Chris Crawford wrote:
> The 85/2 is great for portraits, but consider also the 100mm f2.8. It's got
> very smooth Bokeh; very close to that of the also excellent 85, and its
> sharper than the 85 and costs a LOT less.
Both you and Mike say the 100/2.8 is sharper than the 85/2. Although I
have both, I've never had a shootout, but generally think them to be
very close.
For most portrait work, one wants wide open performance to be good
enough for accurate focusing, but not tack sharp.
In Gary's tests, the 85 beat the 100 at all apertures but very small
ones, where it equaled it. Esp. at f2.8 & f4, the 85 was consistently
much better.
Remember that the 85/2 is relatively unique in Zuikodom, for having a
significant change in optical formula mid-stream, from 6/4 to 5/4. I
seem to recall that happened at the same time as the switch to MC, but
could be wrong. The older design handily beat the SC 100/2.8 in Gary's
tests, but he didn't publish the ser#s, so we can't place the 100/2.8 in
AG's list of quality.
It is also has a floating element for improved close-up performance
(only in the second version, I believe?), which all the other teles
lack, so it should outperform the 100/2.8 closer in. I've heard it
reported here that it even works well with extension for macro. Never
tried that myself, as I have a sufficiency of dedicated macro lenses.
Moose
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