Oberkochen, Germany—Zeiss debuted a tenth Milvus lens for full-frame Canon and Nikon DSLR cameras: the Zeiss Milvus 1.4/35. The distagon lens in the Milvus family is particularly suitable for portrait photography.
“The high maximum aperture enables the subject to stand out clearly against the background, and the photographer can achieve creative combinations of focus and blur,” said Christophe Casenave, product manager at Zeiss.
“The manual focus enables very exact focusing, and the creamy bokeh provides an excellent image look. And even at full aperture, the image quality leaves nothing to be desired.”
Its 35mm focal length makes for an all-around lens, and the 35mm f/1.4 lens is also suitable for landscape photography. Moreover, like all lenses in the Zeiss Milvus family, it is protected against dust and splashes. In addition, a metal barrel gives the lens a robust and durable character.
New Milvus Optical Design
Zeiss gave this lens a completely new optical design, with 14 elements in 11 groups. They include aspherical lens elements, special glass materials and advanced correction. In addition, all lenses feature a Zeiss T* antireflective coating.
“This means the photos are practically free from chromatic aberrations,” added Casenave. “Thanks to their excellent edge-to-edge imagery, Zeiss Milvus lenses are designed for high-performance digital cameras. The resolutions of camera sensors are constantly becoming higher, and this also increases the demands made on the lenses. For Zeiss Milvus lenses this is no problem. They are a solid investment in the future.”
Zeiss Milvus Family
The 10 lenses in the Zeiss Milvus family, ranging between 15mm through 135mm, are also suitable for film productions. Manual focus via a large rotation angle for pinpoint focusing can be operated with the aid of a Zeiss lens gear with a follow-focus system.
In addition, the silent de-click function allows the aperture to be set continuously in the versions for Nikon cameras. A further benefit for filming, Zeiss matched the color characteristics of the 10 lenses. Filmmakers can therefore switch between the focal lengths and still have a uniform color look.
Zeiss Milvus 1.4/35 Pricing
The Zeiss Milvus 1.4/35 prime lens will be available from photo specialty dealers and the Zeiss Online Shop beginning in July 2017. Its suggested retail price is $2,235. zeiss.com
