinex control settings for mountain shot above There are several other settings that you can play with here, but I generally just adjust the “Strength” slider. Note that there is “Process: Settings” that can be expanded in Retinex for even more control. Retinex after increasing Strength from 21 to 40 You might have noticed that there are a few undesired artifacts that have been added to the sky in the shot above, which look like faint squares. To fix this, I’d rather send the shot to another editor that has a healing brush. RawTherapee  does have a ‘Spot Removal’ feature in the Detail  tab, but fixing the sky using that tool would be very tedious. Occasionally, Retinex adds wierd artifacts that are only noticeable in blank skies. Hazy waterfall Haze Removal tool with defaults (Detail tab) For comparison purposes, the “Detail” tab offers “Haze Removal”. Haze removed using ‘Haze Removal’ tool using defaults Haze Removal using Strength 75, Depth 69, Saturation 74 'Retinex' tool instead of 'Haze Removal' tool, plus increasing color temperature Given the right kind of shot that has a lot of haze, Retinex can do a truly amazing job that looks like no other editor “dehaze” tool that I’ve used. I’m willing to put up with having to fix up some shots to get the ‘sky defect’ corrected. The Retinex tool definitely falls into the category of “niche”, but I think you’ll find that sometimes it can be golden. Using Topaz Photo AI ( or another editor )  via RawTherapee When it becomes necessary to do some extra operations in another editor outside of  RawTherapee , there’s a way to make that job easier. To process the edited photo using Topaz Photo AI , you will first need to configure the use of Topaz: Click on the ‘Equalizer’ icon to get at ‘Preferences’. Scroll down the ‘General’ tab to locate ‘External Editor’ Click Change Executable Browse to TopazPhotoAI.exe, usually located here: C:\Program Files\TopazLabsLLC\TopazPhotoAI\TopazPhotoAI.exe Assign a name, such “Topaz”. If you select Native command , then you can return back to RawTherapee after editing in Topaz. Click OK to save the assigned external editor. Finish all desired edits in RawTherapee. Click the ‘down arrow’ (bottom-left, near the ‘Save current image’ icon for ‘Edit current image in external editor’ and then select the “Topaz” or whatever you named the external editor when ‘Change Executable’ was set up. When ready, click the icon just to the left of the down-arrow, which should now be assigned to ‘Topaz’ Photo AI editor. You can also use the Ctrl+e shortcut. It should then execute Topaz and send the edited file to that editor. Export the finished photo, and then exit Topaz. Return to RawTherapee , if you want to do further editing. You can use a similar procedure to send a photo from  RawTherapee  to any other editor. To save an edited photo as a jpeg from RawTherapee , do this: Quick Single-Image Save (Recommended for one photo) Finish editing your image in the Editor  tab. Click the hard disk / Save icon  at the bottom-left of the preview area (just below the image). Or press the keyboard shortcut: Ctrl + S  (Cmd + S on macOS). In the Save current image  window that appears: Choose the folder  where you want to save the file. Enter a file name  (RawTherapee will automatically add .jpg). Under File format , select JPEG . Set the Quality  slider — default is usually 92 (very good). Use 95–100  for maximum quality (larger file size). Use 85–90  for smaller files with still-good quality. Subsampling : Leave at Balanced  (or try 4:4:4 for best quality if needed). Optional: Check Automatically add a suffix if the file already exists (so it becomes photo-1.jpg, etc.). You can also choose to save the processing profile (.pp3) alongside the JPEG. Click Save immediately  (or OK ). The JPEG will be created right away in the chosen folder. Your original RAW file is never changed.

I came across a very irritating bug when I was editing some shots that were saved in the 16-bit TIF format. For photos that had saturated, shiny surfaces in them, the Capture One editor (I tried both the 22 and 23 versions) ruined them. I'm actually a big fan of Capture One, but here's a case where it does an absolutely terrible job. I generally avoid using the TIF format, mostly because of its large file size. Using LZW compression certainly helps, but the files still tend to be big. In some cases, editors force you to make files with this format to retain the best image quality that they can export. Black edges that aren’t really there on the red flowers More black edges that aren’t really there Look at the obvious black edges on the bright, shiny plastic flower above. This looks like something a really cheap digital camera from the 90s might do. This is a crop from a Capture One23 editor. The photo was loaded from a 16-bit TIF file that was using LZW compression. I tried various editor adjustments to get rid of the false black borders between shades of red-orange, but nothing really worked to eliminate it besides resorting to using the ‘healing brush’. Lightroom : no ugly black black edges on TIF ON1 editor: no ugly black edges on TIF Zoner Photo Studio editor: no ugly black edges NXStudio editor: no ugly black edges I don’t normally edit TIF images, since I deal in raw-format whenever possible. I was using some shots that were exported from my DaVinci Resolve video editor, which can’t save frames in a raw format. I saved the frames in 16-bit TIF format with LZW compression, which should still yield great quality. My Capture One editor consistently makes the shots look awful when there were are bright, saturated, shiny surfaces in them. At first, I was blaming the DaVinci Resolve program for exporting garbage. I just couldn’t find what I was doing wrong in DaVinci . Out of desperation, I tried editing the exported TIF shots in Lightroom . No problems found. I then tried various other photo editors, which all succeeded without any issues at all. Only Capture One fails. I actually have 3 versions of Capture One , and every version failed. After doing some internet searches, I found out that other photographers have noted this same problem with the Capture One editor. This is just another excellent reason to try using raw-format files whenever possible. It’s always good to have a backup editor available, too.

People have been complaining since day one that Nikons can’t do Raw format stills at high frame rates in FX mode, but only jpeg instead. If you have a Z9, Z8, or Z6III, you’re in luck. I came up with a way that you can use 12-bit N-RAW format up to 8.3K resolution at 60 frames per second to capture those stills. If you’re willing to stick with 4.1K resolution, you can go all the way up to 120 frames per second  shooting Raw format in FX mode! This is true RAW format, at 8256 X 4644 resolution in FX mode. The secret to getting this capability is using the special lossless compression format and extracting the stills out of a video. You can achieve this feat by using a video editor called DaVinci Resolve , which understands this 12-bit N-RAW format. Nikon NEF still-picture raw files are 14-bit, but in almost all conditions 12 bits are plenty. You will now have the capability of getting higher quality photos with larger dynamic range than jpegs, and be able to use nearly all of the same shooting capabilities that Nikon provides when shooting stills. You will still be able to focus using AF-C, AF-S, MF, and AF-F (full-time autofocus) modes. You still get subject detection options, such as ‘bird’, ‘people’, ‘airplane’, and ‘auto-detect’. All of these settings can be configured independently from your still-photography settings. A frame from an N-RAW (NEV) video using 60 fps via Nikon Z8 I’d recommend that you leave the camera in M (manual mode) and set Auto-ISO active when capturing video. This way, you still get auto-exposure while being able to adjust the shutter and aperture to taste. High frame rates to capture high-speed action implies that you’ll want to have full control over the shutter speed while still being able to set the desired aperture. Using this mode to capture frames makes pre-capture unnecessary, since you can capture as many images as you want, any time you want. Just be aware that this high-quality N-RAW 60p 8.3K video mode will fill up a 512GB CF-express B memory card in about 12 minutes. These “NEV” video files tend to be huge, and you may need to delete them later from your computer after extracting the still frames you want. When you find the right situation where you want to do high-speed capture, you just flip the switch from stills to movie-mode, and press the red record button instead of the shutter button. The AF-ON button will work exactly like when you’re shooting stills. Just flip the switch back to ‘stills’ mode when you don’t need high-speed capture. Your camera keeps all of your ‘still photography’ settings entirely separate from the video settings. Simple. Compared to shooting hundreds or thousands of still photos while hoping that you captured that peak-action shot, you can capture it inside a single video. If the desired shot didn’t get captured, you only have a single (video) file to delete instead of tediously deleting scores of single photos one-at-a-time. Try manually timing a shot like this. Good luck. Select the precise peak action frame out of the video After you capture the desired action somewhere inside a video, you can process this file using the free DaVinci Resolve video editor, which has the ability to extract single frames as a high-quality 16-bit TIFF with LZW compression format from the original N-RAW video. You will need to get the “paid” version of DaVinci Resolve Studio to get the full 8K resolution from the video. You can still grab 4K-resolution shots with the free version (3840 X 2160). Use the ‘Edit’ page to locate suitable frames As shown above, you can use the mouse wheel to move frame-by-frame through the video to find the ‘just right’ shot. If you place the pointer inside the video frame, then the mouse wheel allows you to zoom in to verify critical focus. DaVinci Resolve ‘Color’ page: grade the image Adjusting the lighting, contrast, saturation, etc. inside DaVinci is an experience. This isn’t going to look like other editors you’re familiar with. Capture the desired frame In DaVinci Resolve , you can do pretty extensive edits in their Color Panel to take advantage of the wide dynamic range in the video, adjusting things such as shadows and highlights. After making the adjustments, you can then extract and export the desired frames in various image formats, including TIF. This is where you get to take advantage of the video raw-format wide dynamic range, even if you use the free version that only lets you save up to 4K resolution. For some weird reason, adjusting the light, colors, and contrast in video editors is called “grading”. As an aside, you can capture more conventional video in formats such as MOV up to 120 fps and extract 4K jpeg photos in FX format using the free Nikon NX Studio . This program doesn’t know how to process N-RAW video, unfortunately. Only DaVinci Resolve is able to edit the .NEV files. After exporting the photo from DaVinci Resolve , you can always import the shot into another editor to make further adjustments. I typically send the TIF exported photos to Topaz Photo AI to perform noise reduction and sharpening. A note of caution about using the Capture One editor: imported TIF-format files can cause some unwanted dark/black borders to appear in highly-saturated and shiny surface colors, such as plastics. Other editors don’t exhibit this effect. The overall N-RAW video image quality in most circumstances is as good as conventional Nikon raw (NEF). I’m going to blame my lack of finesse with color grading for any drop-off of quality. The main caveat is when using the exported TIF files inside Capture One, some saturated, smooth surfaces look unusual. Editors such as Lightroom, ON1, and Zoner don’t have this problem. Frame capture inside DaVinci Resolve after ‘grading’ DaVinci Procedures Project Manager | New Project, enter project name Click Create Double-click the new project to open it (lands on the ‘Edit’ page) Project Settings: Timeline format: pick an 8K near 8256X4644 60p Timeline frame rate: try 60 Audio Sample Rate 48 kHz In Color Management tab: Set Color Science to DaVinci YRGB Color Managed (or ACES if preferred). Under Output Color Space , choose a wide gamut like DaVinci Wide Gamut or Rec.2020. Import Media: Edit, Media Pool (top left) File |Import|Media (select .NEV files) Create Timeline: Media Pool: Select All Clips, RMB→Create new timeline Name Timeline: ‘Main Edit’ Use Project Settings (checked) Empty TimeLine (unchecked) to auto-select clips Click ‘Create’ Save Project: File | Save Project When trying to find key frames to capture, you’ll probably want to click on the “Detail Zoom” in the Edit page to more easily analyze small time slices while moving along the timeline. You can also hover over the “Jog Wheel” icon, which looks like   “ < . > ” with the pointer and then use the mouse wheel to enable frame-by-frame scrolling. To zoom in on a frame to check for critical focus, move the mouse pointer inside the video frame and then scroll the mouse wheel. Method : Grab Still → Export from Gallery (Best for Color-Graded Frames) Position the playhead on your desired frame. Switch to the Color page (recommended for accurate grading preview). Right-click in the viewer (on the image) and select Grab Still (shortcut: Option + G  on Mac or Alt + G on Windows). This captures the frame and adds it to the Gallery (stills album) on the left side. In the Gallery panel: Right-click the new still thumbnail. Choose Export (or Export with Display LUT if you want grading baked in). In the export dialog: Pick your format (JPEG, PNG, TIF , etc.). Set location and name. Export. Alternative Method : Export Current Frame as Still (Available on Cut, Edit , or Color Pages) Load your video clip into the timeline (or open it in the viewer). Scrub the playhead to the exact frame you want to capture . Go to the menu bar: File > Export > Current Frame as Still (or sometimes listed as Export Current Frame as Still ). In the save dialog: Choose your save location and filename. Select the format from the dropdown (e.g., JPEG for photos, PNG for transparency/lossless, TIFF for high quality). Click Export or Save . This exports the frame directly with your current color grading, LUTs, and viewer settings applied (great if you're on the Color page). Notes Exported frames match your timeline resolution (e.g. 4K video → 4K still) unless you change project settings. For highest quality, use PNG or TIFF (lossless). Summary These techniques aren’t something you’d use every day. But when you’re trying to photograph something that’s fleeting and needs a little automation help, this can be just the ticket. Nikon doesn’t advertise this possibility, but if you’re willing to put up with these complications, you can in fact shoot raw-format all the way up to 120fps for your “stills”.

Camera lenses don’t all focus the same way. Manufacturers make many trade-offs when designing a focus system, including speed, accuracy, and cost. I’m going to show a couple of different lens investigations here. One lens focuses fast, but has some focus accuracy and directional problems. Another lens is slow, but much more accurate and repeatable focus. The ‘fast-focus’ lens uses a linear stepping motor (the Meike STM motor). The ‘slow-focus’ lens uses a Nikon SWM (silent wave motor) that rotates. A ‘focus position’ chart analysis result, Meike 85mm f/1.8 lens The screen shot above shows a close-up of a ‘focus position’ chart after analysis using the MTFMapper program. The lens was focused on the chart center (the chart was rotated 45 degrees relative to the camera sensor), indicated by the set of orange arrows. The actual sharpest focus found by the software is indicated by a vertical blue line (-7.5mm here). The MTFMapper program was configured to only use the green sensor pixels here for its analysis, since each sensor pixel color can have the focus at a different distance if the lens has any longitudinal chromatic aberration. The lens focused at a distance of “-7.5mm” beyond the chart center, although the camera focus point was targeting the chart center. Most cameras allow the user to “fine-tune” the focus and force the focus to be closer or further from the camera. Sometimes that can work for a lens that consistently misses focus, but as you’ll see, that doesn’t always fix the problem. A spreadsheet showing focus position measurements The spreadsheet shown above contains the results of analyzing two different 85mm lenses. The left-hand portion of the spreadsheet shows the results from the Meike 85mm f/1.8 Z-mount lens. The top group of numbers was obtained when the lens was manually set to infinity focus before initiating auto-focus on the chart center. The bottom group of numbers resulted from manually setting the lens at minimum focus prior to auto-focusing the lens. The top group averaged an error of about -6mm (focused too far from the chart center). The bottom group averaged an error of about +6.5mm (focused too near from the chart center). This kind of lens defect causes the lens to stop focus before it gets to the target. The lens considers the focus to be “close enough”, and stops. No focus fine-tune setting can fully correct for this type of problem. The best you can do is to configure the lens to center the two groups of focus problems. The right-hand portion of the spreadsheet shows the measurement results from a Nikkor 85mm f/1.4 AF-S G lens, set to the very same f/1.8 aperture. Nikon chose to design this lens to auto-focus at a fairly slow pace, preferring focus accuracy over raw speed. A ‘focus position’ chart result, Nikkor 85mm f/1.4 lens at f/1.8 Just like the Meike 85mm, the lens had the focus manually set to infinity-focus in the top group of measurements, and then minimum-focus in the bottom group. Notice that this lens also fairly consistently stops focusing prior to reaching the target. It just gets a lot closer to the target before it considers that it’s “close enough”. The Nikkor 85mm results indicate that a slight auto-focus fine-tune adjustment might be useful, to push the focus slightly further from the camera sensor and balance the near and far error groups. Focus error for Meike 85mm Focus error for Nikkor 85mm The error plots shown above give a better visualization of how the focus distance error is grouped according to which direction the lens had to move to focus on the target. So, what can be done to ‘fix’ the focus problem here? First of all, note in the shot at the top of this article that the chart center still looks pretty sharp, even though it isn’t in perfect focus. The first step to fix focus is to use focus fine-tune on the lens to at least balance the pair of missed-focus groups to be equally wrong on either side of the correct focus distance. The second step would unfortunately be to override auto-focus and manually adjust focus to get it perfect. Unless you use a tripod, this is easier said than done. My Nikon Z8 and Z9 cameras let me zoom in using the viewfinder to more accurately see how to manually adjust the focus. I also use focus-peaking indicators, although this feature is generally too coarse to perfectly focus the lens. A third option is to stop-down the aperture, to hide the focus error inside deeper focus. Not a great option. A fourth option would be if Meike were to make a lens firmware update that moves focus a little further before stopping, but this is probably wishful thinking.

This article is a comparison of the new Meike 85mm f/1.8 and my old Nikkor 85mm f/1.4 AF-S lens. Before I started this evaluation, I was thinking that my Nikkor would be the clear winner. I was wrong. It’s hard to evaluate how good a lens is unless you have something to compare it to. Something that made this assessment difficult to do is the fact that these lenses aren’t the same focal length… The Meike seems to be about 88mm, compared to the Nikkor 85mm. When I would adjust distances to get equivalent image magnification, the depth of focus wouldn’t be the same. Keep in mind that this Meike lens is made for cameras with Z-mount (Nikon), L-mount (Leica), E-mount (Sony), and EF-mount that can be adapted to Canon cameras. I tested these lenses on my Nikon Z8 and Z9 cameras, which have the same sensor specifications. Resolution Although the Nikkor has a more even distribution of sharpness across its field of view, the clear winner here is the Meike. Nikkor 85mm f/1.4 AF-S vs Meike 85mm f/1.8 At the “ lenstip.com ” website , their review of the Nikkor 85mm f/1.8 ‘S’ lens (NOT my 85mm f/1.4 Nikkor shown above) shows f/1.8 center sharpness as 55 lp/mm, which is quite a bit lower than the Meike. Their f/2.0 center got 58 lp/mm, which is again significantly lower. After that, the lenses get comparable measurements. This Nikkor 'S' lens costs about $800 US, or 3.5X more than the Meike. Meike 85mm MTF50 resolution f/1.8, 2.0, 2.8 Meike 85mm MTF50 resolution f/4.0, 5.6, 8.0 Nikkor 85mm MTF50 resolution f/1.8, 2.0, 2.8 Nikkor 85mm MTF50 resolution f/4.0, 5.6, 8.0 LoCA (Longitudinal Chromatic Aberration) This one is no contest. The Meike has essentially no visible LoCA. Meike (left) vs Nikkor (right) LoCA (f/1.8) The Meike looks totally neutral, but the Nikkor has the reddish foreground and green background. CA (Lateral Chromatic Aberration) Another clear win for Meike. It has a CA span of about 2 microns, while the Nikkor has a CA span of about 4.5 microns. Meike lateral chromatic aberration f/1.8, 2.0, 2.8 Nikkor lateral chromatic aberration f/1.4, 1.8, 2.0 Bokeh The out-of-focus quality is a complicated issue. Since the image magnifications and the minimum focus distances aren’t equal, it’s easy to fudge the contest. By getting slightly closer to the subject, it’s easy to get the background using the Meike lens at f/1.8 look about the same as the Nikkor lens at f/1.4. I found the virtual absence of LoCA with the Meike makes background highlights look nicer than the Nikkor in most cases. I also think the Meike wins with the shape of highlights near the frame edge. Meike f/1.8 left, and Nikkor f/1.4 Weight and Size Meike is 379 grams. Length: 100.2mm, Diameter: 76mm Nikkor is 595 grams. Length: 84mm, Diameter: 86mm Meike wins here, being almost half of the weight. When mounted using the FTZii adapter and using the lens hood, the Nikkor is actually about 20mm longer than the Meike. Weather sealing Nikon claims the 85mm Nikkor is “weather resistant”, which means that you get $0.00 refund if you’re in heavy rain and ruin the lens. Both lenses have a rear rubber gasket for sealing. Be careful out there. Diaphragm Nikkor 85mm has 9 blades. Meike 85mm has 11 blades. Meike wins here. More is better. Filter Meike is 62mm, while Nikkor is 77mm. 62mm is cheaper. Distortion Neither lens has any visible distortion. Build Quality The Nikkor wins here for overall sealing and overall better materials. Focus Scale The Nikkor wins again, since it has a focus scale and the Meike doesn’t. Vignetting The lenses look about the same for vignetting, with a slight win for the Meike. I tend to actually add vignetting to my pictures, and photo editors make it trivial to get rid of it. Meike f/1.8 left, Nikkor f/1.4 Focus Speed I timed focus, and it took 0.416 seconds to focus from 0.8m (33in) to infinity. The Meike is m uch faster than my Nikkor 85mm lens, which took 0.575 seconds over the same focus range. This is in bright light. Minimum Focus Minimum focus on the Meike is specified to be 0.65meters, or 26 inches. I physically measured minimum focus to have the lens front at 0.56m (22 inches) from the subject. The Nikkor is a bit irritating here, with a miminum focus of 0.85 meters (33 inches). Just not close enough. A clear win for the Meike. Focus Consistency and Accuracy I noticed that the Meike autofocus is slightly inaccurate, and it depends upon which direction focus is changing from. You may never notice this inaccuracy, especially if you stop down from maximum aperture. My focus measurement software is really picky, and it consistently shows tiny focus errors that correlate to which direction the lens is focusing from. Manual focus on the Meike is going to cause people to either love it or hate it. It takes multiple rotations of the focus ring to focus throughout its entire range. This means that you can really fine-tune focus. For speed, stick with autofocus. You'll probably want to start with autofocus, and then touch-up the focus manually to get there quicker. The Nikkor wins here. Autofocus is slow, but a bit more accurate. It’s almost impossible to tell the difference from the Meike most of the time. Manual focus is better than the Meike, with a lot less focus ring rotation required. Spherical Aberration Meike focus position f/1.8 (left), f/2.0, f/2.8 Meike focus position f/4.0 (left), f/5.6, f/8.0 Nikkor focus position f/1.8 (left), f/2.0, f/2.8 Nikkor focus position f/4.0 (left), f/5.6, f/8.0 Spherical aberration causes a focus shift by merely changing the aperture. This happens with nearly every high-speed lens. Meike focus shift between f/1.8 and f/8.0 is 19.1mm Nikkor focus shift between f/1.8 and f/8.0 is 18.6mm This is just about a tie, given measurement uncertainties. The chart size and focus distance go into these focus measurements, so it’s only the relative measurements that have meaning. It’s critical that your camera be able to focus at the shooting aperture to compensate for this focus shift. Nikon mirrorless cameras do focus at the shooting aperture (through f/5.6), so you never see this focus error unless the focus shifts beyond f/5.6. Beyond f/5.6, the narrow apertures will hide any focus shift problems. Cost The 85mm Nikkor cost me $1,200 US when I got it, and it was $2,200 at introduction. The Meike cost just $230 US. No contest. You could buy the Meike and also 4 backup lenses. Summary Just get the Meike. I’m sure it’s not as robust as the Nikkor, but you could always buy a replacement if something happens. Technology gets better and better as time goes by. Old lenses really start to show their age.