Quote Originally Posted by neuroanatomist


The point I'm making is that sharpness isn't everything. One of the problems with 'sharpness' is that people focus on that as a comparison measure, simply because it's easy to quantify. Especially for people just entering this realm, it gives them a nice set of numbers that they can compare. They can say, "Wow, I checked out the photozone.de test charts, and my 50mm f/1.8 that I paid $100 for is just about as sharp as that 50mm f/1.2L that costs $1500," ignoring all of the other factors that make the 50mm f/1.2L the lens that is it.



This comment almost brought a tear to my eye.


I almost always shoot my 35 1.4 wide open. The image is so smooth and dreamy. A lot of people will stop it down to at least 1.6 for sharpness, but I just can't do it. I feel like you are throwing out the character of the lens by stopping it down. Usually if you get familiar with a lens you can usually get a decently sharp shot wide open.