After edited my images from this walking series, I realized that I shot most of my images at or near 20mm, rarely 40mm or 65mm. I think if I knew this my shooting habit, I would definitely carry my Voigtlander 21mm f1.4 or Zeiss 25mm f2.4 Loxia instead of the Sony FE20mm f1.8G with this Batis 40mm f2CF or my Voigtlander 65mm f2 APO.
Sure, the Zeiss 40mm f2 CF and Sony FE35mm f1.8G are both very sharp, in fact extremely sharp across the frame, I might even say it is often even sharper than many best Zeiss or GM primes in 20-50mm range, but it lacks something and that makes some type of images like this one a bit dull.
Maybe it is the so-called micro contrast? I do not know but the Loxia or Voigtlander image have a bit more pop or bite to it, and usually I could tell which of my images were shot with the Zeiss Loxia or Voigtlander APO series lenses.
These lenses definitely produce something that no other lenses normally produce in their images. These images taken with them have some sort of pop that most Sony lenses or even AF Zeiss lenses do not have, and I think the true MF Zeiss lenses produce a bit more neutral color palette than Sony produced lenses or other Japanese or Korean brand lenses.
Maybe some people think I have been seeing some sort of illusional or delusional (not existing) color effects or maybe my brain is just making me see what I want to see in my lens tests, whichever case is possible, but I think there are many subjective but important lens quality differences between great AF primes vs great manual focus primes (like the Voigtlander 50mm f2 APO or Loxia 85mm f2.4).
Honestly, there are many super sharp lenses Sony produced over the last 4 years, but none of these lenses have the pop of the Zeiss or Voigtlander MF lenses.
I hated the term "the 3D effect of Zeiss lenses" whenever some crazy Zeiss fanboys at Fred Miranda or Luminous Landscape forums talk about that, but I think there is something very special about their lenses. It cannot be measured like resolution or color accuracy, but it is becoming a bit more important these days, at least in my world.
Most modern mirrorless lenses are very sharp, especially compared to the Canon or Nikon D-SLR mount lenses of similar kind, but most of mirroless lenses have no characters or no pop (like Fred Miranda famously commented in this Sony FE135mm GM review). Now I think this was what Fred was saying "bad rendering", or "boring rendering".
Also, Sony lenses flare very badly, none of their popular lenses have a great anti-flare coating.
This FE20mm f1.8G, for example, is very sharp, actually extremely sharp across the Full frame circle, but the rendering is quite boring. And that lens flares very easily. I hated the term, "rendering", but now I am kind of understanding why many people at FM do care about it so much. I also think the Batis series lenses have very similar color palette to many Sony lenses.
If just resolution or sharpness is important, then we no longer need a prime. Modern zooms are already very sharp, some expensive ones are super sharp throughout their focal range, many times even beat expensive fast primes (especially after stopped down to f4 or so).
Honestly, I like some zooms a lot and use them often (as using a couple or a several zooms is so practical and makes my life easier), but it's because I have no freedom to photograph alone or drive my car these days. I am quite busy and often times I just photograph most of things with just one lens like my FE16-35mm GM or 12-24mm GM as I mostly photograph crazy weather or natural disasters occurred in a tiny island nation called Japan.
Honestly, if I have a bit more time and can travel more often alone, then I will definitely use a set of my Manual Focus primes, which I really love. But the sad reality for me now is I cannot be freer and must use one zoom or a set of one or two small prime/s like this FE20mm f1.8G or Batis 40mm f2CF (one of the most versatile lenses in my bag).
That said, I think I will try to use my Voigtlander APO and Loxia primes more often in this year 2023 as the long lasted (at least in my area) COVID paranoid lockdown policy here is finally coming to cease. In many cities here, we still have to wear masks or even forced to wear it. I really hate wearing any sort of face masks as that usually triggers some sort of odd autoimmune disease or shingles or herps on my face. Wearing a mask gives me a tremendous amount of stress and that makes me immune system weak and the HSV1 virus invades deep into me. When my immune system is working right, shingles or herpes HSV1 virus normally goes inactive or slumber.
I really love manual focus lenses and the ultimate focus accuracy is very important to me. The major lens and camera companies have been obsessed with AF speed of their camera lens systems, but for me it is not a necessary feature, in fact, I do not even want any kind of AF system in my camera. I hope some camera manufactures will make MF only mirrorless cameras like the Leica M but without the rangefinder. It may be the ultimate system camera for my personal needs. If Leica makes something similar to the M without the rangefinder, then I will definitely get interested in that hypothetical camera system.
