This is the 50 millimeter F 1.4 tilt From TT artisan and it's probably the Cheapest tilt lens that you can buy out On the market today maybe that's why They've sold so many of these seriously They have trouble keeping them on the Shelf or in stock and in today's video What I want to do is figure out why it Comes in the basic gray and black box That every TT Artisan Lens comes in There's a little manual a warranty card And the lens packed in some foam plastic Rear lens cap and a metal slip-on front Lens cap the lens feels solid as it's All metal and glass and build fairly Heavy as well weighing 452 grams which Is right at one pound starting at the Rear there is a metal mount with no Electronic connections no weather Sealing at all in this lens as far as I Can tell and you can tell from the empty Space here that what TT Artisan did was They just stuck a 50 millimeter F 1.4 Lens onto a tilt mechanism and that's it This mechanism is composed of two knobs And and two movements first this little Knob rotates the entire lens with Distinct clicks from 0 degrees to 90 Degrees and second this larger knob Allows you to tilt and lock off the lens Slightly in either direction the tilting Aspect of this lens is fine it seems to Work okay but it isn't exceptional in Any way but it's enough and the Locking
Knob does hold it securely in place from There forward it's a typical manual lens There is a focal distance scale and a Focus ring that's all mechanical it's Smooth and well weighted not a ton of Rotation though you get about 60 degrees In front of that there is an aperture Ring which is oddly d-clicked moving From F 1.4 to F16 around the front its Information overload DJ Optical dropping Another LP the lens specs 62 millimeter Filter thread TT artisan and a nine Digit serial number meaning the expect To sell billions of these it's a good Looking lens overall pretty standard Until you tilt it on a camera and then It looks like broken definitely unique And different but for the money I can't Complain about the build quality it's Good so let's talk about performance This is a full frame lens so I'm going To test it on my Sony a7c a full-frame Camera and let me start by saying that You can use this as you would a typical 50 millimeter that is without any Tilting and the result is okay at least For portrait work in the center of the Frame it's okay wide open it's a little Hazy or dreamy or technically blurry the Corners and edges are blurry and the Bouquet looks smooth and not distracting There's a couple of things that you'll Notice though first again wide open this Lens is not sharp in the center second
Chromatic aberration is a major problem Immediately there are green lines and Purple lines everywhere you can stop This lens down and it does get better But wide open this is what you can Expect when you start tilting things get Crazy quickly you've probably seen this Effect in movies and TV shows and it's Interesting to say the least it's an Acquired taste that I haven't quite yet Acquired it does allow you to focus on One part of a scene or part of a face And blur out everything around it or at Least blur out one side completely and Keep the other side a little bit less Blurry or if you tilt vertically you can Change the focal point of a shot from The foreground to the background like This all while keeping the same Focus Point on your main subject it's a unique Thing for sure there are two practical Ways to use this sort of tilt lens at Least that I can think of the first is To capture stuff and make it look Smaller than real life because the human Eye is not used to seeing shallow depth Of field on a subject that's far away it Starts to look like you are taking Pictures of model cars or houses or Hills it is cool I just don't know of a Reason or a way to incorporate that in a Meaningful way without being distracting The second way is if you want to take a Photo in which your subjects are
Diagonal to the camera's sensor but you Want them to also be in focus and for This purpose it works but again wouldn't It be easier to just walk around your Subject and shoot them head on or stop Down the lens I don't know and there are some Optical Issues with this lens and by some I mean There are quite a few again chromatic Aberration is the biggest problem and It's a poor performance in that regard I'd say that every single photo that I Took with this lens had some level of Chromatic aberration in it which again Is not ideal next is flare performance Which is also not wonderful this lens Doesn't come with a lens hood and it Doesn't look like TT Artisans spent much Time on thinking about flare resistance Vignetting is the last issue it's pretty Strong throughout but it becomes Especially strong if you are tilting to One side completely those Corners end up Being very dark and you'll probably want To crop or edit them to make them usable But at the end of the day if the goal is To create shots that look different and Weird and blurry then this is the lens For you I view it more as a toy lens Than a serious photo lens although I Suppose with a bit of practice you can Get it to produce respectable results And the investment into to this little Lens is small you can pick one up for
199 us which isn't a lot for a tilt lens The next nearest competitor is probably Well over a thousand dollars but I do Have one problem with this lens and that Is TT Artisan has released over the Years many great manual focus prime Lenses that are 50 millimeters some of Them are F 1.2 some of them are F 0.95 And optically they perform as well if Not better than this lens in fact I Should say they perform better than this Lens and some of them again are 87 They're very inexpensive so if you can Put whatever lens you want on this base That tilts why wouldn't they just go Ahead and put a better performing 50 Millimeter lens onto this tilting base Instead they gave us this lens which is Optically not the best don't get me Wrong I think that this lens is Definitely unique and good in that sense And there are really no competitors to Choose to go to that are even close to What this lens can do if you're looking For a 50 millimeter tilt lens and you Don't want to spend over a thousand Dollars this is pretty much your only Option at this point but at the same Time I think that given the popularity Of this lens over time TT Artisan will Or at least should update the Optics to Fix some of the Distortion issues and That is going to be it for my review of This lens let me know what your thoughts
Are down in the comment section below And I'm going to be giving this lens Away I'm going to try something a little Bit different I'm going to make a post Put it on my Instagram And if you leave a comment on that post In three days I'll pay a random comment And then I'll send this lens out to you With the box and with the lens caps I Only have 4 000 or so followers on my Instagram so your chances of getting This lens are probably pretty high Depending on how many comments are left But I'll link that down in the Description as well so check that out Thank you guys so much for watching Thanks for all of your likes all of your Comments and your support stay tuned for More have a nice day bye
