Samyang 16mm F2.0 ED AS UMC CS A-mount lens reviews
reviews found: 4
 Chrisblobster#44041 date: Mar-28-2018 | |
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sharpness: 5 color: 5 build: 4 distortion: 4 flare control: 5 overall: 4.6 | tested on:
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| ownership: | I own this lens |
| compared to: | Minolta 20mm AF f/2.8 Rokinon 14mm f/2.8 |
| price paid: | NZ$360 brand new |
| positive: | Great colours & sharpness, low distortion, bright wide aperture, sharp corners even at f/2, flare resistance very good. Pairs nicely on my A57 and built well. |
| negative: | Lens hood not very secure when attached. Big 77mm filter thread. |
| comment: | A fantastic little APS-C wide angle lens bought under Rokinon brand name. Highly recommended for anyone wanting crop sensor astro or landscape shots. |
; 20MP| balacau#32710 date: Nov-20-2016 | |
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sharpness: 4.5 color: 5 build: 5 distortion: 5 flare control: 5 overall: 4.9 | tested on:
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| ownership: | I own this lens |
| compared to: | Sony 16-50mm F2.8 SSM zoom lens Tamron 16-300mm PZD super zoom lens Tamron 14mm F2.8 prime lens Samyang 10mm F2.8 ultra-wide prime (comparison as this was the first experience I had with Samyang and their lenses). |
| price paid: | £320 GBP (new) |
| positive: | Build quality Well damped and smooth manual focus ring Relatively small & compact lens Effective lens hood which clicks into plate securely |
| negative: | Lens cap can come off if not carefully fitted when removing hood Can sometimes be somewhat difficult to focus accurately even with live view/focusing aids |
| comment: | I was very excited to receive this lens and seriously couldn't wait to get out there and give it a try. I was left in no false illusions that it would take some work and re-learning to get the best out of the lens on my a68; the earlier purchase of the 10mm F2.8 ultra-wide prime certainly was a learning curve. Overall I am very impressed with this lens. Although it does stop short of the ultra-wide category, I have certainly already found many uses for it and the images are very sharp indeed (shooting at modest ISO's of 100-400 and F5.6-F8). It can stand up to those typical bright winter sunlit days quite well too which is a challenge for most lenses I find; flaring isn't really a problem even if it looks that way when looking through the EVF, the end result is often alot clearer which is a nice surprise. My main issue with the lens is that the lens cap tends to drop off quite easily, I nearly dropped mine into a deep puddle of muddy water on the first day! Especially when removing the lens hood, people who are buying this lens may want to keep hold of the cap! The lens hood itself fits snugly into place and clicks so you know it is quite secure. The only reason why I rated the lens for sharpness as 4.5 rather than 5 was simply there is a little difficulty in getting that tack-sharp image in some circumstances. I am sure as I use the lens more, this will be somewhat easier. In short, a brilliant lens that certainly does produce wonderfully sharp images when you nail the focus right. Certainly far less distortion than my old Tamron 14mm and takes up less space than the Sony 16-50mm F2.8. Eventually I'd like to compare both the Sony 16-50mm zoom and this Samyang 16mm prime to see if one has the edge in sharpness over the other. I have a feeling the Samyang might just be ahead in that category. Very happy with this purchase indeed! |
| QuietOC#17335 date: Aug-14-2015 | |
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sharpness: 5 color: 4 build: 5 distortion: 4 flare control: 4 overall: 4.4 | tested on:
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| ownership: | I used to own this lens |
| compared to: | Sigma 10-20 F4-5.6 EX DC Sigma AF 24 F2.8 II Minolta AF 24 F2.8 Sony AF 28 F2.8 Sony DT 30 F2.8 Macro SAM Sony DT 35 F1.8 SAM Sony DT 16-105 |
| price paid: | 177 USD (used) |
| positive: | Large, buttery smooth, long-throw focus control Sharp Even extreme corners quite sharp from f/4 to f/8 Low, simple barrel distortion Internal focusing Non-rotating filter threads |
| negative: | Size/weight Over-sized 77 mm filter Awkwardly large plastic hood Narrow, plastic, clicky aperture ring No ROM chip No aperture connection to body Very few distances marked Font on scales is very small. ft/m used where in/mm would be more appropriate (3 ft and 1 m are the last markings before infinity.) |
| comment: | Rokinon 16M-S 16 mm f/2.0 ED AS UMC CS made in Korea. A very new looking example. "MADE IN KOREA" This rather hefty, large lens is the APS-C equivalent of a standard wide angle 24 mm f/3 lens--fairly fast and fairly wide. It is simply enormous sitting next to the Minolta AF 24 F2.8. It is nearly the size and weight of the Minolta AF 28-135, but it is better balanced than that lens on my A58. It really illustrates a problem with SLRs--short focal length lenses have to be quite large regardless of sensor size. Meanwhile the 16mm f/2.8 E-mount lens is tiny. At least this lens isn't that much larger than the Sony DT 16-105 zoom, and it certainly can take better images than that lens. At close focus its angle of view is between the short ends of the Sony DT 16-105 and Sony DT 18-55 view--much narrower than the 16 mm end of the Sony DT 16-105. While many zoom lenses cover this focal length none seem to be close in optical performance to this lens. The smaller Sigma 10-20 F4-5.6 has less distortion, but the corners are never as sharp as those of the Rokinon wide-open. Color rendition is noticeably warmer than the Sony DT 16-105. CA is very well controlled similar to the 35 f/1.8. Evidently a modern optical design, despite the lack of electronics. Very similar sharpness characteristics to the 35 f/1.8 too. Definitely sharper and more consistent across the frame than the Sigma 24 f/2.8 not to mention the Sony AF 28 f/2.8. The lack of Steady Shot and AF confirmation are both unfortunate. The AF zooms is much easier to use to get decent wide shots even using their much harder to use manual controls. Samyang has electronics in their Nikon mount version of this lens including aperture control. The Pentax version of this lens also has auto aperture control, but for whatever reason this version has neither. It is certainly possible to add a ROM to it. The A-mount version at least is currently the cheapest version currently selling for $329 new on Amazon. The lens hood and 77 mm filter diameter are ridiculous though it is a fairly common size for large lenses. The front glass element is only 47 mm--noticeably smaller than the one on the 16-105 and a 62 mm filter and hood should have been more than adequate and much more discrete. Samyang seems to have reused this hood and body size from their full frame 24 f/1.4 and 35 f/1.4 lenses probably so the cine versions can be swapped for each other in a focus-follow setup. The smaller, lighter Sigma 10-20mm F4-5.6 or the DT 16-xx zooms perform well enough especially when Steady Shot is used. |
| ivansinger#11581 date: Jan-4-2014 | |
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sharpness: 4.5 color: 5 build: 4 distortion: 3 flare control: 5 overall: 4.3 | tested on:
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| ownership: | I own this lens |
| compared to: | Sigma 24/2.8 AF II Minolta AF 24-50/4 Nikon AF 20/2.8D |
| price paid: | 435 |
| positive: | Lovely IQ and very pleasing bokeh. Pixel peeper sharp in plane of focus and close focusing. Big focus ring and solid construction. Fast and sharp wide open, esp. with an articulated EVF for oblique (e.g. low to ground, above shoulders) angles, this lens really shines like few others. Reasonable distortion, easy to correct in Lightroom. |
| negative: | On SLT Alphas, focus peaking sometimes not sufficient to nail focus, must be used in conjunction with zoom or zone focus techniques. Not generally a useful focal length for video and not particularly a snap to focus for street photography because of Rokinon/Samyang extremely shallow DOF at most f-stops below f11. |
| comment: | I bought this lens as a UWA companion for my AF 24/2.8 on my Sony A-57 (APS-C sensor) primarily for video work of live theater and music performances. With a 1.8x crop factor in 16x9 video mode it is still surprisingly wide, meaning that the subject has to be very nearby and the horizon of the frame centered and rectilinear to have maximum visual impact. Needless to say, once you find the right placement for the tripod you will want to use it sparingly, because of it's wide coverage, or mount it on a jib. As a stills test, I took some close-up shots of the dog and other nearby objects with texture wide open and was pleasantly surprised by the in-focus detail and bokeh. It really grabs attention. I did not see evidence of flare or CA when pointed at light and the color is neutral and contrast snappy. It seems difficult to focus using focus peaking alone because the peaking will pick out many more areas than a longer focal length lens. It was not until I used the digital zoom feature that I could nail focus. Focus ring is very sensitive to minor adjustments, esp. when find the focus plane. |
reviews found: 4
rating summary
- total reviews: 4
- sharpness: 4.75
- color: 4.75
- build: 4.50
- distortion: 4.00
- flare control: 4.75
- overall: 4.55
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