Samyng on the left and Zeiss on the right. Image courtesy: Tystory.
The brand new Samyang 135mm f/2.0 is now in Stock via eBay Korea sellers (most of them have free worldwide shipment). You can get the lens at BHphoto:
135mm f/2.0 for Sony A-mount (Click here) and Sony E-mount (Click here).
135mm t/2.2 Cine for Sony A-mount (Click here) and Sony E-mount (Click here).
And via Korean sellers on eBay:
[shoplink 33060 ebay]Samyang 135mm E-mount (here n eBay)[/shoplink]
[shoplink 33061 ebay]Samyang 135mm A-mount (here n eBay)[/shoplink]
First Samyang 135mm f/2.0 E-mount review by Patrick Murphy-Racey.
33 Responses
Looks great. But i rather use an adapter along with my Nikon 135 mm f.2,0 DC
I’d rather use the 135mm 1.8 zeiss. I hear this lens is good though and I’ve wondered about that defocus image control.
DC does not stands for a soft-focus lens. DC stands for controll of the out of focus area. How do i use the dc. The R side makes backgrounds go soft, and disappear, or the F side when i want to optimize it for the foreground. But i never uses the F side anyway. I use it in neutral. Then its like any other lenses. Or when i wanna have controll of the bookeh in the background
The Nikkor 135F2 DC is a very unique lens and produces great images, but costs about three times the price with the adaptor (if you could find one) compared to the Samyang so it’s really not a direct comparison. If you already own one that’s a different story, but then you wouldn’t be in the market for the Samyang. All of which makes your comment rather confusing.
For focus sanity I prefer to use either all nikon or Sony / canon / what turns the right way. So right now all my manuals lenses are Nikon legacy glass. Lovely image quality, brings a bit of romance back into the image.
but you will not have an automatic aperture with the Nikon lens!!
That is the reason, why I will sell my Nikkor 135/2.
I have never heard of a serious photographer who uses auto aperture regularly. It’s a non-issue. I have literally never allowed my camera to set the aperture.
The images shot with the Samyang look excellent; razor sharp and beautiful bokeh. I would calibrate the lens color rendition using the colorchecker and be very satisfied. The two lenses look identical with the exception of the shorter mounting flange on the e-mount version.
Where did you see these images? Surely you are not talking about the video.
I wonder how it stacks up against my Leica Elmar 135 4. I suspect not all that well.
Well it stacks up a full 2 stops faster just for starters . I also suspect that stopped down to F/4 it will give superb results . Though Leica lenses do have that something extra { that is often only seen by Leica fans lol } pity none of the “magic ” can be measured. Which is fortunate as a lot of Leica lenses would look like ridiculously overpriced but very well made male jewelery for dentists
Like 50mm the 135mm lens is a very well established focal length and it would be far harder to find one that was bad at F/4 than find one that is excellent { pretty much all of the current models }
I bought the Nikon Mount of this Lens and have been using it with my A7r and i can just say that it is a fantastic lens.
One of those unexpected side-effects of mirrorless is that it’s made manual lenses so much more usable than on DSLRs. I remember, all those years ago, when SLRs had focus aids and AF pretty much killed that. With continuous livev
It’s interesting how things turn. I recall when the first Minolta AF SLR came out and I was informed by traditionalists it was a dreadful development, it took away skill and control. (A parallel argument happened when DSLRs first appeared). Now, of course, we have generations of people who wouldn’t dream of using a manual focus lens, used as they are to AD and the hit-and-miss of manual focusing on a DSLR (especially the cheap ones with nasty, dim OVFs).
And yes, I know, MF isn’t good at lots of things, like action photography and so on. But it’s at least now an option, and is surely great for portraiture, landscapes, architectural and much else. But EVF and focus aids make a whole lot more things possible again.
Anyway, it looks like a bargain (at least compared to the huge prices we appear to being asked to pay now).
Agree. I hope Sony improves peaking further, it isn’t accurate enough especially wide open. Whenever I thought it to be in focus, using magnification revealed this not to be true. I found the EM1-peaking the best I used so far. If they get this right, manual focus and slightly moving target wouldn’t be that difficult any more at 135/1.8 😉
I suspect it will always have to be a mixture. If you want spot-on focusing, then it will need that magnification factor (although I’m sure that some intelligence that can be thrown in – just because the camera doesn’t directly control the lens doesn’t mean it can’t give better advice to the operator).
What I suspect is really required is some work on making the whole ergonomics of the exercise work well.
Also, how much nicer to have great big ring controls on the lens rather than have to fiddle around using tiny thumbwheels on a camera body. I can’t help but feel with all the modern move to fly-by-wire electronics and stuffing all the controls on the camera body that we are missing something.
The Samyang seems to be a really nice lens. The Tystory comparison, however, is weird, I don’t believe it. The center is less sharp than the corners (forgot AF fine tuning?). The Zeiss 135/1.8 is a great and very sharp lens, even wide open. Was worth the money I spent.
Anybody here think Sony, Adorama, B&H will have some sales tomorrow?
Ebay sellers will get more IMO 😉
At the beginning of this video, the reviewer rambles about the true f-stop of the lens, stating that the f/2 is an accurate measurement, but that the Samyang 85/1.4 seems more like an f/1.5 or f/1.6.
What is he talking about? T-stops? Or is he disassembling the lens and measuring the aperture opening against the focal length? Very odd, and while he may have some worthwhile perspective (yet to be seen for me), his misinformed viewpoint on the mathematics and science of photography and optics is a little disconcerting.
For those Emounters that care, This $549 usd lens is sweeeeet. I am using it on the A7r. Yes it’s MF, yes the Emount version is monster big & heavy and yes it delivers. Samyang/Rokinon has a big 135 f2 IQ hit on their hands for those that are not afraid of MF, large lenses or $549.
I’m using the cine version with Nikon mount for both Canon 6D and Sony NEX-6 (with focal reducer) and it works very nice. I’m really satisfied with the quality of this lens, and prefer using it on the mirrorless with the ease of focusing. The sharpness of this lens is amazing, it’s almost the same when stopping down. You can find my samples on Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/langstrum/sets/72157650779753325/
Why would anyone buy this native E mount?
To, like, use on their E-mount camera perhaps.
No advantage. Better usage options and resale potential by adapting another mount to E. No electric contacts on these Samyangs, so no jpg correction or exif info. No auto aperture. I don’t see the advantage beyond heavier weight, bigger size, and less mounting potential.
Some people buy lenses not for resale value, but simply to use on their cameras and make photos. If all one has is e-mount gear, why would they want the lens in another mount and force themselves to also buy an adapter?
$18 adapter.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Sony-Minolta-AF-lens-to-NEX-E-Mount-a6000-a5000-a3500-a3000-NEX-5R-NEX5-Adapter-/330526262316?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4cf4e6842c
Doesn’t seem like much to spend when E mountr’s are more likely to consider such a device for many other conversion potentials. Nothing about forcing anyone to do anything. Just pointing out options that can be logically argued to have more expandability, which is better for user, and seems to fit the philosophy of E mount mind set anyway.
Do you shoot video? FE mount glass is corrected for in the video stream (as it is for jpeg stills), this is very cool for video. So a lens like the FE 4/16-35 OSS becomes somewhat more useful to a multi-media shooter. By comparison, on a Canon 5D, a 16-35 is basically no-go for video as there is no internal correction on the video stream.
But these Samyangs don’t have any electric contacts. I don’t believe there is any auto correct anything with them.
So why not get an A-Mount and adapt, therefor have a lens that fits two systems, rather than just one? Greatly increases usage options and resale potential.
There is SONY FE glass, third party FE glass and adapted glass (via a converter). Only SONY FE glass will give you access to all the cameras automatic lens correction features.
If you shoot E-mount only or primarily?
For resale I would buy the A-mount or even EF or F mount and adapter.
Why does someone make this comment every time one of these lenses shows up here? It is perfectly reasonable to prefer to having to buy, maintain and use a separate adapter. It’s cleaner looking and more convenient to have the adapter “built-in”. In my experience resale prices for e-mount Rokinon/Samyang lenses are comparable if not higher than other mounts on Craigslist/Ebay, maybe because they are generally harder to find.
Swedish photo eq store Cyberphoto posted a review a couple of days ago with large samples from wide open and beyond. Here’s it google translated:
https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cyberphoto.se%2Finfo.php%3Farticle%3D135mmNi
I’m using the cine version with Canon mount on my A7s.The first results are very promising:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/kaherdin/sets/72157650790502195/
Thank you Patrick, for nice review.