Voigtländer Color Skopar 20mm f/3.5 SL II Review | Surprisingly Useful

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Hi, I'm Dustin Abbott, and I'm here today to do a review of the little Voigtlander 20 millimeter F3.5
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This is the color scope, and this is the very first Voightlander lens that I have reviewed
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And I kind of wanted to bring it in as a comparison point since it is the same focal length as the new Sigma 20 millimeter F1.4 from their art series
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And as you can see, from their size, these are two very extremely different approaches to this focal link
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So I thought it would be interesting to kind of compare and contrast them and give me a kind of a jumping off point in looking at Voigtlander lenses
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Now, as soon as I opened up this lens, I noticed a few things about it
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Number one, it has a very kind of classic feel that I love to it, a beautiful mechanical construction
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I have a number of vintage kind of legacy lenses that are manual focus only, metal bodies like this
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and there is something about the construction of them that is just, it really draws me
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They're just beautifully designed and manufactured, and the same as true of this lens
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It operates mechanically. It just, it's a joy to use. The damping here on the focus ring is just perfect
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It just glides along in just the way that I would want it too. And it's nicely kind of nerled metal touch to it
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It's just, it's fantastic. I will note that not all is rosy to me here
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For one thing, I find that the front pinch cap, while it looks similar to the new canon ones
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it feels quite flimsy by comparison and feels kind of cheap on such a beautifully manufactured lens
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And likewise for this rear cap, which is one of the porous excuses for a rear
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cap that I've seen in a long, long time. But my advice is that, number one, dump this cap and
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replace it with a cannon one if you're shooting a cannon or a Nikon one, and away you go with that
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This is not a new lens. It's been on the market for a little while. And so most of the reviews
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that I read from credible sources, they were fairly negative about this lens. And so I took that
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in mind, but I think my final conclusion on this lens is going to differ a little bit, because
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To me, I look at the things that they criticized, and they're not wrong
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This lens, it is, it's not incredibly sharp. And when you compare it to modern standards, and of course, this is the new kind of resolution
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leader in the focal length. So I directly compared them, and certainly the sigma
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In most metrics it kicks the rear end of the little Voight lander It sharper across the frame and particularly sharper in the corners It has a little bit more contrast overall And so this lens is not going to set any kind of resolution records
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It's at F3.5, it has kind of a slower maximum aperture to begin with
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and it's not super sharp at F3.5. And really, it's not until F5.6 and F8
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that it kind of reaches its own in terms of its peak sharpness
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across the frame. And so it doesn't compete necessarily in that level, although there were a few
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things that I preferred in the optics about the Voightlander. Number one being the color rendition
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which I thought was just a little bit better than the Sigma. And when I compared identical images
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taken in the same setting, I found that I just preferred the kind of the global look, the color
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rendition from the Voitlander just a little bit more. Also, I did note when comparing them side by
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side that the Voightlander is a frames a little bit wider than that of the Sigma. That being said
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the Sigma also didn't frame as wide as some of my zoom lenses when I place them at 20 millimeters. And so
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I think the Voightlander is closer to a true 20 millimeter focal length. One other advantage the Voitlander
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has is the ability to focus down more closely than that of the Sigma and the Sigma doesn't have a
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huge kind of maximum reproduction ratio. But this can focus down. to right under 8 inches, around 20 centimeters
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And so it has a nice little magnification and allows you to get quite close to your subject
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If you want to use that for kind of some environmental shots, where you're getting close to a subject and then kind of showing a little bit bigger part of the scene
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The overall dimensions of this, it's actually quite similar in size to some of the other pancake
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lenses I own. I have both Canon's 24-millimeter EFS STM lens. I also have the Canon 40mm F2.8
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And both of those lenses are somewhat similar overall in length. This lens is just a little bit longer overall
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It's quite short still. It's only 1.23 inches. That's a little over 31 millimeters
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But of course, the Voightlander with its all-metal and glass construction is a fair bit heavier than either of those lenses
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And it comes in at right about 8.5 ounces. and are 240 grams
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And so it certainly feels denser and better made. In terms of that mechanical construction
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the one thing that is kind of similar or is very similar to the many Zeiss lenses that I've reviewed
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is that like those in a cannon mount, there is no manual aperture ring
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but rather the aperture is controlled. It's an electronic aperture iris that's controlled through the camera
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just like any other autofocus lens. But of course this is manual focus only The other thing because it has electronics in that way it does report full data back to the camera body and also it has the focus chip
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that seem to be fairly well calibrated from what I could tell in my usage
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When it come to manual focusing this lens, of course, I am experienced with manual focus
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but I found this to be quite an easy lens. At no point does it have a very wide aperture
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and the nature of a wide focal length means that even at relatively short distance
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is the depth of field is quite large. And so it's kind of hard to miss with this lens
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And between focus confirm, it certainly helps with that. And in the primary body that I used it on
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I have Canon 6D with an EGS focus screen installed, which allows me to see true depth of field
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and makes manual focus much, much easier. So overall, I really can't say that I had hardly any misses at all
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My focus rate was quite good. There were a few times that I thought I should have made
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a better hyperfocal focus. focusing distance, a better decision with that, but overall my images looked very sharp overall
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you know, to the limitations of this lens. The other things optically is that I found that the
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flare resistance was quite good. One negative was that it does vignette quite heavily
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probably due to the very compact nature of its design. And as a byproduct of that, I found that
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even at smaller apertures F5.6, F8, that the vignette was really not
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completely cleared up and still required a little bit of work to eliminate that
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While the coma control is not fantastic, don't let that stop you from using the lens
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as you can still produce some beautiful images of the night sky. As I said, a lot of the reviewers kind of knock this lens
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and they're looking at it from the sense of how it tests, it charts in comparison to other lenses
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and certainly if you're going to compare it head-to-head with other lenses, you may not be incredibly impressed by its optical performance
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But here's the thing. I found that although I had both these lenses on hand
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if I were to go out for a quick shooting and I wasn't just going to shoot this focal length
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but going to take along another focal length, I reach for the Voightlander almost every time
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unless I intentionally knew I needed to get some certain shots with the Sigma. And the reason is, of course, it's so compact. I could put it into a pocket of a jacket
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I could throw it into my bag and not really notice its size or even its weight for that matter
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And so having a 20 millimeter focal length, that wide angle of view in such a compact package, is actually quite liberating
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And I found this lens to be far more useful than what I might have anticipated
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And the other thing is is that for the purposes I was shooting this lens for which was primarily to have that kind of wide angle of view either of scenes with family or shooting landscape type images or kind of reportage type images where I wanted that I tended to use a you know stop it down to kind of the optimal apertures for it anyway And so most of my shots of this
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lens were at F5.6, F8, even F11. And so as a byproduct of that, when I compared images
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side by side, while at the pixel level, I could tell that the Sigma images were sharper overall
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the truth of the matter is, is they didn't really process all that much differently
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And so as a byproduct, I found that I really wasn't taking a huge hit by using the Voight Lander
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And as a result, while I don't really need this focal length, I've got it covered in other areas
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Because I like the form factor of this lens so much, I have to confess, I've been creeping eBay a little bit to see if there's some used copies out there
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Now, the Voight Lander is not particularly cheap. It retails for $499 US at its regular price
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And so while that, of course, undercuts the Sigma, the sigma is going to be viewed in a completely different class
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because of that wide aperture F1.4, along with having autofocus, of course
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And so the Voightlander, of course, appeals to a small niche. But I want you to know that this lens may, in fact, be a great one for you
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It's fantastic if you're going out, for example, with primarily a telephoto lens mounted onto your camera
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and you want to bring along a wide look at a seam, drop that into a pocket, put it into your bag
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and have 20 millimeters, a true 20 millimeter focal length right there
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Over the process of my review period, I produced a number of fantastic images with the Voigtlander
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that have been very well received, the ones that I've shared to this point
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And so I certainly think that it perhaps is worth a little bit more
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than what some of the previous reviews have indicated. This is a lens that's built and designed to last you
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for a lifetime. It's beautifully constructed and it is very very similar to a
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Zeiss construction. It's made in Japan like modern Zeiss lenses are and it's
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actually manufactured by the Kocina company that some of you may remember from
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the legacy lens era. So overall I'm actually giving this Voightlander a much more
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favorable review. The reviewers are right. It's not incredibly sharp at wide open
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and not even as sharp as some other options when stopped down to optimal apertures. But it's
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sharp enough to get the job done, has a beautiful color rendition, and that form factor is fantastic
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I'm Dustin Abbott. If you haven't already, you can follow me below on social media
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and please, if you haven't already, subscribe here. I have more reviews. It'll be coming
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your way on a regular basis. Thanks for watching today, and have a great day

Voigtländer Color Skopar 20mm f/3.5 SL II Review | Surprisingly Useful

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Voigtländer Color Skopar 20mm f/3.5 SL II Review | Surprisingly Useful

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