I see a purple blob...please enlighten me (not being sarcastic...I actually want to know). Am I looking for uniformity in colour?

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Olympus OM-D E-M5
Panasonic Lumix 12-35mm F2.8
Panasonic Leica Summilux 25mm F1.4
Panasonic Lumix 45-175mm F4-5.6

Follow the colour legend on the right. The closer to magenta, the sharper the lens. Uniformity of colour indicates nearly equal sharpness across the full frame. Generally the corners will sweep up as resolution degrades toward the extremes of the frame, but the 75mm appears to have just about the flattest graphs I've seen (that's a good thing!).

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Nic
E-M5, GH1
Flickr Photostream
>> Insert quote here <<

The blur index is a three dimensional sharpness scale. Blur is the opposite of sharp, so the more blur the less sharp. You can see the scale on the side, both with colors and numbers. The more pinky-purple (which you can also see is the "bottom" of the scale, between 0 and 1 blur units) the sharper it is. The higher up the scale it goes, the blurrier. Generally you'll see the corners pulling up, moving into blue and even into orange. This lens is incredibly flat and low. At 5.6 it is practically blur free, something I have never seen--and I am addicted to lens reviews. As far as sharpness goes, this is clearly something very special. However, they don't talk about out of focus blur at that site. I am debating whether to get this or the Canon 135mm F2 for my 5D. That lens is often called "magical" because it can isolate a distant object, making it sharp with things in front and back of it out of focus. If this little baby can manage to do that to some degree, it may be the one I go for...

Edit: if you click on the scale it will give you a new, interactive one, and you can adjust the F stop and see how focus changes. For a zoom lens you can also manipulate the focal disance.

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Call me Al. Gear:Oly E-PL 5, Pan GF3, 45 F1.8, 14-42 II, Oly 45-150, Pan 14mm and 25mm Summilux

The question is whether you really have a need for a 150mm equivalent lens, regardless of how wonderful it is. My preferences in primes have been 90-105mm and 180mm and not much time spent in between. My 80-200mm use is similar - most shots near one end or the other. YMMV, but this clearly incredible lens doesn't really ring a bell for me...

I'll still be getting this lens BUT.............
Olympus scores an all-time "low" from me by not including a hood with it's premium lens line-up.

My premium Leica MFT lenses have hoods.....

It will be a great lens for indoor sports.

With optical quality that high, it bespeaks potential as a special-purpose landscape lens, esp. for time spent in alpine, high altitude conditions, like the eastern Sierra and especially the White Mountains with their Bristlecones.

Hmmmmmm..... intriguing.

For people not sure about this, I recommend going to flickr and browsing the Canon 135mm, or Sony (Zeiss) 135mm picture galleries.

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Call me Al. Gear:Oly E-PL 5, Pan GF3, 45 F1.8, 14-42 II, Oly 45-150, Pan 14mm and 25mm Summilux

Which is fine, but still not very practical for comparing results, save quire coarsely.

The 'incredibly sharp' part is true enough, and easily seen in all the other reviews (e.g. Pekka Potka's).

But going by the blur charts, it also beats the Olympus 150/2 by a decent margin at all apertures. Which is more than a little surprising.

DH

Well, that's reassuring.

I was on the fence about ordering this... then as soon as the preorder from link Amin popped up- I made mine

I knew it would be of a "higher quality" but wow. It will not be a everyday lens, but when used it will knock my socks off.

I think I'll put in the same category as my CV notkon 25mm in regards to buyers remorse: always thinking "why did I buy this" and when in use "oh- that's right, I love it."