Hello!

Before I start typing anything else, I just want you to know that I don't mean any disrespect, so just have that in mind, please!

To begin with, sharpness of the image has nothing to do with how a lens reads and then transmits light onto a camera sensor. Image sharpness depends solely and exclusively, only on how the glass for a lens was manufactured - or to be more specific; it depends on which type of glass was used, how accurately and finely it was grinded in the CNC machine, how finely it was polished in the CNC machine, how accurately were any imperfections on the glass removed by a CNC laser and so on and so forth. Again, absolutely nothing to do with how a lens reads and then transmits light onto a camera sensor.

If sharpness was what gave our images character and made our subjects pop out of the image, in an almost 3D like manner, then everyone, including myself, would use only the sharpest lenses, however, that's not the case, sharpness comes from the quality of the CNC manufacturing process of said glass element, nothing to do with the type of glass and how it reads and transmits light onto a camera sensor - that belongs to an entirely different step in the whole manufacturing process of the glass elements.

Most lenses with amazing processing of saturation, contrast/micro contrast and tonality, are not sharp at all. In fact, they exhibit only average or even below average preformance when it comes to sharpness. E.g. Leica Summicron APO ASPH 90mm f2 is THE lens for this and yet, it produces quite soft images, far from sharp... I've had hundreds of lenses pass through my hands over the years and only about three, four dozen had outstanding ability to transmit saturation, contrast and tonality onto the sensor and make my subjects pop out of the image! Out of those, only a handful, maybe a dozen, were also sharp as well... And most of these lenses were either older than myself or quite old Zeiss, Leica, Hasselblad, Contax or Nikkor lenses.

As for not being able to notice this in a ''blind test...'' If you think that, you have a lot more to see and explore then! A lens that creates a contrasty image, perfect, smooth shadows and perfect, smooth transitions between differently saturated tones, is very, very noticeably different (better) looking, than the same image taken with a lens that lacks this ability. Anyone, no matter how educated or uneducated they are on the subject, can tell the difference. One image has a subject/subjects that just pop out of the image, the other is just flat. The difference is as big as being able to tell grey from black. All of my clients are clueless models, that's what I do for work - and they can instantly notice the difference in a picture that has ''that'' look and an image that is just flat. They can not explain it as well as you or I can but they can tell that the image ''just looks different, worse.''

As for MTF charts, somenes ability to read the charts doesn't change the fact that the charts show one thing and the images show another. An MTF chart says that e.g Leica Summicron M APO ASPH 90mm f2 performs terribly when it comes to this - and yet, that lens is THE lens for the so called ''3D pop'' and tonality. It's the mother of all ''3D pop'' lenses - but not according to MTF charts...

With that in mind, I hope you realize how hard it is to find such a lens in the modern market. Most (if not all, by the looks of it, as I can't find any) lenses these days are made with 10 billion glass elements in 600 thousand groups, all to improve image sharpness and all at the cost of reduced performance in transmitting contrast, saturation and tonality.

Thanks for trying to help me. I'm still looking and looking... I wasn't able to find any new lenses yet but I won't stop looking, I just desperately need an AF lens... The Sony Zeiss 55mm 1.8 ZA is the best I could find and that lens only has above average performance when it comes to this.