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Sirui Sniper 75mm F1.2 AF Review | The Best of the Snipers?
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Jun 7, 2024
Photographer Dustin Abbott shares a deep dive review of the new Sirui Sniper 16mm F1.2 autofocusing wide angle prime for Fuji X-mount (reviewed here), Sony E-mount, and Nikon Z-mount. | Read the Text Review: | Visit the Image Gallery: | Purchase the Sirui Sniper Lenses @ Sirui https://bit.ly/41cbS6t (use code DustinA for 5% off) | B&H Photo https://bhpho.to/47pA875 | Adorama https://howl.me/ck3c6eLTjxp | Amazon https://amzn.to/3uoluhY | Amazon Canada https://amzn.to/3SOi6qH | Amazon UK https://amzn.to/3sCy4K6 | Amazon Germany https://amzn.to/49JAFT9 Check out the DA Merch here: https://bit.ly/TWIMerch | Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/dustinabbott | On the Web: http://dustinabbott.net/ | Sign up for my Newsletter: http://bit.ly/1RHvUNp | Instagram: http://bit.ly/DLAinsta | Facebook: http://on.fb.me/1nuUUeH | Flickr: http://bit.ly/1UcnC0B | 500px: http://bit.ly/1Sy2Ngu Follow Craig @ https://www.instagram.com/craigstoffersen/ Want to support this channel? Use these affiliate links to shop at: B&H Photo: http://bhpho.to/1TA0Xge Adorama: https://howl.me/cjU0LKdp3LN Camera Canada: http://bit.ly/DLACameraCan Sony Canada: https://www.thesonyshop.ca/?ref=abbott Amazon: https://amzn.to/3HrY64d Amazon Canada: https://amzn.to/3qG1p18 Ebay: http://bit.ly/DustineBay Into the AM Clothing: https://bit.ly/intotheAMda and use code DUSTIN10 for 10% off Make a donation via Paypal: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/dustinTWI ============================= Table of Contents: ============================= 0:00 - Intro 1:30 - Build and Design
View Video Transcript
0:00
Hi, I'm Dustin Abbott and I'm here today to give you my review of the Sirai Sniper
0:15
75mm f1.2. Now Sirai Sniper series of lenses is their series of autofocusing fast aperture
0:25
f1.2 prime lenses that was released starting in 2023 and I reviewed the initial series
0:31
of the 23, 33 and then 56mm f1.2 lenses in 2023 but they are back in 2024 with the 16mm
0:40
f1.2 that I just reviewed and then the 75mm f1.2. These two new lenses are definitely
0:48
superior in my opinion to the initial series of lenses and have kind of raised the bar
0:53
in terms of the optical performance here and that's particularly true of the 75mm f1.2
0:59
Now there is already of course an exceptional 75mm f1.2 available for multiple mounts like
1:05
this lens and that's the Viltrox Pro AF 75mm f1.2. As we're going to see however, the Sirai
1:12
is a fairly good alternative in some ways because it is smaller, lighter and cheaper
1:20
and at about $349 offers up a pretty strong value even though the Viltrox is a little
1:25
bit more feature rich. So we'll dive into all of that in today's review. So 75mm is
1:33
a full frame equivalent of 112.5mm so the least conventional focal length. We have essentially
1:39
the full frame equivalent of 24, 35, 50 and 85mm in the first four lenses and so this
1:46
falls somewhere in between 100 and 135mm so not necessarily a conventional focal length
1:52
but while it maybe isn't as flexible as some of the other focal lengths, it does produce
1:57
really stunning images and I actually quite like the focal length on APS-C. And of course
2:04
this is an APS-C only specific lens and so you can get it on Fuji X-mount which I'm testing
2:09
here also on Nikon Z and Sony E mounts as well. As with all of the Sniper series, there
2:16
are three different finish options and so there's a black, a white and a silver finish
2:22
and all of these have a unique design element as a part of it. The black that I'm reviewing
2:26
here has a carbon fiber element. The silver series has some aluminum alloy in the frame
2:33
and then the white series has a ceramic kind of paint section in there and so all of them
2:40
have some unique design qualities to them and they are quite attractive lenses with
2:45
very distinct looks from everything else that's basically on the market. So considering how
2:50
many lenses are on the market at this point, I do give Siri kudos for their design philosophies
2:57
It isn't just copying what everyone else is doing at this point. So this lens is very
3:02
slightly the largest of the series. Most of these have kept a very similar profile and
3:06
in terms of length, they're all within a millimeter of each other but this is a little bit wider
3:11
to accommodate those bigger glass elements but still for a 75mm f1.2, it is small and
3:18
lightweight. 75mm in diameter, so just a few millimeters wider and it is 94mm in length
3:25
so that's 2.95 inches by 3.7 inches. It weighs in at 466 grams or right over 16 ounces, right
3:33
over a pound. It has a slightly larger front filter thread again because you have to accommodate
3:40
bigger glass elements. All the rest of the series has been 58mm up front. This is 67mm
3:47
still a very, very common filter size that is going to be shared with a lot of other
3:52
lenses just unfortunately not the rest of the Sniper series. As noted, this is smaller
3:57
and lighter than the Viltrox lens. I noted this is 75mm by 94mm. The Viltrox is 87mm
4:03
considerably wider, by 101mm, considerably longer. The Viltrox weighs in at 670 grams
4:10
so this is 205 grams lighter and so if that happens to be a priority for you and you just
4:15
find the Viltrox just a little bit too large, this is a great alternative because it is
4:20
smaller and considerably lighter. Now, there is no, as with all of these lenses, there
4:26
is no extra switches or features on here. They do have really good style elements as
4:33
I've mentioned here including a diamond pattern grip surface that's a little bit different
4:37
than the typical ribs you find on most manual focus rings. Manual focus ring works good
4:42
here, about 360 degrees of rotation. I prefer a very slightly heavier damping but it doesn't
4:48
feel bad at all. It has some decent feel to it. I do find as kind of a Fuji quirk, as
4:54
if you want to get all the way to minimum focus distance, it's not just 360 degrees
4:58
you have to rotate just a little bit more to get it to get there. So, anyway, just something
5:03
to consider. All of these sniper lenses do have a USB-C port in the lens mount that does
5:08
allow for firmware updates which is always good because it leaves room for improvements
5:12
to autofocus performance, make sure that they're going to be future proof in terms of compatibility
5:19
So a very important feature to have. We do have an included lens hood. The hoods are
5:25
not quite as nice as the lenses. They're a little bit more plastic-y feeling. The only
5:29
thing that concession to something good is the fact that there is a rib section, kind
5:34
of like what Sigma does that allows you to grip it better. It does bayonet into place
5:39
tightly, however, it feels kind of like you're jamming it there at the end rather than a
5:43
nice lock. And so there's precision in the bayonet on any of these lens hoods. It leaves
5:48
a little bit to be desired in my experience at this point. One thing that I do love is
5:53
that inside we have 11 rounded aperture blades and as you can see, this creates a beautiful
5:58
looking aperture iris. So much glass here and so you can look in and see that. The aperture
6:03
iris looks fantastic and on the practical side, as you can see, even when it's closed
6:07
all the way down, it's still maintaining a nicely circular shape. None of these sniper
6:11
lenses have been great when it comes to minimum focus distance and maximum magnification
6:16
This 75mm is ever so slightly better than the rest of the series. Most of them have
6:21
leveled off at a magnification very low of around 0.10 times. This is a little bit higher
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I estimated at about 0.12 times. You can focus as close as 70cm. This is an area that
6:34
is improved over the Viltrox, by the way. The Viltrox, I think it's only about 85cm
6:39
you can focus and so you get a lower magnification level. So as you can see, it does give you
6:44
a reasonable amount and of course with that huge maximum aperture, you can get close enough
6:48
to obliterate backgrounds. And so I still find it useful even though the magnification
6:54
isn't super high. So overall, a fairly nice build, but not a lot in terms of features
7:00
Unfortunately, no aperture ring here on Fuji, which we're accustomed to having from just
7:04
about every lens. Now on the autofocus side of things, this has not been a huge area of
7:09
strength for the sniper series lenses on Fuji. But then again, everything's a little bit
7:15
worse on Fuji when it comes to autofocus, unfortunately. So it's a little bit hard for
7:20
me as I've reviewed all of these on Fuji to kind of differentiate the lens performance
7:26
versus the camera system liabilities. But I'll just have to report on what I see here
7:32
Just note that what I see may be a little bit better on some other platforms where focus
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is better. So autofocus speed here via the STM focus motor is about average. It's not
7:44
bad really for stills. You can see a visible step in the process, but it gets there quick
7:49
enough. It feels like there's a little bit more thrust in this focus motor to accommodate
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for the bigger elements. And so autofocus speed, if anything, is actually probably better
7:58
than some of the other lenses in the series. So that is progress in the right direction
8:03
The actual motor itself is relatively quiet. You can hear some light whirring and clicking
8:07
if you put it right next to your ear. But unfortunately, there is a fair amount of noise
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when it comes to the actual focus process. And it has to do with the fact that the way
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that Fuji's autofocus works is that the aperture blades close to like a middle position, you
8:23
know, F 2.8, F 3.5, somewhere in that range. And so they either open up or close down depending
8:29
on what your preset aperture is. But it goes back to that other state in between. Every
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time you, if I have to press it, it takes me to my preset aperture. If I take it back
8:38
off, it either opens or closes back down with the aperture blades. What that ends up doing
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is because these aperture, the aperture blade mechanism is not particularly quiet. You will
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hear just a little bit of a clacking sound as it opens and closes. So it does make the
8:54
autofocus process a little bit noisier than what it would otherwise be. Now I did find
9:00
that my focus accuracy, even at F 1.2, was actually quite useful. So that's great. And
9:06
I found that, you know, I was able to pinpoint accuracy with a variety of shots. If my target
9:13
was basically moving slowly or not moving. I did find that, for example, with shots of
9:18
Nala, if she was coming progressively towards the camera, I just found a consistent back
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focus. It wasn't nailing at the iris. It was a little behind. And so it's not great for
9:29
tracking action, but outside of that, things worked pretty well. Now, when it comes to
9:35
video AF, you can really see that this is a stepping motor. You can see in these focus
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pools that I counted, there's about four different steps that you can just count either
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going or coming in any one of those focus pools. So obviously it's not that nice, seamless
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you know, movement back and forth. It's not cinematic. It's a little bit steppy. And so
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I don't love that regard. Obviously. I also found that for my hand test that the lens
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was just really bulky too. It didn't want to focus on either my hand or my face. It
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just didn't want to start focus period. And when I finally, you know, got its attention
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and started focusing, it's still not reactive. And so I'd move my hand out of the way, may
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or may not start focus. And it would be slow enough that by the time I moved my hand back
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it hadn't really locked focus on my eye. And so really not great for video work. Unfortunately
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I do know that a big chunk of this is due to the Fuji platform. Everything else that
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I test is just much better in these video related audio auto-focus test than on any
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of the other platforms. Doesn't seem to matter what lens I'm testing. And so, you know, unfortunately
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that's part and parcel of the Fuji experience. So know that you will probably get a little
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bit better results on Sony or Nikon. I will also say that there is some noticeable focus
10:55
breathing there. And so if that's going to be an issue for you, maybe not the best lens
10:59
for you in that regard. So conclusion is the auto-focus for stills actually worked fine
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for me. As long as I wasn't trying to shoot action, I had good precision. Focus was quiet
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enough. I didn't really notice it and fast enough that it didn't get in my way at all
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So that was fine, but I wouldn't advise this lens for either action or for video work
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if that's your top priority. So finally, let's talk about image quality. And I will follow
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this up at the end of the video with a deep dive breakdown, but I'll give you the overview
11:29
here optical formula. And this is 13 elements in nine groups. This is the standout of the
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sniper series optically. A lot of these, you know, lenses that I've looked at them and
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I've tried to find the strengths amongst some pretty obvious weaknesses, but in this case
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I'm kind of unequivocal. I really, really do like the optical performance here. It starts
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you know, with some great metrics. You can see that when it comes to distortion, I found
11:55
nothing to correct for that is distortion free. As far as vignette, even at F1.2, I
12:01
only found that I needed a plus 45 to correct in the corners. And so that is just about
12:07
a, you know, a little over a stop, about a stop and a quarter. That's not bad at all
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And so a great there. I also found that unlike the 56 millimeter had atrocious amounts of
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longitudinal chromatic aberration fringing before and after the plane of focus. This
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is not quite entirely neutral, but it has so minimal fringing that it just wasn't an
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issue in any of my rural world shots or my test shots. So I was very happy with it in
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that regard. I saw minimal amounts of lateral chromatic aberrations near the corners with
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the lens stop down, but only at very high magnifications. And only if I was looking
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for it specifically, it didn't actually pop up in rural world shots. So very good control
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of fringing as well. The contrast and resolution wide open is actually good, even on this super
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demanding 40 megapixel, uh, you know, Fuji X-Trans sensor. This is the most demanding
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platform I test on and it held up actually quite well, a very usable amount of contrast
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in the center. And even the corners were actually quite decent. And so I found that I could
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shoot shots where it was composed towards the corners, even at F1.2, they looked fine
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And so that is great there. It's, it's not like the Viltrox level, uh, Viltrox in the
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center of the frame is just amazingly sharp and high contrast, even at F1.2. It's not
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quite that level, but it does find a really nice balance between sharpness and then really
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softness of the bokeh. And that sense, I feel like it has a flavor that's similar to the
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Fuji 33 millimeter F1.4 or 1.4 WR lens, a lens that I really liked the balance from
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And I think that this is a really nicely balanced lens. You'll find that that contrast
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will dramatically improve as you stop it on down. It's better still by F2. It's excellent
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Corners are super sharp by F4. You'll find that at landscape apertures, you're getting
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really crisp, highly detailed results. I'm very pleased with that. Diffraction is going to start to show up by F11 on the high resolution body. By F16, it
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is more noticeable F16 being minimum aperture here. The standout here to me is the overall
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rendering and the bokeh. This produces gorgeous bokeh, very soft, very creamy. It's very easy
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to get nice bokeh. And I shot on a variety of conditions and I really never saw anything
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that I thought wasn't good looking. I thought that the bokeh really held up well in a variety
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of situations, really, really gorgeous. So that's a standout here. Shutter resistance, it's not perfect, but it's not bad for a very large aperture telephoto lens
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I get a little bit of ghosting artifacts, but nothing that ever becomes image destructive
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in my opinion. And so I think overall, it's quite good. I even shot coma because I happen
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to be testing the 16mm. So I was like going out, I'm going to shoot it at night, might
15:00
as well throw on the 75mm as well. And the results were fine. It's not necessarily a
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focal length that I always reach for, for shooting astro, but star points are nice and
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clean. There's a little bit of kind of coma deformation towards the corner, but actually
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a lower level of coma than what I saw on the 16mm. And so, and of course there's low vignette
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huge maximum aperture that can suck in light. Yeah, there's a lot to recommend even for
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shooting the night sky with this lens. So in conclusion, this is my favorite lens of
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the series. It's not the most versatile in terms of the focal length, but I love the
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optical performance. It's not maybe as, as great as the Viltrox Pro AF 75mm f1.2 in some
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metrics, certainly not as feature rich or as well made, but it is a beautiful optical
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performance in what is a lighter, cheaper lens. And I think that that obviously has
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its own attraction there. The autofocus as pointed out is not overly sophisticated, but
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it's good enough to work for most people. And if you're looking at one of these other platforms, I think that you'll like it better still on either Nikon or Sony. At the end
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of the day, what helps this lens a lot is that it is very competitively priced. And
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as I've said, it reminds me optically of a lens like that Fuji 33mm f1.4, though obviously
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at something that is close to a third of the price. The fact that it has such a nice nuance
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performance even on the demanding 40 megapixel sensor is impressive to me. So this is of
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all the series, if you're just looking saying, I really would love a 75mm lens or a longer
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bright telephoto lens, this is one that is certainly worth considering. Now, if you want
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more information, you can look in my written review, which is linked to in the description
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down below. There's also an image gallery link there, buying links. And beyond that
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if you want a deeper dive into the optics, stay tuned with me right now, we'll jump into
16:55
it. So we'll start by taking a look at vignette and distortion. As you've saw previously
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there is no distortion to correct here. So on the right, it's the exact same, I haven't
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done anything there. The vignette, I used a plus 45 to correct for really a very clean
17:11
result for being such a large maximum aperture. We can see from this result that while there
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is the tiniest amount of fringing before and after the plane to focus, you can see a little
17:21
bit of magenta there, a little bit of a green blue there. For the most part, though, this
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is very, very minimal. And it didn't really show up in real world shots. You take for
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example, this shot of this is actually raspberry blossoms that are coming and you can see as
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you look at the flowers here, you know, this is high transition, high contrast stuff. You
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can see though, that fringing is just really well controlled. And so that allows there
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to be better contrast and not that bleeding around the edges that we saw with the 56
17:51
millimeter. Now here at an extreme level of magnification, more than 200%, you can see
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there is the tiniest bit of lateral chromatic aberration here at the very edge of the frame
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but it's so minimal that it's not going to be a real factor. I didn't see it in real
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world images at all. So a good control of these aspects. So let's take a look at resolution
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and contrast. This is F1.2 and you're going to see these results at 200% magnification
18:15
on a 40 megapixel XH2 sensor. So in the center of the frame, good detail, good contrast
18:21
a nice strong result. Mid frame also looks pretty good here. And as we pan down, we can
18:27
see holding up well here. As we get to the corners, I'm actually pretty impressed. We
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can see if anything, it's actually almost better here than it is here. And so there's
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a little bit of a rebound there. Now to put this in context, I've got the Viltrox 75 millimeter
18:43
F1.2 here on the right, both of them at F1.2. So we can see looking in the middle of the
18:48
frame that the Viltrox is just really, really pops. Like I said, it's got a whole extra
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level of contrast and detail. Mid frame also is a clear win. However, as we look towards
18:59
the corners, while the Viltrox I would say is a winner, it is by the various smallest
19:06
of margins. It has a little bit more contrast, but you can see as far as the detail and all
19:11
the various textures, it is very, very close here on the sniper lens. Now, if we stop the
19:17
sniper down to F1.4, we can see that contrast does boost a bit. That's true also here in
19:23
the mid frame where you can just see the darks are darker, the whites are brighter. And down
19:29
into the corner, it is very moderate improvement here, but a bit of improvement. You'll see
19:34
a more notable improvement in the corners from F1.4 to F2 as shown here. If we look
19:39
over here in the mid frame, you can see that it's now super sharp at F2. Very strong result
19:45
panning over a little bit further. We can see again a significant improvement there
19:50
at F2 looking in the upper left corner. It's looking considerably better there as well
19:55
And finally, the right corner, much improved. And so we can see a fairly decent centering
20:01
here as well. Now at F2.8 and then at F4, we can see that the center looks fantastic
20:07
We can see that the mid frame, particularly here at F4, mid frame is just sparkling and
20:13
down into the corner. We can see the corner is starting to look really strong here by
20:17
F4 and better still by F5.6. We see that same strong performance through F8 with a mild
20:27
drop off due to diffraction at F11. But you can see by F16 minimum aperture here, the
20:32
image is dramatically softened due to diffraction. Probably want to avoid there. Now if the
20:38
sniper lens can't quite match the overall contrast and detail of the Viltrox, it certainly
20:43
can match it when it comes to the bokeh and probably even exceeded a bit. This is really
20:48
some of the nicer bokeh that I have seen. It's really good at creating that overall
20:53
just creamy effect where backgrounds just completely disappear. And you can see here
20:59
at close focus distances, everything before and after the plane of focus will just vanish
21:04
on you. I went a little further back and I find that the combination of contrast and
21:09
detail, there's enough of it there that it looks great. And then the background also
21:13
looks beautiful and it's to focus. Again, here at about six feet, two meters away, you
21:18
can see the background is beautifully blurred away. Get a little bit closer and that blur
21:23
starts to increase. And if you get really close minimum focus distance here, you know
21:28
in the midst of other blades of grass, it is just completely disappeared, beautifully
21:33
blurred out. This is probably the worst result that I could get as far as the flare performance
21:38
You can see there's a little bit more of a ghosting pattern, but for the most part, I actually saw quite good results. Here's another shot where I'm shooting through the slats
21:46
and you can see that really the amount of flare is fine here. In this shot where I've
21:52
got the sun right in the frame, there's a little bit of a ghosting pattern here, but
21:56
contrast is held up. It's certainly not falling apart. Then finally, going back to coma for
22:02
a moment, let's look at the night sky here. You can see around these really bright point
22:06
star points or galaxies. You can see that there really is not much there in terms of
22:12
fringing. So that is impressive. If we go towards the very corner, you can see that
22:17
the star points are no longer perfectly round, but neither are they growing wings or anything
22:22
So it looks fine. Then of course that very bright maximum aperture means that it helps
22:26
a lot. I shot at F 1.2 here and I shot at only ISO 1600, which allows me to get cleaner
22:33
in results because the lens can suck in so much light. So overall, while it's not as
22:39
contrasty as the Viltrox lens, I do think that this lens finds a really nice blend between
22:44
sharpness contrast, but then also the very creamy bokeh and just nice rendering in general
22:51
So thank you for hanging around till the end and I hope that the optical breakdown has given you a better sense of the overall performance of this lens and can help you
22:59
to make an informed decision as to whether or not it's a lens for you. Thanks for watching
23:03
Have a great day and let the light in