Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar 200mm f2.8
It has always been one of my dreams to get this lens. There aren’t many available on the market . It looks like a medium format lens, but made with an M42 mount. Its a bit heavy and quite inconvenient to use as you need to hold the lens not the camera body as usual. It is a very sharp lens, even at wide open and pretty fast too. It has outstanding image quality, rendering nice colours, if you ever see pictures taken with this lens you will be falling in love with the oldies. This lens started me off using vintage lenses on DSLR’s. If you ever have a chance to grab it, do it! Even if it looks ugly, all pieces are excellent I have never heard from a bad opinion from anyone about this lens.
Lens
Related resources
Fact Sheet
Vendor name
Carl Zeiss Jena
Carl Zeiss Jena
Type
Sonnar
Sonnar
Product year
1978-1990
1978-1990
Focal Min(mm)
200
200
Focal Max(mm)
200
200
Focus Min(cm)
220
220
Aperture Max
2.8
2.8
Aperture Min.
22
22
Barrel length(mm)
146
146
Elements In Group
6 in 4
6 in 4
Diaphragm action
fully automatic
fully automatic
Weight (g)
1200
1200
Filter Size (mm)
77
77
Push on diameter (mm)
80
80
Angular field
12.5
12.5
Hi, as written above, I can confirm that the 200mm Sonnar is very sharp an provides perfect images in low level light surroundings and at daylight. Only it’s heavy body compared with modern designs may be a little problem when carrying it with you. Compares it to a 150mm Sonnar from Zeiss (west) for the Hasselblad F Series and found no quality-reduction.
You have to comare it with Canon 70-200 f/2.8, which is by no means much smaller and lighter.
I got this lens recently and use it with my Pentax cameras. It is indeed one of the sharpest and more color rendition loyal lens. It is a big big and heavy, but I love every single photo taken with it. I got a long hood and took care of a small CA that it showed when shooting against the sun without a hood. Great lens, I am lucky I have it.
Sure it’s sharp, but compared to a good modern lens (eg Canon 70-200 f/4 IS) it is relatively soft.
Great build quality though.
A Sonnar that looks like a Pentacon ? I wonder if it’s the original 1/3/1 formula or a Pentacon design branded CZJ for promotion reasons
( Not that some Pentacons aren’t great lenses )
I must agree that this lens is quite soft compared to modern lenses. However, the rendering is great, the bokeh is creamy, contrast is good. For wedding and engagement photography it’s beautiful. I think you’d want something sharper for stuff like wildlife photography though.
Hi,
I have one like this, but it has a very stiff focus ring.
Does any one know how to re-lube it?
Is it hard to do it?
Thanks.