Viltrox LAB 135mm vs Samyang AF 135mm | There Can Only Be One Winner!

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[Music]
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hi I'm Dustin Abbott and I'm here for
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another one of my head-to-head versus
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episodes the fact that the new uh vro AF
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135 mm f1.8 lab series lens is so
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similar in price to the existing samyang
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AF 135mm f1.8 makes it pretty logical to
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put them head-to-head particularly when
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I happen to have both them here at the
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same time and can do a whole lot and I
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have done a lot of head-to-head
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comparisons and a variety of scenarios
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to try to parse out where these two
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lenses diverge in their overall
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performance now there's no question if
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you've seen my review of the lab 135 MIM
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it is undoubtedly a very special lens
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and so we're going to see if the samyang
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can keep up and where you should spend
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your hard-earned money if you're in the
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market for a 135 mimet portrait option
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so first of all I'm going to give you
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some reasons to choose the samyang blue
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side in our comparison today and then
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I'll give you some reasons to choose the
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vro red side here today and then give
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you my overall final conclusions at the
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end and if you want even more after that
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I'm going to do a detailed Optical
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breakdown putting them head-to-head and
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actually showing you um back at the lab
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how they compare so let's dive in let's
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talk about some reasons to choose the
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saming first of all is price now
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interestingly when the samian came to
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Market its original MSRP was actually
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higher than what the vro is coming to
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Market at however it was pretty
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surprising how quickly the price of the
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samyang dropped and So currently you can
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get it for
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$799 and it's been available for even
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cheaper in some really big uh promotions
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at some point down I think more into the
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$699 range whereas the MSRP for the vrs
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is $899 so it's a $100 difference at the
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moment and so if you're all about the
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price the samyang is the cheaper of the
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two more significant I think is the fact
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that the samyang is significantly
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lighter than what the vroo is vro is
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actually the heaviest 135 mimer I have
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ever tested which is saying something
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since I've reviewed a couple of Zeiss uh
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really three Zeiss 135 mm lenses over
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time and so it is the samyang is only
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772 G or 27 o versus a wpp and, 1300 G
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or nearly 46 o for the VR and so that is
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obviously a huge huge disparity in
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weight and about
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5 28 G difference and so you're
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definitely going to notice that less
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noticeable but still worth mentioning is
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the fact that also the size is a little
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bit different most notably when it comes
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to the overall length the samyang is 130
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mm or right over 5 in in length whereas
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the vrox is 145. 7 mm or 5 and 3/4 in
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now putting them side by side that
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height difference is a little less
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obvious for a couple of reasons the
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samyang's lens hood is um it is actually
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considerably deeper than what the VES is
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and so if you remove that out of the
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equation take the cap off samyang you
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can see there's a little bit more of a
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difference there and it becomes even
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more if you remove the actual rear caps
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whereas the rear cap for the filtr is
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lower profile whereas the samyang is not
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so much and so once you take those
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variables out to play you can see that
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the uh size difference is a little bit
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more significant than at first glance
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now the lab series lens is so good
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optically that it's hard to find any
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area of advantage for the samang but I
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did note that at the very edges the
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corners I would argue that the samyang
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is maybe a hair better than what the
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vrox is there and that's about all I can
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grab at when it comes to the overall
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Optical performance so a fairly short
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list of advantages for the same
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because this vro lens is a champ in a
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lot of ways so let's talk about reasons
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to buy the vro one of the big advantages
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here very similar to when I did the
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head-to-head comparison between the
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samyang and the 135mm GM lens is the
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simple reason that autofocus is just not
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at the same level for these lenses the
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uh vro lab series Lens comes with dual
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vcm motors making it more similar to the
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GM lens than the samyang which is
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working with just one Focus motor and
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not as high powerered a motor as either
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one of the ones found in the vtrs so as
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a byproduct autofocus speed is
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noticeably snappier and more confident
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in any kind of situation in the VTR and
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I particularly noticed it when shooting
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a portrait session when I went back and
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forth it was pretty much night and day
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between the vro and the samyang in
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overall performance and so definitely a
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big big win for autofocus speed and kind
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of connected to that number two is more
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reliable autofocus and you can see here
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in this video comparing the two that
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there's just much more Focus confidence
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uh for doing video or for doing Stills
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but here we're demonstrating video just
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much more focused confidence for the vro
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doesn't do any of the pulsing it just
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locks on back and forth with greater
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confidence and so definitely a win there
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when it comes to the vro performance it
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also has a higher grade of build so yeah
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it's carrying a lot of extra weight but
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it has more thorough weather ceiling
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it's also not engineered plastics it's
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got a magnesium alloy body just like
5:30
your if you have a good quality camera
5:32
body it's made out of magnesium alloy
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and as well that means that this in
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theory should be an extremely durable
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tough lens that is just at a different
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grade of build than what the samyang and
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its engineered Plastics nothing wrong
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with the samyang's build but the vtx's
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build is just at another level and
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unlike some metals magnesium alloy you
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already know it's tough because your
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camera body can take a lot of beating
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and hold up very very well another
5:57
Advantage for the vro is it has a little
5:59
bit more sophisticated approach to
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aperture now I don't love all the
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choices that were made here when it
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comes to the aperture but we do have a
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dedicated aperture ring which we don't
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have on the VR we have the ability to
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declick the aperture just a little bit
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more aperture control in general and of
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course uh it has the L LCD screen on the
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top that will give you um you know
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readout on various bits of information
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including the aperture that you're at
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obviously none of that is replicated on
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the samyang that leads us to point
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number five and that is that there's
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just more features here on the vro
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versus the samang it also has while
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there is one function button on the the
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uh samyang lens there's actually two
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different function buttons on the vro
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the ability to con to uh set AB Focus
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pulls ability to just customize the lens
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more thoroughly it's Bluetooth enabled
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it just has a lot going on that this
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more sophisticated than what the sing
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has to
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offer the vrox also has slightly higher
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magnification and that in and of itself
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is not a huge deal the samyang is 0.24
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times vrox is 0.25 times but more
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impressive is that the up close
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performance because of some floating
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elements in the design you can hear it
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rocking back and forth when it is
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disconnected like that um there is
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floating elements but those are designed
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to produce better up close performance
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and it definitely does flatter plan of
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focus better contrast better DET detail
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and so up close it's able to deliver you
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you really although it's not macro
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levels of magnification it is macro
7:33
levels of resolution and contrast and so
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that gives it another pretty notable
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Advantage if you like doing up close
7:39
shots as a part of your overall
7:41
repertoire it also has a much better
7:45
Center Performance and much stronger
7:47
mid-frame performance it is an
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incredibly sharp lens incredibly high
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contrast and it's not just in the test
7:53
chart but in many head-to-head
7:55
comparisons I just felt like the overall
7:58
micro contrast and detail it could
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render was just just very noticeably
8:03
higher on the vro lens because it is
8:05
probably the most exceptional 135
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millimeter V or lens that I've been able
8:10
to review period which I've reviewed
8:12
some really great ones and so that says
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a lot to me it also shows better flare
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resistance and uh not that samyang is
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bad but the vro is better and so in
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situation side by side there would be
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some different artifacts that would come
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into play with the samyang that I just
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didn't see on the vtrs surprisingly for
8:31
being such a sharp lens and considering
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how much better the samyang was than the
8:36
GM lens when it came to the softness of
8:38
the the bokeh the vrox is better still
8:41
and again in head-to-head comparisons
8:43
every time I preferred the bokeh quality
8:46
that came off of the vro lens it is just
8:49
it's an incredible lens that does both
8:50
sharpness and softness particularly well
8:54
also while neither is bad the vrox wins
8:58
when it comes to Distortion and vignette
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namely because it doesn't have any of
9:02
either it is Distortion free and it is
9:04
shockingly vignette free as well and so
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it does have an advantage in both of
9:09
those areas I also noted as just a real
9:11
world advantage in all of my head
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head-to-head comparisons is that the vrs
9:15
consistently metered faster than what
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the samyang lens did while producing an
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equally bright image which tells me that
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the light transmission on the vild TR is
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superior to that on the samyang and so a
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pretty long list of advantages
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um from build autofocus to image quality
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for the vro Lin so in conclusion the
9:36
only real advantages for the samyang lie
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in the fact that it is much much lighter
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and so that's a big deal to you this is
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still a very good lens and it is
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considerably lighter than what the
9:45
viltrox lens is it is slightly cheaper
9:48
though I consider that to be maybe less
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of a real world Factor because the price
9:52
difference isn't huge between the two
9:54
but if those two things are big
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variables for you then the sanyang takes
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a win there but in basically every other
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category the vro has superlative build
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it has superlative feature set it has
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much superlative autofocus it has a
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better overall image quality performance
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it is my clear choice if you are on a
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Sony e-mount right now and you're
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looking for 135 mm lens 900 bucks is
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money well spent because this is
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probably the best lens under $1,000 that
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I've ever tested in terms of the overall
10:26
package that you're getting you're going
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to have to deal with some size and
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weight waight but if you're willing to
10:30
endure that you are essentially getting
10:33
something like a autofocusing otus lens
10:36
it's really really special now if you
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want more information you can either
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check out my full review either text or
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video of both of these lenses which I'll
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link in the description down below
10:46
there's buying links to both of them
10:48
there and now if you want to deeper dive
10:49
into those head-to-head comparisons
10:51
optically stay in tuned with me right
10:53
now we're going to jump into that
10:54
together all right let's have some fun
10:57
comparing these two excellent lenses so
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you see the vro on the left and
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nothing's going to change as far as
11:03
comparisons because the vro is perfect
11:06
there's no vignette there's no
11:09
Distortion meanwhile you can see a tiny
11:12
bit of pin cushion Distortion and
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definitely a bit of vget on the samyang
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a minus one largely takes care of that P
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pin cushion Distortion and a plus 28 so
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only about a stop of Ven yet in the
11:23
corners not bad but again the vro is
11:26
Flawless there so samyang Falls a little
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bit behind now when it comes to
11:30
magnification as noted previously the
11:33
magnification on the VR is just a hair
11:35
higher than what it is on the samyang
11:38
bigger difference however is that when
11:40
you look here at a like close 100%
11:43
magnification you can see just how much
11:45
better the contrast and the detail is on
11:47
the vrs here compared to the samyang
11:50
which just by comparison looks
11:51
considerably softer the textures aren't
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nearly as as tightly resolved so the
11:56
micro contast up close it just really
11:58
favors the vro a much stronger
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performance if we look up here in this
12:02
text area you can see also that the
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those floating elements allow the the
12:09
vro lens to have a very flat plane of
12:11
focus which you can see is just not
12:12
quite the case with the samyang so here
12:14
on an old SLR we can see if we punch
12:17
into the center of the frame we can see
12:20
that there's you know good detail and
12:22
contrast on both but you can just see
12:24
that the blacks are ink here on the vro
12:28
lens you can also see there's a little
12:29
bit of fringing that's showing up here
12:32
on the samyang not bad but definitely
12:34
present whereas it's more neutral on the
12:37
viltrox lens you can see that the bocast
12:39
circles they're just a little bit bigger
12:42
and softer than they are on the samyang
12:44
lens and in fact if you look at the
12:46
defocus area it's just generally a
12:47
little bit softer one final thing I want
12:49
to point out vr's meters at 1100th of a
12:53
second saming at 18 180th of a second so
12:56
again we see just a very consistent
12:58
about that third stop difference in the
13:00
overall metering now in this shot you
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can see even looking at it at a global
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level you can see that the contrast is
13:07
just better on the vro lens and if we
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punch in there to a pixel level you can
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see there's definitely just more
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fringing that is disrupting the overall
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textures whereas with the vrox lens just
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a little bit more pop if you look up in
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this area here you can see in the metals
13:23
that there's just a little bit better
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texture showing up and also you can see
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a little bit of fringing here in the
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specular highlights whereas on the vro
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lens they're more neutral you can see
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looking here as compared to here some
13:34
fringing present that just isn't present
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on the vro lens now this shot is set up
13:39
to see if we can find any kind of
13:41
fringing showing up which often shows up
13:43
in these there is definitely you can see
13:46
a bit of fringing here on some of these
13:48
edges in the samyang that really was
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didn't end up being my biggest takeaway
13:52
however you can see if you look at the
13:53
plane of focus here on the uh the vrox
13:56
lens you can just see how better much
13:58
better the micro contrast is than what
14:00
the samyang lens is just all throughout
14:02
the darks are darker there's uh just
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more delineation around the edges here
14:07
of the Engravings they're just a little
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bit softer and less defined on the
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samyang lens now in this shot here a
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couple of things we're going to look at
14:15
first of all when it comes to the
14:16
overall geometry you can see that both
14:19
of them show at f1.8 some cat ey type
14:22
deformation you can see however that
14:25
shapes are still a little bit more
14:27
circular they're moving a little bit
14:28
more circular a little more deformed on
14:30
the samyang so one thing to note there
14:32
then if we take a look at a pixel level
14:35
once again we can see that the various
14:37
textures and the contrast the micro
14:39
contrast in those textures is just
14:41
stronger on the VR than what it is on
14:43
the samyang lens so we'll briefly take a
14:45
moment to look at test charts and then
14:47
we'll go back to more interesting real
14:48
world stuff here in just a second but
14:51
taking a look at a test chart this is 61
14:53
megapixels at 200% magnification in the
14:56
center of the frame you can see just how
14:58
much better the V procs is you've
15:00
probably already seen that theme you can
15:01
see even on the chart testing how that
15:03
the micro contrast and the overall
15:05
detail is just really it's a lot
15:08
stronger on the vro lens we look at the
15:10
mid-frame and it's probably even truer
15:12
here the vro is just extremely extremely
15:15
sharp still we pop on down here as we
15:18
start to move towards the corners vro is
15:21
definitely stronger in this area as we
15:23
move on down to this zone right here
15:25
this is starting to be the area where I
15:27
think that right off towards the where
15:29
the samyang has a bit of an advantage
15:30
and I would say in this Zone I favor the
15:32
samyang and then if we go right down to
15:34
the corners I would say that I also
15:37
favor the samyang not by a wide margin
15:39
in this area I like the samyang a little
15:41
bit better as we get right out here to
15:43
the edge the vro is actually holding up
15:45
a little bit better when you get right
15:47
off to the very edge of the frame
15:49
stopping on down to f2.8 you can see
15:51
then in the center of the frame while
15:52
the samang has gotten a lot better the
15:54
vro still is just it's just very intense
15:57
in terms of the contrast and detail just
16:00
still everything is a little bit better
16:01
defined we go up here to the mid-frame
16:03
again samyang is improved but not to the
16:06
extraordinary level of the vro lens if
16:09
we look down into the corners the
16:11
samyang has improved a bit more in the
16:13
corners and so again it's better right
16:15
here than what the vro is and right off
16:18
here towards the edge it's it's better
16:21
although I think that the textures are
16:22
actually a little better defined on the
16:24
vrox lens by the time you get to F4
16:27
however the vrox has now not only caught
16:29
up but has surpassed the samyang and
16:33
that obviously it's still better right
16:35
off to the edge look at this writing
16:36
here which you can't hardly read there
16:38
on the samyang in this Zone you can see
16:40
that the vro is caught up there we pop
16:42
over to this other side of the frame and
16:44
we can see that both of them look really
16:46
good however the vro looking the hair
16:48
the vro has just got better contrast and
16:51
detail both of them look good but the
16:53
vrox looks better going back to some
16:55
three-dimensional objects just a few
16:57
observations here we you can see that
17:00
looking at the glass bottle you can see
17:02
just again micro contrast is just better
17:05
on the VTR but also at the same time the
17:08
bouquet is arguably a little bit softer
17:11
um on the vro lens and so it's managing
17:13
to win on both ends which is pretty rare
17:16
this particular scene you can see that
17:18
for once they're metered the same but
17:20
the samang image looks lighter not
17:22
because it has more light transmission
17:24
but you can see because of the bright
17:25
Sun there's just a lot more veiling that
17:27
is taking place and so uh losing some
17:30
contrast there and you can see that in
17:32
the actual textures if we go into a
17:35
pixel level again the vro is really
17:37
holding just really tight on all of
17:40
those edges no bleeding whereas you can
17:42
see some of them are just a little bit
17:44
softer looking on the samyang lens just
17:47
not quite able to hold hold that off the
17:50
same way we look in just this area that
17:53
is defocused we can see that again this
17:57
the specular highlights are just a a
17:58
little bit bigger and softer than what
18:00
they are on the samyang samyang suffers
18:02
from a little bit of fringing there and
18:04
so just in general in this image you can
18:06
see the background is just a little less
18:08
busy and just a little cleaner looking
18:11
and this shot you know again it's
18:13
composed identically but you can see
18:15
that the sun is coming through has
18:17
caused a lot more disruption to the
18:19
overall image uh just various flare
18:22
artifacts here uh it's it's fairly
18:25
artistic I think on the samyang but if
18:26
the goal is flare resistance then
18:28
certainly the vrox is winning that
18:31
particular competition holding up its
18:33
contrast better and the image is just
18:35
just more consistent in general one
18:37
final example here is when it comes to a
18:40
portrait comparison and there's a few
18:41
different things I'm going to point out
18:42
here first of all if we look closely at
18:45
the faces here so you can see that there
18:48
is just better skin texture there's more
18:51
detail microcontrast in the various skin
18:53
textures there of my model you can see
18:56
that in his beard the there's just a
18:58
more Rich contrast in all the individual
19:00
hairs which is a little bit softer
19:02
looking here on the saming you can see
19:04
if you look at the eyelashes which are
19:06
really clearly delineated on the vro
19:08
lens softer here on the samyang lens and
19:11
so definitely a win there I would also
19:13
argue that the skin tones look a little
19:15
bit richer on the vtrs than what they do
19:18
um on the samyang if we look over here
19:20
to the side you can really see quite a
19:22
difference in this image to where the
19:23
background is just much more noticeably
19:25
soft on the vro lens versus the uh the
19:29
samyang here and the composition isn't
19:33
identical and so part of that is is I
19:35
think the I was standing maybe a foot
19:37
closer when shooting with the vtrs but
19:39
just in general observation when
19:41
shooting with these lenses out there I
19:43
just I ended up really favoring the look
19:45
of images I got with the vrox lens so
19:48
hopefully all these various Optical
19:50
tests have given you a better
19:52
appreciation of which lens either you
19:54
prefer or maybe which one that you can
19:56
live with as always thanks for watching
19:58
have a great day and let the light in
20:01
[Music]

Viltrox LAB 135mm vs Samyang AF 135mm | There Can Only Be One Winner!

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