Nikon AF-S NIKKOR 85mm f/1.4G Pro Reviews

The only thing not to like about this lens is its high price, even though the added cost does bring genuinely improved performance. A mark has been deducted from the overall Performance figure for the trace of chromatic aberration at f/1.4 and for marginally less ‘bite' than was expected in real-world images, but this is an admittedly harsh judgement on so fine a lens.

Nikon has a winner here, the AF-S 85/1.4 performs on a very high level. Sharpness is excellent in the image center at any tested aperture, border and corners follow only slightly behind wide open, reaching excellent resolution stopped down, too. For a portrait lens, this is a quite rare performance characteristic. For the intended usage, portraiture, a lack of sharpness towards the borders and corners usually would not be an issue, but having the extra sharpness available opens up new creative options. Typical for a fast prime the amount of vignetting is rather high at large apertures, the same applies to Bokeh fringing. CAs and distortion are well controlled though. As you'd expect from such a lens it offers very smooth bokeh. The build quality is on a very high level. Thanks to an AF-S drive autofocus action is virtually silent and quite fast for a portrait lens. So, in summary, the lens is no doubt highly recommended!

There is a lot to like in the new Nikon 85mm ƒ/1.4G. The addition of nano-crystal coating will help to contend with flare issues that were something of an issue with the previous 'D' version of the lens. The new AF-S motor makes focusing a snap: if you want to override autofocus results, just turn the focus ring. Much easier than the manual-auto focus switch on the 'D' version. Edge-to-edge sharpness is radically improved in the G version of the 85mm ƒ/1.4, when compared to the D version. However, the $1,700-question: is this an improvement?