As you probably know, I review a wide variety of lenses. I’ve increasingly found myself reviewing lenses from brand-new lens makers in recent years. It seems like the rise of mirrorless cameras in particular has triggered a lot of fresh creativity, and there are some excellent alternatives out there to the established brands. The Dulens APO 85mm F2 is the first lens from Dulens, but there’s a lot of maturity in the design and performance of the lens. It handles and performs much like a Zeiss lens (including having an Apochromatic design), with a beautiful rendering, lovely bokeh, and an incredibly smooth manual focus ring. It is a manual-only lens for Canon EF or Nikon F mounts, and I think it best suited for someone who does video. It produces gorgeous footage and is a genuine joy to use manually. Check out the photo gallery for inspiration and watch the video review for all the details.
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Purchase the Dulens APO 85mm F2 @ Pergear Store https://bit.ly/DulensAPO85 | Amazon https://amzn.to/3eibo4r | Amazon Canada https://amzn.to/3eryB4t | Amazon UK https://amzn.to/3elt7Im | Amazon Germany https://amzn.to/2ZnYWw1 | Ebay https://bit.ly/Dulens85APO
Keywords: Dulens APO 85mm, Dulens, APO, 85mm, F2, EF, F, Dulens APO 85mm F2, Canon, Nikon, Canon EOS R, EOS R, Dulens 85 Review, Canon, Mirrorless, EOS R Review, Canon EOS R Review, Canon R Review, RF, Firmware 1.6, Dustin Abbott, Review, Hands-On, Portrait, Bokeh, Sample Images, Video, AF, Resolution, Demonstration, Resolution, Focus, Apochromatic
DISCLAIMER: This article and description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive a small commission. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
In 2020 I’ve been doing a series of long term review of lenses that have managed to stay in my own personal kit for years on end. I evaluate these lenses using my current review techniques and with the unique insight that comes with knowing how well the lenses have held up to real world use and how they compare to more recent releases. I’ve recently run through that process with the Tamron SP 85mm F1.8 VC USD lens. The Tamron was the first 85mm lens that I’ve tested that had a built-in image stabilizer, and, since its release in 2016, I’ve only reviewed one other 85mm lens with a stabilizer (the Canon EF 85mm F1.4L IS), so this remains a unique feature. So how has the Tamron held up, and how does it compare to more recent alternatives? You can watch my video review here or just check out the long term photos below.
Purchasing your gear through B&H and these links helps fund this website and keeps the articles coming. You can also make a donation here if you would like. Visit my Amazon page for some of my gear of choice! Thank you for your support.
Great News! I can now offer a 5% discount on all purchases at Amplis Foto, Canada’s Leading Photographic Supplier. Please enter discount code: AMPLIS52018DA in your cart. It is good for everything in your cart, and is stackable with other coupons, too! It will take 5% off your entire order! Proceeds go towards keeping this site going and providing you with new reviews!
Keywords: Tamron SP 85mm, Tamron, AF, 85mm, F1.8, VC, Di, Tamron 85 VC Review, Long Term Review, Tamron SP 85mm F1.8 VC, Canon EOS R, EOS R, Canon, Mirrorless, EOS R Review, Canon EOS R Review, Canon R Review, RF, Firmware 4.0, Dustin Abbott, Review, Hands-On, Portrait, Bokeh, Sample Images, Video, AF, Resolution, Demonstration, Resolution, Focus, Vibration Compensation
DISCLAIMER: This article and description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive a small commission. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
At the beginning of this year I was delighted when Samyang released the Samyang AF 14mm F2.8 lens in an RF mount. It was an autofocusing lens (and one that autofocuses very well on the Canon EOS R that I tested it on) and also had a beautiful, weather sealed build. To this point there have been very, very few autofocusing third party options on the Canon RF mount, though it has become clear that Canon is fully committed to developing for the platform. I expressed hope that this was the beginning of Samyang delivering a number of their excellent recent autofocusing lenses designed for Sony FE onto the new Canon RF platform, and that appears to be the case. I’m delighted to see one of my favorite Samyang lenses (the AF 85mm F1.4) now come to Canon RF, where it delivers a MUCH less expensive alternative to the excellent (but incredibly expensive) Canon RF 85mm F1.2L lens (my review here). Despite being less than a third of the price, the Samyang RF85 (as we’ll call it for brevity) delivers a beautiful optical performance and is a very welcome addition to the Canon RF ecosystem.
The Canon RF 85mm F1.2L is a truly amazing lens, but at $2700 USD, it is also out of the reach of most photographers. Often Canon helps fill that gap with a less-expensive F1.8 lens, but to date that has not yet happened on the RF mount. There are a variety of 85mm lenses that can be adapted successfully to the mount, but that does require the use of an adapter. A reasonably priced alternative is obviously extremely welcome, as the EOS R family of cameras are great portrait options, and the RF85 mounted on my EOS R made for a lovely portrait combination.
While I’m familiar with the Sony FE version of the lens, Samyang has made a few tweaks to the lens to help it work on Canon RF. In this review, we will explore the strengths and weaknesses of the RF85 and deliver a final verdict on it.
Prefer to watch your reviews? My thorough video review will show you all the details of autofocus, image quality, video performance, and more!
Thanks to Samyang Global for providing me a review copy of the lens. I’m doing the review on a Canon EOS R camera body.
Samyang RF85 Build and Handling
While there are obviously a lot of shared aspects of the build and design with the existing Sony FE version, I did note a number of changes when comparing both versions of the lens. First of all, Samyang has adapted a different finish to the barrel to better match the aesthetic of RF lenses. It is less shiny, with a slightly more matte finish. That, combined with the red ring that Samyang long ago copied from Canon, makes for a very nice fit and a handsome combination with one of Canon’s full frame mirrorless bodies.
You’ll note from the photo beneath that the FE version (on the right) is a tiny bit longer than the RF version. The Sony version is 99.5mm (3.92″) while the Canon RF version is 97.5mm. This is most likely due to a slight difference in the “flange distance”, or the proper distance from the sensor to achieve focus that is typically unique to each camera system. The RF mount is also considerably wider than the Sony FE mount, so you’ll see that the barrel design near the lens mount is different to accommodate the design differences between the two mounts. You can also the minor difference in finish with the two lenses side by side.
The overall diameter of both lenses is identical at 88mm (3.46″) and both have a 77mm front filter thread.
What’s interesting is that Samyang clearly determined after the release of the Sony FE version of the lens that a more substantial lens hood was warranted, so, while the new RF version of the lens is slightly shorter than the Sony version, it actually looks considerably longer with the lens hood attached.
Also welcome is the inclusion of an AF/MF switch on the barrel (which didn’t exist in the FE version), which makes switching between these two approaches to focus simple and intuitive.
The focus ring itself is wide and tightly ribbed. While this (like other autofocusing mirrorless lenses) is a “focus-by-wire” design, the emulation of manual focus isn’t bad here. The focus ring has fairly good damping, turns smoothly and consistently, and Canon’s “Focus Guide” and color overlays make it easy to achieve proper focus…though I suspect few people will spend much time manually focusing this lens.
Like the Sony version, Samyang has included a weather sealed design here, complete with a thick gasket at the lens mount (as always, the rubber gasket on Canon mount lenses is much thicker than those found on Sony lenses) and two other seal points inside the lens (either side of the ring).
What isn’t present is any equivalent of Canon’s control ring that is built into the native Canon RF lenses.
That point aside, however, the lens is very nicely built. The lens hood does not have a lock, but bayonets into place with precision and a definite “click”. What’s also true is that this lens is significantly smaller and lighter than competing lenses. It is about 20mm shorter than the Canon RF 85mm F1.2L and weighs half as much.
This diagram also shows the Sigma 85mm F1.4 ART, though that lens would require an adapter as there isn’t a native RF mount version of the lens.
With the lens hood in place, this is a substantial lens, but the quality grip and ergonomics of the EOS R I paired it with made it an easy match.
The RF85 has 9 rounded aperture blades that does a fairly good job of retaining a circular shape when the aperture closes down, though by F2.8 in my series here you can see the nine bladed shape a bit. You’ll also note that there is the typical geometric deformation towards the edges of the frame at F1.4 and F2, though the circular shapes are fairly consistent across the frame by F2.8:
The RF85 can focus as close as 0.9 meters (2.95 feet), but has a rather poor 0.11x magnification. This is on the low side for an 85mm lens, though not by much. The 85mm lenses I’ve tested have ranged from 0.11-0.14x (the Canon 85L is 0.12x, for reference), so this is never a strength for them. Here’s what MFD looks like:
The close up performance is pretty good, fortunately, with good contrast and sharpness. This isn’t going to serve as a substitute for a macro lens, however.
It’s worth noting that the lens properly communicates all EXIF information and properly identifies in post processing software (Samyang RF 85mm F1.4). What isn’t supported (at least by the time of this review) is Canon’s Lens Aberration Correction, as the camera shows no data available for the lens. Normally I wouldn’t be surprised by this, but the RF 14mm F2.8 did receive in-camera corrections. Perhaps a future firmware update will correct this, though it is worth noting that Samyang requires their Lens Station to apply firmware updates to their lenses, and at the time of this review the RF version is not widely available in North America.
All in all, however, there’s little to criticize here. This is a nicely made lens that has reasonable size and weight for a large aperture 85mm prime.
Samyang RF85 Autofocus Performance
Samyang has made tremendous strides in their autofocus performance in the past few years, and that’s true here. They’ve employed a “DLSM” focus system here (Dual Linear Sonic Motor) where focus motors on either side of the moving element propel focus back and forth.
While autofocus isn’t quite as fast or silent as the RF 14mm F2.8, this isn’t unexpected. The nature of the focal length and maximum aperture of the 14mm lens means that the elements are smaller and require less torque to drive them. An 85mm F1.4 lens has a LOT of glass inside, and those larger, heavier elements are harder to move with speed and silence. Focus speed is fast in either “One Shot” or “Servo” modes when making smaller changes, and only a bit slower when making major focus changes. There’s a light “clicking” noise when focusing that is audible but faint. I would say that focus noise and speed is roughly similar to the Canon RF 85mm F1.2L.
Focus accuracy has generally been very good, with fine objects being picked out easily and accurately by the focus system. I did periodically encounter the focus quirk that I also saw with the Canon 85L lens, and that was sometimes the focus system was reluctant to grab a foreground object with all points active.
I could overcome that either by choosing a different focus mode (a smaller zone, focus point, or cluster) or by touching the screen to create a smaller focus area…which typically will solve the problem.
The fact that I saw something similar with Canon’s own 85mm lens makes me think this might have more to do with the focus system in the camera than the lens itself.
I had outstanding focus results when shooting portraits. Eye AF worked perfectly, and grabs on quickly and stays locked there. This makes shooting portraits so easy (and fun), and I had amazing results even though I largely shot at F1.4. Here’s a few examples:
That makes the RF85 a great portrait option if your budget doesn’t stretch to the extremely expensive Canon RF 85mm F1.2L.
I’ve also used the lens quite often for shooting video episodes, and, while the focal length becomes very long (due to the 1.7x crop factor of the EOS R while shooting 4K video, I’ve actually had extremely good detection of my face and stable video AF performance…great news! I presume this lens will be even more useful once the highly anticipated Canon EOS R5 arrives.
I don’t really have any major criticisms here. The RF85 performed well in all the various scenarios I put it in, and has become an easy lens to reach for even for casual shots.
Put simply, I’ve reached for my EOS R more often since this lens arrived on my doorstep. While I would love to own the Canon 85L, its price is prohibitive ($3500 + tax here in Canada!), so I’m enjoying having a quality 85mm lens with good autofocus available…and one that I can afford.
Samyang RF85 Image Quality
Samyang has delivered a lens with an optical formula high on special elements, including four HR (High Refraction) and one ED (Extra Low Dispersion) in the total of 11 elements in 8 groups. This results in a very strong performance optically. Here’s a look at the optical formula and MTF charts.
The challenge with portrait lenses is that if they are too sharp and contrasty, skin looks a bit “plasticky”. Without enough sharpness and contrast, however, one feels like they have to stop the lens down to get rid of haze or chromatic aberrations, which kind of defeats the purpose of buying a large aperture prime lens to begin with. The AF85 hits the sweet spot, though, with very nice wide open sharpness and downright wicked sharpness by F2.8. It doesn’t suffer from pronounced chromatic aberrations or hazy textures, and the overall rendering and bokeh is very nice. Here’s a real-world example at F1.4.
Pretty nice stuff there!
Let’s first take a look at some of the basic optical issues like vignette and distortion.
What we see is a negligible amount of pincushion distortion. The “corrected” version has a -1 value plugged in, but it is hardly necessary. Vignette is another story, however. I slid both sliders to the extremes (+100 and midpoint moved all the way to the left) to correct the vignette. A lot of this lifts by F2 and is almost all gone by F2.8. Just for reference – the vignette is about identical to that seen on the Tamron SP 85mm F1.8 VC (a logical comparison point in terms of price) and is about 25% heavier than what is seen on the Canon RF 85mm F1.2L (at F1.2) and between 40-50% heavier than the Canon when it is stopped down to F1.4. So while it is not unusually heavy on the Samyang RF85, this is definitely an optical vulnerability for the lens. For portrait work, however, I preferred the uncorrected vignette which is linear in nature and is flattering.
I do like the additional light on the subject, but I would prefer to add that directly and not lose the spotlighting of the subject. Something more like this:
Your preferences may vary, of course, but I wanted to highlight the issue.
There are mild amounts of LoCa (Longitudinal Chromatic Aberrations) visible at F1.4, and contrast is good but not Otus level.
I saw nothing to be concerned about in this regard with real-world results.
Here’s a look at the test chart globally, followed by crops from across the frame.
Center sharpness is very good at F1.4 with edge performance at good levels. Contrast is also good (but again, not at Apochromatic levels, which might a good thing depending on your perspective).
For some perspective, here’s hope the lens compares to the incredibly expensive Canon RF 85mm F1.2L (both lenses at F1.4) at center, midpoint, and corner:
What’s interesting is that while I think the Canon shows better levels of contrast across the frame, there is little discernible difference in resolution. I would favor the Canon overall, but I would certainly see where people might question whether that is 300% better (the Canon costs 3x as much).
How about against a more reasonably priced competitor? The Tamron SP 85mm F1.8 VC (which easily converts to RF via the EF to RF adapter) has a pro-level build, image stabilization, and a comparable price ($749 USD at present, while the Samyang is listing at $699 USD). Here’s a look at how they compare (at F2) across the frame:
This one is pretty close, but I see a definitely Samyang advantage in the center of frame, while I perceive a slight resolution advantage for Samyang but arguably a bit more contrast for the Tamron across the rest of the frame.
Bottom line: the modern lens market is very, very competitive. It is rare that a bad lens optically gets released, and any of these modern lenses would blow away the top 85mm lenses from a decade ago in terms of raw resolution and contrast.
By F2.8 the contrast and resolution across the frame is fantastic. You can see the increase in both here:
For real world work, this means that detail is really going to pop at F2.8:
You can see that the crop from the left side from this handheld landscape image at F2.8 looks very good:
I noted previously that some may prefer a slightly lower contrast look and not to have all aberrations perfectly corrected. My experience is that many lenses that have all aberrations corrected unfortunately lose something in the process. They are very sharp and have very high contrast, but their overall rendering and bokeh is often busier and less “magical”. People will sometimes use terms like “clinical” to describe such lenses; they lack character. I personally feel like Samyang has struck a nice balance with the RF85; it has plenty of sharpness and contrast, but also has “soul” as well. The rendering is beautiful, the bokeh is lovely, and images from the lens are very pleasing. Here are some examples:
Occasionally I will see the slighted bit of “busyness” in some transition areas, but my overall impression from the lens is that the bokeh is very nice. This is going to make for an extremely nice portrait lens. Here’s a full length F1.4 portrait:
Very nice. The RF system has desperately needed an affordable portrait option, and it has definitely arrived.
There is one other flaw to be discussed, one that is fairly common to wide aperture medium telephoto lenses: flare resistance. It is rare that prime lenses with huge amounts of glass are able to thoroughly resist the effects of bright light, and the Samyang RF85 is no exception. I got a variety of different flare artifacts when shooting into the sun, though I didn’t see anything unusually bad here.
The good news with telephoto glass is that it is fairly easy to avoid pointing them into direct sun because of the more narrow angle of view. Furthermore, if you position it properly, these aberrations can be used to artistic effect. I would summarize this performance as being fairly typical but certain not impressive.
All in all, there is a lot to commend the Samyang RF85 for optically and relatively little to criticize it for. I’m definitely a fan of what I see here. If you would like to see more images from the lens, check out the image gallery here as I believe the images speak for themselves.
Conclusion
The release of the Samyang RF 85mm F1.4 AF is very, very welcome on Canon’s new full frame mirrorless platform. I gave the Canon RF 85mm F1.2L a fairly rave review while also acknowledging that it’s price ($2700 USD) places it out of the range of the vast majority of photographers. For those interested in portrait photography, but without incredibly deep pockets, the Samyang RF85 ($700) is a godsend. It gives them a quality build (yet reasonable weight), good autofocus performance (with excellent Eye AF results), and image quality that is, essentially, near perfect for portrait work.
The RF85 is quite sharp from F1.4 on, and while there is fairly strong vignette, I’m fairly partial to the wide open performance of the lens:
The list of shortcomings is fairly brief, with the typical wide aperture short telephoto traits of vignette and flare being the chief optical complaints. The autofocus performance is roughly on par with what I saw from the Canon 85L lens, which is to say very good but not as quiet, smooth, or fast as the very best that I’ve seen. I also wish the lens had support of Canon’s Lens Aberration Corrections (like the 14mm F2.8), but hopefully that will come via firmware in the future. That’s about as much as I can come up with, as overall I think the lens is a wonderful addition to the RF catalog and a lens I plan to add to my own Canon RF kit.
While lenses like this are certainly a threat to the more expensive first party options, they also serve to make the platform more accessible and help sell cameras. Canon needs third party lenses like this to convince people to move either from DSLRs to mirrorless or from competing mirrorless systems to their own. The Samyang (Rokinon) RF 85mm F1.4 AF is a pretty compelling reason to do so.
Pros:
Beautiful build with moderate weight
Weather sealing improves flexibility
Dual linear motors makes focus smooth, fairly quiet, and fast enough in most situations
Video AF is very stable
Excellent center sharpness and good edge sharpness at wide apertures
Very sharp and high contrast across the frame when stopped down
Aberrations exist but in small, non-destructive amounts
Beautiful bokeh and rendering
Eye AF works fantastic
Vastly improved manual focus ring and focus action
Great price to performance ratio
Cons:
Autofocus can refuse to focus on close objects initially with all points active
Purchasing your gear through B&H and these links helps fund this website and keeps the articles coming. You can also make a donation here if you would like. Visit my Amazon page for some of my gear of choice! Thank you for your support.
Great News! I can now offer a 5% discount on all purchases at Amplis Foto, Canada’s Leading Photographic Supplier. Please enter discount code: AMPLIS52018DA in your cart. It is good for everything in your cart, and is stackable with other coupons, too! It will take 5% off your entire order! Proceeds go towards keeping this site going and providing you with new reviews!
Keywords: Samyang AF, Samyang AF 85mm, Samyang AF 85mm F1.4, 85mm 1.4, AF 85mm 1.4, Samyang 85 1.4, Samyang AF 85mm F1.4 FE, Sony, Samyang AF 85mm Review, Samyang AF, 85, 85mm, 85mm 1.4, 85 1.4, Dustin Abbott, AF 85mm Review, Portrait, Linear Motors, Sony a7RIII, Sony a7III, Eye AF, Bokeh, Sharpness, Resolution, Rokinon, Rokinon 85mm, Rokinon AF 85mm, AF 85mm F1.4, AF 85mm 1.4, Video Test, Sample Images, Real World
DISCLAIMER: This article and description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive a small commission. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
At the beginning of this year I was delighted when Samyang released the Samyang AF 14mm F2.8 lens in an RF mount. It was an autofocusing lens (and one that autofocuses very well on the Canon EOS R that I tested it on) and also had a beautiful, weather sealed build. I expressed hope that this was the beginning of Samyang delivering a number of their excellent recent autofocusing lenses from Sony onto the new Canon RF platform, and that appears to be the case. I’m delighted to see one of my favorite Samyang lenses (the AF 85mm F1.4) now come to Canon RF, where it delivers a MUCH less expensive alternative to the excellent (but incredibly expensive) Canon RF 85mm F1.2L lens (my review here). Despite being less than a third of the price, the Samyang RF 85mm delivers a beautiful optical performance. I’ll be delivering a detailed analysis of the lens in my review (stay tuned!), but in the meantime you can get a sense of the kinds of photos you can produce with a prime portrait option like this.
Purchasing your gear through B&H and these links helps fund this website and keeps the articles coming. You can also make a donation here if you would like. Visit my Amazon page for some of my gear of choice! Thank you for your support.
Great News! I can now offer a 5% discount on all purchases at Amplis Foto, Canada’s Leading Photographic Supplier. Please enter discount code: AMPLIS52018DA in your cart. It is good for everything in your cart, and is stackable with other coupons, too! It will take 5% off your entire order! Proceeds go towards keeping this site going and providing you with new reviews!
Keywords: Samyang AF 85mm, Samyang, Rokinon, AF, 85mm, F1.4, RF, Samyang 85mm RF, Rokinon 85mm RF, Canon EOS R, EOS R, Canon, Mirrorless, EOS R Review, Canon EOS R Review, Canon R Review, RF, Firmware 1.6, Dustin Abbott, Review, Hands-On, Portrait, Bokeh, Sample Images, Video, AF, Resolution, Demonstration, Resolution, Focus, Samyang AF 85mm F1.4 RF
DISCLAIMER: This article and description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive a small commission. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
With any new camera system there is a vulnerable period where the quantity and quality of lenses available for the system can either make or break its momentum. Canon has been weathering that storm on its “R” full frame mirrorless platform, where of the ten RF mount lenses from Canon at this point, only two fall under $1000 in their MSRP, with the majority of the lenses (7 of them!) being in excess of $2000! Canon has desperately needed more financially accessible lenses for a broad rollout of the R system, and that typically means needing third party lenses to come in and flesh out the affordable part of the range. I recently reviewed a lens that will help (the Samyang 14mm F2.8 RF) and the subject of today’s focus is another – a nicely made manual focus prime from Japanese boutique lens maker Yasuhara. The Yasuhara Anthy 35mm F1.8 has classic good looks, a solid metal build, and comes in a native RF mount (covering the full frame image circle). And, perhaps most importantly, it has a very reasonable price tag of $299 USD (making it one of the most affordable lenses from any brand in a native RF mount at the moment). The Anthy35 (which we’ll call it for brevity), is also available on Nikon Z mount (where it will also be welcome for similar reasons) and on Sony FE (where it faces much more stiff competition due to the sheer number of options available there).
The Anthy35 has a classic, retro vibe in both its look and handling, but also has a somewhat fatal flaw that seems to be unique to the RF mount. Something about the coatings of the lens and Canon’s color science clash, producing a vignette with a pronounced magenta hue. This flaw is unfortunately exaggerated by the time of year I’m doing the review (winter) where the snow cover everywhere really highlights any discoloration in the vignetted area.
Fortunately this isn’t seen in more traditional scenes, but since a lot of my photography is done outdoors, and since the outdoors is coated in white for about 5+ months of the year where I live, it makes avoiding this effect a little more difficult. No such issue has been reported on Sony FE or Nikon Z cameras.
In many environments this issue won’t be seen, but it’s definitely something to look out for.
But like a lot of vintage lenses, there are two ways to look at a lens like the Yasuhara Anthy 35mm F1.8. You can define it by its flaws, or you can define it by the unique character of the images that (at least in part) those flaws are responsible for. This review will explore both viewpoints. Is the Yasuhara Anthy prime worth your money? Read on to find out, or you can watch the video review here:
The Anthy35 has a very classic vibe that screams “Classic Zeiss”. It is an all-metal construction with a similar satin anodized metal finish complete with white and red etched markings for distance, hyperfocus, and aperture values.
Here are the basic specificiations:
Focal Length
35MM
Maximum Aperture
f/1.8
Minimum Aperture
f/16
Lens Mount
CANON EOS RF
Format Compatibility
Full Frame
Minimum Focus Distance
11.81″ / 30 cm
Optical Design
9 Elements in 7 Groups
Focus Type
Manual Focus
Image Stabilization
None
Filter Size
52 mm (Front)
Dimensions (D x L)
2.59 x 2.59″ / 66 x 66 mm
Weight
14.9 oz / 423 g
You’ll note that the weight and size are moderately small. The Canon RF mount is a large one, but the lens itself is essentially no wider than the mount flange, so fits on my Canon EOS R test camera very neatly.
One unique feature here is the built in lens hood that can either be retracted or extended according to your preference. It is metal (like everything else) and doesn’t have any way to lock in the extended position. A tiny bit of friction there does keep it from retracting of its own accord, but it takes very little pressure to make it move.
The interior of this hood has very fine metal ribs to help keep light from bouncing around, though the Anthy35 has some serious flare issues nonetheless.
The metal focus ring occupies the front half of the lens and moves smoothly and with a nice degree of damping. That damping is just slightly on the firm side, though the smoothness of the ring makes you quickly forget that. There is about 170 degrees of focus throw, which has proven adequate in my tests for accurate focus. The outer barrel rotates and extends very slightly (just a few millimeters of travel), though the inner barrel (which is where the 52mm filter threads are) does not rotate, which means that using circular polarizers is not restricted.
There is a small section of the barrel in between the focus ring and aperture ring that is fix, and it has the distance marker along with a hyperfocal scale for F4, F8, and F16 (marked) along with smaller lines for other aperture values. It’s worth noting that a manual focus lens with a good manual focus ring is still one of the best options for shooting video. Mirrorless lenses are great if you want to have constant autofocus, but are often terrible if you want to do manual focus pulls or have finite control over what is in focus. The Anthy35 could be a tempting option for video shooters.
The aperture ring is also nice. It has definite detents and a nice mechanical quality to it. Unfortunately there are only full stop aperture values present (outside of F1.8-F2). I like having a little more finite control of aperture than just full stops.
There are no electronics of any kind, so no information will be transmitted to the camera body.
That means no EXIF data, not automatic magnification of the image when you start focusing, and, on the Canon EOS R, no “Focus Guide” (a really clever manual focus aid that is my favorite of its kind). You can employ things like overlays and can manually magnify the image to verify focus.
There are nine rounded aperture blades, as you can see here:
Here’s a look at the shape of bokeh highlights as the lens is stopped down (F1.8, F2.8, and F4):
You can definitely see a nonagonal shape as the lens is stopped down, though the impression is still circular because of the higher blade count.
The Anthy35 comes with a front pinch cap and a rear cap that looks very similar to Canon’s own, but without any branding on either. This is an area where I always recommend that lens makers put their branding; it feels generic and unfinished without that.
Outside of a lack of electronics and weather sealing, the build here is beautiful and feels very much like a classic Zeiss lens…just for a whole lot less money! I’ve seen very few budget lenses with a build as nice as this.
Yahuhara Anthy35 Image Quality
The optical character is also classic, with a bias towards center sharpness with the edges of the frame improving at landscape apertures. The optical formula is 9 elements in 7 groups, which should make those who prefer simpler optical formulas happy. The strengths and weaknesses are essentially classic as well as we will see.
I typically start by examining the vignette and distortion. In this case the distortion is essentially non-existent, so no problems there. The vignette is another story, however. It very pronounced (I used a +70 for correction) and spreads fairly deeply into the frame (a midpoint of 10). Here’s a look at an uncorrected RAW result along with a manually corrected result:
Even on the wall test you can see some of the magenta/brown cast that I highlighted earlier. The color cast itself is somewhat dependent on the color temperature of the image. I discovered this while working to correct the vignette on this image:
I used the Eyedropper tool to sample the vignette color in the lower left corner and then pulled down the saturation of those colors (orange and yellow, as it turns out). I then decided to do a custom white balance as the snow looked a little yellowed. That looked great for the snow, but the vignette color returned somewhat. I needed to resample the vignette area, and found that now the color was more in the magenta range. As you can see from the final image, I was able to solve the problem fairly well, but if there had been other things in the image that were naturally magenta in color, they too would have been desaturated. It’s a definite liability in some situations. If you have a Nikon Z or Sony FE camera, however, this won’t be a problem for you.
In other environments, however, not only will you not see the color cast, but you may not even want to correct the vignette at all; it can add character and mood to images.
By the way, vignette diminishes by gradual degree as you stop the lens down, but at no point does it radically correct. It remains a part of the signature of the lens even at smaller apertures like F8, which is why I was still trying to correct for vignette in the landscape image above.
Our initial wall test also reveals that the color from the Anthy35 tends a little warm/yellow. If precision color balance is your goal, this is a negative. In other situations, however, it will give a warm, analog kind of look to images:
I consider this to be good choice for restaurant/bar type scenes for stills or video; it has good character and color rendering for those type scenes.
If we take a look a look at sharpness and contrast, we discover that center sharpness and contrast are quite good with some obvious softening and diminishing contrast as you head towards the edges.
Here’s some real world examples, which show that there is plenty of sharpness and contrast where you need it for the way you would typically use such a lens:
You do have the option of stopping down 1/3rd stop to F2, but I saw no miraculous changes to optical improvements there, though I have seen that happen with a few other lenses.
There is a more obvious improvement at F2.8, however, with center sharpness and contrast moving from good to great. You can also see improved resolution and contrast in the corners, though sharpness doesn’t quite reach them yet.
By F4, however, we have excellent resolution and contrast across the frame, and even the extreme bit of the corners are sharp at F5.6. Here’s some real world samples and crops to help illustrate the point:
There is a bit of uncorrected longitudinal chromatic aberrations (LoCA), though nothing I consider extreme.
I actually feel in many cases a slight bit of uncorrect LoCA leads to softer, more pleasing bokeh (it leaves less contrast in the defocused regions), and I believe that is case here. First of all, let’s take a look at the “bokeh balls” from the wide open aperture test above:
Note how beautiful those bokeh circles are. Very soft inner line (the line right inside the “edge” or “rim” of the bokeh circle) and very little busyness in the bokeh circles. That’s an unusually good result, and it is reflected in very nice bokeh rendering from the lens. Take a look at this shot of a Christmas decoration, for example:
Note how nicely everything melts away there? That’s a mirror just beyond the Nutcracker, but the edges of it melt away.
Here’s another that I really love. It’s simple, but the character of the image is exceptional:
Here’s a low light image where the shadows are a little crushed, but you can see that the image itself has very nice character.
One final example – a familiar Scrabble board:
This type of result actually reminds me of the classic Zeiss Planar 50mm F1.4; it really is very nice. The lens has nice character if used to its strengths.
Here’s a look at a few portrait examples to give you a sense of how it works for that. I’m going to include one wide open shot from church to show how it renders in an event type setting as well.
No problem there. It’s a nice portrait or street lens if you don’t mind manually focusing.
There are a few more weak spots however. One significant one is flare. This lens can react fairly strongly in some situations to backlighting, and part of the issue is in some interesting color casts once again. Here’s a mix of images with mostly large apertures and a few smaller aperture examples.
There is some obvious veiling (lost of contrast) but also some unique ghosting effects including a really unique blue/purple “blooming”. I’ve never encountered a lens quite like this. You will either have to be very careful about the situations where you point this lens at bright light or else embrace the very unique character of the lens. I can see some filmmakers valuing the unique flare properties for certain scenes. It is certainly unconventional…which is either good or bad depending on your tastes.
The final area of weakness is when it comes to coma correction. There is some obvious coma along the edges of the frame, looking like angels taking flight:
This isn’t a great result, to be sure, though you could use the lens in a pinch to shoot the stars if you aren’t too bothered by this.
One final observation is regarding minimum focus. The Anthy35 can focus down to 29 centimeters (right under a foot), and I estimate the magnification at somewhere near 0.19x. This is a useful figure and allows you some creative license for shooting images.
I think you can conclude, as I did, that this is not necessarily a lens for a novice. It will require an understanding of how to use it well and also a little understanding of post processing to correct for the optical oddities. You can see more examples in the image gallery here.
Conclusion
For years I have chosen to pull out vintage lenses occasionally despite the fact that they have far more optical flaws than more corrected modern lenses. Why? Because often there is a unique character to them that I enjoy despite their flaws. Images have a certain quality to them that I like. I also sometimes enjoy the “analog” approach of manual focus and a more deliberate style of photography. It is that part of my inner photographer that can appreciate the Yasuhara Anthy 35mm F1.8 despite some glaring flaws like poor flare resistance, warm color rendering, and the odd vignette effect. Used in the right settings, the Anthy35 produces images with a rich color palette and nice bokeh falloff. It has an artistic, retrograde feel that some photographers will love and others will hate. I hope that this review and the images contained in it have helped you decide which you are.
I’m thankful that a lens like the Anthy35 exists, as it adds some depth to the new (and rather thin) catalogs of the new Canon RF and Nikon Z platforms, and there will certainly be some Sony FE users as well who will consider this a nice budget option for street, portrait, or casual photography. It will also appeal to some film makers who will appreciate the smooth manual focus ring. Others will certainly be turned off by its flaws. Yasuhara has gone for a very classic approach with the Anthy 35mm F1.8, and, in a modern world, not everyone will appreciate that…
…but some will.
Pros:
Beautiful classic build – much like classic Zeiss
Rich color in certain environments
Nice, well damped manual focus ring
Aperture ring is precise
Nice bokeh and rendering
Skin tones are nice
Good center sharpness at wide apertures
Excellent sharpness across the frame at smaller apertures
Reasonably priced
Cons:
Odd vignette discoloration effect on Canon RF
Colors tend to be warm – works well in some settings, not in others
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Great News! I can now offer a 5% discount on all purchases at Amplis Foto, Canada’s Leading Photographic Supplier. Please enter discount code: AMPLIS52018DA in your cart. It is good for everything in your cart, and is stackable with other coupons, too! It will take 5% off your entire order! Proceeds go towards keeping this site going and providing you with new reviews!
Purchase the Yasuhara Anthy 35mm F1.8 @ Yasuhara: https://yasuharausa.com/discount/DUSTINABBOTT (10% off) or B&H Photo: https://bhpho.to/37tbDqo
Keywords: Yasuhara, Anthy, 35mm, F1.8, 1.8, Yasuhara Review, Anthy 35 Review, Canon EOS R, EOS R, Canon, Mirrorless, EOS R Review, Canon EOS R Review, Canon R Review, RF, Dustin Abbott, Review, Hands-On, Sample Images, Video, MF, Resolution, Demonstration, Resolution, Coma, Focus, Yasuhara Anthy 35mm F1.8 RF
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With any new camera system there is a vulnerable period where the quantity and quality of lenses available for the system can either make or break its momentum. Canon has been weathering that storm on its “R” full frame mirrorless platform, where of the ten RF mount lenses from Canon at this point, only two fall under $1000 in their MSRP, with the majority of the lenses (7 of them!) being in excess of $2000! Canon has desperately needed more financially accessible lenses for a broad rollout of the R system, and that typically means needing third party lenses to come in and flesh out the affordable part of the range. I recently reviewed a lens that will help (the Samyang 14mm F2.8 RF) and the subject of today’s focus is another – a nicely made manual focus prime from Japanese boutique lens maker Yasuhara. The Yasuhara Anthy 35mm F1.8 has classic good looks, a solid metal build, and comes in a native RF mount. And, perhaps most importantly, it has a very reasonable price tag of $299 USD. Is the Yasuhara Anthy prime worth your money? Watch for my review soon, but in the meantime you can check out the images here in these galleries to help determine if it is for you.
Purchasing your gear through B&H and these links helps fund this website and keeps the articles coming. You can also make a donation here if you would like. Visit my Amazon page for some of my gear of choice! Thank you for your support.
Great News! I can now offer a 5% discount on all purchases at Amplis Foto, Canada’s Leading Photographic Supplier. Please enter discount code: AMPLIS52018DA in your cart. It is good for everything in your cart, and is stackable with other coupons, too! It will take 5% off your entire order! Proceeds go towards keeping this site going and providing you with new reviews!
Purchase the Yasuhara Anthy 35mm F1.8 @ Yasuhara: https://yasuharausa.com/discount/DUSTINABBOTT (10% off) or B&H Photo: https://bhpho.to/37tbDqo
Keywords: Yasuhara, Anthy, 35mm, F1.8, 1.8, Yasuhara Review, Anthy 35 Review, Canon EOS R, EOS R, Canon, Mirrorless, EOS R Review, Canon EOS R Review, Canon R Review, RF, Dustin Abbott, Review, Hands-On, Sample Images, Video, MF, Resolution, Demonstration, Resolution, Coma, Focus, Yasuhara Anthy 35mm F1.8 RF
DISCLAIMER: This article and description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive a small commission. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
When Canon released the Canon EOS R full frame mirrorless camera last year it arrived with a fair bit of controversy. There were some key areas where Canon lagged behind the competition despite offering some innovation in other areas. My consensus (largely echoed by other reviewers) was that there was a lot of potential there, and the early Canon RF lenses were excellent, but more work was needed. Fortunately, Canon has continued to support the EOS R and expand it’s capabilities via firmware along with delivering more and more outstanding lenses. There’s been another problem, however, and that is of the ten RF mount lenses from Canon at this point, only two fall under $1000 in their MSRP, with the majority of the lenses (7 of them!) being in excess of $2000! Canon desperately needs more financially accessible lenses for a broad rollout of the R system, and to date third party support had been reserved to a handful of manual focus lenses. Fortunately, that seems about to change, and leading the charge is Korean lens maker Samyang (also sold as Rokinon) with this lens – the Samyang AF 14mm F2.8 lens in an RF mount. This is an autofocusing lens (and one that autofocuses very well on the Canon EOS R that I tested it on) along with having a beautiful, weather sealed build. It delivers an extremely wide angle of view that is wider than any other autofocus lens on the platform (at the time of review) and comes with a more approachable price tag of $699 USD. The RF14 (as we’ll refer to it for brevity) is an intriguing option for those who want a wide angle of view without breaking the bank.
14mm is a very dramatic angle of view, and the RF14 allows you to produce some uniquely dramatic images. It can also be a challenging lens to compose with if you aren’t accustomed to using wide angle lenses, as very wide focal lengths have a way of making everything feel like it has been pushed away from the camera, leaving foreground objects to really stand out. It can fun to revisit familiar scenes with a wide angle lens and make them look completely different.
In many ways the importance of the Samyang RF 14mm is disproportionately exaggerated by this being the first autofocusing third-party lens on the new Canon full frame ecosystem, and I was pretty delighted to discover that the RF14 enjoys a much more thorough amount of Canon support than my years of experience with third party lenses on Canon DSLRs have led me to expect. The lens is fully supported in Canon’s Lens Aberration Corrections with nothing (not even Digital Lens Optimizer) greyed out.
This enables you to have a variety of corrections to either JPEGs or Video footage that results in the optical defects of the lens being minimized. In years past only first party Canon lenses received this support, though in the last year or so Sigma lenses also started to have access to LAC. Having full support like this is a great sign that perhaps Canon is opening up the R platform a bit more than it did with DSLRs in the past. Samyang has had a number of 14mm varieties (both MF and AF versions), and, while doing a little research, I discovered that this new RF mount lens most closely resembles the Sony FE version, though with the upgrade in weather sealing. I’m actually happy about, this, however, as I’ve reviewed a number of Samyang AF lenses for Sony FE over the last couple of years and been very impressed by a number of them. Canon R shooters would be fortunate to get access to lenses like the 35mm F1.4, 45mm F1.8, 85mm F1.4, and even the little 18mm F2.8.
By the way, it seems (like with the Sony FE lenses), that firmware updates will require using the dedicated Samyang Lens Station rather than receiving them via camera or some other means, though as of this review the RF version of the Lens Station is not yet available.
But is the Samyang AF 14mm F2.8 RF a lens that you should consider yourself? Let’s explore more fully what you are getting if you decide to lay down your money…
A great place to start to explore the build, handling, and autofocus performance of this lens is by checking out Part 1 of my video review here:
I’m really happy on this front as the RF14 is pretty much everything I would want save one detail. It has a beautiful build (including weathersealing), a handsome look, and a nicely compact size considering that this is a very wide angle focal length with a fairly large maximum aperture. So what’s the one missing detail?
Part of the magic of Canon’s new RF lenses has been the control ring – an extra point of control that can be figured to a variety of different functions from aperture to EV compensation and more. It remains to be seen if other third party lenses will have this ring, but the RF14 does not.
What it does have is a very handsome finish on a lightweight anodized metal (probably aluminum) body. Samyang “borrowed” Canon’s red ring accent years ago, and I actually like their shade of red a little better.
Everything here is metal, including the finely ribbed focus ring that feels good in the hand and turns with a nicely damped amount of resistance. Like other mirrorless lenses, the RF14 has “focus-by-wire” manual focus where the focus input is routed through the focus motor, but there is not really any perceptible lag and focus is fairly responsive. Fortunately the only time I actually needed manual focus is when I was setting up astrophotography shots in the dark.
Also included is a nice degree of weather sealing, with a gasket as the rear mount along with some internal seals and coatings on the front element. It’s very important in a lens likely to be used for landscapes to have some sealing in the body.
Speaking of that front element, it is by necessity a curved front element that is protected by a fixed lens hood (the only plastic part of the lens, though a very tough, very thick plastic). This means two things: 1) screw-on filters are precluded and 2) the lens cap is a deeper one that has to fit over the lens hood, making it a little tougher to fit into a pocket. Fortunately the lens hood does have some tension clips that helps keep the lens cap firmly attached.
Samyang has worked to help minimize the impact of not having access to screw-in filters by including a rear gel filter holder. While I’m rarely enamored with the optical properties of gel filters, I am heartened by the fact that the rear filter holder assembly is attached by screws, meaning that it will be very easy for a third party filter maker like Aurora Aperture to design a replacement filter holder for better quality glass filters. I’ve tested something similar that they designed for Canon and Irix lenses with rear filter holders, though that particular holder won’t work here because the RF mount has a wider diameter. I did find that I could slide my existing Aurora glass filters into the stock rear holder, and, while the fit isn’t secure (the filter isn’t as wide as the opening), it seemed at least on a cursory level the the filter would work and cover the sensor area. This would be an easily solvable problem by companies like this if there is some demand for them.
I’m also really happy with the size of the lens. While it isn’t a small lens, per se, it is a reasonably compact one with a nice weight. Samyang had previous released it’s manual focus 14mm F2.8 in an RF mount, though that lens wasn’t a fresh design for mirrorless. It weighs in at 800g (1.8 pounds) compared to the more svelte 523g (1.15 pounds) of the RF14. The Canon 15-35mm F2.8L IS, by comparison, weighs 840g (1.85 pounds), though that comparison hardly seems fair considering the zoom range and image stabilization that the RF 15-35 sports. Still, if traveling light (or working from a gimbal) is important to you, that extra bit of weight savings could be a big deal.
The lens is also fairly compact in length. It is (D x L) 3.39 x 3.75″ (86 x 95.3mm) compared to 3.43 x 4.73″ (87 x 120.1mm) for the manual focus version. The zoom lens is longer and wider still at 3.48 x 4.99″ (88.5 x 126.8mm). So, while not tiny, I feel like Samyang has delivered a very reasonably sized lens that is a nice match for either the R or RP bodies.
I also appreciate the inclusion of an AF/MF switch on the side of the lens, which is still my preferred method of controlling this. You can also switch from within the camera body if preferred.
The lens can focus down quite closely (20cm or 0.66 feet), which produces a rather uninspiring 0.12x magnification:
To be fair, however, close up image quality is quite good and the MF version of the lens only manages a very weak 0.08x. The 15-35 zoom lens can deliver a much higher 0.21x magnification on the long end of its zoom range.
All told, though, I’m very happy with what we are getting here. I do miss the control ring, but I’m also not surprised that it isn’t here. I love the fact that the lens is weather sealed and also appreciate the quality feel of the construction. This is a beautiful lens that looks like it belongs on the EOS R that I tested it on (that red ring doesn’t hurt…)
Samyang RF 14mm F2.8 Autofocus
This is another section that I’m very, very pleased about. When I first began reviewing Samyang AF lenses, I found the focus a little primitive in behavior (somewhat course and buzzy). I’ve watched Samyang make huge strides in this area very quickly. Some of the more recent lenses (the 18mm F2.8 and 45mm F1.8) have been downright excellent, and the 85mm F1.4 became so after some firmware updates. Fortunately the RF14 falls into the category of excellent, with autofocus every bit as good as native Canon RF lenses that I’ve used to date. The RF14 employs linear motors that provide silent, accurate, and fast autofocus. I can faintly hear the focus motor if I put my ear on the barrel of the lens, but even in traditional viewfinder position I cannot hear it at all. The in-camera microphone did not pick up anything when I did focus pulls in a silent environment. There was also no hunting or settling. Focus was quick and accurate in my video tests, and this proved true in real world shooting as well. To be fair, a wide angle lens puts less pressure on a focus system because depth of field is quite large at any aperture, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t wide angle lenses with poor focus systems. This isn’t one of them. I had zero complaints about the nature of the focus during my review period.
I also had no complaints over focus accuracy. The EOS R has improved Eye AF performance after firmware updates, and, while situations where Eye AF were necessary/applicable are fewer with a lens like this, it did prove effective in those situations. At a distance of 3m/10 feet or greater you will almost never get Eye AF with the small box covering the eye for the simple reason that the eyes occupy too little of the sensor space for that to be possible. Case in point is this shot:
I could not get apparent eye detection at this focus distance in camera, though the larger depth of field essentially made this a moot point. Focus is accurate, and you can tell my subject is more in focus than the backdrop here:
At a closer focus distance (I’m no more than 2m/6.5 feet away here), Eye AF picked up quick and accurately. All of the shots from this series were as well focused as this one even at F2.8:
Close focus results (where depth of field is shallow) also show good focus accuracy in those rare moments where depth of field is more shallow:
I got smooth, consistent focus results when using the RF14 on a gimbal or for a brief vlogging test where I held the camera away from my face as I walked along talking. I could see from the articulating screen on the camera (which I had facing me) that Eye AF was keeping an effective lock on my eyes, and the footage is crisp and confident (no pulsing or focus drifts).
It’s also worth noting that I was able to get focus lock in extreme low lighting conditions. In the first example the EV value is roughly -2.67 EV (1/8th second, F2.8, ISO 40,000). This was near dark conditions, and I had no problem focusing on the books on the shelf. In the second example, I was shooting in a room so dark that I couldn’t see the subject with the naked eye. I was unable to lock focus on the boxes higher on the shelf (I was able to do so with the wider aperture Canon RF 50mm F1.2L lens), though I was able to lock focus on the “Welch’s” box below that had a slightly higher contrast subject. This was down to a 0.8 second exposure, which drops the EV value to an amazing -5.33 EV. In other words, I was able to get focus in essentially dark conditions, meaning that you should expect good low light performance out of this lens.
Kudos to Samyang for delivering a very mature autofocus experience on their first lens on the RF platform. Their years of growth on the Sony FE platform have paid dividends here. It seems like Samyang has gotten mirrorless autofocus nailed down.
RF14 Image Quality
My evaluation of the image quality from the Samyang RF 14mm F2.8 went through ebbs and flows during my review period of about three weeks. I was originally somewhat disparaging, as I was disappointed with some of my real-world results. As I spent time with the lens, however, and did a few comparisons to other lenses, I realized that perhaps my expectations were a little skewed and also that I was able to get better real world results with a few tweaks. I’ll do my best to deliver those results in as nuanced a way as possible here. If you wanted to see the image quality more “hands-on”, watch Part 2 of the video review:
As previously noted, the RF14 has full in-camera profile correction support, which does make a difference for dealing with various aberrations. The two that I always start by exploring are vignette and distortion. There is some of both present here, with the barrel distortion exaggerated by the close focus distance. The vignette is similarly moderately heavy in the extreme corners with a diminishing pattern seen moving towards the center of the frame. I was able to do a fairly good manual correction of both of these things in Lightroom by entering a +13 on the distortion scale and a +53 value on Amount and 18 for a Midpoint in Vignette correction.
I’ve certainly seen far worse results for both metrics in wide angle lenses. There is a mild amount of a “mustache” type pattern in the barrel distortion which leaves a bit of uncorrected distortion in the corners, but by and large the result is pretty clean after these corrections.
An even better result can be had by digging a little in Lightroom. At the moment, the lens is too new to have a standard profile, but I was able to find a profile for the Sony FE 14mm F2.8 version under the Rokinon tab (Rokinon is the label that Samyang sells under often in North America). I believe that the optical properties of the two lenses are the same, and the profile does a quite effective job correcting the vignette and distortion.
JPEGs and Video footage can receive similar corrections in camera if you enable the corrections. So, while neither result is flawless, neither is either result unusual for the class or among the worst examples that I’ve seen. If you need extremely low distortion results for your work (and don’t mind manual focus), you might try either the 12mm or 15mm Laowa Zero D options (now available in an RF mount). Neither of them will offer less distortion (more, actually), but they have negligible amounts of barrel distortion. For most people, however, the RF14 will work fine for their purposes.
The RF14 has an optical formula of 14 elements in 10 groups, and this includes 3 aspherical lenses, 1 high reflective lens and 2 extra-low dispersion elements. The credentials sound good, but how does this play out in real life?
If look at center sharpness and contrast, we see a good result from F2.8 on. There’s good sharpness and contrast in the center of the frame at F2.8, with mildly better contrast at F4:
Real world usage verifies this observation, with excellent sharpness on this portrait shot in the center of the frame.
Mid-frame also looks fairly good, but there is some obvious drop-off in the extreme corners. Part of this is exaggerated by field curvature due to the short focus distance for this test.
F4 looks better than F2.8 a little ways out from the extreme corners, but not much better in the actual extreme corners.
We see improvement in the extreme corners at F5.6, and a bit more at F8.
I often shoot with higher resolution cameras like the Sony a7RIII/RIV, and so I’ve learned that F5.6 is often the landscape sweet spot for me. You avoid any softening due to diffraction, and often lens sharpness peaks around there. With the EOS R and RF14 combination, I’ve found that I prefer F8 for the additional evenness of contrast and resolution across the frame when shooting landscapes. Part of this is instinctive more than techinical (I found that when I started shooting at F8, I liked the end results more), but I think you might be able to see what I mean in this pixel crop from a controlled tripod shot taken at F5.6 and then at F8:
The snow has a brighter look to it with improved contrast – which makes resolution look better even though it isn’t technically all that different. It’s subtle, but that subtlety was enough to shift my perception of the lens performance from negative to positive. I just liked the images better, and that matters.
Field curvature becomes less of an issue at distance, and I found real world performance at wider apertures better there in the corners. There the biggest improvement came from F2.8 to F4, with more moderate improvements after that. This is a crop taken from the lower mid-frame along the right side of a formal test image, and you can see that F2.8 is usable while F8 looks great.
Here’s a look at the full image this crop is taken from (the F2.8 version). Globally it looks pretty great for a wide open shot.
The RF14 is capable of producing some lovely landscape images at smaller apertures with good color, contrast, and that dramatic angle of view:
The RF14 does suffer from a bit of lateral chromatic aberrations in some extreme situations (see the green and purple fringing on the edges of the tree branch in the upper left corner).
Fortunately this is the “simple to correct” variety that exhibits and corrects in a consistent fashion, so either using the in-camera profile for JPEGs or clicking the “Remove Chromatic Aberrations” button in post is enough to fix it nicely (that’s all that’s been done to the image on the right). I didn’t actually see the CA very often in any of my test images, and if you set up an import preset with a profile enabled, you’ll never see it again.
I found colors to be very nice from the lens. Winter isn’t the most colorful season, but I think you’ll agree that these images have a certain pristine crispness to them:
I also found flare resistance to be an area of relative strength. At wide apertures I rarely saw any veiling or ghosting with the sun in the frame (though a bit showed up when I panned the camera back and forth shooting video). Ironically in stills images I saw a bit of ghosting when stopped down to F11 but little when panning back and forth for video. You’ll also see some longer shafts of light coming off the “blades” of the sunstar at small apertures at times. Either way, however, this is a lens with fairly good flare resistance…which is really important in a lens with such a wide angle of view as the sun is far more likely to be in frame. In some of the images (including the last), you can see the shape of the sunburst effect from the seven-bladed aperture.
You are not going to see much bokeh with this lens, as the focal length is too wide to have things much out of focus, but the quality of the blur I’ve seen isn’t bad.
Finally, I also had a chance to test the coma performance of the RF14, and I have mostly encouraging news to report on that front as well. Obviously you do have to contend with some vignette for such photos, though I found that the benefit of correcting that vignette was situational; some images looked better with it corrected while others did not. With the flat plane of focus for distant stars, I actually found sharpness quite good, with star points very crisp in the middle and only that deterioration in the extreme corners. Coma is fairly well controlled, with most star points looking good and only mild wings growing on some of the brighter stars in the corners. Even this was only visible at a pixel level, so I feel like this would be quite a suitable lens for shooting astro due to the dynamic focal length and fairly sharp rendering of the night sky. Here’s a look at an astro image with a crop from first the center and then the upper left corner followed by a few other astro images:
I would consider this to be a useful tool for those wanting to shoot astro images. You’ll note from the first image in the second series that perspective distortion will always be an issue with a lens with a wide focal length. Tilting the lens up will provide a very obvious leaning effect; this is no tilt-shift lens! You will also get some “stretching” near the edges, so you probably won’t want to put people there. This cabin won’t complain about it’s “weight” the way that a human subject will!
All told, though, I got a lot of images I liked from the lens despite not shooting at the most colorful time of year! Once I discovered that I preferred shooting at F8 than F5.6 for my landscape shots, I began to get more and more images that I was pleased with both artistically and technically. You can see more of them by visiting the image gallery here; I only have room for so many samples in the review itself!
Conclusion
As I mentioned earlier, I believe the Samyang RF 14m F2.8 has a somewhat outsized significance. If this lens had been released years into the development cycle when there were dozens of lenses available, I think that it would be easy to say that it was an attractive option for those without the deep pockets required for Canon’s L lenses, but with little more weight than that. At the moment, however, it is important and special because it is the first to start to plug the gap in the Canon RF lineup between the moderately expensive ($499 USD for the Canon RF 35mm F1.8 IS) and the exceptionally expensive (there are a number of lenses with price tags in excess of $2500 USD). There have been some manual focus options released from a few manufacturers in an RF mount, but the fact remains that the vast majority of photographers are not really interested in manual focus. The RF14 asks you to sacrifice very little (save the control ring), and has a beautiful build and handles very nicely. It’s autofocus works fantastic and that, combined with the full lens aberrations corrections, will make you quickly forget that you aren’t using a Canon lens.
It’s not perfect; the extreme corners aren’t super sharp until smaller apertures, and I didn’t feel that the best landscape performance came until F8. Fortunately the wide focal length means that you can still effectively handhold in a lot of lighting conditions as you don’t need a particularly high shutter speed to avoid motion blur even without image stabilization in Canon bodies (thus far). I found that even shooting at 1/30th to 1/50th of a second was sufficient to get reliably sharp results (unless I was particularly cold!), and that’s possible in most lighting conditions. There’s a fair bit of barrel distortion, and definitely some vignette, though all of these are correctable in either camera or post. There’s no question that you can produce some dynamic, intriguing images with this lens, and the fact that you can do it without breaking the bank ($699 USD MSRP) is just icing on the cake. It’s also an intriguing option for video either on a gimbal (light weight and good autofocus help!) or for doing vlogging. By the end of my review period, I had come full circle and appreciated this lens for its many strengths despite having a few shortcomings. If you want a really wide angle of view and can’t afford the pricey Canon RF 15-35mm F2.8L IS, then the Samyang RF 14mm F2.8 might just be the lens for you.
Pros:
Beautiful, attractive, functional build
Weather sealed
Excellent autofocus performance – quick and silent
Widest angle of view with autofocus currently available on RF
Good astro performance
Good center sharpness at wide apertures; good edge performance stopped down
Good color and contrast
Excellent price
Cons:
Corners a little soft until smaller apertures
Best contrast and “pop” doesn’t come until F8
Some “mustache” pattern in distortion
Vignette doesn’t ever completely go away at smaller apertures
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Keywords: Samyang AF 14mm, Samyang, Rokinon, AF, 14mm, F2.8, RF, Samyang 14mm RF, Rokinon 14mm RF, Canon EOS R, EOS R, Canon, Mirrorless, EOS R Review, Canon EOS R Review, Canon R Review, RF, Firmware 1.6, Dustin Abbott, Review, Hands-On, Sample Images, Video, AF, Resolution, Demonstration, Resolution, Coma, Focus, Samyang AF 14mm F2.8 RF
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When Canon released the Canon EOS R full frame mirrorless camera last year it arrived with a fair bit of controversy. There were some key areas where Canon lagged behind the competition despite offering some innovation in other areas. My consensus (largely echoed by other reviewers) was that there was a lot of potential there, and the early Canon RF lenses were excellent, but more work was needed. Fortunately, Canon has continued to support the EOS R and expand it’s capabilities via firmware along with delivering more and more outstanding lenses. There’s been another problem, however, and that is of the ten RF mount lenses from Canon at this point, only two fall under $1000 in their MSRP, with the majority of the lenses (7 of them!) being in excess of $2000! Canon desperately needs more financially accessible lenses for a broad rollout of the R system, and to date third party support had been reserved to a handful of manual focus lenses. Fortunately, that seems about to change, and leading the charge is Korean lens maker Samyang (also sold as Rokinon) with this lens – the Samyang AF 14mm F2.8 lens in an RF mount. This is an autofocusing lens (and one that autofocuses very well on the Canon EOS R that I tested it on) along with having a beautiful, weather sealed build. It delivers an extremely wide angle of view that is wider than any other lens on the platform and comes with a more approachable price tag of $699 USD. I’ll be delivering a detailed analysis of the lens in my review (stay tuned!), but in the meantime you can get a sense of the kinds of photos you can produce with a wide angle optic like this.
Purchasing your gear through B&H and these links helps fund this website and keeps the articles coming. You can also make a donation here if you would like. Visit my Amazon page for some of my gear of choice! Thank you for your support.
Great News! I can now offer a 5% discount on all purchases at Amplis Foto, Canada’s Leading Photographic Supplier. Please enter discount code: AMPLIS52018DA in your cart. It is good for everything in your cart, and is stackable with other coupons, too! It will take 5% off your entire order! Proceeds go towards keeping this site going and providing you with new reviews!
Keywords: Samyang AF 14mm, Samyang, Rokinon, AF, 14mm, F2.8, RF, Samyang 14mm RF, Rokinon 14mm RF, Canon EOS R, EOS R, Canon, Mirrorless, EOS R Review, Canon EOS R Review, Canon R Review, RF, Firmware 1.6, Dustin Abbott, Review, Hands-On, Sample Images, Video, AF, Resolution, Demonstration, Resolution, Coma, Focus, Samyang AF 14mm F2.8 RF
DISCLAIMER: This article and description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive a small commission. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
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