Image courtesy: ePhotozine
ePhotozine posted the first hands-on pictures with the two new Schneider MFT lenses. And also has good news to report:
They advised us that the company is still planning on releasing the Micro Four Thirds lenses, after originally being delayed, and were able to show us working samples of the lenses. The price and release dates are not yet finalised, however they are in talks with retailers at the moment to get them into stores. The price is likely to reflect the premium quality of the German made lenses, with the 14mm lens likely to be over 1000 euros.
Interesting. You see the 14mm f/2.0 and the 30mm f/2.4. UPDATE: We have been told the third lens, the 60m macro is still on roadmap!
Note: Both lenses have full AF and electronic Aperture control!
Image courtesy: ePhotozine
100 Responses
These had better be Makro-Planar good to justify that price point.
You can place them at any price point you like if they will never actually be produced!
Yow. A high-end 30/2.4, no matter how good it is, will be a very tough sell against Sigma’s 30/2.8 for $150 (!), or the pair of very good fast 25mm native lenses, both of which presumably will cost less and be more versatile…
the sigmas are really good too
For the life of me I don’t get this new 30mm f2.4 lens. The previous prototype didn’t look half-bad, especially if Schneider could ensure very good performances right into the corners at f1.4, but now the 30mm is longer, bigger, and slower. What for ? Or is it a typo on the lens barrel ?
30 1.4 et plus petit…là autant garder le 12/40 2.8 sur son E-M1
c’est 30/2.4 et non pas 30/1.4, raison de plus de garder son 12-40/2.8.
ça fait un an que j’attends cette optique étanche pour le E-M1.
C’étais prévus 1.4 et plus petit…là je suis dégoûté…http://www.magezinepublishing.com/equipment/images/equipment/30mm-f14-Xenon-4857/normal/xenon-30-front_1348384517jpg_1357898151.jpg
Mais après, on ne connait pas la qualité optique de ces objectifs.
the 14mm might be a decent seller though.
never cared for the Panasonic 14mm (Barring the form factor),
I really like the Oly 12mm except I think the glass could be a bit better,
Schneider would do well to to after the 12mm f 1.8 and ace it.
The 14mm would be interesting to me, especially given its weather sealing. 30mm is an awkward focal length on a 4/3 sensor, but I suppose it may attract disciples of the Dusseldorf school. With such a bulk and only f/2.4 the 30 must be near-perfect optically.
Front element on the other hand looks tiny. If they went with f1.4 and no compromises to IQ would be interesting, but this? Let’s see if they will release those lenses at all, so much time passed already.
The sigma 30/2.8 isn’t that bad and is really cheap.
And there is a Panasonic 30mm f2.8 macro on display at Cologne.
so true and even at that low price has not bee a big seller – now we have several manufacturers with fast lenses but no AF – so not that attractive – and these at crazy prices and no IS of course –
Same to me , have an eye on this 14mm lens but due to delay , I end up with the 15mm Summilux .
Definitely consider to sell it if this lens can beat the Summilux in optical performance .
Yun, are your pics so good that you are prepared to spend money for a similar upgrade?
Price seems kinda insane for those speeds.
30mm 2.4 is nuts … unpopular focal length, not very fast, not small … who’ll buy this? 14mm is decent, but there are so many alternatives.
I think the 14mm stands a chance if it performs brilliantly in the corners wide open.
The 30mm f2.4 though… it’s a rubbish idea. I believe there might have been room for a fast focusing 25mm f1.4 with brilliant performance wide open right into the corners with strong weather-sealing, but not this.
Where is the Oly 1.8 14mm prime? This is the one I am waiting for and would fill the gap between the 12 and the 17mm. Please tell me about the alternatives. I know the Pana 14mm, 2.5 only.
There is Leica 15/1.7 )
When you have 24mm and 35mm – you don´t need an extra 28mm prime – just move your bloody body.
sorry, but so wrong
*sigh* I know, the unique FOV you only get from 28mm is worth purchasing another lens – cause it´s so great for street and… stuff. All true, I´m sorry for my grumpiness.
Oly 12mm f2 or the Panny 15mm 1.7. Both are likely to be much cheaper than this… hell, you could probably buy both the Oly 12 and the Panny 15 for what this will cost.
Gahhhnn this is not what the system needs…
In a word: “STUPID”….and late to the party. Duh.
schneider makes great optics…but these lenses are not going to make a splash…14mm 2.0…1000 euros…don’t make them schneider…you are going to lose money
totally agree – so expensive that no one will buy them and therefore have no affect on competitive pricing – if it where around $300-$400 then it might help drive down Olympus and Panasonic prices which would be fine – if they do make the mistake of trying to sell these – they will loose money for sure – Schneider does not have quite the reputation of Leica or Zeiss – ( although very good ) – which I think is part of Samsung’s issue with their cameras which just have not gotten much recognition – although using the Schneider logo – just is not impressing many as they are not familiar with that name
maybe they cancel it when they read you
“The third lens Schneider showed us last year (60mm macro) seems to be off the roadmap now!” NOoooo, that was the only one I might have been interested in if the IQ was REALLY good. C’est la vie
m.zuiko 60 is actually quite good already. The Schneider, which I don’t expect to be a budget lens, will have to be in a different category!
It is indeed. Charging huge amounts while chasing diminishing returns on a 4/3″ sensor seems like a slightly misguided business model. There are lenses that are truly optically excellent like the 75/1.8 and the 42.5/1.2, but they’re also extraordinarily fast to justify their price tags. That, and the 75 is as sharp as it gets from f/1.8, since it’s essentially diffraction limited…
Why don’t they try filling a niche that hasn’t been filled already? Like a long macro? Or a compact ultrawide (AF!) prime? Or a tilt-shift?
It already took them 3-4 years of developpment for those 3 lenses… and alternatives are already there. Another 3 years from now and you’ll have your long macro or UWA from another manufacturer and read here that Schneider is still working on it.
Yes it’s sad 🙁
It cant be. Unless it sees below the surface of the subject…
It should be 90mm Macro.
This will be just another short macro. Moat expensive one…
+1 and make it to 1:1, just noticed the Schneider only goes to 1:2, I actually use that extra magnification.
1:2!?
Even more futile.
There are even more options then…
agreed – I have it and like it, but two things annoy me; the fidgety AF limit switch and it could actually be a bit larger – manual focusing the tiny focus collar is no fun for me. The Schneider will have to be REALLY, REALLY good, since it will no doubt be pricey, but …. we’ll see.
Does it have AF?
Said to have AF.
It’s mentionned in the post…
Note: Both lenses have full AF and electronic Aperture control!
The lenses will debut 2 years after the micro four thirds format has been completely abandoned.
ps; I love photo’s of lenses with dandruff/ dust on them!
feed the troll!!
So, those lenses will never see the day light (opinion extracted from you comment) LOL.
you could be right, after the regular complainers moved into a monastery, whats left ?
More likely Cheetos dust from the fawning Canikions.
Schneider have been losing the plot lately and the 30 is just another example in the long line. The Schneider PC 50 Super Angulon is actually pretty bad.
with gratis dandruff on focus ring
How is this good news ??? A $1200 plus 14mm F2.0 – Seems the manufactures like Sony/Zeiss and now Schneider are conditioning folks that every lens they produce is at least $1000 – in a way this makes the Panasonic LX100 a killer deal for less then $1000 with a lens that is 24-75mm F1.7-2.8 that is several lenses in one – granted that the Panasonic lens will not have the same quality as some primes – but still a good value – and when Olympus can make the 45mm F1.8 for $349 with it’s amazing image quality – so seems like something has to give – we have now Zeiss, Schneider and of course other 3rd party makers as well as Olympus and Panasonic all making – just can’t see my self buying it – for few hundred more one could get the Panasonic 42.5mm F1.2 with AF and IS –
You’re right.
In the other hand, it gives room for “cheap but quite good” lenses like Sigma lenses. If only Sigma would expand its DN line a litlle bit (UWA and tele), that would be sweet.
Two years ago, these would have been almost eagerly bought, but the marketplace has changed with more alternatives.
Even if the 14mm f/2.0 is better with distortion than Olympus’ 12mm f/2.0, is it enough to drive sales?
Agree, now we have the very good Samy 12 mm f/2 ~3 times less expensive than 14mm f/2 Scheider.
We can use a lot of f/2,8 APS-C lenses with SB to get f/2 lenses, etc
There are few people who buy a product for the brand, but most of the people don’t care so much about the name, if the product (lens) is good and fits their bills.
i vaguely remember some details about dust sealing, lets hope they join the small group of dustproof and water resistant lenses, makes this feature more meaningful for the sealed bodies
60 macro would be nice if the quality is better then the Olympus, and I mean by that is less diffraction at f11 and later.
The Oly is a lovely lens and i see them selling (used) for $300 so this best be kickarse.
Then again it’s no more than the annual rumor
Diffraction cannot be reduced by any lens at higher f-no’s
“Super Angulon”?! Wasn’t that the name of Bender’s girlfriend in an episode of Futurama?
Oh y oh y did they end Futurama! 🙁
This lens to good for puny sensor. Hulk smash puny sensors.
Hulk smash brain cells too, evidently.
Hulk poor speller too.
eh? you mean 30mm 1.4 surely…!!
I’ve been waiting on this lens for a year and all of a sudden it goes to 2.4??
tell me it’s just a typo!
Look at the pic. It’s f/2.4.
Haven’t you got enough gear yet, Neil? 🙂
la première version 30 1.4 avait meilleur allure :
http://www.openpn.com/wp-content/gallery/voigtlander/dynamic/schenider-kreuznach_14-30-60_mft-nggid043579-ngg0dyn-480x360x100-00f0w010c010r110f110r010t010.jpg
It’d be interesting to know the story at Schneider surrounding these lenses. I mean we all agree they are doomed. What were they thinking at Schneider? I suspect that there’s a single person behind this who had a good idea but didn’t have the resources to deliver.
They will be lucky to sell ten of these. Seriously, they should put a stop to the production of these and cut their losses. Huge waste of money. No one is going to spend over a grand for a huge 14mm f2.
sigma 30mm f2.8, usd100
The camera industry is killing themselves.
They blame everything. They blame smartphones, as though instamatics prevented enthusiasts from buying 35mm cameras in the 60s.
35 years ago top-end SLRs sold for $200-300 with a lens, and even the flagship Nikon F2 could be had for $330 new. High end medium format equipment could be bought for $400-800 with body and “normal lens” Dunno what the average salary was… $15-20,000? More- the suggested list price was just that, and retailers could far undercharge to meet what the consumer was willing to pay.
The industry blames everyone but itself. It’s prices are way over the top, with manufacturers jumping in to sell a lens with a brand name for $1500, a lens whose image quality no one will ever be able to distinguish from that of a much cheaper lens when looking at a real life photo.
I can’t wait until 5 years from now, when the industry will only be selling 10,000 units a year, but lenses will cost $5,000. And when one by one they go under, they’ll still blame smartphones, not back room marketing departments who set artificial wish prices, and then refuse to allow the entities actually facing customers- the retailers- to discount prices to meet the market.
Comparing prices from the late ’70s to those of today? Try and do the math first, cumulative rate of inflation amounts to almost 230%.
Well prices where not realy that cheep and inflation rased as @zardoz said, but you are right. The current digital camera prices are insane!
35 years ago average salary was $7000-10 000 in EU/US. And you couldn’t get mamiya or hasselblad medium format so cheaply with two good objectives.
Then throw there inflation and availability and film cost and you get closer. Today cameras cost less than then. 1500€ for body is nothing, when we go over 2000-2500€ it becomes more expensive and considerable.
Now if you are professional photographer, you can get 500-700€ per case or 160€ per photo. Do a couple studio works for higher client and you can get 10-20k in two hours.
Successful photographer can throw money easily on PhaseOne after a year. If wanted high quality. Then get m4/3 if wants high quality in portable form.
Were you born in the 1990’s? Maybe you should google “inflation.” Cameras are by a far margin cheaper then they have ever been, especially for the quality. That’s the way technology works. Also, the used market is saturated with a decade of amazing cameras. You can pick up an old used flagship DSLR from Nikon or Canon for less than $1,000 or a Nikon D5200 for about $600 with IQ that beats any FF digital camera made before 2007.
A normally sized 14mm, sharp from corner to corner and a max aperture of 2.8. Naaa it’s going to be cheap, no interest in such a lens.
Looks so cheap.
Why oh why. Pana 15/1.7 is already out.
On the other hand, despite all the competition, all they need to sell truckloads of them is to set prices REALISTICALLY.
Schneider, here is the price guide from you (maximum MSRPs which will sell if the lenses are weather-sealed and have great optical quality):
14/2 – $500 (because PanaLeica 15/1.7 is $600)
30/2.4 – $200 (because of Oly 25/1.8 and Sigma 30/2.8)
60/2.8 macro – $500 (because of Oly 60/2.8) if it is 1:1 macro, $300 if not (because of Sigma 60/2.8)
Why charge extraordinary prices for small simple devices – they are not made of gold and platinum after all.
Schneider make amazing optics but mostly make cinema lenses, which are significantly more. If their m43 offering are even close to the quality of their higher end glass then the prices are actually very reasonable.
Complaining the the price for a Schneider lens is too expensive is like saying a Zeiss Otus is expensive. You pay for quality.
Sometimes, you pay more for the brand than for the quality…
You pay 5-10x more for 2-5% improvement. Rest is for brand and virtual penis extension.
Perhaps the most noteworthy feature of these lenses, coming from a traditional German name in optics, is that they’re “automatic” lenses including AF.
If 14mm was a favorite focal length of mine and the lens was really excellent, I’d possibly be interested. Personally, I’d rather like to see a great 17mm lens – one that surpasses the Olympus 17mm f/1.8, which is only mediocre in terms of image quality.
And I definitely would be interested in the 30mm if it was a macro lens. It seems it is not, though.
I find “mediocre” to be a bit on the hard audience for the 1.8/17.
The problem as I’ve observed it is that its resolution and sharpness are visibly limited even stopped down, which may still be good enough for many applications, but it is not at all suited for resolution-critical applications like landscape photography – something one would really want to be able do with a 35mm equiv. lens, though.
If I want absolute resolution-critical captures, I won’t use a $400 tripod/head combo, let alone a $400 lens when there is a Voigtländer available.
So fine, the 1.8/17 is not the sharpest landscaping lens out in the wild. It is not mediocre.
I’m not talking about “absolute resolution-critical captures”, which I would be stupid to use a Four Thirds sensor for in the first place, I’m talking about virtually all images lacking visibly in resolution and sharpness, even stopped down, compared to many other lenses. The 17/1.8 doesn’t even get as sharp as the significantly cheaper Panasonic 20/1.7, which, by the way, shows that a decent lens does not have to cost a fortune.
Coming from Four Thirds without ever having owned one of the expensive SHQ lenses, I’m simply not used to such weaknesses, let alone in a $400 prime (!) lens. With a camera of only 16 MP, it is my not so humble opinion that I don’t have to expect a $400 prime lens to be the limiting factor for resolution.
I’ve used the best SHG lenses, not to mention various other legendary medium format lens from Rodenstock, Zeiss, Fuji. And my favourite lens these days is, er, the 17mm 1.8. Works fine for taking photos.
Good for you, but does it work fine for similarly sharp photos, resolving the same amount of finest detail as those SHG lenses, too?
Well possibly a brick wall shot with the 150 f/2 will reveal a touch more detail than same wall shot with the 17 f/1.8. But we’re talking minor differences in real terms, especially viewed at any sane size. Of course there are caveats, perhaps 2 or 3% increased res allows you to crop more. Or perhaps other factors such as contrast come into play. Everybody has their own metrics. But for real world photographic use, I can’t agree that the 17 1.8 is rubbish. Ultimate IQ is highly overrated. I’ve worked alongside MFT-using pros this year who will happily shoot at f/22 if means getting the shot. A bit of sharpening in post, and no one is the wiser.
As always, the judgement depends on one’s personal demands and habits. For me, besides what else it can do and how good it may be for street, low-light, whatever, a 35mm equiv. lens will always be a lens I will want to shoot landscape with, and if it’s $400 I expect it to produce decent shots which are sharp over the whole field of view at least when stopped-down. I have seen many landscape images shot with the 17/1.8, and I know people personally who tried their absolute best to persuade the lens to deliver, but I have not yet seen a single one that I’d even call acceptable. To shoot landscape at 35mm, I actually would rather use my Panasonic/Leica 14-150 FT superzoom.
If small and light and somewhat fast comes with such a disadvantage in image quality, I’m not interested.
Well I take your point. I haven’t really used it for landscapes. However, I’ve really looked hard for these apparently blatant flaws, but to be honest, comparing for example with the Sigma DP2M, the 17 1.8 is far from disgraced.
Guess I have lower standards…
But honestly, if you looking for ultra-IQ landscapes, are you sure you’ve chosen the right system?
“Ultra-IQ landscapes” are not really what I’m usually looking for, actually there are other fields which are more important, so yes, (M)FT definitely is the right system (although I’m starting to find Fuji really attractive) – still I want my lenses to resolve the sensor’s 16 MP (which isn’t even much these days) at least when stopped down, and the 17/1.8 has its problems with that, especially where there’s low-contrast detail like leaves or grass.
If the scene allows for it, I can of course always shoot a panorama out of a couple of images with a longer focal length, which is what I’ve often done with my 10 and 12 MP DSLRs…
Where’s my 9,10 or 11 f/2.8 mm AF prime?
That should say “9, 10 or 11 mm f/2.8 AF prime.”
Why create 14/2 for 1000 euro when there is a super sharp Olympus 12/2 for 600 euro?
Unbelievable. The only one I was interested in, was a 60mm macro. Better 90mm macro. And they don’t deliver.
A excellent 30mm 2.4 will be worth the 3x price of a Sigma 30mm 2.8. And do you think we would detect much differences in a print?
And 14mm F 2.0? What for? I will stay with my small Pana 14mm 2.5. And the price is beyond horizon.
@Schneider-Kreuznach: Have a look at the road map of availabel lenses http://www.hennigarts.com/micro-four-thirds-objektive.html
There are missing
7, 8, 9, 10mm UW Prime
17mm high quality Standard Street Prime
75 to 100mm Macro
Someone at Schneider into “Fantasy Football” and decided to launch a new game “Fantasy Lens”? Not content with having these same m43 prototypes on show since 2012, they are now trying a
similar approach with some FF lenses. But not one of these mythical lenses is ever likely to make it to production it seems.
While Schneider still promises to launch MFT lenses nearly every other competitor does it. That’s so ridiculous! It is more likely that Nikon and Canon will sell MFT lenses than Schneider.
And to be honest – I’m not interested anymore.
Might as well get an LX100 with its 10mm 1.7 lens for less!