90 years of the Olympus company - Olympus F.Zuiko Auto-S 50 mm f/1.8 versus Olympus ZD 50 mm f/2.0 Macro - Image resolution

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90 years of the Olympus company - Olympus F.Zuiko Auto-S 50 mm f/1.8 versus Olympus ZD 50 mm f/2.0 Macro

1 September 2009

Szymon Starczewski

4. Image resolution

As we mentioned before, the resolution of both lenses was based on the MTF50 function values. They were calculated by the Imatest program on the strength of RAW files from the 10-megapixels 4/3 sensors, used in such cameras as E-3 and E-510. The measurement errors could be placed in the 0.4 - 1.2 lpmm bracket.

90 years of the Olympus company - Olympus F.Zuiko Auto-S 50 mm f/1.8 versus Olympus ZD 50 mm f/2.0 Macro - Image resolution

The result of the frame centre duel between the two tested lenses is presented on the graph above. As we wrote in the ZD 50 mm f/2.0 Macro test, its performance can be described only as sensationally good. Even at the maximum relative aperture we get brilliant sharpness – the MTF values reach over 44 lpmm. The older lens gives in to the new and the difference is the most pronounced exactly at the maximum aperture. The old OM reaches there at most a decent 31 lpmm level. Fortunately, on stopping down the situation ameliorates quickly – by f/2.8 we get the result reaching almost 46 lpmm so only 4 lpmm less than the new ZD 50 mm f/2.0 Macro lens. Starting with f/4.0, its really hard to distinguish between the shots from the old and the new lens.

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The frame edge performance got us very interested. The older lens, designed to cooperate with a much bigger sensor, shouldn’t have much worse results than the new one. How it fared in reality is illustrated on the graph below.

It turns out that the difference is huge indeed as the older lens fares much worse than the new. At the maximum aperture the difference is above 15 lpmm and it decreases to almost 11 lpmm by f/2.8. By f/4.0 both lenses perform equally well but still you can see the 4 lpmm advantage of the new over the old. Only using f/5.6 and higher makes pictures from both lenses hard to distinguish.

At the end of this chapter, like in other lenses’ tests, we present you our test table crops, based on JPEG files. Of course they concern only the Olympus F.Zuiko 50 mm f/1.8.