Remember that this lens is aimed towards videographers and its a totally different world, as people are paying money to get a less clinical look and call it a "characteristic" (as long as they want it). Still pretty good for its price
@@AnimeZone247 I don't know how (un)popular this lens would be due to the weak performance, I just don't think it's realistic to expect much higher quality from Sirui given the circumstances: 1, they are making three T1.2 (if true then that's probably F1.1) distortion-free focal length lenses to the same size, and 2, it's for aps-c so unlikely they'll target any higher resolution than 4k.
Given that this review was done from a stills perspective, I would imagine CF would even find many $10K+ Panavision lenses unsatisfactory. Sharpness is often not the end goal with cinema lenses. For cinema filming, lenses that would be considered excellent for photos are considered "too sharp" (the word 'clinical' is often used), and need to be tempered with diffusion filters to work for video. So, the lack of sharpness should not be considered a weakness, but instead just taken as quite normal for a cinema lens. That being said, this Night Walker series is actually sharper than pretty much any "budget" cine lens you could name. Pretty respectable intro to "serious" videography IMO.
@@kevinstrachan741 I think the samyang/ rokkinon might be sharper (only T1.5 though), you can get a used set of 6 for approx. the same price as the sirui 3 lens set. Granted they don't have a 270° focus throw and they are more cine style than actual cine lenses. On the plus side you can get them in EF. When I tested the nightwalker I didn't like the feel of the focus and iris ring. The rings are way too loose, to the point where you might knock your aperture while filming handheld. I compared them directly to the NISI Athena (I would still call them budget cine lenses), and the NISI just felt better in every way, also you can get them in PL mount making them a long lasting investment (price was like 4 or 5 times though). I think the Sirui are great options for situations where you wouldn't want to use your best lenses (most expensive).
Honestly this review doesn’t seem 100% fair to me. Filmmakers prefer optics like this as it gives more character to our work. I don’t think cine lenses should be reviewed in the same way as photography lenses. Love the videos though!
Great lens set for someone wanting to get into film making but not ready to drop $3-5k on a lens set. You’ll get a nice wide aperture, good array of focal lengths and universal filter size and gear positions.
Although I agree that video and photography are different use cases even for video you'd want SOME sharpness and contrast. This lens wide open is actually worse than my 40+ year old Pentax 😶 Granted: that lens only does f1.7 (and it's a somewhat dark f1.7), breathes quite a lot and doesn't have a clickless aperture but it's also 40+ years old and cost me 40 bucks and is far less blurry in the center (the edges are fairly rough, but so are these).
It really comes down to how much does one hate noise in an image. It's tradeoff between contrast/sharpness and noise by having to use ISO instead. One thing I will say is it's typically really fast and happens in realtime to add contrast and sharpness in post. Noise reduction done well in post is very time consuming but will generally look better in the end as long as the noise isn't too bad. Thing is just how much more noise is that one stop going to really have? f1.2 compared to f1.8 is only one stop and we generally can get really good f1.8 lenses for a very affordable price. Lenses that only require us going up one stop. Ironically for years Hollywood didn't really shoot lenses wide open. Instead preferring the sweet spot of the lens and to aid focus pullers. A lot of times a movie is shot f4 or f5.6 and that in a way makes lenses like this seem kind of silly if one is going to use them in a similar production like environment with proper lighting. Where these will excel is the more do it quick kind of film making where little to no lights are used and one wants to capture a clean image no matter how much else the quality may suffer because of it. Instead of investing in lenses like this I wish more budding film makers on a budget would instead invest in even the most basic lights. Even a work light from a hardware store with a white sheet in front to diffuse would be better than attempting to shoot at f1.2 with no lighting. Dimmable Led lights don't even have to cost a lot these days. This should really have been made as a t2.0 lens and not made to push further. That extra bit is basically an overshoot of its natural ability to be a decent T2.0 lens. Just because it can be pushed past T2.0 doesn't mean it should. Stick a hard limit on that lens and assume it's always T2.0 and it's ok. Its really best if one doesn't even think of its ability to go to T1.2.
Great review as usual. However I just don't think it's fair to review a strictly Cine lens with the standards of a photo lens. I've been using these guys for a while, no complaints at all, beside I wish the focus rings can be a little more tight. :)
If folks want a fully manual lens with a bright maximum aperture and loads of character, surely they could find a vintage lens with better performance and pricing.
Great review Chris. I don't buy the whole "the bad image quality is a good thing for filmmakers" comments, this lens genuinely does not look nice. What's the point of having a set of lenses with T-Stops for consistency when you get inconsistent performance, like the T2.8 ugly magenta fringing that appears out of nowhere? "Character" in a lens is interesting bokeh, flares, 3D pop, the way it renders colours, vignettes, or its distortion. Unusably low sharpness is not a "feature" anyone should be looking for - can always add that in post!
Believe it or not, a lot of these traits are desirable for filmmakers. Softness is nice for things like soft focus images or counteracting digital sharpening and people add filters to take away contrast a lot, so subpar contrast might actually be desirable as well. Adding these characters in post also isn’t always desirable, oftentimes the added characters can interact unnaturally in post and there’s always those with a desire to get as much of a look done in camera. You really shouldn’t look at any budget bright aperture lens for its performance at its widest aperture. They’re almost universally going to be best stopped down quite a bit. Also shooting manual focus at anything under t2.8 is incredibly difficult due to the incredibly shallow depth of field anyways so most people will stop down unless they absolutely need the light. I think if you’re looking at this as a t1.2 lens then of course you’ll be disappointed, but if you look at it as a t2.8 lens that can open up to t1.2 if you absolutely need it, you’ll start to see what the lens is good for! Also, working around your gears flaws is the mark of low budget cinema, and since this is a low budget cinema lens, working around what it can do should also be the expectation. I can’t imagine using any manual focus cinema lens for anything other than a planned, controlled shoot like documentary, run and gun or vlogging, etc. so I’d imagine the people interested are filmmakers who have the time to set up a scene and lights and staging and mark focus etc. in which case, you’ll be able to plan around things like the chromatic aberrations because they won’t really show as much in low contrast scenes. Regardless, the next cheapest set of uniform cinema lenses for mirrorless mounts is like the SLR Magic Microprimes and they’re about $100 more expensive for the set which isn’t insubstantial for anyone shopping in this price range.
@@questioneverything680 One thing these have to compete with is the old and new Samyang cine sets, but those ones (especially the first "generation") have their own issues as well. But sharpness-wise, those can stand up quite well, I think.
Haven't tried these myself, but as far as cinematographers and photographers generally having very different preferences when it comes to leases is nothing new. Just look at the rise of anamorphic lenses. Or imagine watching a movie as tack sharp as a still image. 😂
F and T stops are not completely comparable and thus there is no exact formula for conversion. F stops basically is a theoretical value that is gotten from dividing focal lengths by the aperture diameter. T stops are the actual light transmission value of a lens and can only be gotten by measuring it, this obviously is expensive as you have to do the whole measurement process for every new lens instead of just popping two variables into a formula. Deviation usually is within 1/3 of a stop and thus negligible for photography work. With videography having less leeway in terms of exposure and multiple lenses often being used simultaneously on the same scene it obviously is more of a problem when one lens sways 1/3 in one way and another lens 1/3 in the opposite way. This is why in videography manufacturers usually go through the process of measuring every new lens as it offers actual value to the people using the lenses, for photographers having every lens tested would add little to nothing and just make lenses more expensive.
Let's use f1.4 or f1.8 lens as examples, at dx0 review they usually translate to approximately 1/3 stop darker in light transmission (T stop). By using that standard, T1.2 should feel like F1
sure, but they would be way bigger and heavier. The Focus and Iris rotation is super light, to the point where it bothered me focussing manually. I guess if you use a FIZ Motor you won't have this problem.
That image circle on FF isn't completely tiny. What f# have you shot the image in video at? What FF corners look like if you try shooting wide open and focus on something close? There's a chance that vignetting in corners will not go to a total black as quickly.
Can't wait for the next review of this set of lenses. I fully expect it to reveal that these "bargin" set are complete dogs. Are videographers visually impared?
@@CRaul87 Eh, plenty of comments here to that effect, but you still don't see entire videos or movies shot with soft focus. The odd consistency pointed out elsewhere is what makes these lenses weird, not the soft-focus per se. That's just an option you have when cranking the aperture wide open, vs shooting at 2.8 or f4, which will still blur the background somewhat, while rendering a sharp image. @christopherfrost If you happen to have time at the end of this series, may I ask for a side by side of all 3 lenses at various apertures? If they all sharpen up to a reasonably similar degree by f/2.8 or something, then that's a different matter.
Remember that this lens is aimed towards videographers and its a totally different world, as people are paying money to get a less clinical look and call it a "characteristic" (as long as they want it). Still pretty good for its price
you know that's what character mean, right? It means imperfections but in a pleasing way
@@AnimeZone247 I don't know how (un)popular this lens would be due to the weak performance, I just don't think it's realistic to expect much higher quality from Sirui given the circumstances: 1, they are making three T1.2 (if true then that's probably F1.1) distortion-free focal length lenses to the same size, and 2, it's for aps-c so unlikely they'll target any higher resolution than 4k.
Given that this review was done from a stills perspective, I would imagine CF would even find many $10K+ Panavision lenses unsatisfactory. Sharpness is often not the end goal with cinema lenses. For cinema filming, lenses that would be considered excellent for photos are considered "too sharp" (the word 'clinical' is often used), and need to be tempered with diffusion filters to work for video. So, the lack of sharpness should not be considered a weakness, but instead just taken as quite normal for a cinema lens. That being said, this Night Walker series is actually sharper than pretty much any "budget" cine lens you could name. Pretty respectable intro to "serious" videography IMO.
Yes so just buy cheap lenses with plenty of “character” and imperfections…
@@kevinstrachan741 I think the samyang/ rokkinon might be sharper (only T1.5 though), you can get a used set of 6 for approx. the same price as the sirui 3 lens set. Granted they don't have a 270° focus throw and they are more cine style than actual cine lenses. On the plus side you can get them in EF.
When I tested the nightwalker I didn't like the feel of the focus and iris ring. The rings are way too loose, to the point where you might knock your aperture while filming handheld. I compared them directly to the NISI Athena (I would still call them budget cine lenses), and the NISI just felt better in every way, also you can get them in PL mount making them a long lasting investment (price was like 4 or 5 times though). I think the Sirui are great options for situations where you wouldn't want to use your best lenses (most expensive).
Honestly this review doesn’t seem 100% fair to me. Filmmakers prefer optics like this as it gives more character to our work. I don’t think cine lenses should be reviewed in the same way as photography lenses. Love the videos though!
Ah yes, the classic “it’s not a bug, it’s a feature”
@@jeremytheoneofdestiny8691 Ok but like this is fact. Why else do you think DP’s still use lenses from the 70’s?
Agree with this comment.
Great lens set for someone wanting to get into film making but not ready to drop $3-5k on a lens set. You’ll get a nice wide aperture, good array of focal lengths and universal filter size and gear positions.
Although I agree that video and photography are different use cases even for video you'd want SOME sharpness and contrast. This lens wide open is actually worse than my 40+ year old Pentax 😶 Granted: that lens only does f1.7 (and it's a somewhat dark f1.7), breathes quite a lot and doesn't have a clickless aperture but it's also 40+ years old and cost me 40 bucks and is far less blurry in the center (the edges are fairly rough, but so are these).
It really comes down to how much does one hate noise in an image. It's tradeoff between contrast/sharpness and noise by having to use ISO instead.
One thing I will say is it's typically really fast and happens in realtime to add contrast and sharpness in post. Noise reduction done well in post is very time consuming but will generally look better in the end as long as the noise isn't too bad.
Thing is just how much more noise is that one stop going to really have? f1.2 compared to f1.8 is only one stop and we generally can get really good f1.8 lenses for a very affordable price. Lenses that only require us going up one stop. Ironically for years Hollywood didn't really shoot lenses wide open. Instead preferring the sweet spot of the lens and to aid focus pullers. A lot of times a movie is shot f4 or f5.6 and that in a way makes lenses like this seem kind of silly if one is going to use them in a similar production like environment with proper lighting. Where these will excel is the more do it quick kind of film making where little to no lights are used and one wants to capture a clean image no matter how much else the quality may suffer because of it.
Instead of investing in lenses like this I wish more budding film makers on a budget would instead invest in even the most basic lights. Even a work light from a hardware store with a white sheet in front to diffuse would be better than attempting to shoot at f1.2 with no lighting. Dimmable Led lights don't even have to cost a lot these days.
This should really have been made as a t2.0 lens and not made to push further. That extra bit is basically an overshoot of its natural ability to be a decent T2.0 lens. Just because it can be pushed past T2.0 doesn't mean it should. Stick a hard limit on that lens and assume it's always T2.0 and it's ok. Its really best if one doesn't even think of its ability to go to T1.2.
Hi Christopher! I'm waiting for your review of Nikkor 24mm 1.7 prime :). I told myself not to buy until I hear few sentences from you about it :)
As entry level videographers this is the perfect lens to get started. The lenses at 3-5k is simply too expensive when you are just starting out.
Are these still good on a full frame? Like you just modify settings to crop mode? Or ?
@@j.b.7133 Yes apsc crop works fine 👍🏼 just needs a little more consideration for the shot, but overall really good entry
Great review as usual. However I just don't think it's fair to review a strictly Cine lens with the standards of a photo lens. I've been using these guys for a while, no complaints at all, beside I wish the focus rings can be a little more tight. :)
You should review 7artisans 25mm T1.05 and the 35mm T1.05 as well.
Love your videos!! Keep them coming
heya Chris will you be reviewing the new G2 version of the tamron 70-180?
If folks want a fully manual lens with a bright maximum aperture and loads of character, surely they could find a vintage lens with better performance and pricing.
But not everyone wants loads of character, just some. And also, people want a set, where all the lenses are the same sizes.
Did you get your hands on their new sniper range autofocus lens?
Great review Chris. I don't buy the whole "the bad image quality is a good thing for filmmakers" comments, this lens genuinely does not look nice. What's the point of having a set of lenses with T-Stops for consistency when you get inconsistent performance, like the T2.8 ugly magenta fringing that appears out of nowhere?
"Character" in a lens is interesting bokeh, flares, 3D pop, the way it renders colours, vignettes, or its distortion. Unusably low sharpness is not a "feature" anyone should be looking for - can always add that in post!
Believe it or not, a lot of these traits are desirable for filmmakers. Softness is nice for things like soft focus images or counteracting digital sharpening and people add filters to take away contrast a lot, so subpar contrast might actually be desirable as well. Adding these characters in post also isn’t always desirable, oftentimes the added characters can interact unnaturally in post and there’s always those with a desire to get as much of a look done in camera.
You really shouldn’t look at any budget bright aperture lens for its performance at its widest aperture. They’re almost universally going to be best stopped down quite a bit. Also shooting manual focus at anything under t2.8 is incredibly difficult due to the incredibly shallow depth of field anyways so most people will stop down unless they absolutely need the light.
I think if you’re looking at this as a t1.2 lens then of course you’ll be disappointed, but if you look at it as a t2.8 lens that can open up to t1.2 if you absolutely need it, you’ll start to see what the lens is good for!
Also, working around your gears flaws is the mark of low budget cinema, and since this is a low budget cinema lens, working around what it can do should also be the expectation. I can’t imagine using any manual focus cinema lens for anything other than a planned, controlled shoot like documentary, run and gun or vlogging, etc. so I’d imagine the people interested are filmmakers who have the time to set up a scene and lights and staging and mark focus etc. in which case, you’ll be able to plan around things like the chromatic aberrations because they won’t really show as much in low contrast scenes.
Regardless, the next cheapest set of uniform cinema lenses for mirrorless mounts is like the SLR Magic Microprimes and they’re about $100 more expensive for the set which isn’t insubstantial for anyone shopping in this price range.
@@questioneverything680 One thing these have to compete with is the old and new Samyang cine sets, but those ones (especially the first "generation") have their own issues as well. But sharpness-wise, those can stand up quite well, I think.
Fair enough, good points! @@questioneverything680
Haven't tried these myself, but as far as cinematographers and photographers generally having very different preferences when it comes to leases is nothing new. Just look at the rise of anamorphic lenses. Or imagine watching a movie as tack sharp as a still image. 😂
Next time a more video centric review of cine of characteristic lenses would be nice. Not really a photo lens
I wonder how bright t1.2 in f stops would be
Couldn't it be F1.2 too?
Just really good glass or very little glass?
I'd say F1.0 probably...
F and T stops are not completely comparable and thus there is no exact formula for conversion.
F stops basically is a theoretical value that is gotten from dividing focal lengths by the aperture diameter.
T stops are the actual light transmission value of a lens and can only be gotten by measuring it, this obviously is expensive as you have to do the whole measurement process for every new lens instead of just popping two variables into a formula.
Deviation usually is within 1/3 of a stop and thus negligible for photography work. With videography having less leeway in terms of exposure and multiple lenses often being used simultaneously on the same scene it obviously is more of a problem when one lens sways 1/3 in one way and another lens 1/3 in the opposite way. This is why in videography manufacturers usually go through the process of measuring every new lens as it offers actual value to the people using the lenses, for photographers having every lens tested would add little to nothing and just make lenses more expensive.
Let's use f1.4 or f1.8 lens as examples, at dx0 review they usually translate to approximately 1/3 stop darker in light transmission (T stop). By using that standard, T1.2 should feel like F1
Blimey! I was interested in this lens - briefly! - because I might be getting the 33mm f1.4 Fuji soon. Looks like the Fuji is still the right one.2
Would love these for FE
sure, but they would be way bigger and heavier. The Focus and Iris rotation is super light, to the point where it bothered me focussing manually. I guess if you use a FIZ Motor you won't have this problem.
That image circle on FF isn't completely tiny.
What f# have you shot the image in video at?
What FF corners look like if you try shooting wide open and focus on something close? There's a chance that vignetting in corners will not go to a total black as quickly.
The lenses are for super 35, which is a hair larger than APS-C, so these should have a little more coverage than a usual APS-C lens
maybe should be able to cover APS-H sensors
Practically speaking any standard zoom will do better. Marketing wise they promise a chinise iphone for 50 bucks, what could go wrong?
Bro you think this is better than the sirui 35 mm artisan
nice sharing
Can't wait for the next review of this set of lenses. I fully expect it to reveal that these "bargin" set are complete dogs. Are videographers visually impared?
From what I understand videograpgers don't like sharp lenses... they like a soft look to their footage
@@CRaul87 Eh, plenty of comments here to that effect, but you still don't see entire videos or movies shot with soft focus.
The odd consistency pointed out elsewhere is what makes these lenses weird, not the soft-focus per se. That's just an option you have when cranking the aperture wide open, vs shooting at 2.8 or f4, which will still blur the background somewhat, while rendering a sharp image.
@christopherfrost If you happen to have time at the end of this series, may I ask for a side by side of all 3 lenses at various apertures? If they all sharpen up to a reasonably similar degree by f/2.8 or something, then that's a different matter.
How much love? Lol :)
First. Woot!
LLongyfarchiadau!
Guess I'm second
What a disaster
Because it’s not made for photography. It’s made for filmmaking where people want character like this.
SONY DIE DIE DIE
These lenses are garbage. You can get way better image quality buying good vintage lenses. Love your video though.