The Online Photographer

Zeiss has introduced two new Otus lenses for mirrorless cameras, a 50mm and an 85mm. The series will be called Otus ML. (Does that stand for mirror and less, perhaps?)

This is not the tip of the iceberg; this is a snowball from the tip of an iceberg. Carl Zeiss AG, branded ZEISS, styled in all capital letters, is an incredibly complex enterprise, making, designing, marketing, branding, or co-branding lenses for: cinema cameras; its own cameras; smartphones from several companies; other companies' cameras—such as Voigtländer, which it acquired in 1956 and later sold to Rollei, the name Voigtländer now belonging to Cosina; and Leica rangefinder-mount cameras (M39—or LTM, Leica thread-mount, as Marc James Small used to call it). At least some of those those rangefinder lenses are made by Cosina. In the past, Carl Zeiss made Contax film SLR lenses in Germany, and licensed and oversaw the manufacture of identical lenses made in Japan by Kyocera. The latter were actually superior to the German-made versions because the machinery and tooling were newer, the opposite of what photography hobbyists back then assumed. The company makes, or made, super-rotator lenses; some of the optical components for the James Webb Space Telescope; enlarger lenses; process lenses; sports optics, including rifle telescopic rifle sights, binoculars, spotting scopes, and distance measuring devices, in three separate lines, one made in Germany, one made in Germany but assembled in the USA, and one made in Asia. Then there's Carl Zeiss Meditec, which makes optics for ENT, spine, ophthalmology/optometry, dentistry, gynecology, neurosurgery, P&R, and radiotherapy equipment and devices. They make eyeglasses and eyeglass technology; virtual reality components; components and technology for the semiconductor industry (Carl Zeiss AG's cash cow) and for industrial metrology; and lenses for five different kinds of microscopes. As far as camera lenses are concerned, there are five different lines not including the Leica rangefinder mount lenses: Otus, Batis, Loxia, Touit, and Milvus. And that doesn't cover the ZA Sony lenses, in two lines, E for APS-C and FE for FF. Just try to figure out who makes what and where with all that. It would take some doing.

The first in years
And I admit that Google-fu has failed me: I haven't been able to really figure out what's been happening with Zeiss's camera lenses in recent years. It appeared that the company might have been leaving the business by attrition—before this, there had been no new Zeiss lenses announced since before COVID-19. Lenses are made in batches, and then can be sold out of NOS, or new old stock—the products are warehoused and sold for as long as they last. Outgo (outflow?) can be accelerated or extended (slowed down) by adjustments to the prices. If you want to exit the lens business quietly, it might take years to go through the NOS, with different products being "discontinued" at different times because that's when they ran out of what they had. Or, a company (presumably—I don't know about this stuff firsthand) can just stop offering new products, but can continue to make new runs of old products as long as they're selling. It's beyond complicated.

All this is the backdrop to the two new Otus ML lenses. Does this mean Zeiss (I'm sorry, I can't shout) is back in the camera lens business? Well, were they ever out of it? Did they ever intend to go out of it? Where are the new lenses made, and by whom? [See Update below.] Are these two lenses it, or will there be more lenses in the Otus ML line? Will there be other lines for mirrorless too?

I don't know the answers to any of that. Probably Zeiss's own representatives don't either. But by way of description: the ZEISS Otus ML Apo-Distagon 50mm ƒ/1.4 ($2,499) (shown above) and ZEISS Otus ML Apo-Sonnar 85mm ($2,999) are "more compact" and "smaller," but that will be true mainly when they're compared to Otuses (Otii?) for DSLRs—taken on their own, the Otus ML pair are on the very large and heavy side compared to their natural competition from other companies. The 50mm weighs a pound and a half (!). Compare that to the old but still available Pentax 50mm ƒ/1.4 FA at 7.6 oz. and $333. The Otus ML however is a Distagon (i.e., retrofocus) design, like a wide angle, because that is more ideal for the ray paths with mirrorless cameras where the lens can be placed nearer the sensor. And the Otus ML has 14 elements, including two with aspherical surfaces and four made with exotic anomalous partial dispersion glass. Versus the Pentax's seven spherical elements. It's not like you're not getting what you pay for. The Otus ML's are available in Nikon-Z, Sony E, and, significantly, Canon RF mounts—meaning Zeiss has paid for access to RF, because many third party lenses, especially from China, are still being blocked from the RF mount. The aperture rings can be switched from clicked to smooth by using a little key that fits into the back of the mount, so they're also intended for videography.

UPDATE: The Otus ML lenses are featured prominently on the Cosina website, so, while it is not directly stated, it can be assumed the new lenses are made by Cosina for Zeiss. It appears Cosina makes far more Zeiss lenses that I had known about.

That's not necessarily a bad thing. Regardless of measurements, for visual picture quality the 50mm ƒ/1.4 Zeiss Milvus, also made by Cosina, is one of the best 50mm lenses ever made, assuming you shoot in color. I hope someone, somewhere will compare the Milvus 50mm ƒ/1.4 to the Otus ML 50mm ƒ/1.4, eventually. The Milvus 50mm ƒ/1.4 is generally considered "too expensive" at approximately half the price of the new Otus ML 50mm ƒ/1.4. Of course they fit different cameras.

The Otus ML cross-section (14 elements, 2 aspherical elements) is not even close to the same as the older Otus 55mm (12 elements, 1 asphere), so those two lenses are not directly related.

Both Otus ML lenses in all mounts are manual focus. That's going to be a discussion point, I'd guess. The Otus line is meant to be Zeiss's idea of the best-performing camera lens, according to its idea of the ultimate in performance for pictorial photography. For Zeiss lenses, this means all-metal construction, traditional designs, and fastidious, even fanatical attention to both lens design and build. Lately it has also come to mean high performance at the widest aperture as well. The downsides are weight, size, and expense, and lack of autofocus. Is it what photographers want in fine premium lenses, circa 2025?

Mike

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