Three lenses in one: Contax CY 85mm F/1.4 AEG

 

Though out the history of Contax, you may find that Contax lenses always have very long production run. Contax 85mm 1.4 has a very very long production run from 1970s until the end of Contax production. And the design of this lens had been finalized in 1950s!  

The one I have is the AEG version and this is the lens having three characters in one package. The later MMJ version don't have this magic due to the difference of the aperture blades.  

At its full opened aperture the creamy of the image with good details make this lens be a very good portrait lens. A perfect circular bokeh is smooth and perfectly blended into the background. But once you close the aperture to f/2, the image was sharp and creepy.   And due to the ninja shape of the aperture which is unique to AEG, the bokeh to the point light source will have a ninja star from f/2 to f/2.8. The bokeh have a very different characteristic. If you would like to have a super sharp lens for landscape, just stop the aperture down to f/4.  At this aperture, the lens are in excellent performance with very high sharpness and even details across the image circle.  The sharpness of this lens at f/2.8 and smaller performs better than a Contax 85mm f/2.8.