7Artisans AF 85mm F1.8 STM Review | High Quality Budget Option Under $300?

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Hi, I'm Dustin Abbott
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Several months ago I did a review of the first autofocusing lens from the company 7Artisans
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That was the 7Artisans AF 50mm f1.8. Since that point I've done a subsequent review of an APS-C specific lens, 27mm f2.8
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But I am back with the next lens in the more premium series, full frame, larger aperture
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lenses and that is the autofocusing 85mm f1.8 STM. Now this lens is priced a little bit higher, it's $299 vs $229 US dollars, but it is also
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improved in all areas as we're going to see as a part of this review
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And even at the price point a little bit higher of around $300 US dollars, it is still cheaper
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than just about all of the autofocusing 85mm options available on Sony E-mount, which is
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what I'm reviewing today. And it offers up a very impressive optical performance
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So is it worth buying? Well that's what we're going to explore as a part of today's review, right after a word
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So as noted I am reviewing this lens in Sony E-mount. I will note with the 50mm lens it also released initially only in Sony E-mount
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They have followed up with a Nikon Z-mount version. Since that point I suspect we'll see the same for the 85mm lens
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As noted the $300 price point, the only lens that is cheaper is the Mike AF 85mm f1.8 which
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comes in at $200 but it is terrible by comparison. It's a lens that I wouldn't recommend unless you have an absolutely tight budget but I
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would 100% recommend you save up a little bit more and purchase this lens instead of
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that Mike lens. It falls anywhere between with the other kind of cheap alternatives it falls about $100
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cheaper than most of them. For example the probably the most notable comparison would be the Viltrox AF 85mm f1.8
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Mark II. It's about $100 more and so on the value proposition this lens stacks up I would say
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fairly well. Now when it comes to the size it is not all that different than what the 50mm lens was
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but while the 50mm felt kind of large for a 50mm lens with just a maximum aperture of
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f1.8 this lens not so much. It's actually the same diameter 72mm or 2.83 inches but it's a little bit shorter
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This lens is only 96mm versus 104mm right around 4 inches in length and so it is definitely
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a little bit more compact though when it comes to the weight the weight is a hair heavier
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it's at 412 grams or right under 15 ounces in terms of the weight
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The build quality here though is very substantial all metals in the barrel it feels like a actual
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feels quite premium in the hand in many ways in fact it reminds me of the Sony's Iceplane
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R 50mm f1.4 in terms of the build quality which in my mind is a very complimentary thing
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It's got that same anodized metal look to it kind of a satin finish you know metal focus
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ring metal aperture ring everything here feels you know fairly top-notch which is pretty
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surprising at this price point. As noted the manual focus ring itself is all in metal now I will note that the damping
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is a little bit on the firm side however it feels really really precise it's maybe not
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you know I just did some Voigtlander reviews and they have amazing manual focus rings and
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this is maybe a little bit on the heavy side when it comes to the damping but what it feels
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like to me is again very much like the Sony's Iceplane R that I owned for years where it's
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it feels pretty close to a true manual focus experience and so it's it's actually quite
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a premium feel in my mind. As far as the feature set we've actually got some further improvement here we have a pretty
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decent amount of specifications or features we've got an AF-MF switch as we did on the
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50mm lens however the feel of this switch is definitely improved the other the other
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switch felt a little indefinite when it came to you know where whether you were actually
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locked into the mode there's a more definite click here so that feels better there's the
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addition of a function button or focus hold button and and so that can be programmed to
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a variety of functions from within the camera body and again the button itself feels precise
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there's a nice click to it it's not rubbery feeling at all
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Then we have an aperture ring here the aperture is declicked as was the case before though
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there are markings at the one third stop to tense all throughout the aperture ring
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remains I'm not blown away by it in a few ways the the actual weight of it feels good
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so you could do the racking I feel like I have to be really precise at lining up with
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those markings to get the correct aperture value and so it's it's a little bit odd in
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that regard but the other thing that I will note is this there's there's a few quirks
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that have remained that I don't quite understand for example between f1.8 and f2 we have one
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third stop markings as if there are you know three stops between f1.8 and f2.8 and if you
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know aperture values you know that there's only one third stop between f1.8 and f2 and
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so we have two absolutely unnecessary markings here just eliminate that it's for those that
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care about photography and know photography you look at that and that seems misguided
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likewise after f16 which is the minimum aperture there are two detent marks between f16 and
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then the a marking for switching into an automatic mode I would again I would prefer that to
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be removed or replaced maybe with a horizontal line showing a mark in between that and maybe
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a little bit more of a definite detent blocking you going into the a mode because if you're
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doing an aperture rack right now it's not difficult at all to go right past f16 into
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automatic mode which you're not going to want to do so again very solvable problems but I would
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like to offer up the recommendations that those problems get solved now when it comes to the the
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action of the aperture itself the aperture itself is beautiful it's 11 bladed so a nice high aperture
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blade nicely circular looking shape I will note an unfortunate thing is that there is a fair amount
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of noise as you control the aperture so even if you're doing an aperture rack it's very possible
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that that sound could be picked up by the in-camera microphone because it is fairly noisy and so
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that's actually the most noisy process of the whole focus process really doesn't have to do
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with focus but it is the sound of that aperture iris blades opening and closing a little bit noisy
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outside of that however you know function is fine here it does have a USB C port in the lens mount
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much like the Viltrox lenses and like the Viltrox lenses the updating firmware updating
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process is very similar I mean it's a drag-and-drop situation into the folder when you've connected
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this to your computer it's quite easy to do and can be done in a matter of seconds so I appreciate
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that unfortunately we still have no weather sealing on the lens itself so at the Brio you'll
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have the electronics but you don't have any kind of gasket I will note a little bit of an improvement
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to the included lens hood however I noted with the previous lens that the lens hood itself it was
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very matte it wasn't a good texture match to the rest of the lens wasn't a great finish match in
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this case I feel like they've done a better job it's a little less matte a little bit more satin
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so it looks like it belongs more it also feels more precise to me it bayonets on a little more
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precisely it locks into its final place more precisely progress in the right direction minimum
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focus distance here is 80 centimeters it's about average for an 85 millimeter lens and while they
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don't list the magnification when I compare it to some of the other options that I have a known
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figure for I'm an estimated to being around 0.13 times which is a about the middle of the pack
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about average for an 85 millimeter lens so nothing really to complain about there as far as the
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handling goes in general although there are a few quirks with the Aputure ring that I've detailed
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I do see signs of maturation throughout and that there's a little bit more refinement in the way
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that these you know the switch and in this case the button feels the lens hood some of those
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improvements there they're getting better and frankly for 300 bucks this is a really really
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nice lens in terms of its build quality and its overall functionality so let's talk autofocus
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once again we have a stepping focus motor stepping focus motors STM motors are pretty ubiquitous on
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kind of non-premium lenses typically when you go to a more premium lens you're going to switch to a
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linear style focus motor even multiple linear motors and so this is probably it's good enough
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to get the job done but there is certainly room for improvement as you can see here focus speed
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is not bad it's about average I would say there were a few situations where it felt a little bit
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deliberate but as I looked at the overall focus and used it in general it got the job done you
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know speedily enough that I didn't think about it very much your typical focus changes are nice
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and quick not instant like the best lenses but very very good if you go back just a few years
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back to the you know DSLR days I would have been really really pleased with the focus speed here
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and so overall not bad at all focus sound also not bad you can hear very very light whirring
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and clicking but you know it's very very insignificant overall I would say one shot
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or you know non burst accuracy was very very good one thing that I did notice that was an issue with
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the 50 millimeter that they have solved with the 85 millimeter and that is that if you're shooting
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a burst of a subject that's staying still a portrait subject for example and I use myself
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as an example with my wife taking the pictures for both the 50 millimeter and 85 millimeter
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with the 50 millimeter you could see the first shot was well focused and then the focus would
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go all over the place and the rest of that burst that's not the case now with the 85 millimeter
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lens it stayed consistently focused on my eye and it did not drift so that's great news there I did
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use it in a wedding situation for a friend that did a civil ceremony and I shot some photos in
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their ceremony and then of them afterward and it just it nailed focus no problem at all in that
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kind of setting both the speed and accuracy I was very very pleased with the end results again for
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such an inexpensive lens and I use this lens exclusively for that where it still isn't good is
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when it comes to trying to keep up with a moving target I feel like from what I see that autofocus
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basically does not operate during a burst with movement forward and so what I found is that my
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first shot and maybe second shot and a burst were focused just fine but it seems like the focus
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point never moved forward so as Nala moved towards the camera where that original focus point was
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remain the focus point without it moving forward so this is still not a good option if you need to
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shoot action and so that's certainly something to consider now video autofocus was generally fine
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focus changes for my focus pools were smooth and quick I did see some settling and micro pulsing
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with the 50 millimeter lens I don't see that now so again some further refinement when it comes to
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that I found that my hand tests also did find good transitions from the hand to the eye and vice
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versa you can see some focus breathing there and so if that's an issue for you you might want to
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consider that overall in terms of the focus transitions out in real-world shots not really a
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whole lot to complain about it was basically not it's not not to say that it was like overly cinematic
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or anything but it was about what I would expect it was about average for a lens like this you know
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any kind of lens in this particular class and so overall I think it was just fine so if you're
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thinking about a lens for tracking your toddler or young children this is probably not the choice
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for you but for most people in most situations it'll do just fine so how about the image quality
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I'll give you an overview here and then if you want the deeper dive into the performance including
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a few comparisons to other lenses that will come at the end of the video and our deep dive optical
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breakdown optical formula here is 10 elements in 7 groups that includes some ED or extra low
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dispersion elements and some HRI or high refractive index elements a few exotic elements
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there and it certainly pays off this is a really really good lens optically for the price in fact
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I was extremely impressed with the real-world performance it's very sharp even on my high
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resolution 61 megapixel Sony a7r mark 5 which a $300 lens on a such a high resolution lens
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our camera the fact that it keeps up just fine very very impressive it has minimal amounts of
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distortion just a tiny bit of pincushion distortion a minus 2 to correct and a minimal amount of
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vignette as well just a plus 35 or about a stop of vignette to correct no issues there I didn't
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really see any kind of real longitudinal chromatic aberration or fringing issues before or after the
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plane of focus so positive results there there is a little bit of lateral chromatic aberrations
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near the edge of the frame nothing significant or deal-breaking there however when it comes to the
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sharpness and contrast it's very impressively good not just in the center of the frame but all
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across the frame right into the corners in fact and as I did comparison over the last all the
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e-mount 85 millimeter autofocus lenses that I've tested over the last five years or so I went back
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and did some comparisons and I found that the only lens that I would consider to be sharper is
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actually the Sigma art 85 millimeter f 1.4 DN lens and even there this lens is actually a little bit
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better in the corners than what the Sigma is though the Sigma is a little bit stronger elsewhere but
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again you're talking about a lens that cost between three and four times as much and so I'm
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in comparison with the lenses that are actually in this class this lens is impressively sharp very
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very good sharpness is basically top tier across the frame by f 2.8 it'll stay consistently extremely
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good all the way through f11 you will see diffraction start to set in by f11 and then a
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little bit more pronounced by f16 which is common on a high-resolution body the bokeh quality is
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surprisingly good for such a budget lens and again and again I was really really pleased with the
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overall look of images images feel a lot more expensive than what the price tag of the lens
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suggests the bokeh quality is good and even in the shot of the doom you look at the geometry it's not
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like perfect circular shapes at f1.8 but the nature of those is quite good and the overall effect is
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very pleasing and in many other situations I found the bokeh quality to be to be really creamy and
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very very nice it's a definite strength for the lens flare resistance was fairly poor on the 50
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millimeter lens I feel like it's a little bit better here but what you will still see is a bit
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of a flashing effect if the Sun is right outside of the frame and so again not a flawless performance
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there use the included lens hood and in most situations you'll probably be just fine my
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conclusion is this this has both the build quality and the overall optical performance of I would say
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a much more expensive lens and autofocus has improved to the case to where I think in again
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for most people in most situations it's going to be absolutely fine for them and really deliver
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well focus results just don't buy it for action and I think for if you're all the other applications
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you should be okay I'm not sure that you're going to find better I'm pretty sure that you won't find
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better image quality from an 85 millimeter lens at a price point even under $400 maybe even under
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$500 and so the fact that you're getting this at a $300 price point is very very impressive you know
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I would say the next lens that I would consider a major upgrade from this would be that Sigma 85
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millimeter f1.4 art but you're talking about a much more expensive bigger heavier lens that you know
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is incredible optically but you know that's that's basically we're gonna have to pay to get better
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image quality than this at 85 millimeters now I would say that the Sony 85 millimeter f1.8 is
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still a good option if you need higher-end autofocus but outside of that this lens is
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pretty great I'm Dustin Abbott if you want more information you can check out the full text review
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that's linked in the description down below you can also look there and find an image gallery and
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some buying links if you want more detail you can stay with me right now as we dive into our
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detailed image quality breakdown so let's start our breakdown by taking a look at vignette and
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distortion if you look here with the uncorrected result you can see a little bit of a pin cushion
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distortion on the right side this is a manual correction very linear no problem a minus two
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to correct for that you could see some vignette largely concentrated towards the extreme corners
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but again not significant I added a plus 35 and as you can see that cleared everything up perfectly
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I didn't really notice any kind of significant issue with longitudinal chromatic aberrations
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fringing before after the plane of focus either in my chart test as you can see here just a very
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mild amount of fringing before and after and then out in the real world I didn't really notice any
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kind of issue either now you do see a little bit more when it comes to lateral chromatic aberrations
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that show up typically at smaller apertures towards the edges of the frame definitely here
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there's kind of a blue fringing that shows up and that a bit of a yellow on this side and so that is
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the strongest thing that I saw though to be fair in real-world shots I didn't see much of it so
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let's take a look at resolution in contrast so frame of reference this is a 61 megapixel a7r
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mark 5 results shown here at 200% that's a challenging thing for any expensive lens but
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no problem here you can see contrast in detail is really nice and high as we pan over here towards
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the mid-frame mid-frame looks great come on down here we can see that we've got consistent
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performance from the left side down to the right side and as we move down into the corners you can
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see right into the corners contrast and detail looks good there's a little bit of that fringing
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that we saw but really that's the only thing you can critique it's great detail right off to the
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very edge of the frame so let's compare this to some competitors so I've got the original Viltrox
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AF 85 millimeter f1.8 on the right now I will point out that that Viltrox was shot on a much
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lower resolution a7r mark 3 so 42 versus 61 megapixels so it's not really an apples to
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apples comparison but you can see that the two lenses are comparable in the mid-frame if you
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pop into the corners they're close though I would give the edge when it comes to the rendering of
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the fine details to the 7 artisans lens you can also see that there's a little more of the fringing
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showing up even at this lower resolution point on the Viltrox than what we see elsewhere we look
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down here at this zone here you can see that the 7 artisans looks much much better and up here into
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the left corner you can see some give-and-take I would give maybe the edge to the Viltrox but
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overall I would say that the 7 artisans is consistently better so next we'll jump to a
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comparison with the Viltrox 85 millimeter mark 2 now it to be fair that is pretty much the same
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lens optically so we shouldn't expect to see any kind of great improvement and if anything I would
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say in the two copies that I tested that actually the first generation lens of the Viltrox performed
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a little bit better in my test than what this second generation copy did and so I see a pretty
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easy win for the 7 artisans here in the various places that I check out and so just seems that
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the 7 artisans is the more consistent performer here look at the difference in this text right
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here versus the text here just much better even when you're using the advantage of the lower
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resolution for the Viltrox now we can do more of an apples to apples tests with the Sigma 85
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millimeter f1.4 though it's still not quite the same you it's the 50 megapixel of the alpha 1
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here rather than the 61 of the a7r mark 5 still a little bit closer so you can see that the Sigma
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is the winner in terms of contrast in the center of the frame it's fantastic likewise mid-frame I
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favor the Sigma there we look in the corner however the Sigma is definitely weaker than what
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the Viltrox, excuse me, the 7 artisans lens is look over here on this side and the Sigma is very
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slightly better but not really significantly so now if we compare to the only less expensive
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option here the mic 85 millimeter f1.8 well here's where things start to get a little ridiculous and
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so as you can see here the 7 artisans lens is night and day better in the center of the frame
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in the mid frame and in the corners it's just not even close and so a much much stronger result for
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the 7 artisans lens so to put all that into perspective here's a look at real world 100
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magnification f1.8 you can see great amounts of detail in this shot here likewise here the shot
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of Nala if we punch in to a pixel level you can see that the detail and contrast there is just
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really really beautiful it's a great lens optically now the mild step down to f2 doesn't
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a huge difference here there's a little bit more contrast as you can see you could see that a bit
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more in the mid frame though not significantly down here in the corner everything looks a little
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bit brighter so it's mostly contrast that's impacted not so much sharpness but again if
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you take that into the real world here's f2 and so I wanted to focus on the green so you can see
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the foreground blurred out and then if we look there and by the way look at my t-shot is that
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awesome almost had a hole-in-one there anyway you can see as we pan across the frame here again
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high-resolution at just f2 there's good detail they're all across the frame now the big leap
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in terms of improvement is going to be found at f 2.8 and so you can see at f 2.8 the contrast
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and detail looks well it looks a lot like that Sigma did which is exceptionally good that's true
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here also in the mid frame the corners look excellent they're bright there's lots of detail
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I mean this lens is looking really really strong that's true in landscape images as well here at
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5 f 5.6 you can see that as we look into the various details in this frame there's just lots
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of information great contrast there you know we can see detail right off into the distance and
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all handled really really well so you can expect that strong results all the way through f8 at f11
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diffraction starts to soften things a little but you can still see it looks really good f16 here
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on the right is just a little bit softer but not terrible like I think that most people would be
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happy with real-world images shot at f16 they would hold up fine now while magnification is
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not off the charts you can see here that we actually have you know good strong results
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in terms of contrast and detail at minimum focus flat plane of focus so you know it's
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very consistently good everywhere that I look in the frame this shot is basically at minimum focus
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and you can see that the detail is held up really well some images are some lenses kind of fall
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apart when you shoot them up close that's certainly not the case here and overall I actually felt like
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colors was more nice good saturation overall I like the look of the images and you can see that
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the background transitions all look really nice the blur on this image looks great if we punch in
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look at these unripe blackberries they look beautifully detail by the way they have since
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ripened and most of them have been eaten and they were fantastic this coming back to this shot for
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a moment you can see that yes there is some lemon or cat eye shape near the edges of the frame but
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overall I would say that the specular highlights are looking pretty good you can see looking in
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the middle of them a little bit of outlining but overall pretty clean not a lot of fringing in them
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contrast looks great here I'm pretty impressed now the final thing that I'll look at is the fact
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that there is a little bit of some veiling issues flashing if the Sun is right out of the frame now
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in this case I would say that the effect works for the shot but just be aware that that is something
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you have to be aware of and to compose accordingly so thanks for sticking around to the very end I
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hope that this deep dive is giving you all the information you need to make an informed buying
25:48
decision as to whether or not the 7Artisans AF 85mm f1.8 STM is the lens for you
25:54
thanks for watching have a great day and let the light in

7Artisans AF 85mm F1.8 STM Review | High Quality Budget Option Under $300?

Dustin Abbott

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7Artisans AF 85mm F1.8 STM Review | High Quality Budget Option Under $300?

Dustin Abbott