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Author Topic: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810  (Read 11027 times)

BenNorton

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TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« on: April 01, 2015, 09:15:10 am »

So it's been quite a while since i've a) Posted here and b) Shot ANYTHING with a DSLR.

I've been spoiled with years of Leaf backs and Cambo WDS but before christmas was tempted into a new Nikon. I was amazed at the quality increase since the days of D2X or whatever they were making back when i worked for them.

Ramble over, i'm digging the fact i can just go and shoot without the need for LCC's and what not but i'm missing a decent PC/TS lens for the architecture. I'm not a huge fan of the cost to build quality of the Nikon 24mm PCE and i've been informed that the Hartblei only shifts on one axis.

I've also tried the Cambo Actus and although i can use my old RZ lenses, the quality is pretty poor from this old bits of glass when shifted.

Does anyone have recommendation for a good lens that i can get rise/fall from and also a reasonable stitch or am i asking too much? Is it a case of stick with the Cambo WDS / Aptus?

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Paul2660

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #1 on: April 01, 2015, 09:31:27 am »

With Nikon you have several options in a lens, I can think of 2. the Nikkor PC-E in 24mm or 45mm and then the Rokinon 24mm. 

Opinion vary on these lenses.  So my best suggestion is rent from www.lensrentals.com

I came from Canon, where I used the 24mm and 17mm TS-E II lenses, and I don't feel that the current Nikkor's come close, not close.  especially when shifted.  Others feel the Nikkor 24 and 45 are fine.  I found way too much corner softness on shifts even at F11 with the D800e with the 24mm Nikkor.  The Rokinon is sadly doesn't hold up to their other lenses, as it's way too soft on shifts. 

Both lenses showed a lot of CA on shifts, but this can be cleaned up in post.  The Rokinon allows tilt and shift in the same plane out of the box, the Nikkor will need to go back to Nikon to be modified, or you can try it yourself.  (Similar process to how the older Canon 24mm TS-E worked)

This to me is one of the huge inconsistencies with Nikon, as they have a great sensor line up in both 24MP and 36MP but have really outdated and poor performing shift lenses. 

Paul
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Paul Caldwell
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shadowblade

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #2 on: April 01, 2015, 09:56:32 am »

Nikon's PC-E 24 is crap.

At the moment, the best option for a Nikon shooter is probably to get the Canon TS-E 24L and a Sony A7r.

The Sony body is light and small enough to not add significantly to the weight and size of your kit (think of it as an attachment to the lens, not unlike an extra teleconverter) and the Canon TS-E 17L and TS-E 24L are much better than anything Nikon has. Which is unfortunate, since Nikon's sensors are way better than Canon's for the type of photography you'd normally do with a tilt-shift lens, and better in general except at high ISO, while the lossless RAW format is better than Sony's.
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BenNorton

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #3 on: April 01, 2015, 10:18:06 am »

I was told pretty much the same thing by the Cambo gent, that i should just buy the Sony... (Cheers Charles hahaha).
Doesn't help with the fact that i've just sunk money into a D810 and a D610 as an alt back up.

The very same Mr Woods briefly mentioned a new attachment that would allow use of the WDS lens panels on the Actus but i've heard nothing back from him to clarify if this will work with the Nikon or only with the Actus DB system.

Anyone here confirm or deny?
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shadowblade

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #4 on: April 01, 2015, 10:21:11 am »

I was told pretty much the same thing by the Cambo gent, that i should just buy the Sony... (Cheers Charles hahaha).
Doesn't help with the fact that i've just sunk money into a D810 and a D610 as an alt back up.

The very same Mr Woods briefly mentioned a new attachment that would allow use of the WDS lens panels on the Actus but i've heard nothing back from him to clarify if this will work with the Nikon or only with the Actus DB system.

Anyone here confirm or deny?

The Nikon bodies are good for everything besides tilt-shift.

Pair them up with a 14-24 and a few Zeiss Otus lenses (or Sigma 35 and Sigma 50).
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kers

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #5 on: April 01, 2015, 10:26:00 am »

Nikon's PC-E 24 is crap....
As a long time user of the 24mm PCE i disagree.
It is the best nikkor wide angle for indoor shooting. It has strong field curvature that is of benefit indoors.
Because of the same quality it has problems outdoors @ infinity. Better use the 14-24 zoomlens on 24mm for that purpose.
more valuable information you can find here:
http://www.alpa.ch/de/news/2013/fps-lenses-free-choice.html?year=2013&num=3
and here:
http://www.lenscore.org



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Pieter Kers
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shadowblade

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #6 on: April 01, 2015, 11:03:40 am »

As a long time user of the 24mm PCE i disagree.
It is the best nikkor wide angle for indoor shooting. It has strong field curvature that is of benefit indoors.
Because of the same quality it has problems outdoors @ infinity. Better use the 14-24 zoomlens on 24mm for that purpose.
more valuable information you can find here:
http://www.alpa.ch/de/news/2013/fps-lenses-free-choice.html?year=2013&num=3
and here:
http://www.lenscore.org





That's not saying much.

It's not sharp. You can't independently adjust the tilt and shift angles - they're fixed to be either parallel or perpendicular to each other, but you can't adjust it on the fly. The image quality, when fully shifted, is terrible - way too much CA and poor sharpness.

Sure, it's the best Nikon 24mm tilt-shift, but that doesn't mean it's any good.
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kers

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #7 on: April 01, 2015, 12:44:37 pm »

That's not saying much.
...

Well you are actually saying all nikkors wide angles are bad... that is saying a lot...( too much)
again i would say ; look at the ALPA samples and decide how bad it is and how much sharper the 24mm TS Canon is.
They all have there problems - ( now Canon goes from 21 to 50 MP we will find out more about Canon lenses)
I would like Zeiss to built the ultimate 24mmTS F4 lens, but i am afraid if it ever comes it will cost 5000$ or so.
if they make an f5.6 24mm TS for 2500 i will buy it at once

« Last Edit: April 01, 2015, 12:59:08 pm by kers »
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Pieter Kers
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shadowblade

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #8 on: April 01, 2015, 01:19:21 pm »

Well you are actually saying all nikkors wide angles are bad... that is saying a lot...( too much)

No, just the PC-E 24L.

The 14-24 has been unmatched until the last few weeks, and the new Canon 11-24, while wider and matching it for image quality, does not offer f/2.8.

Quote
again i would say ; look at the ALPA samples and decide how bad it is and how much sharper the 24mm TS Canon is.
They all have there problems -

The Canon TS-Es are not only sharper, but also have less CA (both transverse and longitudinal) and a greater range of shit.

Since I use these lenses for shifted panoramas, shift range is paramount. Also, the resolution of the Nikon at full shift is far worse than that of the Canon.

Finally, the inability to adjust tilt and shift angles relative to each other is very inconvenient on the Nikons (same with the Canon 45mm and 90mm tilt-shifts).

Quote
( now Canon goes from 21 to 50 MP we will find out more about Canon lenses)

I've been using the TS-E 24 and TS-E 17 (as well as the Nikon 14-24) on 36MP ever since the A7r came out. They hold up very well at that resolution.

In contrast, I found that the PC-E 24 didn't even hold up well at 24MP on the D3x.

Quote
I would like Zeiss to built the ultimate 24mmTS F4 lens, but i am afraid if it ever comes it will cost 5000$ or so.
if they make an f5.6 24mm TS for 2500 i will buy it at once

So would I. Actually, I'd like the f/3.5 version, since the f/5.6 version would become f/8 by the time you put a 1.4x TC on it.

Going on recent record, Sigma may be able to pull it off as well.
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shadowblade

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #9 on: April 01, 2015, 01:23:55 pm »

With the TS-E 24L and A7r, fully shifted to each end and stitched.

I'd be loathe to print this at 32x96" with the PC-E 24 - the details in the ends just wouldn't be sharp. But no problem with the TS-E 24.
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Stephen Starkman

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #10 on: April 01, 2015, 09:18:59 pm »

Once I acquired a D800e I decided the Nikon 24 shift L and 45 shfit L just, well, sucked. I had them both checked by Nikon. They were within spec. I couldn't use them - my focus is on landscape and the results off centre reminded me of going to the optometrist and having him dial in the wrong numbers. They were ok on my D700 years ago. Sold them. Really want a 17 and 24. I have to admit I've not tried alternate brands to date (budget is a factor currently). Have a D810 now but don't expect it to make any difference. I'm a bit in envy of the Canon 17 TS!

Edited: left the letter "l" out of "shift". Freudian typo.
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BernardLanguillier

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #11 on: April 01, 2015, 09:41:16 pm »

The 24mm PCE is IMHO pretty good when tilted for landscape applications, but it is not that great with heavy shift for sure. This makes it a difficult option for busy architecture photographers.

On the other hand, if you shoot a low volume of high quality images and spend anyway much more time setting up a shoot, lighting it up, than the actual time spent shooting, then stitching is IMHO  a possible solution and will deliver much high levels of image quality with pretty much perfect corners (resolution, light fall off, CA,...).







These were captured a few days ago with a D810 and Otus 55mm f1.4. The 3rd image also combines DoF stacking for perfect near/far sharpness and would be impossible to achieve with a T/S lens.

Cheers,
Bernard
« Last Edit: April 01, 2015, 09:44:04 pm by BernardLanguillier »
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shadowblade

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #12 on: April 01, 2015, 10:56:40 pm »

The 24mm PCE is IMHO pretty good when tilted for landscape applications, but it is not that great with heavy shift for sure. This makes it a difficult option for busy architecture photographers.

On the other hand, if you shoot a low volume of high quality images and spend anyway much more time setting up a shoot, lighting it up, than the actual time spent shooting, then stitching is IMHO  a possible solution and will deliver much high levels of image quality with pretty much perfect corners (resolution, light fall off, CA,...).

The problem is the far-higher rate of failed stitching. Sometimes, no matter what you do, they just won't stitch properly, even if you have overlap. And good luck getting three panoramas to line up properly if you need to blend exposures for dynamic range.

Also, if you have foreground elements, parallax comes into play and you need an offset pano rig (and a big long list of exact offsets for each lens, including each focal length on a zoom lens) to eliminate this.

Also, you can't use graduated or polarising filters, because these depend on the lens not changing position.


Quote
These were captured a few days ago with a D810 and Otus 55mm f1.4. The 3rd image also combines DoF stacking for perfect near/far sharpness and would be impossible to achieve with a T/S lens.

I've only once managed to pull off a successful focus stack, and on a single-frame image, not a panorama.

Too often, the actual focal length changes from the stated value as you change from infinity to foreground focus, leading to frames that don't match up.

Which lenses don't have this property and maintain their focal length for the entire range of focal distances?
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armand

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #13 on: April 01, 2015, 11:09:51 pm »


Too often, the actual focal length changes from the stated value as you change from infinity to foreground focus, leading to frames that don't match up.

Which lenses don't have this property and maintain their focal length for the entire range of focal distances?

I would also like to know the answer to this question as I encountered the same problem (focus breathing) in my few trials.

BernardLanguillier

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #14 on: April 01, 2015, 11:56:54 pm »

I would also like to know the answer to this question as I encountered the same problem (focus breathing) in my few trials.

The Otus 55mm f1.4 is excellent on this KPI, with very limited focus breathing.

The Zeiss 100mm f2.0 is OK, the 135mm f2.0 is unfortunately poor, suffering from significant focus breathing.

Cheers,
Bernard

BernardLanguillier

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #15 on: April 02, 2015, 12:02:05 am »

The problem is the far-higher rate of failed stitching. Sometimes, no matter what you do, they just won't stitch properly, even if you have overlap. And good luck getting three panoramas to line up properly if you need to blend exposures for dynamic range.

Also, if you have foreground elements, parallax comes into play and you need an offset pano rig (and a big long list of exact offsets for each lens, including each focal length on a zoom lens) to eliminate this.

I am not sure what you have been doing wrong, but my failure ratio on stitches when using a proper pano head and lenses positioned at their nodal point (and why would you not use one for architecture shots) is around 0.2-0.3% (2-3 every thousand). The failures being mostly generated by moving items in natural settings.

I haven't felt the need to do HDR since I started to use the D800 (the shadow highlight sliders of C1 Pro do a great job), but if you need to then the right technique IMHO is to perform that for each image in the pano and then to compute the stitch. The same recommendation applies to DoF stacking. You do it shot by shot and the compute the stitch. I agree that trying to blend 3 panos is not going to work.

Cheers,
Bernard
« Last Edit: April 02, 2015, 12:05:00 am by BernardLanguillier »
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shadowblade

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #16 on: April 02, 2015, 12:04:38 am »

The Otus 55mm f1.4 is excellent on this KPI, with very limited focus breathing.

The Zeiss 100mm f2.0 is OK, the 135mm f2.0 is unfortunately poor, suffering from significant focus breathing.

Cheers,
Bernard


Unfortunately, longer focal lengths are generally when you need focus stacking the most...
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shadowblade

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #17 on: April 02, 2015, 12:08:56 am »

I am not sure what you have been doing wrong, but my failure ratio on stitches when using a proper pano head and lenses positioned at their nodal point (and why would you not use one for architecture shots) is around 0.2-0.3% (2-3 every thousand). The failures being mostly generated by moving items in natural settings.

I haven't felt the need to do HDR since I started to use the D800 (the shadow highlight sliders of C1 Pro do a great job), but if you need to then the right technique IMHO is to perform that for each image in the pano and then to compute the stitch. The same recommendation applies to DoF stacking. You do it shot by shot and the compute the stitch. I agree that trying to blend 3 panos is not going to work.

Cheers,
Bernard


The failures seem to most happen when the individual frames are taken at a focal length wider than 35mm.

Pano heads are very inconvenient to carry when hiking long distances in difficult terrain for landscape shoots. Then again, I've rarely encountered parallax errors when shooting landscapes.
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BernardLanguillier

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #18 on: April 02, 2015, 12:10:43 am »

Unfortunately, longer focal lengths are generally when you need focus stacking the most...

Well, focus stacking for a single image works ok with these lenses also. What doesn't work well, or at least not without a significant amount of painful manual re-work with layers in PS, is the combination of focus stacking and stitching. Don't get me wring, PTgui will be able to compute a stitch, but there are going to be some visible stitching errors. They can usually be dealt with by tuning layers position and masks in PS, but that is a pain and is risky for architecture work because of the many straight lines. It is mostly a non issue for landscape.

But I really don't see any need to combine stitching and focus stacking with these longer lenses for architecture work. The Otus 55mm f1.4 used to cover the same angular coverage of a 24mm lens will already result in stitched files in the 150 megapixel range. And the pixels will typically be sharper than those of a wide angle lens to start with. Of course, nothing prevents you from adding light fall off or softening in the corners if you like the traditional T/S lens look. ;)

Cheers,
Bernard
« Last Edit: April 02, 2015, 12:12:31 am by BernardLanguillier »
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BernardLanguillier

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Re: TS / PC Lenses for Nikon D810
« Reply #19 on: April 02, 2015, 12:15:57 am »

The failures seem to most happen when the individual frames are taken at a focal length wider than 35mm.

Pano heads are very inconvenient to carry when hiking long distances in difficult terrain for landscape shoots. Then again, I've rarely encountered parallax errors when shooting landscapes.

I rarely stitch with lenses wider than 55mm, in fact I typically carry only 2 lenses in the field for landscape work. The Otus 55mm (before that the Zeiss 50mm f2.0 Makro) and the Leica 180mm f2.8 APO.

I have done most of my hiking (a lot of which multi-day in steep terrain and adverse weather) with tripod and pano head for nearly 10 years, so it can be done. :)

Cheers,
Bernard
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