SHOOTOUT: Sony FE 50mm f/1.4 ZA vs Zeiss Loxia 50mm f/2: Upper Lee Vining Creek Meadow (Sony A7R II)
See my Sony mirrorless wishlist and other wish lists at B&H Photo.
See my review of Zeiss Loxia and review of Sony mirrorless lenses in Guide to Mirrorless.
A far distance comparison is extremely demanding of any lens, with infinity focus tending to reveal any latent lens asymmetries as well as field curvature effects and across-the-frame performance. As it turns out, this comparison hits the nail on the head in all these areas.
This effort confirms the findings in Shootout vs Zeiss Loxia 50/2: Spuller Lake View to Mt Conness. To see similar results and come to similar conclusions in two different scenes is important when comparing lenses. As discussed in that comparison, the Sony 50mm f1.4 ZA has a skew problem of the same character as seen with two samples of its 35mm f/1.4 ZA sibling.
Sony FE 50/1.4 ZA vs Zeiss Loxia 50/2: Upper Lee Vining Creek Meadow, Sony A7R II
Includes images up to 28 megapixels + large crops, all from f/1.4 through f/6.3.
The about $949 Zeiss Loxia 50mm f/2 Planar makes a very fine landscape lens when stopped down to peak performance range.
* Loxia 50/2 limitations: a decades-old all-spherical design derived from a rangefinder optical formula tweaked to compensate for the sensor cover glass. One simply cannot expect high performance across the field with such a design for the first few stops. But the Planar design is very strong stopped down to f/5.6 - f/8.