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Join Dustin and Craig from @letthelightintv for a look at Sirui's unique Astra series of full frame autofocus cine lenses with a 1.33x Anamorphic squeeze. Are these a filmmaker's dream?
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Table of Contents:
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0:00
Hi, I'm Dustin Abbott from Dustin Abbott
0:02
channel and this is
0:04
Craig from Delighted
0:05
and we're here for another collaboration
0:07
today. This is going to be of the Suré
0:10
Astra 50mm T1.8.
0:13
The Astra is a new series from Suré that
0:16
continues in their tradition of
0:18
anamorphic lenses, but in this case, it
0:20
is not only an autofocus lens, it is
0:22
also designed for the full-frame image
0:24
circle, which is a progression of what
0:26
we've seen in the past.
0:27
Yes. Now, starting out, they sent us a
0:29
couple years ago fully manual 35 mm
0:33
anamorphic lens. This was covering the
0:34
super 35 format. Uh quite a tiny barrel
0:37
in a handy little lens at the time.
0:40
However, they've continued to progress
0:41
and we are certainly thankful for it.
0:43
Moving on to the 40mm. We also reviewed
0:46
the 20 mm at the time covering the APS-C
0:49
format and this brought autofocus to
0:52
their anamorphic series. Now the 40mm
0:55
you could kind of get away with using it
0:57
on a full-frame lens. The 20 had to stay
1:00
with the APS-C. It wasn't able to kind
1:02
of cheat it a little bit, but now
1:04
finally with the 50mm Astro series that
1:06
we are reviewing here today, we've got
1:08
the full-frame autofocus anamorphic
1:11
lens, which we are certainly excited to
1:13
see.
1:13
Yeah. And all three of these have that
1:15
constant 1.33 time squeeze. Actually,
1:17
the first one that we reviewed was an
1:19
even wider. It was a 1.66. Yes.
1:22
1.66 66 anamorphic squeeze, but now
1:26
these are constant 1.33 times. And we've
1:28
got a 50mm, 75mimeter, and 100
1:31
millimeter T1.8 lenses. We're actually
1:34
testing the 50mm and actually filming on
1:37
it at the moment. So throughout this
1:38
review, in some of these sections,
1:40
you're going to see that nice wide
1:42
anamorphic look, which is really what
1:43
this series is all about. So we'll jump
1:45
in in a moment into the build quality.
1:47
We'll cover the autofocus. We'll take a
1:49
look at the optical quality, show you
1:51
some sample footage, and at the end,
1:52
Craig and I are going to circle back
1:54
together and give you our thoughts as to
1:57
whether or not this is a lens worth
1:58
considering. So, let's dive in. Let's
2:00
take a look at the build and handling.
2:03
All right, let's take a closer look at
2:05
what you are getting here. This uh new
2:09
Astra series comes in three different
2:11
lens mounts. I'm reviewing the Sony
2:13
E-mount version here, but you can also
2:15
get it in Lmount and in Zmount uh for
2:19
Nikon. You have the option of either
2:22
going with the neutral or blue streak as
2:25
far as the look for the the flare. Focal
2:28
links come 50 mm, 75 mm, and 100
2:32
millimeters. I'm reviewing the 50
2:33
millimeter here, and all of them come
2:36
with maximum aperture of 1.8, T, stop
2:40
rating of 1.8. 8 as well. On top of
2:43
that, they all are similar in size with
2:46
similar diameter and with the exact same
2:50
setting for the gearing to make sure
2:52
that you can just swap them quickly in a
2:55
gearing or focus follow configuration.
2:58
They're also uh all come with a constant
3:01
1.33 times squeeze ratio anamorphic
3:05
lenses and they all tout that they have
3:08
a uniform color signature and so that
3:10
you can swap in between the lenses and
3:12
get a consistent look all across them.
3:15
Price is $849
3:18
for this lens. Now, this is really a
3:21
uniquely hybrid lens in that we not only
3:24
have autofocus, but we have a true
3:27
manual focus. And so, we are talking
3:30
about an actual manual focus ring with
3:33
distance scale, which I really love the
3:35
implementation of that. By the way,
3:37
ability to look at both feet and meters
3:39
as far as the distance scale. This has,
3:41
you know, definite hard stops. It has a
3:45
focus throw of 136 degrees and so a
3:49
really really useful setup and that 136
3:52
degrees is going to be standardized
3:53
across all three lenses by the way again
3:55
for the gearing. Now we do have the
3:58
ability to do to have autofocus here.
4:00
There is a customer function button and
4:03
then we have a robust approach to
4:05
aperture control. So there is a manual
4:07
aperture ring again that is set up with
4:09
the teeth for gearing as well. You can
4:11
set it up to smoothly rack here and back
4:14
and forth for aperture racking. And then
4:16
also you can do clicks with the one-/ird
4:19
stop to tense. And it does have an iris
4:21
lock as well. And so that will allow you
4:24
to either lock into or out of the
4:26
aperture ring. And so in that with that
4:29
aperture iris lock off, you can go into
4:32
the automatic mode and control aperture
4:34
from within the camera. If you don't
4:35
like aperture rings, you can lock here
4:37
and not worry about it. or if like
4:39
myself you prefer that aperture ring you
4:42
can lock and so you don't inadvertently
4:43
go into the automatic or uh camerabased
4:47
control. Now the overall size here is 80
4:50
mm in diameter. That's at this ring here
4:53
and that leaves us with a 67 mm front
4:56
filter thread up front. That's 3.14 in
4:59
in diameter. The length is 131 mm or
5:02
5.15 in. The weight here is 620 grams or
5:07
right under 22 ounces. You know, it's
5:10
made of metals very, very robustly and
5:13
nicely made. And that includes a
5:14
thorough weather sealing with a gasket
5:17
here, internal sealing seals throughout
5:19
the lens, and a coating on the front
5:21
element. And we have a USB C port for
5:25
firmware updates as well. The actual
5:27
aperture Iris is 11 blades here. and
5:30
rather than being circular, that's going
5:32
designed to give you that kind of
5:33
uniquely ciney oval look to it. Minimum
5:36
focus distance is 50 cm, giving us a an
5:39
okay but not exceptional maximum
5:41
magnification. It does come with a nice
5:44
setup in terms of both the box and then
5:46
it comes with an actual zippered
5:47
patterned padded case, Allah Sigma,
5:50
which I vastly prefer to the socks that
5:52
come with some other brands. So all
5:55
told, we have a really, really nice
5:56
package here that while it's not small,
5:59
as you can see, it is not overly large
6:01
either. And it is very, very nicely
6:03
built and obviously extremely
6:05
featurerich.
6:07
So let's talk autofocus. And yes, it is
6:10
snowing yet again. Welcome to winter in
6:12
Canada. So we have an STM or stepping
6:15
focus motor here. However, while that's
6:18
not the most sophisticated autofocus
6:19
motor out there, autofocus really does
6:21
quite a good job, particularly
6:23
considering that this is a hybrid. Nice
6:26
snow in the face there. A hybrid lens
6:28
that has really fantastic manual focus,
6:30
but autofocus is really solid as well.
6:33
So, obviously for some of you, you're
6:35
going to be using this with a focus
6:36
follow type system. But if you need to
6:38
use the autofocus motor, you'll see here
6:40
in doing focus pools that they happen
6:42
with, you know, [snorts] good
6:43
confidence, no visible steps, no pulsing
6:46
or settling, but just kind of locks onto
6:49
the subject going back and forth. No
6:50
concerns there. Likewise, when I did my
6:52
hand test, there's good transitions from
6:54
my hand to my eye back and forth. And
6:58
then so no issues with that. And if I
7:00
approached the camera, you can see that
7:02
it tracks me fine as I come towards the
7:04
camera. And if I step in and out of
7:06
frame, it picked me back up with good
7:08
confidence and quickness. And again,
7:10
it's it's locking on accurately and
7:12
getting autofocus to the place that it
7:14
should be. And for a segment like this
7:16
where I'm in front of the camera and it
7:18
is just tracking my face, you can see
7:20
that it is doing so with good accuracy.
7:22
And that is despite the flakes that are
7:24
falling in layers in between the actual
7:27
lens and my face. So really, I got
7:30
nothing to complain about when it comes
7:32
to autofocus here. I think that Suré is
7:34
getting increasingly confident in their
7:36
autofocus performance and even in a a
7:39
fully hybrid lens like this Astra really
7:42
is doing quite a good job.
7:45
Let's talk about image quality. Starting
7:47
off with its nighttime performance, of
7:50
course, with a nice wide open aperture
7:51
of f1.8.
7:53
opening it all the way up, you've got
7:55
tons of room to bring that light in
7:58
through the lens. And it pays off with a
8:00
nice clean low light shot. And even with
8:03
the lights coming in, you know,
8:05
depending on how uh bright those lights
8:07
are and the angle towards the lens, you
8:09
can get a nice little bit of amount of
8:11
flaring. And you can see in this lens,
8:13
we selected the blue flare option.
8:15
There's also a natural neutral flare
8:18
option as well. Now, as far as focus
8:21
breathing goes, this lens does have
8:23
focus breathing. And you can see towards
8:25
the sides that whenever we're moving,
8:27
there's some distortion. And the edges
8:29
come in in a convex way, bending in
8:33
slightly towards the edges of the frame.
8:36
And I measured focus breathing at about
8:38
a 3.5% kind of difference between
8:41
minimum focus difference and infinity.
8:45
Taking a look at bokeh, we can see that
8:46
it's nice and circular here in the
8:48
middle. And it becomes more fish scaly
8:51
towards the edge. Um, still keeping its
8:54
relatively circular shape, but just not
8:56
resolving completely as you might see in
8:59
an ordinary lens. So, that's the
9:00
character of this particular anamorphic
9:03
one is that the bokeh on the sides and
9:06
the edges of the lens don't resolve
9:08
completely, but they kind of get cut off
9:10
there wide open. And you can see moving
9:13
the aperture and that would bring us
9:15
towards aperture racking. As we change
9:17
the aperture, aperture racking is very
9:20
very smooth. In fact, in this particular
9:22
shot right here, we are closing down
9:24
from f-22 or sorry, opening up from f-22
9:28
all the way to f1.8. And you can see
9:30
there's just a couple couple minor steps
9:33
through that massive complete and total
9:35
change of the aperture sharpness and
9:38
detail of the image. As you can see,
9:40
it's got great sharpness. Pulling out
9:42
the material of the scarf, the jacket,
9:45
even my skin, and the little bit of
9:46
facial hair that I'm currently uh
9:48
sporting right now. The sharpness and
9:50
the detail of this lens was very good.
9:53
And you can see, of course, as you would
9:55
want and as you expect from an
9:56
anamorphic lens, great subject
9:58
separation from its background. Now,
10:01
unfortunately, a lot of the days here in
10:03
the Canadian winter were quite gray, but
10:06
when the sun came out, you can see these
10:08
really nice, beautiful colors being
10:10
painted by this lens. And so, it's got
10:12
some great color resolution, rendering,
10:15
and contrast. As far as chromatic
10:18
aberrations go, they were slightly
10:20
present whenever wide open. Overall
10:22
though, I would say it's really nothing
10:24
that you have to worry about. you could
10:25
see it a little bit in the branches of
10:27
the trees, but uh it wasn't anything
10:30
that was distracting or destructive to
10:33
the overall image that you were
10:35
capturing. So, you'll see it in in a
10:37
tiny bit, even a little bit in the
10:38
bokeh. Uh but, uh it was very clean
10:41
performance overall. So, this lens has
10:43
nice autofocus capturing your subject. I
10:46
would say though, you'll find it a
10:48
little bit jumpy if your autofocus
10:49
setting on your camera body is set too
10:52
high. So, I would just recommend
10:53
bringing that back to a neutral value if
10:56
you've boosted it. And you'll find that
10:57
autofocus becomes much more smooth both
11:00
in its acquisition and also its
11:03
tracking. So, just a little tip there.
11:04
If you find it a little jumpy, turn down
11:06
your autofocus settings within your
11:09
camera body, and you'll get that nice
11:11
smooth autofocus transition that you're
11:13
looking for in your shots. All right,
11:17
having spent some time with the lens, I
11:19
have to say that I'm actually impressed
11:22
with the progress that they have made.
11:24
For myself, I've not actually been a
11:27
huge fan of Surray's optical glass in
11:29
the past, but really feels to me like
11:31
they are moving in the right direction.
11:33
And I'm really impressed by how that
11:36
this lens shows less of the optical
11:38
flaws that I saw in what has been
11:40
previously the Super 35 lenses. So the
11:43
fact that we've moved up to coverage for
11:44
fullframe while improving that
11:47
performance and in this case reducing
11:48
the size relative to the 40 millimeter
11:51
which was also a T1.8 but designed for
11:53
super 35. So they've made a smaller lens
11:56
the same you know light transmission
11:59
same maximum aperture except for now a
12:01
full-frame lens that is optically
12:02
superior. Well that's progress in the
12:05
right direction.
12:06
Absolutely. And they've also worked to
12:07
make a cinematic lens more cinematic. So
12:10
something that kind of we had to nitpick
12:13
a little bit about with the 40 and the
12:14
20 of their previous iteration is that
12:17
for example the focus ring was just
12:20
turning infinitely. Now they've brought
12:23
distance markers and about 120 degrees
12:25
of rotation from minimum focus distance
12:28
which is 0.5 m all the way to infinity.
12:30
So we've got distance markings, we've
12:32
got, you know, locks at both ends. So
12:34
we're talking about repeatable movements
12:36
at that point. If you do choose to
12:38
continually uh use manual focus,
12:41
although of course autofocus is a nice
12:42
option. Yes. Then moving towards the
12:45
aperture ring. Before it had a bit of a
12:48
bump at f-22. Quite light though. I mean
12:50
quite easy to surpass between 22 and
12:53
automatic aperture. This time what they
12:56
brought in if this they brought in an
12:58
iris lock switch so you can stop firmly
13:01
at 22 without going over. So, they've
13:04
brought these improvements to the 50
13:06
millimeter that we're talking about
13:07
today, which is good improvements,
13:09
making the cinematic lens more cinematic
13:11
for those who continue to choose and
13:13
want that just fine-tuning ability. So
13:16
it really feels like this is
13:18
increasingly a truly hybrid lens where
13:20
if you want to use it like you know a
13:22
manual lens as far as the focus or
13:25
aperture, it's set up for gearing and
13:27
it's actually got those physical
13:29
qualities that we would look for in
13:30
that. But it also has very very
13:32
effective autofocus and autofocus does
13:34
seem to be steadily improving. It's it's
13:36
more stable. It's more accurate. And
13:38
while we're still working with an SDM
13:40
focus motor, it's it's really stepping
13:42
in the right direction. And so the only
13:45
I would say downside that you could look
13:47
at is the fact that we are looking at a
13:49
more expensive price tag. And so now
13:51
we're looking at $849
13:54
for to purchase this lens. However,
13:56
that's about $150 markup over this
13:58
previous series. But if you're shooting
14:01
on a, you know, a full-frame camera,
14:04
it's well worth that money because
14:05
you're getting actually a a smaller,
14:07
lighter lens that's more versatile for
14:09
that extra $150. And you had mentioned
14:11
there's a couple of other options it's
14:13
competing with where it's beating those
14:15
in price. So,
14:15
yeah. So, it's right in the middle. I
14:17
mean, there's a couple different
14:18
options. One coming in at 800, one
14:20
coming in at a,000. So, you know, $50
14:22
more than the cheapest option, which by
14:24
the way doesn't have autofocus. And this
14:27
uh Suriri lens has the widest open
14:29
aperture at f1.8. The other competition
14:33
is, I believe, f2 and f2.5. So,
14:36
okay. So, I mean, at the end of the day,
14:38
I would say keep it up, Suré. I'm
14:40
actually really intrigued by this
14:42
series, and maybe in the future, we'll
14:44
have an opportunity to look at some of
14:45
the other focal lengths. But all told,
14:47
if you are looking for a versatile
14:50
hybrid style lens for shooting some cine
14:52
work and you like that anamorphic look,
14:55
at at the moment, it's hard to point
14:56
towards a better option than this that
15:00
kind of checks all of the boxes that the
15:02
Astra series does. And so while still
15:04
retaining a I would say a pretty strong
15:06
value. And so I really like the
15:08
direction Suré is going with their
15:10
anamorphic autofocus lenses and hope to
15:12
see maybe a few more focal lengths in
15:14
the future since we're only starting at
15:15
50 mm. You got a good thing going Suray.
15:18
Keep it up. So as always, thanks for
15:20
watching. Have a great day and let the
15:22
light in.