50mm Lenses on 42 and 150 MP

The lenses

The tested lenses
Left to right, bottom to top: Nikkor 1.4/5.8cm, 1.4/50, 2/50, 1.8/50, Micro-Nikkor 2.8/55, Sony 1.8/55, Zoom-Nikkor 3.5/50-135, 4/25-50, 4.5/50-300 ED.

Lens Mount Design Aperture blades min. Focus Length Weight Filter Remarks
Nikkor-S 1:1.4 f=5.8cm Nikon F 7/6 6 0.6 m 47.5 mm 350 g 52 mm  
Nikkor 50mm 1:1.4 Nikon F 7/5 7 0.6 m 48.5 mm 310 g 52 mm earlier K type
Nikkor 50mm 1:2 Nikon F 6/4 6 0.45 m 41 mm 220 g 52 mm K type
Nikkor 50mm 1:1.8 AI Nikon AI 6/5 7 0.45 m 37 mm 220 g 52 mm  
Micro-Nikkor 55mm 1:2.8 AI-S Nikon AI-S 6/5 7 0.25 m 62 mm 290 g 52 mm  
Sony Sonnar T* FE 55mm F1.8 ZA Sony FE 7/5 9 round 0.5 m 88 mm 281 g 49 mm  
Zoom-Nikkor 50-135mm 1:3.5 Nikon AI-S 16/13 7 1.3/0.6 m 125 mm 700 g 62 mm  
Zoom-Nikkor 25-50mm 1:4 Nikon AI 11/10 7 0.6 m 104 mm 600 g 72 mm  
Zoom-Nikkor ED 50-300mm 1:4.5 Nikon AI-S 15/11 7 2.5 m 239 mm 1950 g 95 mm  

Tests

Test scene 1
Distance ~ 30 meters, focus on center sign.
Test scene 2
Distance ~ 3 meters, focus on watch face.
Test scene 3
Distance ~ 30 meters, focus on sign near CX frame edge. The blue border is the FX frame.

Scene 1 and 2 where shot on the Sony A7R2. Scene 3 was shot on the Nikon 1 J5. The pixel density of its 20 megapixel CX format sensor is roughly equivalent to that of a 150 megapixel FX sensor. But of course you can only test near the center of full frame. Still, I think it is interesting to see how the lenses would perform on a hypothetical 150 MP sensor.

The 1.4/5.8cm Nikkor was only included in scene 1. In addition, the 2/50 Nikkor and the Sony lens could not be included in scene 3, because adapting Sony E lenses to Nikon CX is impossible, and the 1.4/5.8cm and 2/50 Nikkors do not fit the FT1 adapter because of protruding rear mount elements.

All photos taken at base ISO using a tripod and a remote release. On the Sony, EFCS was enabled. Developed in Capture One 11, no lens corrections applied, output sharpening disabled.

I did some additional shots at f/5.6 for scene 1 where I focused on the outer midfield crop instead of the center. Comparing these to the center focus images shows the effect of field curvature (quite drastically, I think).

CropAperture
Scene 1 center
Scene 1 outer midfield
CA corr.
Focus
Scene 2
CA corr.
Scene 3  
CA corr.