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Photographer Dustin Abbott compares the new Viltrox EVO 55mm F1.8 against the mighty Nikkor Z 50mm F1.8 S. Which is worth your money?
Viltrox EVO Reviews: Text Review: | Video: https://youtu.be/3_WZR-SfG5c
Nikkor Reviews - Video https://youtu.be/QUlS2RyLAfc | Text Review: https://tinyurl.com/Z50mmreview
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Show More Show Less View Video Transcript
0:10
Hi, I'm Dustin Abbott and I'm here today
0:12
for another one of my showdown videos.
0:14
As promised, the Nicor Z50mm F1.8S is in
0:20
my mind the hidden gem of their uh their
0:23
F1.8S 8 Sline series of lenses which is
0:26
pretty unique in all of photography that
0:28
I've ever seen before and that there is
0:30
a premium lineup of lenses with a
0:32
maximum aperture of f1.8.
0:35
This lens has been around for a while
0:36
however and a much much newer contender
0:39
just coming to market right now is the
0:41
new Viltrox
0:43
55mm f1.8
0:45
from their EVO series. Now, it claims to
0:48
be an apochromatic lens, and if you've
0:50
seen my review of it, you know this is a
0:52
very, very good lens optically. And
0:54
while Nick doesn't make any kind of
0:55
similar claim for the 50mm f1.8s, in
0:59
many ways, I feel like it has something
1:02
similar to an apocromatic design with
1:04
the fantastic control of chromatic
1:06
aberrations, amazing contrast. It just
1:08
optically punches at a level higher than
1:10
those the other f1.8 8 Sline lenses
1:13
having great contrast and still
1:16
retaining very nice rendering at the
1:17
same time. It's a lens that I remain
1:19
impressed with. But the question is is
1:21
can the new contender dethrone it? Well,
1:23
that's what we're here to explore today
1:25
and I'm going to take you through a
1:27
variety of different categories. I've
1:28
been working for a while on this and
1:30
shooting all kinds of various
1:32
head-to-head comparisons and trying to
1:34
find little details in between. And
1:36
frankly, it's been a bit of a challenge,
1:38
but I'll show you my results as we jump
1:39
in. Today we're going to look at four
1:42
different categories. We're going to
1:43
look at when it comes to build and
1:44
features, price, things like that. We're
1:47
going to take a look at autofocus
1:48
performance. We're going to look at
1:49
video performance and the optical
1:50
performance and see who comes out at the
1:52
winner in the end. Let's start by taking
1:54
a look in the build and handling
1:56
category. So, when it comes to price,
1:59
Viltrox is going to jump out to the lead
2:01
here, as they almost always do in these
2:03
comparisons because they price their
2:05
lenses so aggressively. So, this lens
2:07
has an MSRP of $370,
2:10
whereas the Nicor lens comes right under
2:13
$670.
2:15
And so, we're talking about about a $300
2:18
difference between the two. Now,
2:19
obviously with the Nicor lens, there's
2:21
going to be a little bit more play there
2:22
because it's been out for a while, could
2:24
be on sale, used market, all of those
2:26
things. But, we're just looking at MSRP
2:28
for this particular comparison. And the
2:30
gap is big enough that I'm confident in
2:32
calling the Viltrox a winner there. So,
2:34
one point for Viltrox. As you can see
2:36
also, it takes a win when it comes to
2:38
the size. It is 69 mm uh in diameter by
2:42
78 mm in length, whereas the Nicor lens
2:46
is 76 mm in diameter. That's a pretty
2:49
significant kind of scaling up of the
2:52
barrel size and it is 86 12 mm in
2:56
length. And so again, we're talking
2:58
about nearly 9 mm in overall length
3:01
there as well. And so it definitely is a
3:03
bigger lens all around. And if if you
3:05
look at the two lenses side by side, it
3:07
kind of looks like the nicor in a little
3:09
bit bigger a class of lens than what the
3:11
felt little Evo lens is. The EVO lens,
3:15
however, because it has a little bit
3:17
more of a dense build quality. It
3:19
actually is lighter, but not by as much
3:22
as what you would expect looking at the
3:23
two lenses. It weighs in at 385 g or
3:27
13.6 oz compared to 415 g or 14.64 64 oz
3:33
for the nicor lens. And so, you know,
3:36
only 30 g different. That's not
3:38
necessarily as much as what you would
3:40
expect. It also is the winner when it
3:42
comes to the feature set. It's got a
3:44
very robust. It's part of what I love
3:46
about the Evo series is that it's got a
3:48
surprisingly robust feature set for a
3:50
compact and inexpensive series of
3:52
lenses. We've got the full aperture
3:54
control with the traditional aperturing.
3:56
You can use it either clicked or
3:57
decllicked. It's got a custom or
3:59
function button. It's got an AFMF
4:01
switch. It's got a USBC port for
4:03
firmware updates, all of that stuff. The
4:05
Nick lens, well, it's got an AFMF
4:07
switch. And it doesn't even have a
4:09
secondary control ring. And so, if you
4:11
want to control aperture with the ring,
4:14
you're going to have to do that at the
4:16
expense of not having manual focus
4:18
unless you actually switch into manual
4:20
focus. So, no full-time manual focus
4:22
override. And so, it's really limited in
4:25
the feature category. And so, definitely
4:27
another win for the Viltrox. Seems like
4:29
Viltrox is cleaning up so far with four
4:31
to zero. But let's keep going. Wait a
4:34
second. It's another win for Viltrox.
4:36
When it comes to manual focus, the
4:38
Viltrox's manual focus ring is smoother,
4:41
at least in the copies I'm comparison
4:43
comparing here. But more importantly,
4:45
when you actually go to manual focus,
4:47
the uh the Nicor lens feels like it
4:49
moves more in like little focus chunks.
4:52
Um it sticks a little bit in the
4:54
process. And so I it makes some noise as
4:57
you manually focus. In fact, if I play
4:58
this back here, you can probably hear
5:00
it. You can see that as I'm manually
5:03
focusing, there's just a little bit of
5:04
noise going on there. None of that
5:06
happens with the Viltrox. It's a more
5:08
smooth and linear focus process, and so
5:11
I definitely prefer that. But now, Nicor
5:14
is going to get onto the board with a
5:16
few wins of its own. First of that is
5:18
when it comes to the minimum focus
5:19
distance. The Viltrox is rated at a
5:21
minimum focus distance of 43 cm. The
5:24
Nicor lens is at 40 cm. So, it's winning
5:27
there. And as far as the stated
5:29
magnification, the Viltrox is listed
5:32
magnification, which I think is actually
5:34
an error, as we're going to see here in
5:36
a moment, is listed as just 0.10 times,
5:39
whereas the Nicor is 0.15 times. So, if
5:43
you're taking those numbers, you should
5:45
see a big difference between the two. Is
5:47
that what you see? Actually, no. They're
5:50
actually very, very close, though. There
5:52
is a slight edge for the nicor. And you
5:54
can see from these images, they look
5:56
very similar. If I throw them side by
5:58
side, I scale it to where they're
6:00
they're perfectly lined up. You can see
6:02
that the Nicor is giving you just a
6:04
percentage of a point, extra
6:07
magnification, but they actually play
6:08
out very very similar. However, the
6:10
Nicor lens can focus more closely and it
6:13
gives you just a slight edge there. So,
6:15
we're going to give a point to there.
6:17
Now, when it comes to the uh kind of
6:20
your afterare, I'm going to give a point
6:21
to Nicor there because they have a
6:24
wellestablished customer service network
6:26
around the world. They have more options
6:28
when it comes to repair or replacement.
6:31
And so, they just have a more robust
6:33
afterare support and that's not
6:35
something that I always evaluate quite
6:38
as much as what I should and that's, you
6:40
know, partly on me. I because I'm not a
6:43
ordinary consumer most of the time at
6:44
this point. I have a relationship with
6:46
almost all of these lens makers and so
6:48
if I ever have a problem I just tell
6:49
them and of course they're very quick to
6:51
address it when it comes to me. You may
6:53
not get that same level of care and so I
6:55
do want to point out that it's sometimes
6:57
safer to buy a first-party lens because
6:58
they have that more robust network. A
7:01
few other things are very similar. Both
7:02
of them have nine aperture blades do
7:05
roughly similar things with those
7:06
blades. Both of them are weather sealed
7:09
designs. They have gasket at the lens
7:10
mount and both of them have about seven
7:13
seal points inside the lens themselves.
7:15
They have roughly similar levels of
7:18
build build. Though I will say that the
7:20
Evo lens actually feels a little bit
7:23
more upscale. It feels like it's a mix
7:25
of some metals and then the engineered
7:27
plastics whereas the Nick lens does feel
7:30
maybe a hair more plasticky of the two.
7:33
And so but I'm going to I think the
7:36
build quality is actually roughly equal
7:37
between the two. Another kind of neutral
7:40
difference here is that the Viltrox has
7:42
a 58mm filter thread and the Nicor lens
7:45
has a 62mm thread. I don't know that
7:47
that's necessarily a win. Those for one
7:50
or the other. I mean, those filters are
7:52
going to price out roughly similar. And
7:54
you know, and maybe if you have lenses
7:57
that share the 62 millimeter, that's an
7:58
advantage. If you have lenses that share
7:59
the 58 millimeter, that's an advantage
8:01
there. So, we'll just call that a draw
8:04
at that point. So leaving this category
8:06
that leaves us with a total of five
8:07
points for the Viltrox lens and just two
8:10
points for the Nick lens. So after the
8:12
first category, Viltrox has jumped into
8:15
the lead.
8:18
But how about round number two? Let's
8:20
talk about autofocus. Again, we'll start
8:23
with some similarities because there's
8:24
actually more similarities than
8:26
differences here. Both of them have STM
8:28
or stepping focus motors. Both of them
8:30
focus quietly. Both of them focus
8:33
accurately in my test. I'm testing on a
8:35
Nikon Z8 body. I got very accurate
8:37
results with both of them. I couldn't
8:40
necessarily tell a difference. However,
8:42
when I did some formal tests, while they
8:44
are very, very close, I did feel like
8:47
the Nicor was maybe a hair faster in
8:50
autofocus. It's not significant at all.
8:52
I don't know that I would make my
8:54
decision based on that alone. However, I
8:56
think that it does have a very slight
8:58
edge. So, I'm going to give a win to it
9:00
there. I also will point out that as a
9:02
first-party lens, it's going to make the
9:05
most of what it has. It has that
9:06
first-party algorithm uh support, you're
9:09
never going to have to worry about in
9:11
the future having to, you know, rely on
9:12
a firmware update that hopefully
9:14
addresses some kind of change to a new
9:16
camera or um a firmware update to the
9:18
camera itself. Being a first-party lens,
9:20
I'm going to give it another point there
9:21
just for that basic advantages that come
9:24
from having a first-party lens. And so
9:26
after this category, the gap has closed
9:29
a bit and we're going to give still five
9:32
points for the Viltrox lens, but now up
9:34
to four points for the Nicor lens. And
9:37
so things have tightened up a bit.
9:43
Now moving into our third category,
9:45
we're looking at video performance. And
9:49
uh I some of the tests that I like to do
9:51
include things like doing touch to focus
9:53
to see how those actual focus transition
9:55
goes. Then if I force bigger
9:57
transitions, it allows me to evaluate
9:58
things like focus breathing. You can see
10:01
here from the nicor lens that while the
10:04
actual focus process is about similar
10:06
between the two, neither of them show
10:08
any kind of obvious steps. I didn't see
10:10
any kind of hunting or pulsing or
10:12
settling. But what I did notice in the
10:14
actual process is that with the first
10:17
party Nicor lens, every time I touched
10:19
it moved to do what I wanted. Whereas
10:21
with the Viltrox lens, sometimes there
10:23
was a lag. I would touch and I thought
10:24
it wasn't going to do anything. It
10:26
would, you know, pause for a second or
10:27
two and then focus transition would
10:29
start. And so you can definitely tell
10:31
which is the first party lens in terms
10:33
of just the overall responsiveness of
10:35
the process. So a win for Nicor there.
10:38
You might have also noticed a second win
10:41
category for the nicor lens and that is
10:43
when it comes to focus breathing. Uh
10:45
when it comes to focus breathing, there
10:47
is a little bit less of it. And of
10:49
course, if you have a camera that has
10:51
any kind of focus breathing
10:53
compensation, the first party nicor is
10:55
going to get the benefit of that
10:56
compensation whereas the third party
10:58
Viltrox is not. Outside of that,
11:01
however, the behavior was very, very
11:02
similar. I found both of them to be very
11:04
stable. I've used them both for filming
11:07
in video episodes. They're stable,
11:09
they're reliable, and so in general,
11:11
both of them do a great job. I just give
11:13
a couple of wins to the Nicor in that
11:16
category. And so now, the Viltrox has
11:18
been holding steady at five points, but
11:21
we're up to a total of six points for
11:23
the Nicor lens at this point as we go
11:26
into our last category.
11:33
So, finally, the big one, probably the
11:35
one where most of you are most
11:36
interested in some of these other
11:38
differences, particularly when it comes
11:40
to the build feature set. You can tell
11:42
that just by looking at the listing. But
11:44
how about the actual performance? I did
11:46
a lot of different comparisons along the
11:48
way with these lenses, trying to
11:50
determine which is the winner. And
11:52
frankly, it was tough. So, first of all,
11:55
starting off with the the vignette and
11:57
distortion. As I shot my chart for this,
12:00
what I found is that the Nicor neither
12:03
of them have much distortion at all.
12:04
However, the Nicor did have a bit that I
12:07
needed to correct for a little bit of
12:09
barrel distortion and so I needed a plus
12:10
three to correct. Whereas the Viltrox
12:12
lens was basically completely neutral,
12:14
requiring zero correction. So there's a
12:16
win for Viltrox. However, on the
12:18
vignette side of things, both of them,
12:20
if left uncorrected, have heavy amounts
12:22
of vignette. However, it is heavier for
12:25
the Viltrox than what it is for the
12:26
Nicor. I needed to dial in a plus 85 to
12:29
manually correct the vignette for the
12:32
nicor lens. I needed to dial in a full
12:35
100 slider all the way for the Viltrox
12:38
lens. And so both of them are not great
12:40
in this category. However, the Nicor is
12:42
slightly better. So a win for it. Now,
12:45
when it comes to evaluating things like
12:46
just sharpness, it's I can't really give
12:49
a winner to either one because frankly,
12:51
it was some give and take depending on
12:53
where I looked on the test chart. In the
12:55
center of the frame, I felt like while
12:57
it was extremely close, I felt like the
12:59
Nicor was ever soslightly sharper in the
13:02
center of the frame. In the mid-frame,
13:04
they were basically equal. I couldn't
13:06
tell a winner. In the corners, however,
13:08
the Viltrox was obviously better. And
13:10
so, you know, in that case, I looking at
13:13
that at f1.8. I also checked back in at
13:16
f2.8. And you can see the same pattern
13:18
basically holds that the looks a little
13:21
bit better in the center of the frame
13:22
for the nicor. the edges definitely
13:24
still favor the Viltrox lens. And so
13:27
both of these lenses are extremely sharp
13:29
and extremely high contrast and I really
13:32
can't really call a winner between the
13:34
two. Likewise, when I looked at contrast
13:36
results in a variety of, you know,
13:38
three-dimensional settings, I found that
13:40
the contrast results were basically the
13:42
same between the two lenses. There
13:44
really wasn't an advantage that I could
13:46
tell. And anytime I thought I saw an
13:47
advantage, if I looked closer, there's
13:49
just the tiniest depth of field
13:50
perception at high levels of
13:52
magnification that might favor one or
13:54
the other. But in terms of the raw
13:55
contrast, they deliver basically the
13:57
same. Likewise, when it came to
13:59
fringing, I did a lot of different
14:01
fringing tests, and what I found is that
14:03
both of these lenses are awesome. On the
14:05
test chart, no problem there. But more
14:08
importantly, out in three-dimensional
14:09
situations, I found that with my dad's
14:11
old SLR, both of them are showing
14:13
basically no fringing. I shot a lot on
14:16
um guitar strings because I found that
14:18
that can cause some issues. Neither one
14:21
of them were showing any kind of issue
14:23
there. I I tried shooting just water
14:25
droplets on the top of something. Again,
14:28
about similar results. Everywhere that I
14:30
looked, I even shot on the the knobs on
14:32
the oven because they're shiny and can
14:35
cause a lot of fringing. Neither one of
14:37
them would take the bait. They just did
14:38
awesome across all of those. Likewise,
14:41
when it came to color, I was surprised
14:42
that when I equalized you and sometimes
14:44
there'd be a minor difference in the
14:46
white balance, you know, from one image
14:48
to the other. But if I equalized the
14:49
white balance, I felt like the colors
14:51
were basically identical. If you shot
14:53
take a look at this shot of the guitar,
14:55
for example, I mean, if I were to take
14:58
the labels off there, I don't know that
14:59
any of you would be able to
15:01
realistically tell one for the from the
15:03
other. And so, they seem to be very,
15:04
very similar in that regard as well.
15:08
However, when I begin to examine bokeh
15:10
quality, I did see a few patterns. And
15:13
again, there's some give and take, but
15:14
I'm going to give out a few awards here
15:16
because I think that there are some
15:17
areas that can uh will be a win for one
15:20
or the other. In terms of the general
15:22
rendering, I'm going to give a slight
15:24
win to the Viltrox. While the two lenses
15:26
are similar, because of that slightly
15:29
longer focal length, in a similar
15:31
situation, you're going to get a
15:32
slightly softer background um from that.
15:35
And I also felt just in general, even
15:37
when I tried to equalize for the
15:39
difference. And so I moved the camera a
15:40
little bit closer when I shooting with
15:42
the Nick, even then I felt like the
15:44
general softness was just a little
15:46
softer for the Viltrox lens. And then so
15:49
the general rendering, general look of
15:51
images I liked better. And then also as
15:52
I looked more detailed at the softness,
15:55
I felt like there was a little less hard
15:57
edges for the Viltrox lens. So a little
16:00
bit softer. However, one area where the
16:03
uh the Nicor lens has always stood out
16:04
to me and I it did again in this
16:06
comparison is when I looked at the
16:07
corners feels like the Nicor lens kind
16:10
of like the Plenna is really engineered
16:13
all the way out to the corners. And what
16:15
I found is that the bokeh quality near
16:17
the edges, it was just smoother to me
16:19
than what I saw from the Viltrox lens.
16:22
When it came to the bokeh geometry, both
16:25
of them look basically the same. They
16:27
have almost the same shape. Both of them
16:29
show just a little bit of busyiness
16:31
inside bokeh highlights, specular
16:34
highlights, but there's not really a
16:36
winner either way. They both looked more
16:38
similar than different. And so that
16:41
leads me to adding up the totals after
16:43
this round. Now we are up to having a
16:46
total of eight points for the Viltrox.
16:49
And guess what? Eight points for the
16:51
Nicor lens as well.
16:56
That brings me to my conclusion. This is
16:59
frankly one of the toughest comparisons
17:00
that I've ever done because both of
17:02
these lenses are incredibly competent.
17:04
It's not like one was able to establish
17:06
any kind of clear win over the other.
17:09
And so I'll break it down this way. If
17:11
you're looking at a pure value
17:13
proposition, I would say the Viltrox
17:15
takes the win. It's smaller, it's
17:16
lighter, it's cheaper, it's more
17:18
featurerich, and it delivers a similar
17:21
level of optical performance, which is
17:22
to say outstanding for both of these
17:25
lenses. At the same time, when you're
17:27
looking at the value side of things, the
17:29
Nicor has been on the market for a
17:30
while. It goes on sale for very, very
17:33
generous prices. It can be available for
17:35
the in the used market for similar
17:37
pricing is what the Viltrox is available
17:39
for, and it gives you the confidence of
17:41
a firstparty lens with firstparty
17:43
performance. At this point, the
17:45
reliability of this lens is well
17:47
established. It's been on the market for
17:49
a while and it remains a really really
17:51
strong performer. Even after the I mean
17:54
tons of 50mm lenses that I've reviewed
17:56
across all kinds of platforms, this
17:59
still is a standout as one of the best,
18:01
if not the best 50mm f1.8 lens that I've
18:04
ever tested.
18:07
There's really no downside here. Truth
18:09
be told, both of these lenses are
18:11
awesome. And I don't think you're making
18:12
a wrong choice whichever one that you
18:14
choose. Maybe you're more comfortable
18:16
with a first party lens. Great news.
18:18
This is a fantastic lens. Maybe you're
18:20
looking and saying, "I want a little bit
18:21
smaller, lighter. I want those extra
18:23
features. I love the performance from
18:25
the Viltrox." Fantastic. It's a great
18:27
lens. You want more information on
18:29
either lens, you want to break this down
18:31
a little bit further, in the description
18:32
down below, I've got links to both my
18:34
video and text reviews on both lenses.
18:36
There's buying links there. So, go ahead
18:39
and peruse that before you make your
18:41
final decision. But, as always, thanks
18:43
for watching. Have a great day and let
18:45
the light in.