Introduction Many of us know the problem – sometimes wide and fast just isn’t wide and fast enough. And then there’s the other problem – the wider and faster you go, the more you are entering stratospheric price levels. However, there might be a solution to these problems – meet the Viltrox AF 16mm f/1.8 FE, available in Sony E-mount and, soon, in Nikon Z-mount. Yes, there are wider and faster lenses, but the Viltrox lens keeps a nice balance by offering a little extra without going downright bonkers. And it does so without breaking your bank account at just…
Author: Klaus
Introduction At the time Canon announced the Canon RF 600mm f/11 IS STM and RF 800mm f/11 IS STM, the photo community was a little confused. While (all-manual) slow, long tele tele prime lenses have been around for decades, these were mostly confined to more or less obscure third-party manufacturers. e.g. The oldies among you may remember the T-mount Samyang/Vivitar/Exakta 500mm f/8 from the 1970s and 80s, but with the emergence of 500/600mm zoom lenses, these vanished into history.So why a modern 600/800mm f/11? There are a couple of reasons, of course. The most obvious one is costs. Canon R-mount…
Review by Klaus Schroiff, published May 2023 Introduction Most of us start photography with an affordable camera kit. This will be sufficient for a while, but eventually, you want to up your game and move towards faster lenses. You can, of course, add some prime lenses, but most will probably upgrade their standard zoom lens first. If you stick to the OEM manufacturer, this can get pretty expensive, but there’s also a nice middle ground occupied by third-party manufacturers. And one of the APS-C format alternatives in Sony-E mount (and Fujifilm X-mount) is the Tamron 17-70mm f/2.8 Di III-A VC…
by Klaus Schroiff, published May 2023 Introduction For decades, full-format standard zoom lenses have been confined to the 24-XX or 28-XXmm range. This only changed very recently in 2020 when Panasonic released their Lumix S 20-60mm f/3.5-5.6 lens. The Panasonic lens was quite an innovation because conventional standard zoom lenses are already hard to design, and a 20-60mm is on an even higher complexity level while remaining quite affordable. It took Sony no less than 3 years to come up with their own interpretation of the topic – the Sony FE 20-70mm f/4 G. Unlike the Panasonic lens, it is…
Review by Klaus Schroiff, published April 2023 Introduction Fast 85mm f/1.4 lenses are hot commodities, but the OEM options tend to be on the expensive side. However, at least Sony users are not without options – and the Sigma 85mm f/1.4 DG DN ART is one of them. It’s actually Sigma’s 2nd 85mm f/1.4 lens in E-mount. The first one was merely a somewhat optimized DLSR lens – whereas the “DN” has been designed specifically for mirrorless cameras. During the late DSLR era, Sigma was known for offering very good but also huge & heavy lenses. This isn’t really true anymore.…
by Klaus Schroiff, published April 2023 Introduction Reviewing a “super zoom” lens is both heaven and hell. It’s heaven because the world is full of shooting opportunities with this much zoom range. And it’s hell for the same reason when having to do the formal testing across many focal lengths in the lab – with results that are often not all that exciting. Anyway, these lenses are popular, so they are an “inevitable” part of the game. This time, it’s about the Canon RF 24-240mm f/4-6.3 USM IS. Canon has a bit of a mixed history regarding super zoom lenses.…
Review by Klaus Schroiff, published March 2023 Introduction Sometimes, albeit rarely, a new lens seems to defy conventions. Straight f/2.8 standard zoom lenses tend to be rather bulky and heavy – even in APS-C format. e.g. The Fujinon 16-55mm f/2.8 has a size of 83.3 x 106 mm and weighs 655g, and the Sony E 16-55mm f/2.8 G isn’t much smaller. So meet the new Sigma 18-50mm f/2.8 DN DC Contemporary coming in at just 285g and a size of merely 61.6×76.8mm. Of course, this comparison is slightly unfair. After all, the Sigma isn’t quite as wide – these 2mm…
Review by Klaus Schroiff, published March 2023 Introduction The release of the Panasonic/Leica DG Summilux 9mm f/1.7 ASPH killed a lot of the market of the emerging Chinese players in the ultra-wide segment – wide(r), fast, small, and affordable were important value propositions for them, and some of this is now basically owned by Panasonic. So what to do when facing the inevitable? You go even more extreme. Meet the Laowa 6mm f/2 Zero-D MFT. On paper, a difference of 3mm may not sound impressive, but it’s far from insignificant in terms of field-of-view. We are talking about 112° vs…
Review by Klaus Schroiff, published February 2023 Introduction Welcome to our new mini-series of vintage lens tests – and this time, it’s not just about some vintage-style lenses but truly about lenses from the 1970s to the early 1980s. In phase I, we’ll have a look at lenses around the 100mm f/2.8 mark with a typical used-market value between $100 to $200. This is probably the financial sweet spot for vintage lenses that you don’t just want to collect but intend to use. There are substantially more expensive (and better) lenses from this era but you have to be quite…
Review by Klaus Schroiff, published February 2023 Introduction Our 2nd 100mm-ish lens in our vintage test series is the Olympus E. Zuiko 100mm f/2.8 in OM mount. The Olympus OM mount was developed by Olympus Corporation for their OM-series 35mm single-lens reflex (SLR) cameras. The mount was introduced in 1972 and was used on several Olympus camera models until the early 2000s. So Olympus manufactured manual lenses well after most others had moved on to AF. Some of their latest lenses feature special glasses, and the price on the used market are often sky-high. However, the 100mm f/2.8 is reasonably…