Not to speak for anyone else, but if I remember correctly,
Yoshihiko later qualified that statement. I think he ended up
using it just for portraiture. It is perhaps that the Ricoh
Rikenon f1.2 offers a pleasing character of bokeh at wide
apertures, but not a superior lens compared to the Pentax at all
apertures.
I use an XR Rikenon 55 f1.2 as my standard walking around lens on an LX. Personally, I've been delighted with its performance. I went to the library and pulled the July, 1995 Popular Photography where they tested the lens.
I compared the scores that the Ricoh 55 f.12 got with the ones in Pop Phot's September 99 round up of 50 mm f1.4 lenses (which covered the Canon EF USe, Zeiss T* Planar, Leica Summilus-R, Minolta maxxum AF, Nikkor D-AF, Pentax FA, and Schneider Xenon.)
Looking at the SQF data, here's what I found:
At f1.2 the Ricoh trails most of the f1.4's (at 1.4) by a fair margin, with the exception of the Canon, which the Ricoh actually outperforms.
At f2 and f2.8 the Ricoh trails a fair amount behind the other lenses, with a more narrow gap at f2.8. (though it actually beats the Minolta at f2).
By f4 the Ricoh, while still behind the entire f1.4 pack, is within one point of the weakest 50mm at this aperture (the Schneider) and within 5 points of the strongest (the Zeiss.)
At f5.6 the Ricoh surges forward as the other brands slack off. At 95.8 for a 20 x 24 image it beats the Canon, Leica, Pentax, and Schneider; ties the Minolta; and is within 0.1 of the Nikkor and 0.4 of the Zeiss.
At f8 only the Minolta and the Nikkor surpass it, by less than 1 point.
At f11 only the Minolta, Nikkor, and Zeiss surpass it, this time there is up to 1.5 points different.
At f16 the Ricoh slides back, but still manages to beat the Leica, Pentax, and Schneider...
Comparing the Ricoh 55 f1.2 against the Pentax FA 50 f2.8 macro - the Ricoh has a higher SQF score for all apertures except f2.8 and f11, and ties at f16. Albeit, the scores are very very close.
Comparing it against the 43 f1.9 - the Ricoh's SQF is higher at all apertures except f2 and f4.
I'm not sure what Yoshihiko's ultimate opinion of this lens is, but I personally find it to be very satisfactory. the Pop Phot tests show it as being competitive with most 50mm f1.4's at the f2 - f4 range and superior to most at apertures smaller than that. The Ricoh does trail the f1.4's wide open - but then we're comparing apples to oranges since the Ricoh is at 1.2 and the others are at 1.4.
Personally, this doesn't amount to that much - I use a lens like this mostly hand held, which introduces enough randomness to each shot that the differences are pretty insignificant. (My personal conclusion of the Pop Phot 50mm f1.4 round up was that, in general, all of the lenses performed good enough (except maybe the Canon wide open.) Ultimately, all I can say about the Rikenon 55 f1.2 is that it is good enough, especially for a piece that can be had for under $200 in the used market.
- MCC
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Mark Cassino
Kalamazoo, MI
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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