Roger Cicala
I'm Roger and I am the founder of Lensrentals.com. Hailed as one of the optic nerds here, I enjoy shooting collimated light through 30X microscope objectives in my spare time. When I do take real pictures I like using something different: a Medium format, or Pentax K1, or a Sony RX1R.
Posts by Roger Cicala · page 15 of 39
Tamron 15-30 f/2.8 Di VC Partial Teardown
We’ve become fans of the Tamron 15-30mm f/2.8 Di VC USD lens since we first tested it optically, but we haven’t really been inside of one yet. It’s not that we weren’t curious. We’ve just been trying to get through the week before and after Memorial Day, typically one of the busier times of the…
Canon Announces T6 Sensor Recall
I want to give credit to Canon for so quickly handling the problem we first reported with some T6 sensors. We announced the problem on April 30th, and within 10 days Canon had determined which cameras were affected (those with Serial Numbers beginning with “01 or “02”) and issued a product alert.…
Sony FE 90mm f/2.8 G OSS Resolution Test
We got a pre-release set of Sony FE 90mm f/2.8 G OSS Macro lenses in for preliminary testing last week, and I was kind of excited about this lens for a couple of reasons. First it simply gives me a nice short telephoto prime option that has been lacking in the lineup (although the Zeiss 85mm Batis…
Canon T6 Sensor Issue
NOTE: As of May 8th, Canon has issued a recall of affected units. My hat is off to them for superb Customer Care. I didn’t dream it could be done this quickly. Roger Every once in a while we notice something, because of the large quantities of cameras and lenses we buy, that we think people should…
Tearing Down the Sony 24-70 f/4 ZA OSS Vario Tessar
Those of you who read our teardowns know that we commonly are tearing down Canon or Nikon mount lenses. The reasons are pretty simple and it basically comes down to the fact that we have a lot more of those lenses. If we have a lot more it’s less of a problem to take a couple out of stock for a…
Just the Lenses: Sigma 24 f/1.4 Art Comparison
Most of you know I’ve been very impressed with Sigma’s new Art lenses. Their 35mm f/1.4 Art I still think is the sharpest 35mm prime lens made. The 50mm f/1.4 Art is also superb. When I heard about the Sigma 24mm f/1.4 Art lens, I had some mixed emotions. I was excited that we might get a 24mm lens…
Announcing C-4 Precision Optics
## Or, What I Did Over Winter Slow Season Those of you who read my blog regularly know I’m not a huge fan of sameness. But new lens releases, lately, have tended to have a lot of sameness. Don’t get me wrong, there have been some excellent lenses released; marked improvements and refinements have…
Just the Lenses: The Great 200mm Shoot Out
For those of you who haven’t read our ‘Just the Lenses’ posts before, these take advantage of our Trioptics Imagemaster optical bench to compare lenses from different camera mounts with no camera involved. Why is that different? Because all other forms of testing (DxO, Imatest, or even photography)…
A Quick Zoom Variation Demonstration
Sometimes I put up posts basically because I find myself answering the same email over-and-over. One of the emails I get a lot is: “I want the best copy of the xxxx zoom lens.” People get irritated because my response is usually something like this: Which focal length do you want the best copy at?…
SLR Magic’s 50mm APO HyperPrime Cine T2.1 MTF Tests
* Zeiss 50mm CP.2 and SLRMagic 50mm T2.1 * About a year ago, Andrew from SLR Magic came and spent a couple of days in our lab, testing some of the SLR Magic lenses and getting input on improving the optical adjustments on their lenses. At the time Andrew made it clear their company wanted to up…
Canon 11-24 f/4 L MTF Tests
I’ll be honest. I’m pretty excited about the Canon 11-24mm f/4 L lens. I love shooting ultra-wide and the chance to shoot this wide with a rectilinear lens on a full-frame camera has me pretty excited. But I’m also very aware of how near-impossibly difficult designing a lens this wide would be, so…
Just the Lenses: Tamron 15-30mm f/2.8
Our Just the Lenses posts are optical tests where we compare various lenses on the optical bench. Unlike DxO or Imatest test results, no cameras are involved, eliminating one of the major variables. It’s particularly useful when we’re looking at third-party lenses that can be used on various…