My second lens I have bought to date. First things first, this is a manual focus lens only and cannot auto focus. That's right, you have to actually do something besides point and shoot. The horror!
A big plus of this lens is that it is an EF mount so works on both APS-C crop sensor cameras and full frame as well.
To make this more interesting I will add in some pictures I have taken with the 14mm so you can judge for yourself.
Price:- Around £330
Compared to that tiny 50mm EF-S lens I reviewed first, this is 4 times the price. So what do you get? For that price you get really good build quality. It's so sturdy and weighty that is makes my camera tip when it's not on a tripod and could probably smash it's way through a few bricks without taking a dent. You also get a really smooth, and I mean SMOOTH focus ring. It glides under your fingers. You also get a manual aperture ring on the canon mount which is so useful, so so useful. And look at that sexy glass bulging out of the end! Fwoarr!
Like I said above, it's manual focus. It's all about the handling.
The Aperture ring is manual and clicks to confirm it has been changed. It is very nice to keeping the same aperture without accidentally changing it, it's a very robust ring and the chances of knocking it and it changing are almost non-existent. This makes it impossible to change aperture during video however, because you'll jog the camera. But who does that anyway?
It's pretty weighty but you don't notice really. It fits perfectly in your hand for handheld and feels nice to hold with the bonus of having a rubber focus ring that's easy to grip.
The Aperture ring is manual and clicks to confirm it has been changed. It is very nice to keeping the same aperture without accidentally changing it, it's a very robust ring and the chances of knocking it and it changing are almost non-existent. This makes it impossible to change aperture during video however, because you'll jog the camera. But who does that anyway?
It's pretty weighty but you don't notice really. It fits perfectly in your hand for handheld and feels nice to hold with the bonus of having a rubber focus ring that's easy to grip.
The focus ring is smooth as hell and takes a lot of work to go from infinity to its 28cm limit. 2 Meters to infinity is a very small distance with the majority of the ring for under 1 meter. To be honest, it's so wide you can leave it close to infinity unless you're getting within 3 meters of the subject. It's really handy for walking and shooting.
Image quality! The big reason you will buy this lens. As you can see from the pictures, when you buy this lens you are buying it for the beautiful 14mm perspective. Not only that but with minimal distortion around the edges. It is an absolutely gorgeous lens. I haven't noticed any colour fringing which is a nice plus. There is however, no place to put any filters because of how protruding the front element is. This means lens flares unless you get a really wide lens hood you made yourself or something. It's a soft lens as well. It's not sharp, but it's a wide angle, sharpness isn't what you buy it for. It works very well for video. There is a VDSLR version with a follow focus ring but to be honest this works just as well. My biggest problem is it has a tendency to over expose. The LCD on the camera is not to be trusted. The exposure simulation on the camera is off so go buy the meter.
.jpg)
Uses:-
The field of view is pretty much your entire field of view as a human. Everything you can see with your eyes, the camera picks up. This is on a crop sensor camera as well. Put this on full frame cameras and you have a seriously trippy looking picture. On full frame you get huge distortion but on a crop sensor camera not so much. It is extremely good for landscapes, nature shots, rocks, skies and anything which is large and benefits from the stretched perspective. It is not good for portrait photography at all. People get very distorted when you get close enough to get a decent picture. It's great for video, both hand held and tripod because of how nice everything looks through it. If it's close ups you want, this is not the lens for you.
£330 is a lot of money if you're on a budget. Is it worth it? For me it was. From day 1 those thoughts evaporated. It's a beautiful lens with a decent build quality. The perspective is awesome and it comes in handy, too as a functional lens. The focusing is easy to do and the aperture ring saves time. It feels good knowing you're doing everything. For what it is, is a well made third party lens that is cheaper than the canon equivalent. While it does have it's issues, mainly the over exposure. It is soft but only when compared to a 50mm prime which is sharp as hell to begin with. Bokeh? Forget it, you don't get any but that's not why you buy this lens. You buy it for the perspective and character of the image, not the bokeh. If you're wanting an architecture lens then move on, you won't get straight lines. Portraits? Move on. Animal shots? Move on. If you want to expand the environment with a really deep depth of field even at f2.8, get this lens. It is amazing.
No comments:
Post a Comment