Lens Performance Survey

This lens survey represents an attempt to average user experiences for a number of AF and non-AF lenses. Please take a few moments and enter some performance information about your lenses.

Please, be conservative with your ratings! It isn't helpful to enter professional performance values for cheap lenses. The ratings are absolute and shouldn't reflect any price performance considerations or whether you're happy with a lens or not! Think always of professional 35mm results and rate your lens based on this comparison! If you don't know how your lens rates in a certain criteria simply don't enter anything (except for some mandatory ratings)! This should keep the database more consistent. Please read the 'Notes' before entering your data.

Browsing the Lens Database

Note: Please be aware of the fact that the data doesn't become -relatively- stable until there're -at least- 10-15 inputs for a lens !!!

Below you'll find the form where you can select various filters for accessing the stored results of the database. After your selection just press the "Query" button and enjoy the show ...
The query engine will only include lenses with more than 5 inputs so you may not find brand new or exotic lenses in the output. The results are weighted and interpreted in order to be readable. If you prefer a raw (numeric) output you're welcome to do so HERE (all brands, all lenses).

Please note that each query eats quite a bit of bandwidth so be friendly with my resources ... Thx!

So what are these "weighted textual results" ?

Well, if you have a look at the numerical results you can observe that there're virtually no entries with a really bad performance - few users tend to be totally honest when it comes to rating dog lenses. However, looking a bit closer at the numerical results there's clearly something like a "bottom end" which is around 40%. This bottom end defines the "poor" (*) rating in the "weighted textual" anlysis. The upper 60% are divided into 5 zones resulting in (*) to (*****) performance ratings.

And what is this "optical" verdict ? Basically it is a summary of the optical characteristics which are covered by the survey. The maximum rating is 5 pts similar to the "stars" of the textual output. The number is calculated based on the following weighting factors:

Performance (wide-open) - 20%
Performance (stopped-down) - 40%
Distortions - 10%
Vignetting - 10%
Color Balance - 10% (neutral is maximum)
Flare - 10%

The number is generated for all lense with at least 5 user entries. The idea behind this "verdict" is to provide an easier way to compare lenses. Advanced users may not be too interested in this but I received some requests to implement this.

Enter new Performance Data:

Please note that I've installed a couple of consistency checks in order to shield the database from junk inputs so don't be surprised if your entry gets denied:

you cannot enter a worse performance for the "stopped-down" section compared to "wide-open"
you cannot enter extremely poor ratings for fix-focals or professional zooms. E.g. a "soft" performance for the Carl-Zeiss T* 300/2.8 is not accepted.
partial ratings in the performance section (e.g. no long end rating for zooms) are not excepted
So just in case you wonder that your database entry doesn't get accepted ...

BASE INPUTS

Skill Level:

Enter your skill level:

Lens:

NOTE: if you're using a D-SLR with 1.5x/1.6x mag. factor please select "(APS-C DSLR)"-marked lenses.

Select your lens:

OPTICAL RATINGS

Sharpness &
Contrast,
Distortions,
Vignetting

_{(performance absolute,
not relative to other lenses)}

ALL LENSES:
WIDE END
(incl. tele fix-focals)

SHARPNESSS/CONTRAST
WIDE-OPEN
e.g. 28mm for a 28-135mm zoom or a 400mm fix-focal

_{Mandatory input here!}

SHARPNESSS/CONTRAST
STOPPED-DOWN
e.g. 28mm for a 28-135mm zoom or a 400mm fix-focal

_{Mandatory input here!}

VIGNETTING
e.g. 28mm for a 28-135mm zoom or a 400mm fix-focal

DISTORTIONS
e.g. 28mm for a 28-135mm zoom or a 400mm fix-focal

ZOOMS ONLY: LONG END

SHARPNESSS/CONTRAST
WIDE-OPEN
e.g. 135mm for a 28-135mm zoom

_{Mandatory input FOR ZOOMS!}

SHARPNESSS/CONTRAST
STOPPED-DOWN
e.g. 135mm for a 28-135mm zoom

_{Mandatory input FOR ZOOMS!}

VIGNETTING
e.g. 135mm for a 28-135mm zoom

DISTORTIONS
e.g. 135mm for a 28-135mm zoom

Flare:

Please take the following into account:

more elements -> more ghostings

degree of loss of contrast

flare cutting mechanisms

Color Balance:

Please take the following into account:

Best observed in non-colored shadows and pure white objects.

film independent.

no color correction nor filter applied.

MECHANICAL RATINGS

AF Speed:

Please take the following into account:

Ring-USM / Silent-Wave vs Micro-USM vs micro motor

Internal Focus

Zoom / Fix-focal

Build Quality:

Please take the following into account:

Metal vs plastic body

Metal vs plastic mount

Internal Focus (sealing)

Quality of Controls

A final Note: This survey doesn't track the number of owners - your input will be excluded unless you have entered some serious performance data. The current acceptance rate after all consistency checks is about 25% ... so please - don't try to enter junk data. This is just a waste of bandwidth.

After submitting the form you'll have to wait for the reply of the database server!