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Laowa 7.5mm f/2 MFT C-Dreamer - Review / Test - Samples & Verdict |
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Lens Reviews -
(Micro-)Four-Thirds
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Page 3 of 3
Sample Images & Verdict
Click on a thumbnail to view the original file (opens in a separate window). Please note that the originals are FULL SIZE samples
(=several megabytes) thus requiring a significant amount of bandwidth so please take care of the limited resources here.
| Make |
OLYMPUS IMAGING CORP. |
|
| Model |
E-M5MarkII |
| ISO Speed |
200 |
| Focal Length |
|
| Aperture: |
f/0.0 |
| Exposure |
1/125s |
|
| Make |
OLYMPUS IMAGING CORP. |
|
| Model |
E-M5MarkII |
| ISO Speed |
200 |
| Focal Length |
|
| Aperture: |
f/0.0 |
| Exposure |
1/160s |
|
| Make |
OLYMPUS IMAGING CORP. |
|
| Model |
E-M5MarkII |
| ISO Speed |
200 |
| Focal Length |
|
| Aperture: |
f/0.0 |
| Exposure |
1/320s |
|
| Make |
OLYMPUS IMAGING CORP. |
|
| Model |
E-M5MarkII |
| ISO Speed |
200 |
| Focal Length |
|
| Aperture: |
f/0.0 |
| Exposure |
1/200s |
|
| Make |
OLYMPUS IMAGING CORP. |
|
| Model |
E-M5MarkII |
| ISO Speed |
200 |
| Focal Length |
|
| Aperture: |
f/0.0 |
| Exposure |
4.0s |
|
| Make |
OLYMPUS IMAGING CORP. |
|
| Model |
E-M5MarkII |
| ISO Speed |
200 |
| Focal Length |
|
| Aperture: |
f/0.0 |
| Exposure |
13.0s |
|
| Make |
OLYMPUS IMAGING CORP. |
|
| Model |
E-M5MarkII |
| ISO Speed |
200 |
| Focal Length |
|
| Aperture: |
f/0.0 |
| Exposure |
1/30s |
|
| Make |
OLYMPUS IMAGING CORP. |
|
| Model |
E-M5MarkII |
| ISO Speed |
200 |
| Focal Length |
|
| Aperture: |
f/0.0 |
| Exposure |
1/40s |
|
| Make |
OLYMPUS IMAGING CORP. |
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| Model |
E-M5MarkII |
| ISO Speed |
800 |
| Focal Length |
|
| Aperture: |
f/0.0 |
| Exposure |
1/25s |
|
| Make |
OLYMPUS IMAGING CORP. |
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| Model |
E-M5MarkII |
| ISO Speed |
200 |
| Focal Length |
|
| Aperture: |
f/ |
| Exposure |
1/1600s |
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| Make |
OLYMPUS IMAGING CORP. |
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| Model |
E-M5MarkII |
| ISO Speed |
640 |
| Focal Length |
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| Aperture: |
f/ |
| Exposure |
1/30s |
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| Make |
OLYMPUS IMAGING CORP. |
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| Model |
E-M5MarkII |
| ISO Speed |
200 |
| Focal Length |
|
| Aperture: |
f/ |
| Exposure |
1/320s |
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Verdict
The primary value proposition of the Laowa 7.5mm f/2 MFT is certainly its extremely small size and low weight combined with a very large max. aperture. Upon unboxing, we experienced one of the few WOW effects during recent years. The dwarfish size also makes perfect sense on Micro-Four-Thirds cameras. Despite its size, the delivered resolution is actually very respectable. It's usable at f/2 and very good at medium aperture settings. The amount of lateral CAs is decent. The vignetting is very high, yes, but in reality it's not quite as bad as the numbers suggest because of a relatively gradual light falloff. Image distortions can be visible in certain scenes but they are far from being bad really. Ghostings/glarecan be an issue if a strong light source is part of your scene and that can happen often due the immense field-of-view.
The build quality is very good thanks to a full-metal body and tight control rings. Fully manual lenses may not be everybody's darling. However, a manual ultra-wide angle lens is really easy to use especially on Micro-Four-Thirds cameras. If you want to shoot an image with an infinite depth-of-field, just set it to ~1.5m and f/5.6 and you are done really. And if you want to explore a shallow depth-of-field scene just use focus magnification - it merely take a few seconds. Honestly, we didn't feel real usability issues during our time with this lens. The most significant annoyance may be the lack of EXIF data.
Over the recent years, we were often wondering why no manufacturer dared to release an ultra-wide pancake lens for MTF (or for any other mirrorless system for that matter). Formally the Laowa 7.5mm f/2 MFT is still no pancake lens but it's the next best thing. Let's be honest - most of us enjoy ultra-wide images but it's not as if we are using such lenses all the time. It's probably a safe bet to state that using an ultra-wide lens is more often than not the exception to the rule. If so and if you just don't want to carry lots of stuff, the idea of having such a tiny lens in your bag may have quite some appeal.
The official pricing has yet to be confirmed but the preliminary figure that we've heard feels reasonable.
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