I had the privilege in late February to be in Japan for Sigma’s announcement of a three new products along with some new branding initiatives. My favorite of those announcements was the 300-600mm F4 DG OS | SPORT lens. Sigma had yet to release a true “super-telephoto” on FE and L mounts, and this one is exciting. It’s a big lens (167mm in diameter and 467.9mm in length) and weighs nearly 4 kilos (3985g), but it also delivers a constant F4 aperture all the way through 600mm, which puts it into very rare company. The Sony, Canon, and Nikon 600mm F4 lenses on their respective platforms all costs $13,000 USD or more ($14,000 for the Nikon), while the Sigma offers the versatility of being a zoom and also comes at a price tag of right under $6000 USD. But is the performance of this new 300-600 Sport make it worthy of inclusion with the best from the big brands? I try to answer that question in my video review and text review, or you can just enjoy the photos from the big lens in the galleries.
Thanks to Sigma Canada (Gentec) for sending me a review loaner of this lens. As always, this is a completely independent review. *The tests and most of the photos that I share as a part of my review cycle have been done with the Sony a7RV along with the Sony Alpha 1 that serve as my benchmark cameras for Sony lenses. You can visit the product page for the Sigma 300-600mm F4 SPORT here.
Don’t plan on being discrete with this one. People are going to KNOW when this big white is pointed at them.
This lens seems to have it all, including the premium HLA focus motor for sports work, an effective 5.5 stop OS2 stabilization system, and a huge amount of controls, including a drop in filter system including the ability to rotate circular polarizers. I noted and tested the ability to preset focus positions where a new unique control ring can be rocked and instantly return focus to the preset position – great for sports like baseball, for example.
As a Sports lens, it has Sigma’s premium build quality, including a magnesium alloy body and carbon fiber lens hood and completed with a thorough weather sealing. It’s also Sigma’s first white super telephoto lens, and it looks beautiful.
Keywords: Sigma 300-600mm, DG, SPORT, SPORTS, Sigma 300-600 Sport, Sigma 300-600mm F4, Sigma 300-600mm F4 DG OS Sport, Sigma 300-600 Review, #SIGMAEmount, #SIGMA #SIGMA300600mmF4Sport, #SIGMASport, #SIGMASPORTS, Full Frame, Review, Sony Alpha 1, Sony a7RV, Review, Hands On, Dustin Abbott, Real World, Comparison, Sharpness, Bokeh, Flare Resistance, Autofocus, Image Quality, Sample Images, Video, Photography, let the light in, weathersealing, #letthelightin, DA
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.
I had the privilege in late February to be in Japan for Sigma’s announcement of a three new products along with some new branding initiatives. My favorite of those announcements was the 300-600mm F4 DG OS | SPORT lens. Sigma had yet to release a true “super-telephoto” on FE and L mounts, and this one is exciting. It’s a big lens (167mm in diameter and 467.9mm in length) and weighs nearly 4 kilos (3985g), but it also delivers a constant F4 aperture all the way through 600mm, which puts it into very rare company. The Sony, Canon, and Nikon 600mm F4 lenses on their respective platforms all costs $13,000 USD or more ($14,000 for the Nikon), while the Sigma offers the versatility of being a zoom and also comes at a price tag of right under $6000 USD. But is the performance of this new 300-600 Sport make it worthy of inclusion with the best from the big brands? We’ll explore that question in either my video review below or in the text review that follows.
Thanks to Sigma Canada (Gentec) for sending me a review loaner of this lens. As always, this is a completely independent review. *The tests and most of the photos that I share as a part of my review cycle have been done with the Sony a7RV along with the Sony Alpha 1 that serve as my benchmark cameras for Sony lenses. You can visit the product page for the Sigma 300-600mm F4 SPORT here.
Don’t plan on being discrete with this one. People are going to KNOW when this big white is pointed at them.
This lens seems to have it all, including the premium HLA focus motor for sports work, an effective 5.5 stop OS2 stabilization system, and a huge amount of controls, including a drop in filter system including the ability to rotate circular polarizers. I noted and tested the ability to preset focus positions where a new unique control ring can be rocked and instantly return focus to the preset position – great for sports like baseball, for example.
As a Sports lens, it has Sigma’s premium build quality, including a magnesium alloy body and carbon fiber lens hood and completed with a thorough weather sealing. It’s also Sigma’s first white super telephoto lens, and it looks beautiful.
So does Sigma have a hit on their hands? We’ll dive in a little further to find out.
Build and Handling
Sigma’s build standards are continually evolving, but there really isn’t any precedent for this lens. Sigma launched a new logo, new primary font, new packaging, and of course a new finish for this lens. And, in my opinion, they nailed all of those ingredients.
What’s more, I had the opportunity to visit Sigma’s Aizu, Japan factory where they create almost every part of these lenses, and I’ve got a fresh appreciation for how much the “Made in Japan” label means to this company.
This is the most feature rich lens that I’ve ever used, and there are essentially multiple sections of features. Essentially the only thing that isn’t here is an aperture ring.
We’ll work out way forwards. The closest feature to the lens barrel is the drop-in filter holder (RFH-21). The basic (included) filter is a UV/protection filter.
“Protection from what?”, you might ask, since typically protection filters are screwed onto the front of the lens to protect the front element. In this case the opposite is true, as that filter seems to protect the rear element.
You can screw any 40.5mm filter onto that filter holder.
Perhaps more useful will be the optional circular polarizer or variable ND filter. That adapter comes with an external wheel that will allow you to rotate that filter to achieve optimal effect.
The bottom line is that the front of the lens is so large that using traditional screw-on filters wouldn’t really be an option (167mm filters aren’t really a thing!) so no front threads are included.
Next we come to one bank of switches on the left side and another on the right side of the next section. On the left side we have a fairly standard bank of switches including an AF | MF switch, a three position focus limiter, an OS mode switch (OFF | Mode 1 [Standard] | Mode 2 [Panning Mode]), and finally a three position Custom switch ( OFF | C1 | C2).
L-mount purchasers will get more out of this final switch, as there is a USB UD-11 dock available for L-mount that will allow you to customize the settings. No such dock exists for Sony E-mount, so that means for Sony users (like myself) the C1 and C2 are by default more options for the OS. C1 is Dynamic View (more stabilization of the viewfinder) and C2 is “Moderate View”, which gives you less viewfinder stabilization (allowing you to follow action more naturally) but gives you more stabilization assistance at capture.
The OSS (Sigma calls this most recent version “OS2”) is very effective, being rated at 6 stops on the wide end and 5.5 stops on the telephoto end. I’m not sure how much the system will work in conjunction with your camera’s stabilization, but I certainly felt like I got more stabilization out of the combination than what I did with Sony’s own recent 400-800mm G lens. That’s great if you are trying to handhold this beast, as it isn’t exactly on the light side! I think that Sigma’s OS2 (on this and other lenses) is the most effective stabilization system that I’ve tested on E-mount to this point.
There’s a second bank of switches on the right side of the lens, and these are design to work with the unique power focus controls. There is a button that allows you to set a focus position (Preset). When this mode is activated, a quick twist of the function ring located up near the zoom ring will will instantly return focus to the preset position. This could be useful for sports (pitcher’s mound!) or if you are watching a preset position for wildlife.
In the power focus position, focus will smoothly move through the focus range. It is speed dependent (two speeds) depending on how quickly you rotate the ring. The idea is to be able to focus without moving your hand’s position (as it takes some effort to hold this thing up!)
I’m not sure that most users will be using these controls on a regular basis, but there are certain applications where they could be useful.
The “set” button in this section is not to be confused with the Custom/Focus Hold buttons) found nearer the front of the lens. There are four redundant buttons there at 90° intervals around the lens barrel so that one is always close to hand. These buttons will allow employ whatever function you’ve assigned in camera to the Focus Hold button.
Next comes the tripod collar section. Once again we have a very robust implementation. There is a tension knob that allows you to loosen the tripod collar section to rotate it. I’ll note that the balance point is excellent, making this easy to set up even on a lightweight tripod. There are strap attachment points on either side of the tripod.
The foot is awesome! It’s long, got Arca grooves, and, uniquely, it has a lovely padded section along the top that makes carrying the lens by the foot much more comfortable.
The foot also has another unique surprise. Along the back there is a dial that allows you to determine whether or not there will be clicks at the cardinal positions when you are rotating the lens on the tripod collar. I prefer clicks (easier alignment at these points), but others may prefer free rotation. This is the first lens I’ve tested that allows you to have both.
The tripod collar is not removable (not surprising in such a big lens), and removing/changing the foot will require Allan keys (included).
Next comes the manual focus ring. It looks relatively narrow in the picture below because the lens is so big, but in reality it is 3cm wide. It has a rubberized, ribbed finish and moves nicely with a good balance of freedom and resistance.
Next comes the large zoom ring. It is about 2.5x as wide as the focus ring and has a bevel in it to give it a tactile distinction from the focus ring. This is an internally zooming ring, so zooming is easier than most external zooming lenses. I would have liked the zoom ring throw to be even smaller than its roughly 80° arc to allow for even swifter zoom changes, but it isn’t bad. The action is a little heavier (and not quite as smooth) as my internally zooming Sony 200-600G, though that lens is moving much smaller elements.
It is worth noting that Sigma lenses zoom in the opposite direction of Sony lenses (and pretty much every other brand on E-mount). It’s a little annoying, actually.
There is a significant flare at the front of the lens to accommodate that huge front element.
The pearlescent finish of the “thermal insulation paint” is gorgeous. Sigma waited a long time to do a “great white”, but they did it well.
The lens hood is massive and relies on a tension knob to hold it in place.
Remove that hood and you’ll find an absolutely massive amount of glass up front.
I was able to get a look at the components of the lens before assembly, and you can see both the huge aluminum/magnesium housing components along with some of those massive glass elements that go into the design.
This includes some serious weather sealing. Sigma says, “The mount joints, manual focus ring, zoom ring, custom switches and other control switches, and exterior joints are all protected from dust and splash by a dust- and splash-resistant structure. Further, the frontmost surface of the lens is coated with a water- and oil-repellent coating to facilitate maintenance when water droplets or dust adhere to the lens.”
Bottom line is that this is a beautifully built lens both inside and out. It’s made to be tough, durable, and capable…but all of that comes at a price. This is a lens that dwarfs the largest lens in my kit, which is the Sony FE 200-600mm F5-6.3 G OSS. It looks rather tiny next the big Sigma despite covering an additional 100mm of zoom range.
It illustrates well a point that is lost on non-photographers. This lens obviously gets attention when you are out with it, as it looks like you are carrying a bazooka. People ask me, “Is that for taking pictures of the stars or something?” They assume it is akin to a telescope, because your average person has no sense of aperture, light gathering potential, or any of the actual reasons a lens like this has to be so large. They just think in terms of “reach”, as in, “the bigger the lens, the more telephoto it’s able to achieve.” It’s not even particularly easy to explain it to them, as most “civilians” have no context for trying to stop action with long telephoto lenses.
The 300-600 Sport has no more reach than my 200-600 G, but a look in the front of the lens shows just how much light gathering potential there is in this constant F4 aperture than what exists in the variable aperture Sony.
All of that glass shows just how much extra light can get to the sensor vs the Sony, which means that I have a much better chance of stopping action with the Sigma.
But yes, that means that it is huge and heavy. The lens in E-mount form is 167mm in diameter (6.6″) by a whopping 469.9mm (18.5’mm”) in length. The lens hood adds another 165mm to the length (longer than a Tamron 35-150mm!), meaning that when mounted on my camera the lens extends out a full 60cm (2 feet). Wow! You’ve got to bust out a wide angle lens just to take a picture of it!
The lens weighs in at a whopping 3970g or 140oz, meaning that for most people a nearly 4 kilo lens is going to be more of a monopod or tripod lens rather than a handheld option. I did use it mostly handheld, but it definitely gets tiring fast. Let’s just say it will be a handful for most people!
Sony has limited the use of teleconverters on all third party lenses. I can confirm that my Sony 1.4x does physically fit, but there is no flow of communication through it. The camera will power on, and you can see the image in the viewfinder or LCD, but you can’t focus. And no, you can’t just manually focus, either, because on mirrorless even manual focus relies on the focus motors to actually move the focus group.
On L-mount, however, both Sigma’s TC-1411 (1.4x) and TC-2011 (2.0x) teleconverters will work, allowing you to achieve up to 840mm at F5.6 with the 1.4x and 1200mm at F8 with the 2.0x. It is such a shame that the lens won’t work with TC’s on Sony, as that would add so much value to the lens. On L-mount the Sigma is a first party lens (L-mount is a consortium of brands) and thus gets first party support.
The aperture iris has 13 blades, which helps maintain a nice circular shape when the lens is stopped down.
It will be easy to get lots of “sparkle” from this lens if you’re shooting with bright areas in the frame.
Like many modern zooms, the minimum focus distance will vary from the wide end (2.8m) to the telephoto end (4.5m), or 110.3″ x 177.2″. Magnification is slightly higher at the telephoto end than on the wide end.
Performance is fairly close on both extremes.
If you look at the fine print, however, you’ll find that the maximum magnification figure of 1:6 (right under 0.17x) actually comes at a very specific 470mm. There’s one significant problem with that – there is no marking at 470mm, leaving you having to guess where exactly that is. I took a shot and got 462mm, but you can see that it definitely produced a higher level of magnification.
The minimum focus distance didn’t feel much longer (if any) than the 2.8m of 300mm at 470mm(ish).
Obviously you can obliterate a background when shooting at close focus distances. Depth of field is less than one centimeter.
The lens ships with a nylon hood, a very large (and very nice) padded and zippered case, a shoulder strap, and the basic drop-in filter holder.
There’s a lot to love here in every sense of the word. The Sigma 300-600mm F4 DG OS | SPORT is one of those rare lenses that is simultaneously both very expensive (at $6000 USD) and also a great bargain relative to the competition.
Autofocus and Video
This is another area where Sigma has made some key strides. Their initial offerings on Sony (and L-mount) featured STM focus motors, but Sigma has since released their more powerful, smoother HLA focus motor (High speed Linear Actuator). The HLA motor has much more torque/thrust than lenses equipped with the stepping motor, which is very important when you are talking about a lens with larger, heavier optical glass like this one. The increased thrust of the focus motor means that it is capable of moving much faster and is thus much more reactive. Real world focus changes at 300mm are essentially instantaneous, while focus pulls at 600mm from a close to distance subject took just a bit longer. Focus speed was fast enough that I could pick up birds from essentially the first shot.
This will allow you to nail the critical moments and get the shots you want.
Focus sound is basically nonexistent. The HLA motor is essentially silent even if I put my ear next to the lens. It is quiet enough that I literally looked up at the screen to make sure the lens was actually focusing.
Focus accuracy during bursts was largely extremely good (though perhaps not Sony GM good). I did have one particularly distracting burst with a lot of very bright highlights on the water that results in some focus confusion and misses, but that’s understandable when the subject stops being the highest contrast object in frame.
In general I found that where a high quality Sony lens might give very near 100% perfectly focused shots, the 300-600 Sport would give around 90%, with a few shots here and there that were close…but very slightly front or back focused.
Slower moving subjects weren’t a problem…particularly when they aren’t moving at all!
I shot a kayaker shooting the spring rapids and had no problem tracking the subject throughout the sequence.
The HLA focus system is definitely fast enough to do birding, with quick acquisitions and accurate tracking.
Bottom line is that this autofocus system is capable of unleashing the optics of the lens.
Autofocus for Stills
I also saw mostly good results for video work. Autofocus pulls were very fast and confident. No hunting or settling. Focus pulls at 30mm were smooth and confident. At 600mm pulls were a little slower as momentum built and then moved quickly.
I shot sequences of the seabirds and found that focus was nicely “sticky” on the subjects but was sometimes a bit reluctant to move to the next subject if one bird walked out of frame, for example.
Here’s a freeze frame from one of my video clips.
Overall I found video focus worked fine. I had a limited time with the lens and didn’t have as much time to give to the video side of things.
Sigma’s HLA focus motors are great, though they are slightly limited on Sony by the fact that Sony limits bursts to 15FPS with third party lenses. It’s not “fair”, but it’s reality. This lens is awesome, but it would be even more awesome with TC support and full burst speeds.
Image Quality Breakdown
As you would expect, this is a fairly complex lens optically. There are 28 elements in 21 groups, and, as you can see from the optical design cutout below, a lot of space between some of those groups. There are 6 FLD elements and 1 SLD element as a part of the design. The MTF chart shows an excellent center and a very linear fade to the corners, which remain excellent. The 600mm looks similar but just slightly weaker (and lower contrast).
At it’s best, the 300-600 Sport is able to produce images with a lot of detail, contrast, and pop even at 600mm, F4.
If you aren’t experienced with long telephoto lenses its important to know that sharpness results are much more dependent on environmental conditions than with shorter focal lengths. You are often shooting at much great distances, and there are many more variables like thermal pockets that cause heat shimmers and other optical disturbances. Shooting with long lenses requires skill and developing a sense of what works and what doesn’t…often some trial and error.
I got fairly lucky on the day I shot the visual comparison of focal length, as the water temperature and the air temperature were fairly close, which eliminated some of the heat waves which can mar sharpness.
Here’s 300mm:
And here’s 600mm:
Obviously that is going to be extremely useful…particularly with an F4 aperture.
A bit of a caveat before my formal tests. It is very hard to chart test long lenses unless you have very specific equipment and environments (which I don’t have). I worked very hard to make my tests as scientific and accurate as possible, but when I have to take things outside there are more environmental factors that can cause minor inconsistencies. I used a ten second delay on all tests, for example, but a lens this big is like a sail, and so there’s a possibility that vibrations can be introduced even if nothing is touching the tripod. That being said, my results look fairly consistent with what I expect.
Testing for longitudinal chromatic aberrations (LoCA) show a bit of fringing at 300mm:
…but essentially none at 600mm:
I also saw zero issues with LaCA (lateral chromatic aberrations), which shows up along the edges of the frame. All of the transitions here are very neutral.
This is a lens with near perfect OPTICAL correction of vignette and distortion. These “before and after” results are not going to look very different as there was very little to correct.
I used a -2 to correct a tiny bit of pincushion distortion and added about a +12 of vignette correction mostly because it felt weird to not add any.
At 600mm things are largely the same. I changed to a -3 of correction for the distortion and if anything there was less vignette.
There’s nothing here that would need correcting in real world shots, though correction profiles obviously do exist.
This is a high end optical instrument, and they’ve corrected the issues in the optics rather than through software. What a novel idea!
So how about resolution and contrast? My formal tests are done on the 61MP Sony a7RV.
The MTF suggests that this is a very sharp lens in the center and mid-frame areas, with a typical corner drop-off at wide apertures. Is that what we see? Here’s a look at the test chart from which the crops come.
Here are crops from across the frame at F4 and shown at a 200% magnification.
In many ways I’m more impressed by the mid-frame and corners than the center, which looks very good but the corners more unusually so.
What’s so weird to me is that you can get shots like this on the WIDE end of a zoom lens!
That tiny, shallow depth of field of 300mm, F4, is actually incredibly rare. None of the variable aperture zooms achieve F4 at 300mm, much less 600mm!
Stopping down will provide a slight contrast boost.
Sharpness consistency seems to peak at F8 in some areas of the frame, though you’ll probably get the best center performance at F5.6.
Diffraction will start to take a bite out of contrast by F11, but more noticeably by the minimum aperture of F22.
Moving on to 400mm shows an uptick in contrast and detail as compared to 300mm.
That’s particularly noticeable in the corners, which are notably sharper and higher contrast.
That’s an absolutely brilliant performance for F4 at 400mm.
Ferrari’s head will give us a real world sense of F4 performance in this range.
Contrast will tick up even higher at F5.6. It’s fantastically sharp in the 400mm range.
If we move on to 500mm, contrast is a bit lower, but sharpens up nicely at F5.6:
Even at F4, however, there’s a nice amount of detail in real world shots.
At 600mm we see a similar pattern, with good sharpness and contrast that improves when stopped down to F5.6:
Corners also improve a bit by F5.6:
I find that F8 performed the best at 600mm in my tests, though the gains from F4 to F5.6 to F8 are very incremental.
Even “on the wing” the 300-600 Sport is capable of giving crisp results.
On a random side note: have you every considered how weird seagulls “red eyeliner” is?
It wasn’t hard to nail great looking shots in the fast, reactive situations where this lens will the most valuable.
One of the things you have to get used to when using an extreme instrument like this is just how shallow the depth of field is at 600mm, F4. Even at a considerable distance of 15 meters (around 50 feet), the the depth of field is still just 15cm (6 inches). In this shot, for example, shot at roughly that distance, the foreground seagull is in focus while the landing (and squawking) seagull just a couple of feet away is completely out of focus.
A shot of this chain at a closer distance shows just how tiny the depth of field is.
The big advantage of a lens like this is no much the close focus shots where you can completely obliterate a background (though that looks great!)
Lessor lenses can do something similar if you get very close to the subject.
But the advantage of a lens like this is going to be in the quality of the background blur when you have the unfavorable ratios where your subject is further away from the camera and perhaps the background is closer to the subject. With variable aperture zooms at F6.3 or F8 there won’t be much subject separation, but that’s no problem with this lens.
In this shot of Nala I was around 10 meters (33 feet) away from her, but she was only perhaps 2 meters from the background objects, yet the 300-600 Sport allows for nice separation.
Even a dove in a complicated network of budding branches is still rendered pretty nicely.
I didn’t shoot right into the sun with the lens, but I did plenty of shooting in very bright and backlit scenes without any sign of flare issues. That’s a more typical case use anyway.
Overall, the optics are pretty fantastic. No, it might not quite match a dedicated prime at any of those main focal lengths, but it’s about as close as you are likely to get in a zoom. And, if you consider that you are getting a 300mm, 400mm, 500mm, and 600mm F4 near-prime performance for just $6000, that’s pretty amazing. That collection of lenses mentioned above would probably cost nearer $40,000! If you want to see more images, check out the image gallery for the lens here.
Conclusion
The Sigma 300-600mm F4 DG OS | SPORT is a very appropriate flagship lens. It’s big, it’s expensive, it’s high performing, and it’s beautiful. Carrying this thing around is liking having a supermodel on your arm…you get a LOT of attention.
It also is a very capable lens, delivering high optical performance along with generally excellent autofocus performance (though not quite at a premium Sony level). Like most long telephoto lenses, however, the more you use it the more refined your technique with the lens would become and thus the quality of your photos will only improve.
You’re going to need to have (or build) some serious muscle if you’re going to use this lens handheld for any length of time, but most people can solve that with a monopod. I love this addition to either Sony E or Leica L, however, as it provides a more flexible yet still high performing alternative to long telephoto primes. I’ve always noted that there was a huge gap between the $2000 telephoto zooms and then the $10,000 telephoto primes, and Sigma has done a beautiful job of filling that void with this lens. I just wish that Sony would release the artificial limitations on third parties, and the 300-600 Sport was MADE for teleconverters and fast burst speeds. Or perhaps the solution is a Sony Alpha 1 level camera for L-mount. Right now neither solution seems close, but fortunately even with the limitations the Sigma 300-600mm F4 DG OS | SPORT is a pretty killer lens.
Pros:
The kind of lens many birders have been looking for
Beautifully made
Oozes premium quality
Feature rich
Thorough weather sealing
Function ring brings an interesting control point
HLA focus motor is extremely quiet and has a lot of thrust
Extremely sharp lens over most of the frame and zoom range
Excellent flare resistance
Near perfect control of aberrations
Beautiful colors
Constant F4 aperture
Great value for what it offers
Cons:
Very big and very heavy
Focus accuracy during bursts not quite at Sony level
Keywords: Sigma 300-600mm, DG, SPORT, SPORTS, Sigma 300-600 Sport, Sigma 300-600mm F4, Sigma 300-600mm F4 DG OS Sport, Sigma 300-600 Review, #SIGMAEmount, #SIGMA #SIGMA300600mmF4Sport, #SIGMASport, #SIGMASPORTS, Full Frame, Review, Sony Alpha 1, Sony a7RV, Review, Hands On, Dustin Abbott, Real World, Comparison, Sharpness, Bokeh, Flare Resistance, Autofocus, Image Quality, Sample Images, Video, Photography, let the light in, weathersealing, #letthelightin, DA
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 the past six weeks I have reviewed two amazing 135mm lenses – both in Nikon Z mount. That’s great, as 18 months ago we had zero 135mm lenses. Both of them have tremendous strengths and a lot of similarities…but they are priced radically different, with the LAB coming in at $900 USD and the Plena closer to $2500 USD. Is the Plena worth it? Does the LAB make the Plena irrelevant? It’s complicated…so let’s dive in. You can get my full thoughts in the video review below or by checking out a summary of my findings in the article below.
Thanks to Chris at Nikon Canada for sending me a review loaner of the Plena and to Chloe from Viltrox for supplying me a review copy of the LAB. As always, this is a completely independent review. All opinions and conclusions are my own.*The tests and most of the photos that I share as a part of my review cycle have been done with the 45MP Nikon Z8, which I reviewed here.
Mostly similar feature set (Aperture/Control ring, AF | MF, Function)
Both weather sealed
Autofocus speed and feel pretty similar*
Optically very similar (portrait comparisons)
Neutral Differences
One is wider (Plena); one is longer (LAB) – within 1% of volume
Reasons to Choose LAB:
Price (currently $899 (less with discount), so -$1600
More customizable – LCD screen allows you to set A – B focus
Has focus limiter and click/declick aperture
Slightly less distortion
Nicer build? (definitely nicer hood)
Sharper in mid-frame and corners
Higher magnification
Reasons to Choose PLENA:
Much lighter at 995 weights 273g less than LAB (1268g)
Can do smooth aperture racks
Manually focuses smoother
Rounder specular highlights
About half the vignette
More focus consistency
More reactive focus
A few less video focus quirks*
Sharper center
Conclusion
I think it is safe to say that differences in performance between the two lenses are subtle. They are both incredible optically, but I did encounter more quirks with the Viltrox (needs a firmware update – 16mm). There were moments using them side by side where I was reminded that one was a first party lens and the other a third party lens. I would still call the Plena the better lens, all things considered. BUT – $1600 is a lot of money, and I think the case can be easily made that the LAB is giving you at least 90-95% of the performance on the Plena – and you could buy 2.7 LABs for the price of one Plena.
Keywords: Nikkor, Nikkor Z 135mm, Plena, F1.8, F1.8 S, Nikkor Z, Nikkor Z 135mm F1.8 S Plena review, Nikon 135mm, Nikon Z 135mm, Viltrox, LAB, Viltrox AF 135mm F1.8 LAB Z, Nikon, Nikon Z8, Z, Z-mount, Z8, Review, mirrorless, Full Frame, Sports, Tracking, Dustin Abbott, Real World, Comparison, Handling, Focus, Portraits, Resolution, High ISO, Image Quality, Sample Images, Photography, 45MP, #letthelightin, #DA, #NIKON, #Z8, #nikonz8
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.
Last year about this time I reviewed the little 7Artisans AF 27mm F2.8, a pretty decent budget autofocus lens for various APS-C mounts (I reviewed in on Sony). This year they are back with another APS-C lens, but this is a much more ambitious option – the 7Artisans AF 35mm F1.4. F1.4 is two full stops brighter than an F2.8 lens, and is thus much harder to engineer. They have also elected to bring it to market (at least initially) just for Fuji X-mount. 7Artisans has managed to keep the size small and the price inexpensive ($169 USD), so should you consider this new 7Artisans AF 35mm for your Fuji camera? Find out my thoughts in the video review below or by reading on…
Thanks to 7Artisans for sending me a review copy of this lens. As always, this is a completely independent review. All opinions and conclusions are my own.I’m doing this review on a 40MP Fujifilm X-H2 camera.You can visit the product page for the 7Artisans AF 35mm F1.4 here.
The first thing that jumped out to me about the new AF 35mm F1.4 is just how small it is. This is lens not much bigger than a pancake lens (only 49mm long) and which weighs only 184g. That’s incredibly small and light for an F1.4 lens.
35mm on APS-C behaves differently than on full frame. While a 35mm lens on full frame is moderately wide, the 1.5x crop factor of Fuji’s X-mount system means that the lens will behave like a 52.5mm full frame lens, or what is called the “normal” perspective because it is similar to the field of view that the human eye sees.
There are some quirks with this lens that I’ll detail, but put in the right situation, the 7Artisans AF 35mm F1.4 can produce some lovely images, with very soft, creamy bokeh and a solid amount of sharpness and contrast even at F1.4:
So is this a lens that you should seriously consider? We’ll explore whether or not that is the case in this review.
Build and Handling
As noted, this lens has a nicely compact size. If you remove the lens hood, the lens looks pretty short mounted on my X-H2. Not much sticks out past that grip!
It is 68mm (2.67″) in diameter and is just 49mm (1.92″) in length. 184g translates to just under 6.5oz, making for a very compact, lightweight package.
The front filter thread size is fairly uncommon 62mm.
The 7Artisans AF 35mm F1.4 is wider in diameter (+4mm) but shorter (-5.3mm) in length than the Viltrox AF 35mm F1.7, a lens that has a similar price and may be the top competition for this lens.
The Viltrox is very slightly lighter (-14g) at 170g in weight. Both lenses are have metal mounts, but while the Viltrox has a plastic outer shell (though very good plastics), the 7Artisans is a mix of metals and plastics.
Because there aren’t any real features on the lens, the look of the lens is very clean and simple. Nothing striking, but nothing negative, either. The large tulip shaped hood that is included adds a bit of visual interest.
That hood is strongly needed, as we’ll see in a bit.
The one feature here is a USB-C port covered by a small rubber gasket. Be careful when pulling it out, as it is small and wouldn’t be hard to lose.
The USB-C port will allow for quick and easy firmware updates, which is very smart of 7Artisans considering that they are A) new to autofocus and B) a third party lens maker, so they may have to rely on firmware updates to maintain compatibility with cameras in the future. The lens does include a USB-C cable in the box in case you don’t have one.
There is a metal lens mount but no weather sealing gasket, though no competing lenses at this price offer weather sealing, either. 7Artisans does claim a water and fingerprint resistant coating on the front element.
Some Fuji users are going to be disappointed to find that there is no aperture ring, as that is a fairly ubiquitous feature on native Fuji lenses. There are seven aperture blades in the aperture iris. These blades are clearly not rounded, as you can clearly see the aperture shape even by F2. The geometry near the edges of the frame gets a little weird looking as you stop down further (F1.4, F2, and F2.8 shown below).
The manual focus ring is main object on the lens barrel. It’s made of tightly ribbed plastics, and has a fairly firm amount of damping. While perhaps a little heavy, the damping feels good (tight and connected), but unfortunately (as is so often the case on Fuji) the focus seems to happen in little steps rather than in a smooth, linear fashion.
The minimum focus distance is 35cm. I estimate the maximum magnification figure to be roughly 0.12x, which looks like this:
That’s close enough to be useful but not exceptionally so. The Viltrox, for example, can focus a little closer (33cm) and has a slightly higher 0.13x magnification.
The 7Artisans AF 35mm F1.4 is a simple lens, but it does get high marks for being so compact and light for an F1.4 lens. It’s also a very affordable lens at just $169 USD. You aren’t going to get too many F1.4 lenses for that price.
Autofocus for Stills
Most 7Artisans lenses that I have tested have used an STM (stepping motor) focus system, but I could quickly tell that this wasn’t the case with the AF 35mm F1.4. It has the kind of buzzy focus motor that I haven’t heard in a while, and autofocus definitely proved to be the weak link in the equation. Autofocus speed is not quick. In my formal tests there was a bit of a lag while inertia built, and then the main focus pull was relatively quick. The combined focus speed was on the slower side, however.
That’s not a big deal if your subject is still.
Autofocus precision was generally pretty good when shooting at large apertures. My shots at F1.4 (like above) were generally well focused – even if the subject was in profile and the eye was not generally visible.
Shots at F1.4 to F2 of other subjects were accurately focused as well.
So, with still subjects, focus is fine.
If the subject is moving, however, it’s another story. Focus speed is just not reactive enough to adjust to movement. This is NOT an action lens.
There’s a secondary problem, too, though this one will most likely be fixed via firmware. On my X-H2, I could focus well and accurately if I was shooting at larger apertures. This shot at F2.8, for example, locked on quickly and without any pulsing.
But just a couple of minutes later, I tried to take a shot up the street at F5.6. Focus just went back and forth without locking on a target. I went ahead and pressed the shutter to highlight the issue.
Here’s another example. On the left side you can see that I clicked the shutter and happened to catch the pulse where it was totally defocused. On the right side I had to open the aperture up to F3.2 to achieve proper focus.
I do think that 7Artisans will fix this via firmware, as I’ve seen them do similar things before. But, at the moment of this review, it remains an issue on my X-H2. I watched a few other reviews from those using different Fuji cameras and none of those reviewers reported similar issues. I tested a second copy to make sure it wasn’t just my original lens, and I saw the same issue on both, so it is definitely an X-H2 compatibility issue.
Autofocus is definitely the weak link in this design.
Video AF
I saw some mixed results on the video front. Fuji’s state of autofocus for video definitely has some shortcomings at present, and that is a bad combination with a lens that is also a little weak in the autofocus department.
Video focus pulls were reasonably well damped, though as is often the case I found that touch to focus often wouldn’t work, with either the lens stubbornly refusing to shift focus or a serious lag before it happened. I see this often on Fuji, so I put more of the blame there than on the lens. I did see some visible steps in the focus process, however, and sometimes there would be a final adjustment once focus was 95% of the way there. Focusing breathing isn’t terrible, but I did note that it was more pronounced than the Viltrox.
The 7Artisans AF 35mm F1.4 did better with with my “hand test” however, where I alternately block the view to my face with my hand and then remove it. While there might be a bit of that lag for a split second, focus would then transitioned nicely from my hand to my face. Fuji’s AF does better when there is a recognizable subject that the AF can track.
Focus results are decent if you are just shooting a normal video clip and focus is making small, minor adjustments.
7Artisans AF 35mm F1.4 Image Quality Breakdown
The 7Artisans AF 35mmmm F1.4 has a simple optical design of 8 elements in 5 groups. There is one ED (extra low dispersion) element in the design. I wasn’t able to to find a published MTF chart for the lens.
I always add the caveat that the Fujifilm 40MP X-Trans sensor in my X-H2 and other cameras is the most demanding platform that I test on…by far. It is the equivalent of over 90MP on full frame, so if a lens can perform reasonably well there…it is exceptionally sharp. The 7Artisans AF 35mm F1.4 doesn’t thrive in every optical situation, but, at its best, it is very usably sharp even at F1.4.
7Artisans glass often has a unique look to it. Somewhat cinematic, without deep contrast levels. For the right subject it really works, though I think it is a “taste” thing (you’ll either like the look or you won’t). The Viltrox delivers a higher contrast, higher detail look wide open while the 7Artisans has a more cinematic rendering.
Zooming in to a pixel level shows the more intense contrast and detail that comes from the Viltrox lens.
Like, I said, it’s a look. Some people don’t want intense contrast and detail, preferring something that’s a little “kinder” on skin.
There are some minor issues with longitudinal chromatic aberrations (LoCA) which show up before and after the plane of focus. I didn’t notice them in a lot of situations, but as I’ve found with some other 7Artisans lenses, that result is very situational. There’s a mild amount in the contrast points here:
A lot of the optical vulnerabilities for the 7Artisans AF 35mm F1.4 come in bright or high contrast situations. Here, for example, you see that contrast drops and some fringing emerges around the subject because of the brightness of the snow.
Put the lens in a lower contrast situation, like this, and I think the end result is pretty great even at F1.4; I don’t see any fringing even in the vulnerable spots.
In general, I don’t have a lot of concerns over LoCA.
LaCA lateral chromatic aberrations are another story. There is some strong fringing visible in the transitions from black to white at the edges of the frame.
There is moderate amounts of barrel distortion and vignette present.
I corrected the barrel distortion with a +7 (nothing extreme) and about two stops of vignette (+57). That’s actually not bad at all for an F1.4 lens wide open.
So how about resolution and contrast? My tests have been done on a 40MP X-H2. I have used a steady tripod and two second delay to achieve optimal results. Crops will be shown at roughly a 200% level of magnification. Here’s the test chart:
Here are F1.4 crops at roughly 200% from across the frame (center, mid-frame, and lower right corner).
The center results look reasonably sharp but with lower contrast, the mid-frame has similar lower contrast but dropping sharpness towards the further out edge, while the corners look quite soft. My testing criteria (particularly on this Fuji sensor) tends to exaggerate softness more than what you’ll see with real world images. If you want high contrast, you probably want to choose the Viltrox, which is noticeably sharper and higher contrast across the frame even when the 7Artisans is stopped down to F1.8.
The rendering of the 7Artisans AF 35mm F1.4 is more like a classic lens. A little “dreamy” wide open (a glow due to lower contrast), which works nicely in certain situations. In lower contrast situations the results are less dreamy. This show in a restaurant, for example, looks great even at F1.4. I don’t need (or want) sharp corners here.
This street scene at F2.2 has a great look to it.
If you tend to favor the “Instagram look” and put those kinds of filters on your images, then this would be a good fit.
Like many classic lenses, if you want more sharpness and contrast, stop down to F2.8 or smaller, as contrast and detail intensify there. There’s a dramatic difference between F2 and F2.8 in the center:
The corners don’t sharp up until F5.6, though they never get quite as sharp as the center.
Peak consistency across the frame is found at F8. Landscape images look good…but again, if you just want sharpness, there are better options.
Diffraction will start to soften the image after that, with a mild amount at F11 but a more obvious amount by F16,though this is one of the rare lenses where the sharpness gains the lens continues to make as you stop it down offset the softening due to diffraction. I would definitely use it at F11, and would consider using it even at F16.
The subject of bokeh, like sharpness, is a little complicated, as there are situations where I really like the rendering from the lens and others where I don’t.
Here, for example, I think the bokeh is lovely. Very soft and creamy, resulting in a beautiful image.
At F1.4, the geometry of specular highlights is only okay, however. There’s some of the normal “cat eye” effect near the edges of the frame, but what I don’t like is the irregular “clipping” that changes the shape a bit near the edges of the frame.
And, where normally specular highlights will become more evenly round when the aperture is stopped down a bit, the 7Artisans 35mm F1.4 does the opposite. The shape of the specular highlights becomes even more irregular.
Now, to be fair, bokeh is a subjective measure that really comes down to your personal tastes, but I’m not personally a fan of irregular shapes in the bokeh.
I also found that the lens really benefits from being smart about the background. It doesn’t handle complexity well. This shot, for example, has a clean background that is rendered beautifully.
This shot has a more complex background, and I find that a lot of edges in the defocused region are too hard and draw the eye in a negative way.
This shot is pretty good, however, rendering the background in a fairly soft fashion.
Bottom line is that you’ll need to learn to use this lens to its strengths. If you do so, it can deliver some beautiful images.
7Artisans can use some improvement to their lens coatings, which is part of the reason for the more the vintage character of the lens. That remains true when it comes to flare. This is a lens you’ll definitely want to use the lens hood on, as it is particularly prone to ghosting when the bright source of light is angled in the corners.
The lens is better with veiling, as contrast holds up reasonably well when a bright light is in the frame.
A bright wide angle prime like this will be useful in low light situations, including shooting the night sky. When testing for coma I found a few things. 1) Bright light points will have some fringing on them (crop 1) and 2) while coma isn’t too bad, the low sharpness in the corners will mean that star points aren’t very crisp (crop 2).
When viewed as a full image, however, it looks fine. I managed to catch a meteor shower that I didn’t even know was happening!
The look of your images will vary a fair bit depending on your shooting conditions. That may have something to do with the low element count and lack of coatings on the lens. I found that it behaved more like a vintage lens, and often I rather liked it. I felt like it had character and wasn’t the typical modern, perfectly corrected lens. If that look appeals to you, then you might enjoy this lens.
So not a flawless performance, but for a very inexpensive lens there’s a lot of positives here. If you’d like to see more image samples, check out the image gallery here.
Conclusion
The idea that we could get an autofocusing F1.4 lens for well under $200 was unthinkable just a few years ago. Those lenses would more typically be in the $400-500 range, and I’m still pretty amazed at how decent these extremely inexpensive lenses are. $169 USD is a great price for this lens, particularly when you consider that Fuji’s own 35mm F1.4 costs more than $400 more, and even their 35mm F2 costs more than twice as much. Now, to be fair, those lenses are better, with better features, build, and image quality, but as noted in this review, someone on a tight budget can buy the 7Artisans 35mm and will be able to create images you simply couldn’t make with a kit lens.
The autofocus isn’t fantastic (and needs a firmware update!), but it mostly got the job done. And while the optical performance isn’t exceptional by modern standards, it does have a good deal of charm that will appeal to those who feel that modern lenses are overcorrected and overly complex.
There’s no bells and whistles here, but this is actually a really good little lens for the money. If you want a lens with a more modern rendering, then choose the Viltrox AF 35mm F1.7 for similar money, but if you are looking for some vintage charm, check out the 7Artisans AF 35mm F1.4. If your dream lens is a classic vintage lens but with autofocus, then the 7Artisans 35mm may be just what you’ve been looking for.
Pros:
Extremely compact and lightweight
Comes with a lens hood
Has an F1.4 aperture
USB-C port for firmware updates
Good focus accuracy at large apertures
Useful center sharpness wide open
Good sharpness across most of the frame when stopped down
Fairly good bokeh
Vignette and distortion not bad
Interesting look to images
Is this the least expensive F1.4 lens you can buy?
Keywords: 7Artisans, 7Artisans 35mm, AF, 35mm, F1.4, 7Artisans AF 35mm F1.4, Full APS-C, 7Artisans 35mm, Fuji X, Fujifilm, X-mount, APS-C, Review, Telephoto, Action, Tracking, Hands On, Dustin Abbott, Real World, Comparison, Sharpness, Bokeh, Flare Resistance, Autofocus, Image Quality, Sample Images, Video, Photography, Fujifilm X-T5, Fujifilm X-H2, let the light in, #letthelightin, DA
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.
Sony’s mirrorless E-mount has reached a saturation point with more lenses available than possibly any lens mount before, so finding an actually unique lens can be hard to do. That’s not true for today’s review, however, as Sony is releasing a genre-busting lens that builds on the foundation set by last years FE 28-70mm F2 GM, which I reviewed here. The Sony FE 50-150mm F2 G Master goes from normal to telephoto while maintaining a maximum aperture of F2, making it a genuinely unique lens unlike any released on any platform before. The most similar lens we can point to is Tamron’s 35-150mm F2-F2.8, which has been my most used lens since it’s release in late 2021. The 50-150 GM is a more extreme instrument in every way, however, from aperture to size and to price…a whopping $3899 USD ($5499 CDN!!!) Who is this beast for, and is it worth buying? I’ve explored that in the video review and text review. Enjoy the photos from the lens in the gallery here.
Thanks to Sony USA for sending me a review loaner of this lens. As always, this is a completely independent review. *The tests and most of the photos that I share as a part of my review cycle have been done with the Sony a7RV along with the Sony Alpha 1 that serve as my benchmark cameras for Sony lenses. You can visit the product page for the 50-15mm GM here.
Unlike the Tamron, the 50-150 GM is a constant aperture zoom. The Tamron does start at F2 at 35mm, but as a variable aperture zoom has closed to F2.2 by 50mm, and reaches the smallest maximum aperture of F2.8 by 85mm. After 135mm the 50-150mm F2 actually becomes Sony’s fastest lens as Sony has never released a 200mm F2. It’s pretty impressive that a zoom lens trumps all of the existing prime lenses in this regard.
And Sony’s goal is for this lens to be a replacement for a number of high end primes. About the only way you can justify the price is by looking at it as a replacement for 50mm, 85mm, and 135mm primes…with 150mm as a bonus! One of the key phrases in Sony’s press briefing on this lens was that it would have “prime-like resolution”. It definitely can make pretty pictures!
This is also a beautiful lens that oozes premium quality. If you are a lens lover, it is definitely temptation for acquisition. You can decide if that’s a sound decision by checking out the reviews!
Keywords: Sony 50-150mm, Sony 50-150 GM, 50-150 F2, Sony FE 50-150mm F2 GM, 50-150mm, GM, Sony 50-150 GM Review, Sony 50-150mm Review, Sony FE 50-150mm F2 GM Review, Full Frame, Review, Sony Alpha 1, Sony a7RV, Review, Hands On, Dustin Abbott, Real World, Comparison, Sharpness, Bokeh, Flare Resistance, Autofocus, Image Quality, Sample Images, Video, Photography, let the light in, weathersealing, #letthelightin, DA
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.
Sony’s mirrorless E-mount has reached a saturation point with more lenses available than possibly any lens mount before, so finding an actually unique lens can be hard to do. That’s not true for today’s review, however, as Sony is releasing a genre-busting lens that builds on the foundation set by last years FE 28-70mm F2 GM, which I reviewed here. The Sony FE 50-150mm F2 G Master goes from normal to telephoto while maintaining a maximum aperture of F2, making it a genuinely unique lens unlike any released on any platform before. The most similar lens we can point to is Tamron’s 35-150mm F2-F2.8, which has been my most used lens since it’s release in late 2021. The 50-150 GM is a more extreme instrument in every way, however, from aperture to size and to price…a whopping $3899 USD ($5499 CDN!!!) Who is this beast for, and is it worth buying? We’ll explore that in both the video review and text review here.
Thanks to Sony USA for sending me a review loaner of this lens. As always, this is a completely independent review. *The tests and most of the photos that I share as a part of my review cycle have been done with the Sony a7RV along with the Sony Alpha 1 that serve as my benchmark cameras for Sony lenses. You can visit the product page for the 50-15mm GM here.
Unlike the Tamron, the 50-150 GM is a constant aperture zoom. The Tamron does start at F2 at 35mm, but as a variable aperture zoom has closed to F2.2 by 50mm, and reaches the smallest maximum aperture of F2.8 by 85mm. After 135mm the 50-150mm F2 actually becomes Sony’s fastest lens as Sony has never released a 200mm F2. It’s pretty impressive that a zoom lens trumps all of the existing prime lenses in this regard.
And Sony’s goal is for this lens to be a replacement for a number of high end primes. About the only way you can justify the price is by looking at it as a replacement for 50mm, 85mm, and 135mm primes…with 150mm as a bonus! One of the key phrases in Sony’s press briefing on this lens was that it would have “prime-like resolution”. It definitely can make pretty pictures!
This is also a beautiful lens that oozes premium quality. If you are a lens lover, it is definitely temptation for acquisition. But should you? Let’s take a closer look…
Build and Handling
This is a big lens, but Sony has actually got perhaps the best track record out there among any lens maker for being able to produce smaller than expected lenses. This lens is the same length as the 70-200mm GM II (200mm, or 7.87″). What’s more, unlike the Tamron 35-150mm, the Sony is an internally zooming lens, so the length will stay consistently the same regardless of focal length. You can see that Sony is thus much longer when the Tamron’s zoom is retracted, but at 135mm the Tamron is essentially the same length.
The lens is 102.8mm (4.04″) in diameter by 200mm (7.87″) in length. That gives us a rather large 95mm front filter thread.
The lens hood has a sliding door to allow for more easy access to rotating filters.
I sometimes find this a little gimmicky (the hood is actually quite shallow here), but I do think it is perhaps justified here because a lens with an F2 aperture is far more likely to be used with filters. Using an ND filter in portrait (flash sync) or video work (shutter speed control) won’t be unusual, and a variable ND filter would need rotating just like a circular polarizer.
You can see that the hood itself is quite small for this size of lens, which to me speaks of Sony having great confidence in the coatings of the lens and not worrying much about flare resistance. We will see if that is justified in the image quality section.
The 50-150 GM weighs in at 1340g (47.27oz), which is more than the 70-200mm GM II (36.86oz), but less than 70-200mm GM 1 (52.20oz).
That weight is with the tripod foot removed, so expect another 80g (according to my scale) for the tripod foot if attached. That foot can be easily removed by loosening the knob pictured below, depressing a release button, and sliding the foot off.
You might have noticed from the picture above that I’ve had to add a QR (quick release) plate to the tripod foot. The foot itself is has a standard 1/4″ and 3/8th” holes for attaching quick release style plates, but the foot is not natively Arca-compatible. I don’t know why this remains the case, but I find it very limiting as it means I have to always add a plate before mounting onto a tripod.
Loosening a tension knob on the collar will allow you to freely rotate the lens to your desired position. There are no detents at the cardinal positions, but there are etched dots at those locations to allow you to line up at the 12, 3, and 9 o’clock positions (the 6 o’clock position is where the foot mount is located).
The 50-150 GM has Sony’s typically robust approach to features and controls. The fact that this is a constant aperture lens allows them to take a more prime-like approach to aperture control. We’ve got a manual aperture ring that can either be clicked or declicked. When clicked the action is on the firm side, with one third stop detents and marked full aperture stops from F2 to F22. There is an extra firm clip between F22 and A (Automatic).
There is an Iris Lock that will allow you eliminate the transition from manual to automatic aperture control, allowing you to either lock into the manual aperture ring if you don’t want to inadvertently bump into automatic mode or to lock out of the aperture ring if you prefer in-camera control.
There is also an option to delick the aperture on the right side. This will allow you to smoothly rack through the aperture without stops, and is particularly useful when shooting video. I was able to do smooth aperture racks without visible steps. Both the declick and iris lock switches are not particularly visible when you are holding the camera, but they probably also aren’t switches you’ll be using on a regular basis.
In between the zoom and manual focus rings there is a slim section of lens barrel that has the other switches and custom buttons. There is an AF | MF switch along with an ON | OFF for Full Time DMF (Direct Manual Override), which allows you to directly override focus in any focus mode (not all Sony cameras naturally allow for this, but this switch will guarantee that operation on all bodies).
There are Custom/Focus Hold buttons in three positions (top, bottom, left side) which will allow for one to be close at hand in either landscape or portrait orientation shooting. These buttons are redundant, with only one function assigned to them through the camera body.
The zoom ring is the first of the two rings, and the advantage of an internally zooming lens is immediately felt. That will keep the balance consistent and allow you to make quick changes to focal length. The rotation of the zoom ring is about 80°, and I actually would have liked it to be even smaller. I was able to successfully zoom in and out during video recording, however, which is not something I can typically do (handheld) with many zoom lenses.
That opens up a tertiary main purpose for a lens like this, as while its usefulness for portrait and wedding photographers is obvious, an internally zooming lens like this with such a fast maximum aperture makes this a very compelling sports lens – particularly for court sports like basketball, tennis, badminton, etc… This is particularly true considering that the blazingly fast autofocus has no problem keeping up with action.
The manual focus ring is near the front of the lens. Both rings have a ribbed and rubberized grips surface. The manual focus ring is well executed, with a fairly light action that nonetheless has decent feel. It is linear to allow for more repeatable focus pulls. My only complaint is that the position feels “far” to reach for. It isn’t a naturally ergonomic position, but I’m sure that a photographer would develop the muscle memory over time.
This is a high end, professional grade lens, so it comes with a thorough weather sealing that starts with a gasket at the lens mount, has internal seals throughout at the ring and switch positions, and has a fluorine coating on the front element to resist moisture and fingerprints.
On an unfortunately negative note, a close look at the rear of the lens also shows that the rear element is very close to the lens mount, leaving no room for use with teleconverters. That’s very unfortunate, as the usefulness of this lens could have really been extended by that compatibility. 210mm at F2.8 would have been handy (1.4x), and 300mm at F4 arguably even more so (2.0x).
It seems to me that modern lens designers are not getting enough criticism over marginalizing teleconverters in mirrorless lenses.
As with many modern zooms, the minimum focus distances varies on the wide and telephoto ends. You can focus as closely as 40cm (1.32ft) on the wide end and 74cm (2.43ft) on the telephoto end. In theory the magnification is very slightly higher on the wide end (0.20x, or a 1:5 magnification ratio), but the difference between the wide and telephoto end is marginal at best:
There’s some pros and cons to shooting at either position. Sharpness and contrast is a little better at 50mm, but the plane of focus is flatter at 150mm and the compression will make the background more out of focus. In some cases it might be preferable to have a wider angle of view (if you want more in the frame), while in other cases it might be preferable to have the tighter framing at 150mm to further isolate the subject.
It is definitely easier to shoot at the longer working distance available at150mm, however, as the shorter MFD means that you’ll be quite close to your subject and can risk shading it with the lens.
There is eleven rounded blades in the aperture iris. The lens does an excellent job of retaining a circular shape when stopped down (F2, F2.8, and F4 shown here).
A second unfortunate missing ingredient is Sony’s OSS (Optical Steady Shot). Lenses like the 70-200mm elements always come with lens based stabilization, but Sony decided to go without here. Perhaps the logic is that it would have added more weight and expense to a lens that is already have and expensive, but Sony’s camera based stabilization is definitely less effective at longer focal lengths. Fortunately 150mm isn’t too bad, however, and the camera stabilization in either my Alpha 1 and a7RV worked reasonably but not exceptionally well. We used the lens for shooting Easter events in our church and got mixed results at 1/60th and 1/100th second. I suspect the lens would have benefitted from lens based stabilization.
Overall this is a beautiful made lens that has that “special” feel you sometimes get from premium lenses. That price is going to be the most daunting aspect of the design, as while the 50-150 GM feels unquestionably superior to the Tamron 35-150mm in build and features, it also costs more than twice as much.
Autofocus for Stills
Pairing a Sony telephoto lens with a Sony sports camera is generally a delight. Sony is the best lens maker in the business (in my opinion) when it comes to designing and executing focus systems that deliver consistently excellent results no matter how challenging the optical design. In this case they have employed four of the premium XD linear focus motors, which assure that focus is nearly instantaneous. It’s pretty amazing in a lens with this large of optical elements, as that’s a lot of glass to move. This is designed to maintain real-time tracking up to 120FPS (a9III) and up to 240FPS movie tracking.
I think there’s a compelling case to be made for the Tamron 35-150mm as an alternative for weddings or events, but nothing is going to compare to a native Sony lens like this for action or sports. I fired off 150 quick frames in some bursts of Nala early in the morning, and despite her blending into the still dried grasses from winter, focus immediately picked her up (from frame 1) and tracked her perfect in every frame. I just don’t see focus that good from third party lenses…ever.
What’s more, Sony does favor its own lenses by capping burst speed with third party lenses at 15FPS. A Sony lens like this will be able to achieve the maximum burst rate of the camera and with sufficient focus speed to match it.
Focus is silent, split second fast, and deadly accurate.
It was a flawless companion for portrait work, even when I used a lot of layers to shoot through to soften the shot (Sony’s SH Profile used here).
Focus was perfect at any focus distance for portrait work.
The zoom ratio allows you to really change up your framing and move from full length to tighter shots.
It was a beautiful lens for taking photos of a new (grand) nephew.
Focus was effortless in a church setting as well.
Autofocus is one of the single greatest strengths for this lens, which is impressive in a lens with an unprecedented focal length/aperture combination.
Great job, Sony.
Autofocus for Video
Sony has worked hard at making their lenses (and cameras) to be equally good whether doing photo or video work. This is another excellent lens for video work. I tested focus pulls at both 50mm and 150mm, and while the focus speed is a bit slower on the telephoto end, it is still excellent.
Focus breathing is extremely well controlled even with Sony’s “Focus Breathing Compensation” turned off. At 50mm I can’t see any at all, and only a tiny amount at 150mm. This is a clear area of advantage over the Tamron. What’s more, what tiny bit of focus breathing is there can be easily eliminated with Sony’s focus breathing compensation in cameras (which only applies to Sony-branded lenses).
My hand test went fine, with focus easily moving from my hand to my eye and back.
I shot some 4K120 footage on my Alpha 1 during a portrait shoot, and focus was perfect as my model moved fluidly through a long series of poses.
Focus for either stills or video is excellent.
Image Quality Breakdown
As expected, this is fairly complicated optical design with 19 elements in 17 groups. This includes a variety of exotic optical elements, including 2 XA (extreme aspherical), 2 aspherical, 3 ED (Extra-low dispersion), and 2 Super ED elements. You can see a very impressive MTF chart on both ends of the zoom range from F2 on.
One would expect a lens like this to be impressively sharp, and that’s exactly what we find.
The 50-150 GM shows a fairly typical distortion pattern for a zoom covering this many focal lengths, with some barrel distortion on the wide end which turns to pincushion distortion midway through the zoom range.
It all remains impressively mild for such a large aperture lens, however, with a +8 to correct the barrel distortion at 50mm, a -4 to correct a bit of pincushion distortion at 100mm, and a -6 to correct slightly higher pincushion distortion at 150mm.
Vignette remains impressively low throughout the zoom range, requiring only about a stop of correction in the corners at any point. This shot, for example, has had zero corrections.
Vignette is just not an issue. Most likely you’ll end up adding vignette to portraits!
I saw a minimal amount of longitudinal type chromatic aberrations before and after the plane of focus on my test charts at on either end of the zoom range.
I also didn’t see any problems in real world shots, either. There’s the tiniest amount of fringing, but not enough to negatively impact the image. The same proved true with specular highlights, which don’t any fringing in the ring around them.
I didn’t really see any lateral style chromatic aberrations near the edges of the frame either on my chart or in real world results.
So how about sharpness and contrast? I did these tests on my Sony a7RV and its 61MP sensor. Crops are shown at roughly 200% magnification (as always) to highlight strengths and weaknesses. Here’s a look at the test chart:
And here’s a look at the 200% level crops from the center, mid-frame, and lower right corner:
Unsurprisingly, the image quality is excellent. Yes, there is some fade into the corners, but they still look quite good.
For some perspective we can look at the Tamron 35-150mm, which is competitive with the 50-150 GM in the center of the frame but considerably weaker at F2 in the corners.
The GM lens is clearly more consistently sharp and higher contrast across the frame.
When a lens is this sharp to begin with, often further gains when stopping down will be minimal. I don’t see any noticeable difference (even at 200%) in the center or midframe, but you can definitely see some improvement in the corners.
There is a bit more to be seen in the corners by F5.6.
Landscape images are just as sharp as you would expect, with excellent detail and contrast across the frame (here at F5.6).
As per usual, expect to see a little softening at F11 due to diffraction but much more obvious impact by the minimum aperture of F22, which I would avoid if possible.
At 70mm (the next marked position on the zoom ring) the detail has not increased but the contrast has (which you can see from the strong moiré pattern). The midframe also looks a little sharper.
Stopping down a bit at 70mm achieves incredible resolution and contrast all across the frame.
Portrait shots even at F2 are very sharp, however, and have good contrast.
At 100mm I feel like there is slightly less contrast but perhaps a bit more detail.
The corners easily favor 100mm, however, and look extremely impressive for F2:
You can see how good the lens is at 100mm, F2 in this real world shot:
Moving on to 150mm shows an uptick in contrast to something akin to what we saw at 70mm.
The center shows well compared to 100mm, though the corners are slightly softer.
That’s still a great performance, however. The Tamron isn’t far behind in the center (though at F2.8 rather than F2), but the Sony wins in the corners.
F2.8 boosts the corners a bit, and then even more by landscape apertures.
But for real world work, the lens is plenty sharp even at F2…and even on the fly!
Detail is crisp, and contrast is strong.
The last two shots give us a segway into our next topic of discussion – the bokeh and rendering. The quality of the bokeh is good but not what I would call great. I feel in many ways similar to my thoughts at the end of the 85mm F1.4 GM II review. The sharpness and contrast I saw are exceptional, but it feels like Sony’s design is a little weighted in that direction. It is possible to correct a lens to the place where the rendering isn’t quite as pleasing.
Here’s where I think the Tamron has a bit of revenge. First of all, the out of camera rendering from the Tamron produces a more pleasing image (to my eye).
Part of that was the color balance, though even if I equalize color balance I find the Tamron colors to be a little richer.
But though the GM has a full stop advantage (F2 vs F2.8 at 150mm), and thus the background is less in focus, I find the more difficult areas like transition zones to be handled more artistically.
Everything flows together more organically in this crop, and that advantage only deepens if you stop the 50-150 GM down to F2.8 and the depth of field advantage is lost.
I think there is a little too much outlining of defocused objects, and that draws the eye a bit.
In this layered shot I find that the foreground bokeh looks pretty good, but the background looks fine but not exceptionally good.
If we take another shot from the burst with Nala we can see that the short grass is the transition zone looks fairly busy.
As as typical, however, if you can set up a shot with a more favorable ratio of distance to the subject and then from the subject to the background, you can get a more pleasing looking rendering.
It looks nice here.
This is perhaps an area where a prime lens might take the win over a zoom. I thought that specular highlights have good geometry (there is some cat-eye shape in the corners, but most of the frame has nice, circular highlights). But rendering is more than just the specular highlights, and while the 50-150 GM is far from bad, it also isn’t exceptional in this area.
Bokeh is subjective, however, so your opinion may vary from mine.
One area of weakness for the Tamron is surprisingly also an issue for the Sony, and that’s flare resistance. While things aren’t perfect at 50mm, they aren’t bad whether wide open or stopped down (F11 shown here).
There’s a bit of a ghosting pattern, but contrast holds up pretty well. I also think the sunstar is fairly interesting in the second image.
But things get much, much worse on the telephoto end even when the hood is being employed.
We are not only losing some contrast, but, far worse, we have a fairly dominant flare pattern that would be hard to ignore or compose out of. I know that Sony has amazing coatings (as does Tamron, for that matter), so this must be one of the challenges of engineering this type of lens.
The lens arrived to me late due to a shipping mix-up, so I haven’t had as much time as I would like to test the flare resistance further, but I do hope to do some head to head comparison with the Tamron to see which is worse in this area. Check out my YouTube channel where I will post that video at some point in the near future.
This is a very strong lens optically and excels in most of the technical categories (flare resistance aside). The main area that I’ve critiqued it is more of a subjective observation, but I think that’s warranted in a les that costs so much. Check out the image gallery if you would like to see more images.
Conclusion
There’s no question that a lens like the Sony FE 50-150mm F2 G Master is a huge technical achievement. It manages to do something that no zoom lens has done before (on full frame) and has managed to do it in a very livable kind of way. Yes, it is big and heavy, but no more than the first generation 70-200mm F2.8 GM. It’s lighter as an F2 zoom than what many of the 70-200mm F2.8 zooms from the DSLR era were.
I feel like the single best market for this lens might be those who shoot courtside sports. To be able to get 30FPS (or even 120FPS on the a9III) while tracking across the full sensor is a pretty unbelievable experience. Settings like that perhaps need less artistic rendering and need more of the technical brilliance that the 50-150 GM brings. It could be the best court sports lens ever released. I also think it would be amazing as an event/wedding lens where you can use that bright aperture in dimmer venues and get shots harder to achieve with an F2.8 zoom.
And while it is a a great portrait option, I’m not sure that I would personally choose it for that alone, as I feel like I can get equally good if not nicer rendering from an 85mm F1.4 type lens. You may value the versatility of the zoom for your portrait work, however, and the ability to effortlessly reframe in a variety of ways without moving could be extremely valuable. What is certain, however, is that the Sony FE 50-150mm F2 GM is the kind of lens you only get when a system has reached a certain point of maturation and a lensmaker feels the freedom to experiment a bit more. So if you’ve got a spare $3900 USD sitting around, you may just be able to get your dream lens. Happy shooting!
Pros:
The first F2 zoom to go from 50-150mm with a constant F2 aperture
Has the kind of premium design that reminds you of the $10,000 telephoto primes
Beautiful build quality including robust weather sealing
Excellent handling (internal zoom helps balance)
Good feature set allows you to stay out of the menus
Incredible autofocus performance – quiet, fast, and accurate
Pair it with a Sony sports camera and get amazing tracking
Strong, consistent optical performance across the zoom range
Keywords: Sony 50-150mm, Sony 50-150 GM, 50-150 F2, Sony FE 50-150mm F2 GM, 50-150mm, GM, Sony 50-150 GM Review, Sony 50-150mm Review, Sony FE 50-150mm F2 GM Review, Full Frame, Review, Sony Alpha 1, Sony a7RV, Review, Hands On, Dustin Abbott, Real World, Comparison, Sharpness, Bokeh, Flare Resistance, Autofocus, Image Quality, Sample Images, Video, Photography, let the light in, weathersealing, #letthelightin, DA
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.
We’ve known that Viltrox’s LAB series was coming for about two years, and I, for one, was very excited for the series. Viltrox has proved to be capable of doing very serious optical engineering, and, put simply, the LAB series was proposed as being Viltrox’s “G Master”, “L Series”, or “S-Line” equivalent lineup of premium lenses. Of those, the LAB lenses are probably most like Nikon’s S-Line lenses where the engineers have clearly been told not to worry about size, weight, or cost, and just deliver the best optics at that particular focal length possible. The LAB lenses may not be expensive (they are actually tremendous value!), but they are among the largest and heaviest lenses in their class, and are definitely optically superior. I was very impressed by the optics of the first LAB lens – the AF 135mm F1.8 LAB FE – that I reviewed here. It was optically amazing (besting great lenses like the Sony 135mm F1.8 GM and the Samyang AF 135mm F1.8), had great autofocus, and struck an amazing balance between sharpness and rendering. But I also knew that Viltrox had a trio of F1.2 LAB lenses on their roadmap, including 35mm, 50mm, and 85mm F1.2 options, and I was very excited about those as Sony has relatively few high end F1.2 options available. The Viltrox AF 35mm F1.2 LAB is here, and it is another landmark lens. And, at a price tag of $999 USD, it is a pretty huge value (and if you use code DA3512LAB5 at checkout at Viltrox, you can get an additional 5% off!). Find out more in either the video review, the text review, or just check out the photos in the gallery.
Thanks to Viltrox for sending me a review copy of this lens. As always, this is a completely independent review. *The tests and most of the photos that I share as a part of my review cycle have been done with the Sony a7RV and the Sony Alpha 1.You can find the listing for the AF 35mm F1.2 LAB FE here.
I love 35mm lenses. I love the focal length for general purpose shooting, and, more importantly for this particular application, for environmental portraiture. The advantage of a wider focal length is the ability to add context to a shot. To include the room, or the setting, or the environment along with the subject. But the downside is that the depth of field increases, and you often lose the ability of really isolating your subject from the background. A 35mm F1.2 lens restores that ability, however. At a distance of the 3 meters (close to ten feet), a 35mm F1.2 lens has a depth of field of about 50cm (20 inches). With an F2 aperture, that depth of field nearly doubles, at F2.8, it nearly triples. In other words, a fast maximum aperture is very necessary to create a shallow depth of field with a wider focal length. By contrast, an 85mm F2.8 lens has a depth of 21cm. You could stop down to F6.7 and still have the same depth of field at that distance as a 35mm lens at F1.2. For portraiture I might argue that a fast maximum aperture is more important on a wide angle lens than it is on a telephoto. Bottom line is that you couldn’t get shots like this on a slower 35mm lens:
And, despite being at F1.2, you can see from the deep crop that the image is sharp and crisp on the subject (despite the intense backlighting), and there is a nice separation of the subject from the background.
Nice, indeed. There are going to be a lot of people interested in this 35mm LAB on both Sony and eventually Nikon when it arrives there. Check out the photos from this lovely lens below.
Keywords: Viltrox AF 35mm F1.2 LAB FE, Viltrox AF, LAB, Viltrox LAB, #LAB, #LAB35, #explorebeyond, Viltrox 35mm, Normal, Full Frame, F1.2, f/1.2, Hyper VCM, Viltrox LAB 35mm F1.2 FE, Viltrox LAB 35mm Review, Viltrox AF 35mm F1.2 FE Review, Sony a7IV, Sony Alpha 1, Sony a7RV, Review, Hands On, Dustin Abbott, Real World, Comparison, Sharpness, Bokeh, Flare Resistance, Autofocus, Image Quality, Sample Images, Video, Photography, let the light in, weathersealing, #letthelightin, DA
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.
We’ve known that Viltrox’s LAB series was coming for about two years, and I, for one, was very excited for the series. Viltrox has proved to be capable of doing very serious optical engineering, and, put simply, the LAB series was proposed as being Viltrox’s “G Master”, “L Series”, or “S-Line” equivalent lineup of premium lenses. Of those, the LAB lenses are probably most like Nikon’s S-Line lenses where the engineers have clearly been told not to worry about size, weight, or cost, and just deliver the best optics at that particular focal length possible. The LAB lenses may not be expensive (they are actually tremendous value!), but they are among the largest and heaviest lenses in their class, and are definitely optically superior. I was very impressed by the optics of the first LAB lens – the AF 135mm F1.8 LAB FE – that I reviewed here. It was optically amazing (besting great lenses like the Sony 135mm F1.8 GM and the Samyang AF 135mm F1.8), had great autofocus, and struck an amazing balance between sharpness and rendering. But I also knew that Viltrox had a trio of F1.2 LAB lenses on their roadmap, including 35mm, 50mm, and 85mm F1.2 options, and I was very excited about those as Sony has relatively few high end F1.2 options available. The Viltrox AF 35mm F1.2 LAB is here, and it is another landmark lens. And, at a price tag of $999 USD, it is a pretty huge value (and if you use code DA3512LAB5 at checkout at Viltrox, you can get an additional 5% off!). Find out more in either the video review below or by reading on in the text review.
Thanks to Viltrox for sending me a review copy of this lens. As always, this is a completely independent review. *The tests and most of the photos that I share as a part of my review cycle have been done with the Sony a7RV and the Sony Alpha 1.You can find the listing for the AF 35mm F1.2 LAB FE here.
Sigma was actually the first to bring an F1.2 autofocusing lens to the Sony FE platform back in 2019. I reviewed that lens here. It was optically impressive (extremely sharp!), but was also very large and quite expensive. It weighed a whopping 1090g (2.4lbs) and cost about $1500 USD. A lot of its thunder was stolen when Sony released their FE 35mm F1.4 GM lens (my review here) in 2021. It was (and is) an amazing lens, and while it isn’t quite as bright (F1.4 vs F1.2), it is amazingly compact, weighing only 525g. It was the 35mm lens that I added to my own kit, and I’ve not regretted that decision. The 35mm LAB is more like the Sigma than the GM in size, however, though fortunately they have managed to trim the size a bit. The 35mm LAB weighs 920g (-170g vs the Sigma) and is about 15mm shorter. Still a big lens, but it will have a couple of sales advantages vs the Sigma. One is the fact that it is smaller and lighter, but also the Sigma actually ended up being MORE expensive than the premium Sony lens (since Sony doesn’t have a 35mm F1.2 GM lens), whereas the LAB lens will be significantly cheaper. And, unlike Nikon’s new 35mm F1.2 S Line lens, the LAB 35 is actually significantly smaller than the LAB 135mm!
I love 35mm lenses. I love the focal length for general purpose shooting, and, more importantly for this particular application, for environmental portraiture. The advantage of a wider focal length is the ability to add context to a shot. To include the room, or the setting, or the environment along with the subject. But the downside is that the depth of field increases, and you often lose the ability of really isolating your subject from the background. A 35mm F1.2 lens restores that ability, however. At a distance of the 3 meters (close to ten feet), a 35mm F1.2 lens has a depth of field of about 50cm (20 inches). With an F2 aperture, that depth of field nearly doubles, at F2.8, it nearly triples. In other words, a fast maximum aperture is very necessary to create a shallow depth of field with a wider focal length. By contrast, an 85mm F2.8 lens has a depth of 21cm. You could stop down to F6.7 and still have the same depth of field at that distance as a 35mm lens at F1.2. For portraiture I might argue that a fast maximum aperture is more important on a wide angle lens than it is on a telephoto. Bottom line is that you couldn’t get shots like this on a slower 35mm lens:
And, despite being at F1.2, you can see from the deep crop that the image is sharp and crisp on the subject (despite the intense backlighting), and there is a nice separation of the subject from the background.
Nice, indeed. There are going to be a lot of people interested in this 35mm LAB on both Sony and eventually Nikon when it arrives there. Let’s dive a little deeper into the build…
Viltrox LAB 35mm Build and Handling
As noted, this time Viltrox has the advantage that the 35mm LAB isn’t the largest and heaviest lens in the class…but that doesn’t mean it is small or light. It is 89.2mm (3.5″) in diameter and 121.8mm (4.79″) in length. It has a common 77mm front filter thread up front and weighs in at 920g (32.45 oz). It has a great aspect when viewed from the front.
The compact size of the 35mm F1.4 GM while still being high performing is going to continue to be one of the most compelling arguments for the Sony lens (particularly for those who feel that F1.4 is bright enough for them). It is only 96mm in length (-25mm) and weighs just 524g (-396g!) However, a more apples to apples comparison might be the new NIKKOR Z 35mm f/1.2 S, which is 150mm in length (+29mm – wow!) and weighs 1060g (+140g). It also costs $2800! So there is at least one lens that will make the 35mm LAB feel at least a bit svelte…though it isn’t the compact little Sony below.
Viltrox has demonstrated that they are capable of producing small, lightweight lenses with good optics, but that’s not the point of the LAB series. I feel like they are probably most similar to those Nikon S-Line F1.2 lenses, which eschew trying to keep the lenses small and light (and optically compromising to achieve that) and instead focus on just making as good of optical instruments as they can. The downside of this philosophy is that it results in some beefy lenses.
Viltrox has persisted in a few of their LAB design cues from the LAB 135mm, and I don’t love all of them. The most notable of those is the approach to aperture control.
Some of Viltrox’s other lenses have (and will have) a more traditional approach to aperture similar to either Sony’s GM series or Sigma’s better DN prime lenses. This is a marked aperture ring that can either be clicked or declicked. For some reason Viltrox left that tried and true approach for a new approach more dependent on the LCD screen. The first ring on the lens is for aperture, but it is an unmarked ring that relies on the LCD screen to show you the selected aperture.
That being said, I’ve recently spent time with the Nikon Z-mount version of the LAB 135mm, and then also Nikon’s own 135mm 1.8 S Plena. I realized that my perceptions of Viltrox’s design strategies with the LAB series were being influenced by first reviewing these lenses on FE. Some of the design philosophy around the “aperture ring” makes more sense on Z-mount, as the standard there is that the customizable control ring can be used for aperture but can also be used to control other things, like exposure compensation, ISO, etc… On Sony we don’t have the options to change the function of the control ring, so it has to function like an aperture ring, so on Sony (at least), I would prefer a more traditional aperture ring.
You still have the option to have the ring either clicked or declicked, but in the clicked mode it has clicks at every 1/9th aperture stop rather than the typical one third aperture stops. I assume the logic is to provide more precision, but frankly it is wasted when A) Sony cameras only register one third stops and B) the LCD screen shows only one third stops between the full stops like F2 and F2.8. In real life it just feels like too many clicks, and I don’t enjoy it. It also makes the amount of rotation needed to go from F1.2 to F16 just too long. A more traditional aperture control setup would have been preferable all around. You can still rotate all the way to the left and move into automatic mode, and I suspect some people will probably prefer to just control aperture from within the camera. You do have the option to turn the clicks off as well via a switch on the left side of the barrel.
In theory, when you turn the clicks off you can smoothly move through the whole aperture range without defined stops. This (in theory) allows for smooth video aperture racking and has become an expected pro-grade feature on modern lenses. I find two problems with this on the 35mm LAB. The first is that the weight is still a little heavy on the aperture ring even when it is declicked (clicks are very definite in clicked mode). This makes moving smoothly (and slowly) when racking through the aperture (to allow the exposure to change in a non-obvious way) challenging. The second issue is that even when declicked, the aperture does not move in a completely linear fashion. I can still see a bit of visible steps when racking. The best lenses do a pretty good job of simulating a true manual aperture ring, but the 35mm LAB falls a bit short of that lofty goal. It’s far from the worse that I’ve seen, but also far from the best.
The iris itself has 11 aperture blades, and these make for a reasonably well rounded aperture iris when stopped down. It’s not until fairly small (F4-5.6) that I start to see the shape of the blades.
Now to that LCD screen. The LCD functions in many ways like those found on the Zeiss Batis lenses, though with some improvements. The screen itself is nice and bright, allowing for good visibility even in bright conditions. It solves the problem of a distance scale (something missing on most mirrorless lenses), as it gives you a large font telling you the precise focus distance along with a distance scale above that. The bottom part of the screen gives you a readout of the current aperture. It also gives you some information related to the function buttons however, with the Fn icon lighting up when the first Function Button is depressed, and then the A or B function lights up when you are presetting focus distances.
I’ve even noticed that this time they are showing you a depth of field scale if you are in manual focus mode that increases as you change the aperture by extending a yellow bar along the distance scale.
There’s actually a lot of useful information on the LCD screen once you get familiar with how it is all being displayed, though I’m sure a lot of people will still find it somewhat of a gimmick.
On the left side of the screen you will find an AF | MF switch along with two FN (function) buttons. The top one functions like the typical function button, performing whatever function you have that button programmed to in camera. The second button works by default as the main control for A-B focus. When in manual focus mode you can preset the focus position(s) by long pressing the FN 2 button, and then access the focus changes by short pressing it. You also have the ability to change the function of both function buttons through the Viltrox app.
Viltrox continues with a trend that other lens makers are now imitating by including a USB-C port in the lens mount that allows you to do firmware updates right to the lens. I’m a fan of this approach, as it eliminates the need for a separate dock or lens station for firmware updates, and I find the process a little more intuitive than doing firmware updates through the camera. This allows Viltrox to future proof their lenses and continue to improve them through firmware. You also have the option to connect to the Viltrox app for IOS or Android via Bluetooth where you can also update firmware wirelessly…or even make a direct correction via USB-C from your phone to the lens. In the app you can go beyond firmware updates to tweaking the behavior of the custom buttons.
You can even customize the splash screen on the LCD at power-up to show your name or logo.
The one thing I wish was there but isn’t (at least yet) is some control over the function of the manual focus ring. I’d like to be able to choose between linear/non-linear focus and the amount of focus throw rotation similar to what Tamron allows on some of their lenses. I wouldn’t be surprised to see Viltrox get there; they are pretty ambitious.
The manual focus ring is slightly raised and has a rubberized, ribbed texture. It moves smoothly and with nice damping. It isn’t linear, so the amount of focus covered will depend on the speed in which you rotate the ring. I found the focus throw to be a little long when trying to do smooth pull for video…at least at close distances. It needed more rotation than I could do with a single wrist rotation. Using the A/B focus is a much more precise way to set up repeatable focus pulls.
We also have weather sealing on this lens that starts with a unique maroon-colored gasket at the lens mount along with other seal points through the lens (a total of 12 of them, by my count).
This is an internally focusing lens, so there is nothing that moves where dust might intrude. There’s also an HD-Nano multilayer coating on the front element to help with water and fingerprint resistance, making the front element easier to clean. This is a professional grade lens with professional sealing. As always, however, “moisture-proof” does not mean “water-proof”, so don’t go crazy!
There is no lens based stabilization, so you will need to rely upon the in-camera stabilization if your camera is so equipped. Handholding a 35mm F1.2 lens is rarely difficult.
Like the 135mm LAB (and the upcoming 85mm F1.4 Pro), the 35mm LAB employs floating elements. You might notice that when the lens is powered off, there will be some movement/clunking if you rotate the lens up and down. This can be very disturbing if you are not familiar with modern lens design. Many high end modern lenses employ floating elements that allow for better up close performance. The lens groups are not fixed, but float in a certain area, so when they are not energized they will move around a bit. This is by design, however, and when the camera is powered on, those elements will be energized and become fixed. You can rotate the lens up and down without anything moving around. This allows for superior up close performance. You can focus as closely as 34cm, giving a maximum magnification figure of 0.17x.
That’s a useful but not exceptional figure. The Sony GM can focus closer (25cm) and gives a 0.26x magnification level. The Nikkor 35mm F1.2 S can focus as closely as 30cm and gives a 0.20x magnification. But what the LAB does extremely well is give you amazing up close performance even at F1.2. Look at how exceptional that detail is in the crop.
The lens also comes with a nicer-than-usual leather pouch (similar to Canon L-series lenses). There is some cushion on the bottom, but I don’t find these pouches nearly as useful as a good padded nylon case like what Sigma provides.
The LAB 35mm includes a lens hood that isn’t quite as premium feeling as the one on the 135mm, but it still feels like good quality. The plastics are thick and it has internal ribs. It doesn’t have a lock, but it does bayonet into place firmly and with a definite “click”.
The lens is constructed with a aviation-grade magnesium-aluminum alloy, making it extremely tough. The finish of the lens feels every bit of premium as the more expensive Sony GM lens, and the LAB badges manages to fall in the same spot and be the same color as the “G” badge on the Sony lens…though I’m sure that’s a coincidence (wink, wink).
As with the 135mm LAB, the Viltrox AF 35mm F1.2 LAB E is a premium lens with a robust set of features. I don’t necessarily agree with all the design decisions, but it is a very, very nice lens. It’s also pretty big and heavy, so that will be a serious factor for some.
Autofocus and Video
Like the LAB 135mm, the LAB 35mm utilizes four(!!!) of Viltrox’s new “Hyper VCM” (Voice Coil Motor) motors working in tandem to drive autofocus. Viltrox states, “Its double floating magnetic suspension system ensures precision focusing, whether you’re tracking a fast-moving subject or shooting videos.” Focus is extremely quiet and fast. I had no problem keeping up with fast squash action on the court…even at F1.2.
Grabbing quick, reactive shots at F1.2 was very easy to execute.
Focus on thin objects with shallow depth of field was effortless, and the lens yielded excellent precision.
Focus sound is near silent, with a very light whirring sound as focus moves back and forth that I can only hear if I put my ear right next to the lens barrel.
I was very impressed when testing for focus speed. It is essentially instant when moving from a foreground to a background subject. I tested with the Sony GM back to back, and actually felt like the Viltrox had a split second advantage. Both are extremely fast, so it feels a bit like splitting hairs, but that helps put the Viltrox’s performance in context.
As mentioned in the intro, I was able to get accurate focus on the eye even when shooting portraits with strong backlighting.
I had no problems nailing focus at F1.2 during a teaching session at a church.
You can also see great precision in this shot of a horse. The lashes were covering the iris, but the precision and detail (at F1.2) is great.
I had no problem snapping focus to a bird on the wing.
If we look at a crop where I’ve raised exposure, you can see that the shot is perfectly focused.
And, of course, here is the obligatory shot of Nala.
This is definitely in the upper tier of autofocus performance for third party lenses. It’s amazing how far Viltrox has come in just a few short years.
I will add one caveat, however. While the Viltrox is fast enough to keep up with a quick moving action, burst speed is limited by Sony to 15FPS. If you are using one of their sports bodies, like my Alpha 1, that means that you can only achieve half the maximum burst rate that you can with a native Sony lens. That difference will be even more pronounced on a camera like the a9III. One of the nice things about the LAB lenses on Nikon is that no such limitation exists.
Video AF
The focus excellence carries over the video side of things. Video focus pulls are smooth, quick, and confident. The advantage of not having a STM (stepping motor) is that there are no visible steps, allowing focus to move consistently and smoothly from one subject to another without any visible pauses. There is some focus breathing, but it is fairly well controlled, with only a slight change of subject size depending on focus (I’ve put some lines here so that you can see the amount of size change).
The Sony 35mm F1.4 GM has a bit of a reputation for breathing quite badly, and you can definitely see that the GM has more obvious breathing…however…Sony has a focus breathing compensation correction on their cameras that utilizes a crop to mathematically eliminate focus breathing. It only works for first party Sony lenses, however, and it’s a pretty significant crop for the 35GM because there is so much breathing.
So, the Viltrox has less breathing, but that breathing will not be corrected in Sony cameras, either.
My “hand test” where I alternately block the camera’s view of my face with my hand and then remove it went exceptionally well. Focus confidently moved from my hand to my eye and back without any pulsing or lack of confidence. The focus breathing means that you will see the pull from my hand to my face, however.
Focus stayed stable in static shots at various apertures and didn’t pulse or move around.
I would say that autofocus for both stills and video is generally excellent. Viltrox’s new Hyper VCM focus motors are pretty great.
Image Quality Breakdown
The 35mm LAB continues in the tradition of being, well, exceptional. The optical design is 15 elements in 10 groups, with five of those being ED (low dispersion) elements, three of them being HD (high refractive index) lenses, and two being extreme aspherical lens (so two-thirds of the elements here are exotics). The MTF at F1.2 looks very good, with an absolutely stunning center and midframe performance and then a fade into the corners. At F8 the MTF is pretty much a straight line across the top, i.e. perfect.
Not everyone understands MTF charts, so I won’t do a deep dive into them here, but what I do find helps people visually is if I line up the MTF charts from alternatives, put a line through 80% (anything above that is looking great), and allow people to see what falls above and below that threshold for each lens. In this case, I’ve grabbed the premium Sony FE 35mm F1.4 and the new and exceptionally expensive Nikkor Z 35mm F1.2 S. The results are illuminating.
By this metric, the LAB lens will have the sharpest center and midframe with only the GM having sharper corners. I haven’t yet tested the Nikkor, but, on paper, the LAB will be the sharper lens essentially across the frame.
And yes, in the real world, this is a lens perfectly capable of producing stunning results even at F1.2:
Look the precision in the fine details after an ice storm. The contrast is pretty much perfect…even at F1.2.
More on this in a moment. Let’s look at the technical side of things.
I was expecting a lens well corrected for LoCA (longitudinal chromatic aberrations), and that is the case here. I see mostly neutral results on either side of the plane of focus without any fringing.
I don’t really see any fringing in this shot of water droplets…one that I’ve often found plays havoc on lenses with lesser control.
I did find a bit of fringing at F1.2 when shooting a camera/lens combo, which is my favorite subject for finding fringing (and I like taking pictures of cameras!) The amount of LoCA here is mild, but visible.
We’ve also got near-perfect corrections for LaCA (lateral chromatic aberrations) that typically show up along the edges of the frame with high contrast transition points. I see only the tiniest amount of fringing here.
I see no evidence of fringing in the transition areas near the edges of real world images, either.
I have seen some VERY unfortunate results in the past year when it comes to fast 35mm lenses and their quantity of vignette and distortion (hello Canon 35mm F1.4L VCM!). There’s much less of that here, though not the perfect levels we saw with the 135mm LAB.
There is a very minor amount of distortion, though unfortunately what’s there is complex. It is neither a true barrel or pincushion distortion, but a non-linear mix of the two. You can see that the corners have a pincushion look while the center is pretty neutral. Trying to correct the pincushion distortion creates barrel distortion elsewhere. I found that dialing in a minimal -2 was the best compromise I could achieve. When the actual correction profile arrives it will certainly do a better job. At the moment there is no correction for JPEGs, either, which will almost certainly change down the road. Fortunately the quantity of distortion is low enough that I couldn’t see it in real world shots.
This horizon looks pretty straight even without any corrections.
However, in this shot, with the horizon right up near the top of the frame, you can see a bit of that “mustache” pattern.
You would probably want to correct that…which will be much easier once this lens has gone to retail and we get RAW correction profiles for Adobe and other editing software. I did find that doing a miniscule -1 in Lightroom’s distortion slider did help enough that I wouldn’t probably notice after correction.
Vignette is moderately heavy at F1.2, requiring a +70 (between 2 and 3 stops). A lot of that clears naturally by F2.8, as you can see here.
At wide apertures, this is often a visible amount of vignette but not necessarily a negative amount. In this portrait shot (uncorrected) you can see that there really isn’t any destructive about the vignette even at F1.2.
There are going to be situations where a bit of vignette is flattering or productive. Bottom line is that while the 35mm LAB has a bit of distortion and a moderate amount of vignette, neither is extreme.
We’ll move on to inspecting our test chart. This test has been done on a 61MP Sony a7RV sensor. I use a high end tripod and two second camera delay to ensure vibration doesn’t affect images. *I ran into an issue that I sometimes encounter with third party lenses in that metering for my test chart didn’t work properly at smaller aperture if the aperture was declicked. I would get overexposed results at F11 and F16. This isn’t the case when testing with the aperture clicked. Firmware should be able to fix this issue.
Here’s a look at the test chart that we will examine at high magnification:
If we take a look at crops (at 200%) at F1.2 from the center, mid-frame, and lower right corner, we find that center and mid-frame performance is exceptionally good, and the corners are good but a bit softer.
So let’s put that in perspective. The premium lens in the class is the Sony 35mm F1.4 GM, which I have owned for years and consider to be exceptionally good. The LAB 35mm is sharper everywhere save in the corners, where the GM has a bit of the edge (as the MTF chart suggested).
But that was with both lenses wide open. If I stop the LAB down to F1.4 and sample the upper left corner, I would give the win to the LAB with both lenses at F1.4.
So this is definitely a very sharp lens at F1.2. I didn’t hesitate to shoot with it wide open at all.
Even landscape images at F1.2 look great:
By F2 the sharpness has increased to the level where my a7RV is struggling with moiré (false color). That only tends to happen when lenses are very, very sharp.
Even the corners are now extremely sharp.
Landscape images shot anywhere between F2 and F8 will look fantastic. Here’s one shot from a car window at F2.8:
This shot of a pier at F2.8 looks great everywhere that is in focus.
If I check back in with a comparison at F2.8 with the GM, I find that while both lenses are ridiculously sharp, the LAB is just a bit sharper everywhere. Take a look at the smaller text in this comparison.
Also interesting is the fact that the LAB consistently required less exposure (faster shutter speed) even when I shot both lenses with the same settings in a controlled environment. Clearly the LAB lens has a bit better light transmission (perhaps not surprising considering its more robust size).
Landscape images in the middle apertures show plenty of punch and detail. Colors are rich, contrast is strong, and detail is great even on a 61MP camera.
As is typical on a high resolution body, diffraction will start to soften the image by F11 and more obviously by F16, which is minimum aperture (though this lens is still sharper than many lenses at its weakest!)
Clearly this is a very sharp lens. But we aren’t just looking for sharpness; can this lens also deliver soft bokeh? It is a rare lens at any focal length that is good at both. 35mm lenses aren’t necessarily the biggest “bokeh makers”, but I’ve seen a few that could deliver lovely bokeh.
Here’s a look comparing the LAB and GM. We would expect the specular highlights to be larger on the LAB due to the faster maximum aperture, and that is the case. Both lenses experience some “cat-eye” geometric deformation near the corner of the frame, though the LAB experiences less of it.
What’s interesting here is that I actually think that the rendering from the LAB is nicer. By that I mean the mix of color, defocus, and general look to the image.
What many people don’t know is that due to some quirk of physics the specular highlights of a brighter lens remain a bit larger and softer than a lens with a dimmer maximum aperture even when you equalize the settings. If I stop the 35mm LAB to F1.4, for example, it still has bigger, softer “bokeh balls” than the GM at F1.4:
We see a little busyness in those specular highlights, but nothing too bad.
This next shot has a lot going on in the frame. It’s a gift shop that is full of various items and knick-knacks. There are also a number of bright lights and small objects that make for a complex bokeh rendering in both the foreground and background.
What we see is excellent subject isolation and fairly smooth rendering on all of those various textures…even the ones likely to induce “nervousness” in the rendering.
A gentler scene produces a more creamy background.
Obviously at closer distances and F1.2 the background will be strongly defocused and will look nicely creamy.
I think that most people are going to be very happy with the rendering from the 35mm LAB, and will love that extra bit of subject isolation that you can get from an F1.2 lens. I’m not sure it’s bokeh is as nice as my favorite 35mm bokeh maker (the Zeiss Milvus 35mm F1.4), but it is pretty close.
I also felt like colors are very nice and rich from the 35mm LAB. It’s a little ugly at home right now as we (very slowly) transition from winter to spring (mostly still winter!). That wasn’t a problem in Myrtle Beach in March, however, particularly when I was up early to catch the predawn light.
I felt like my real world images had very rich color to them.
Flare resistance was also very strong, which is hard to do in a lens with such a huge maximum aperture. I’ve tested a lot of cheap F1.2 and F1.4 lenses that have massive flare issues, but I saw (at most) the tiniest amount of ghosting in all of my testing period.
Contrast remained strong even in strongly backlit situations. This adds a lot of additional versatility for portrait photographers, as they can shoot backlit subjects without fear of their images falling apart.
I did manage to test coma. A 35mm lens with an extremely bright F1.2 aperture is going to be a potential favorite for those wanting to shoot the night sky. How did it do?
As you might expect by this point, this is a lens that is pretty much good at everything. Astro is no problem, even at F1.2, with no issues with fringing around bright points of light, crisp star points in the center frame crop, and very little coma near the edges of the frame in the second crop.
I’ll be honest; I actually didn’t expect this lens to rival the 35mm F1.4 GM, which is perhaps my favorite 35mm lens to date. Now, to be fair, the GM is working within much tighter size constraints, but the fact that the Viltrox AF 35mm F1.2 LAB FE is so good and so comparatively inexpensive ($500 less!) makes for a pretty compelling option. If you’d like to see more images in my extensive image gallery, just click here.
Conclusion
I was excited by the idea of the Viltrox LAB series lenses from the moment that they were announced, but the reality of them has been, if anything, even better. These LAB lenses have been so good that I’ve scaled up my expectations (and critiques) of them to the level that I would hold lenses that cost 2-3x as much to. That’s mostly because Viltrox has proven that they are pretty much capable of anything.
While Kazuto Yamaki (CEO of Sigma) did announce a MK II version of Sigma’s own 35mm F1.2 for Sony FE, at the moment of this review the Viltrox LAB 35mm F1.2 is the only autofocusing 35mm F1.2 lens on FE since Sigma had previously discontinued the existing 35mm F1.2 DN. I’m not sure what level of sales success that the first generation Sigma had on Sony FE, but that fact that the Viltrox is the superior lens in both optics and autofocus, is smaller and lighter, and costs nearly half as much will probably give it a sales advantage. Add to that that this lens will also eventually come to Nikon Z, and I suspect that the 35mm LAB will do just fine.
The Sony 35mm F1.4 GM is a still a lovely choice if you want both high performing and compact, but the LAB 35mm is the new champ if you want that next level F1.2 goodness. It can produce brilliant images at all apertures, nail autofocus in those critical moments, and won’t break the bank. It may break your back, however, though no more so than a lot of the Sigma ART series primes from back in the day. And if you want a lot of this magic in a slightly smaller, lighter, and cheaper package…their 35mm F1.4 Pro lens is coming somewhere in the near future. I’ve already been testing the 85mm F1.4 Pro, and it is pretty sweet. It’s a good day for Viltrox…which means that a lot of other lens makers may be having a bit of a bad day.
Pros:
Not as massive and heavy as the 135mm (or the 35mm F1.2 S-Line)
Beautiful built lens
Feature rich
Very good weather sealing
USB port for firmware updates along with Bluetooth for wireless access
Quad HyperVCM motors means focus is near instant
Focus pulls are nicely damped
Exceptionally sharp lens that matches or bests the very best in the center and mid-frame
Keywords: Viltrox AF 35mm F1.2 LAB FE, Viltrox AF, LAB, Viltrox LAB, #LAB, #LAB35, #explorebeyond, Viltrox 35mm, Normal, Full Frame, F1.2, f/1.2, Hyper VCM, Viltrox LAB 35mm F1.2 FE, Viltrox LAB 35mm Review, Viltrox AF 35mm F1.2 FE Review, Sony a7IV, Sony Alpha 1, Sony a7RV, Review, Hands On, Dustin Abbott, Real World, Comparison, Sharpness, Bokeh, Flare Resistance, Autofocus, Image Quality, Sample Images, Video, Photography, let the light in, weathersealing, #letthelightin, DA
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