7Artisans 55mm F1.4 Review | 4K

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Hi, I'm Dustin Abbott, and I am here today to give you my review of the seven artisans 55 millimeter F1.4 lens
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This is for a variety of APSC mirrorless cameras along with M43
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So as a 55 millimeter F1.4, that makes this basically a prime portrait
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lens and so on APSC with a 1.5 times crop factor that would include like Sony or
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Fuji you're looking at 82.5 millimeters in full frame equivalent and then on I'm reviewing it on
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Canon EFM that's a 1.6 times crop factor that's 88 millimeters full frame equivalent and then
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finally on M43 with a two times crop factor that's 110 millimeter full frame equivalent so all of those
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of course fall to varying degrees, but all within the sweet spot of what a portrait lens constitutes
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I also understand that a lot of times the gear that I review, a lot of you feel a little left
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out of the cold because of the price point. Photography is expensive. Of course, I don't need to tell
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you that. And so I know that some of you are frustrated because of how expensive photography gear is
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Fortunately, however, this is a lens that is probably within most people's budget. And so in the U.S
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It runs around $125. And in places like the UK, for example, it's well under 100 pounds
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European market, around $129. And so, you know, at least more affordable
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But just because it's affordable, does it mean automatically it's a lens that you should consider
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So why don't we explore together and take a look at whether or not this seven artisans 55mm F1.4 is a lens that you should consider for your mirrorless camera
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Let's jump in and let's take a look at the build and the design here. So let's take a closer look at this seven artisans, 55 millimeter F1.4
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Just a quick look at how it comes packaged. You know, pretty straightforward there, but I'll give it this
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It's a better packing than what the inexpensive first-party lenses from Canon compact like
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So what you've got is a pretty compact lens here, particularly when you consider that this is essentially the equivalent of an 85-millimeter, you know
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F1.8 to F2 lens on full frame and so it's very compact in that. So overall with it's everything here is made of metal and so as a result it's got a little bit more heft than you know a plastic fantastic type lens. It weighs in at 272 grams or 9.59 ounces. So in an absolute sense it's not all that heavy. But you know it's not far off the weight of this 18 to 150 millimeter zoom despite being you know pretty close to half the the the over
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overall length. The length itself here is 55 millimeters, a little over two inches, and it is 53 millimeters
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in diameter, leaving us a 49 millimeter front filter thread. Now, one thing that is worth noting
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here, kind of the standout, is that you've got a 14 bladed aperture and a round aperture
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and so you can see when stopped down. You really do maintain a very nice circular shape
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and so kudos to them on that kind of nice feature. your ring here it manual everything no electronics So manual aperture moves nice and smoothly It is a declipped aperture and so you can rack through the whole aperture range from F1 to F16
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without any detents along the way. And then below that you have your manual focus ring
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Now I did note a little in the field that if you're going fast, you will feel almost a little bit of
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slippage on the manual focus ring. It could be the type of
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The tolerances could be a little bit tighter there, but the overall damping outside of that is fairly smooth
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I actually mostly notice that kind of feeling of slippage right towards infinity
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And so anyway, that's where I note that. You will notice you come towards minimum focus of 0.35 meters or 1.2 feet
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That it does extend to its fullest length, and so it extends out about a little over a centimeter
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In addition, when you go towards minimum focus. The amount of magnification, like most 85 millimeter lenses, is only average at best, and so it's not going to be a macro-type lens
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But other than that bit of slippage in the focus ring, I think the construction here overall is really quite nice
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I have to say that I continue to be impressed really by the overall degree of build that is in a lot of these inexpensive lenses
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Now, I recognize that there is some sample variation, and often the tolerances aren't quite as high on some of these inexpensive
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lenses and so in some cases you get a really really great one in other cases some people have found
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some defects there's probably some truth and some reality to that but at the same time if you get
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a nice copy of this it's it's really a really nicely made little lens and of course a great form
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factor for the focal length and maximum aperture as far as the focus goes this is of course manual
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focus only and i've commented on the focus action already i will say that there is enough
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focus row here. It's about 130 or 40 degrees. It's enough for me that I didn't have any
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issues with focus precision. And, you know, there are a lot of focus aids on mirrorless cameras
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And so manual focus isn't nearly as daunting as what it used to be on DSLR. I would say
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you know, mostly just using focus overlay, even without going to the further kind of extent of
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magnifying the image more. Even just using focus overlay, I would say I had about an eight
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80% to 85% keeper rate. And so with a little practice, it certainly is possible
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I know that probably most people, not all people, but most people would prefer to have auto focus
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in the lens like this. But the reality is that it is a workable situation
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if you're on a budget. And so how about the image quality
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Let's dive in and take a little bit of a deeper look at the performance of this little lens
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So let's start by taking a look at vignette and distortion. Fortunately, on the distortion front, you can see it's basically non-existent
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There's not really anything there to correct. There is definitely some vignette that operates in a fairly linear pattern
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You can see it's starting to move into kind of a center two-thirds there
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So as you can see, I move the slider over to a plus 55, midpoint all the way to the left
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and we've got a nice, clean result. So, you know, great on the distortion, vignette is pretty easy to cope with
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Now if we take a look at longitudinal chromatic aberrations what we going to find is that there is basically a fair bit of spherical aberration and so you don have super high contrast You can definitely also see some purple fringing before the plane of focus green afterward
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and you can definitely see it here manifested as well. All of that results in a little bit lower contrast than what I would like to see
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If we take a look at a rural world, F1.4 result, we can definitely see some green fringing out here
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and so you're definitely going to see some of that in some defocused areas
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In this portrait shot, a couple of the transition areas, you can see a little bit of purple fringing up there
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And along these lines here, we have definitely got some purple fringing
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So, you know, at wide apertures, you do have a little bit of chromatic aberration that is definitely visible
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So if we jump to our test chart and we go to a two to one pixel level, as I typically test at
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this is on a 24 megapixel Canon EOS M5, EOSM5. So you can see that contrast, as we saw, is a little bit low
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Resolution is not too bad. The information is there, but that low contrast is affecting textures
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You can see it here. There's not a ton of acuity, and contrast is not significant here
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Looking off into the corner, we can see that acuity is really quite low in the corner
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and so our details are not really crisp. They're a little bit muddy looking
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If we take that out into the real world, we can see at F1.4. this is at a one-to-one pixel level
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that, you know, there's just not a lot of really sharp delineation
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of any of the details there. So that lower contrast definitely has an impact
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Now, for portrait work, it's not so bad. You can see that it's not super sharp around the eyes
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It's not terrible, however. And then our trade-off, however, as we're going to see
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is that the bouquet is quite nice. As a portrait lens, it's actually quite good
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And here, I move closer and stop down just a little bit, and you can see definitely a little bit more detail there
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and so skin tones look better. So as a budget portrait option, not terrible for sure
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So if we go from F1.4 to F1.8, we see a little increase in contrast
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It's still not incredible there mid-frame, not a whole lot of improvement yet
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And down in the corner, more contrast, but definitely not more resolution
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At a full stop down to F2, we're definitely starting to see some corner improvement
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You can definitely see not only better contrast, but you're starting to see a little bit more detail
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Back in the center of the frame, image quality is definitely starting to look better, though not fantastic
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At F2.8, however, things are starting to look fairly decent in the center of the frame
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Definitely improvement in the midframe, midframe looking fairly good now. And also, the corner performance is really not bad at this point
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Stopping on down to F4, now we have fairly good performance in the corner
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Stopping on down to F5.6, we can see a better performance yet
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And so once you have stopped down, there is some pretty good sharpness across the frame
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In a real world F5.6, one-to-one pixel level here, we can see that actually looks quite good across the frame
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And so it makes a pretty compelling landscape option when it is stopped down
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So at our minimum focus distance of 0.35 meters or 35 centimeters, you can see that maximum
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magnification is more like what you see on an 85 millimeter lens It is not particularly high and image quality at that minimum focus distance is not particularly amazing at F1 So what we see near
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that minimum focus is that while again our contrast and sharpness is not great
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bouquet looks really really nice and that turns out to be a real strength for the
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lens. As you can see here the bouquet is really really nice and creamy and so
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that combined with nice color makes the image look good overall. Also here colors look
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really fantastic and of course I think that helps a little bit being on a canon
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body. I still am partial to canon colors but looks really nice
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here. In this shot here you know there's a little bit of chaos there from all the little glisting
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lights but I think at the same time that the bouquet looks quite nice
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and here I think colors look really really rich and so there
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are some strengths to be sure. Finally let's take a look at this image globally
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because you know sometimes we get lost in the weeds of looking at the details. The reality
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is if you're on a budget and you're not looking at a pixel level. It looks okay at a pixel level, not incredible
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Looked at globally, however, it's a lovely image. Beautiful bouquet, that's definitely a real strength for the lens
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And that 14 bladed aperture means that you do retain that nice bouquet in terms of circular shape, even with the lens stopped down some
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So overall, between the color and the bouquet, I'm willing to live with a little bit of, you know, lack of acuity on the sharpness, because the overall images look quite nice
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So definitely I would say more good than bad. The lack of correction of some aberrations does rob us of some wide open sharpness
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However, if this lens was more corrected, there's a good chance it would be significantly larger and more expensive
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So I don't know that I'm necessarily surprised by that outcome. On a positive note, however, I feel like the bouquet and the color actually punches well above its price point
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And that bouquet is really beautiful from the lens. On top that, I'll also say on the note of bouquet and aperture, that is a beautiful looking aperture
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If you care about lens design, take a look inside here. That is a great looking 14-bladed aperture
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And so the bouquet is definitely, it's sweet. And so if you are a person that is more into the global look of images, you care more about the image than you do pixel peeping at the fine detail
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You might actually really like this lens. I think that the look of images from it are actually quite nice
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And while it doesn't hold up always on a pixel level because those spherical aberrations do remove some contrast
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some sharpness of fine details at white apertures, the overall look of the images is beautiful
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And as a portrait photographer, that may also be right down your alley
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If you care more about pixel peeping, I think you need to dig a little deeper in your wallet
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and move up to a larger, more expensive lens with greater correction
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But I suspect for a lot of people, this lens will be good enough and is a great compliment to maybe a kit lens
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to give you a portrait option. I'm Dustin Abbott, and if you'll look in the description down below
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you can find linkage to my image gallery, so you can take a closer look at these photos
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There's also some buying links there if you'd like to purchase one for yourself. Beyond that, linkage to follow me on social media
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to become a patron, to sign up for my newsletter. And if you haven't already, please click that
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subscribe button right here on YouTube. Thanks for watching. Have a great day

7Artisans 55mm F1.4 Review | 4K

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7Artisans 55mm F1.4 Review | 4K

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