The current crop of digital sensors aren't able to capture the full resolution that the best prime lenses are capable of. That kind of levels Primes and Zooms as far as resolution is concerned. I expect that the new 14mp sensor in the K20 will more readily show the difference. On film I only had two zooms that had resolution that rivaled my best prime lenses. But those were rather special. Additionally to really take advantage of the greater resolving power of prime lenses extra care in focusing and camera steadiness was required. I seldom bother since that tends to negate one of the advantage of a "mini format", which is portability, even when using what is by comparison a honking big lens.
Tim Bray wrote: > On Thu, Feb 14, 2008 at 9:16 AM, William Robb <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > >> I've yet to see a zoom lens that can match an excellent quality prime lens >> in overall imaging quality. Zooms are generally not as sharp, though they >> may be fairly close, but tend to have more optical aberrations and flare. >> This is also not adressing size and weight issues, while both lenses would >> be big, my guess is the zoom would be bigger and heavier. >> > > I don't really buy the sharpness argument for primes, either at the > pixel-peeping or holistic level. I've looked and looked and maybe my > eyes aren't good enough. But for me, the smaller/lighter issue is > huge, I want to be able to carry the camera around in one hand all > day. > > Even more important is the fact that with a prime, you can shoot > faster, because there's one less thing to twiddle before you click. > Compose with your whole body then tune the composition in Lightroom or > equivalent. I've ranted on this twice, in reviews of the 40mm and > 21mm Pentax Pancake Primes: > > http://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/200x/2007/04/27/Pentax-P-DA-40mm > http://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/200x/2007/05/24/Pentax-SMC-DA-21mm > > -T > > -- I am personally a member of the Cream of the Illuminati. A union with the Bavarian Illuminati is contemplated. When it is complete the Bavarian Cream Illuminati will rule the world -- Anonymous -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
