Owners of Nikon or Canon DSLRs with US$1,843 burning a hole in their pocket will be able to complement their Carl Zeiss Planar T*1.4/50 and T*1,4/85 lenses with a wide-angle lens that shares the same high speed sometime during Q1 2011.

Used in an APS-C format DSLR, the Distagon T* 1,4/35 provides the same field of view as the standard 50mm prime lenses that came with 35mm cameras of yore.

Zeiss says its new lens renders "special bokeh effects in both the foreground and background areas," the idea being that aiding in creative, and not just available light photography, is a principal virtue justifying the high purchase price.

Zeiss also notes that its large focus ring comes in handy for fine focusing at maximum aperture. The unusually wide range of depth of field options (for a lens of this focal length) also commends the lens for use in HD video capture; especially since shallow depth of field isn't possible with consumer camcorders.

The firm says that the 11 elements in 9 groups optic manages to control light fall-off toward the edges to just one f-stop at one step less than the full aperture opening. Other features include the Zeiss T* anti-reflective coating, robust all-metal precision mechanics, close focusing to 0.3m, 830 - 850 g weight, and M72 filter thread.

Article Tags:  zeiss, field, depth, aperture, light, lenses, focusing,