[Music] Hi I'm Dustin Abbott and I'm here today To give you my review of V trx's newest Lens this is the autofocusing 56 mm F1.7 for Fuji X Mount now they already Had an existing 56 mm f1.4 lens but What's interesting is that vro is kind Of building both up and down at the Moment their earlier lens belonged to Kind of they had certain series of Lenses that were coming out that were Moderately priced you know moderately Featured moderately performing they've Obviously gone in the direction of much Higher performing lenses with more Feature much better Optics better Autofocus all of those things but then They've also gone in the other direction Where for the first time they're using Plastics in some of their lens designs And creating a series of inexpensive Lenses that you know have a little bit Lower grade of build quality though I Will say these lenses are actually feel Quite tough but more importantly these Lenses though very inexpensive are Actually receiving some of the trickle Down effect of the optical improvements That the brand is making in general Making them really really intriguing Lenses so this is a budget telephoto it Is a full-frame equivalent of about 85 Mm right right now it is just for Fuji X Mount and it's coming at under
$150 in terms of pricing making that Really really intriguing so is this a Lens worth buying well let's dive in Together right after a word from our Sponsor today's episode is brought to You by the Phantom duffel a new unique Convertible duffel bag that starts as a Compact packable case that easily fits Into your luggage or carry-on bag but Then converts into a 35 L duffel the Exterior is made of 1680d ballistic Nylon which is tough and weatherproof The interior has a high visibility Reflective finish that allows you to Easily see what's inside even in a dim Hotel room a large foam pouch on the Side has a cable pass through to allow For charging and the removable straps Use a fidlock system to easily and Securely connect them I've been using it For the gym and it has room for my water Bottle a change of clothes a basketball My massive shoes a towel and a charger For my cell phone visit store. fanom Wallet.com to check it out and use code DUS 20 for 20% off when you're ready to Check Out so as noted this lens is at 56 mm When you use the 1.5 times crop factor Of Fuji's APS CX Mount sensor that gives You a field of view of 84 mm full fir Equivalent or a right under 30° angle of View now as noted this is the second 56 Mimet from vrox and while this is the
Less expensive of the two options Available now for food Fuji's XM Mount If you take a look at this MTF Comparison this is where I was really Really impressed I put a line through at The 80% Mark and you can see that almost All of the performance of this lens is Above that 80% Mark well almost none of The performance of the earlier 56 mm F1.4 lens even reaches that 80% Mark and So we can see that this is a really Really impressive lens optically I Brought out the 20 mm f2.8 as a point of Comparison I have uh in some ways raved About this lens you know being a kind of A Plastic Fantastic although again it's Tough Plastics and that's the same for The build quality here very similar in Terms of the kind of basic Design This Has an interesting maximum mture of F1.7 versus the more typical f1.8 and in Fact in the way that most cameras are Set up you don't actually go to f1.7 as A stop or an option along The uh aperture range there and so f1.7 Is 1/ half stop lower than F1.4 now by comparison f1.8 is 2/3 stop Slower than f1.4 and more typically you Have 13d stops there along the way and So for example from f1.4 to F2 you would Have F1.6 f1.8 and then F2 so f1.7 obviously Falls in between um f1.6 and f1.8 so it Is a little bit brighter and so it'll
Give you a little bit more light Gathering than an equivalent f1.8 Lens now this lens is obviously very Very compact much like the 20 mm that I've alluded to before you can see that This is basically a palm siiz lens it is 65 mm or 2.6 in in diameter has a common 52mm front filter thread up front which By the way is shared with the 20 mm f2.8 And the lens is even shorter than that 20 mm lens it is only 54.7 mm or 2.15 in In length and it weighs in at 171 G Which is about 6 oz so it is very very Lightweight and while we don't have Anything like a weather ceiling gasket Here we do have kind of a coating on the Front element to help with fingerprints And things like that now the plastic Lens hood is also included though I do Have one minor complaint similar to what I saw here and that is that it doesn't Bayonet firmly into place and that it Doesn't really lock there at all it's Not hard at all to move that to the side So you may need to watch out to make Sure that the lens Hood doesn't get kind Of off-kilter sometimes that can in Produce a little bit of a vignette Effect though it's less likely to happen With a telephoto lens like This the lens itself has no features on The side there's no switches no buttons All we have is the manual focus ring Fortunately the manual focus ring itself
Is nicely damped it has good feel to it And so what it is here is well executed The only other thing that we have here As far as a potential feature is that Here on the lens mount we do have that USB C Port that allows for easy firmware Updates and once you learn how to do vro Firmware updates they are very very Quick and they're very very simple maybe The most straightforward and easy Process of any of the lenses that I do Updates for now 85 mimish lenses are Rarely very good when it comes to Maximum magnification this lens is no Exception it can focus down only as Closely as 55 cm and it produces a 0.11 Times 0.12 times is about average for The class and the highest that I've seen For typical lenses kind of non- macro Designs is just 0.14 times so it's not Great but it's really not far off from What the norm is for this particular Lens and it is a hair better than what We saw from the earlier 56mm F1.4 so overall again not a whole lot Here in terms of features But the lens Itself does feel Wellmade autofocus comes via a lead Screw type STM or stepping Focus motor Now on Sony I found that the Focus motor On the 20mm f2.8 was great no problems At all I'm a little bit less impressed With this lens on Fuji platform now to Be fair probably a good part of that is
Fuji itself Fuji's autofocus is just not As sophisticated and that's particularly True when you get to the video side of Things so what I found as you can see Here in my focus test is that focus is It's what we would call deliberate it is Not quick there are some visible steps Particularly noticed it making major Focus changes in dimmer light you can See outside it's a little bit better but It is still any not lightning fast at All there is less of a kind of a real World issue when it came to normal Autofocus changes which tend to be less Extreme and so I didn't really notice Autofocus being slow so much in everyday Use though obviously if you're making a Major Focus change it's not as quick as What you would like what it is however Is quiet and it is also very accurate And so if your priority is just getting Results that are well focused you're not Going to have any problem with this lens It definitely gets the job done it was Actually fantastic as a portrait lens Autofocus speed was uh fine for that but More importantly autofocus accuracy was Very good and as we're going to see the Optics in this lens are actually lovely And so as a byproduct I did multiple Portrait sessions with it and I was Really pleased with the results both in The focus accuracy but more importantly In the look of the images as well now on
The video side of things I found that Autofocus pulls they're rather slow and There are some obvious steps as a part Of the pro process again unfortunately That's pretty typical on Fuji with rare Exceptions I did find that when I did The hand test that it was a little bit Better and you can see that Focus Breathing is nicely low but because the Autofocus is not particularly reactive There's that one point at the end where It actually missed the transition from The hand to the eye altogether because It just happened too quick for it to React now ironically in real world shots Where I just wanted to gradually pull Focus from one to another just by moving It along it actually does fairly well For that because that slower more Deliberate autofocus change actually is Tuned nicely for a more cinematic type Look and so it's not abrupt or Snappy But rather more smooth and so I actually Didn't mind it for video work in that Particular setting though obviously Autofocus in general is what I would Consider to be the weak point of this Lens's design I actually be interested To revisit visit it should they release A you know for example a Sony e-mount Version in the future I suspect that Autofocus will be more pleasing in that Kind of application but I can only Report on what I see here on my Fuji xh2
Camera body so I would say if you're Looking for a recommendation from me as To whether or not this lens will work For you if you're planning to do Portrait work event work uh general Purpose work I think it will be fine if You're looking for a lens to keep up With small children or pets or Sports You need to look elsewhere Focus speed Is just not adequate for those kinds of Applications now we get to the really Good part of things this lenss has an Optical design of 11 elements in nine Groups but surprisingly of those 11 Elements seven of them are exotic Elements including four Ed or extra low Dispersion elements and three HR or high Refractive index elements the MTF looks Amazingly consistent which of course is Incredibly important when you're talking About Making a lens that works on Fuji's Incredibly demanding 40 megapixel sensor As is found in my Xh2 the fact that vrs developed this Lens specifically for at least first for Fuji's x-mount platform tells me that They knew the Optics were good enough to Handle this and in fact they certainly Are we'll break that down more in my Detailed Optical breakdown that follows The my conclusion here in a few moments So if you want that you can either Jump Ahead to that or stay tuned for that in
Just a moment but I'll give you the Highlights here there is very low Distortion just a little bit of pin Cushion Distortion I used a minus three To correct vignette is heavier about Three stops of vignette a plus 75 to Correct though on Fuji it is receiving Correction profiles and so for jpegs and Camera I did find that that uh Distortion and venet were corrected for There and there is already available to Me in Lightroom a correction Pro profile There for raw images so not really all That big of an issue I saw next to no Fringing from this lens even in really Demanding situations on my test chart There's nothing to see there but I shot Into the reflector dish of a uh light That I recently reviewed the molus x60 And in that very bright shiny reflector Dish I could just couldn't see any kind Of chromatic aberration or fringing in There so very very impressive also Didn't see it in the corner of images Lateral type chromatic aberration Weren't there either there is excellent Wide open sharpness all across the frame From the center right out to the corners A very consistent sharpness profile and If I compare that to some recent lenses That I reviewed at this focal length it Obviously blows away what I saw from the Sirai sniper 56mm f1.2 even when I stop That lens down to f1.8 it isn't anywhere
Close to being as sharp at this lens at Any point here you can see the corners I Also found that it is sharper than the Soon to be released but already Announced uh TTR Artis 56 mm f1.8 lens a Very good lens by the way but this lens Is while that lens is consistent in this Fairly consistent in the center of the Frame to this one the vrox is sharper in The mid-frame shown here and then also In the corners in fact I found that even With the very expensive new Fuji AF 56mm F1.2 the WRR version which I'll be Releasing a review of very shortly Actually found that while the Fuji is Better in the center of the frame this Vrox is arguably a little bit better in The mid-frame and the corners in terms Of sharpness when I looked at them Comparatively f1.7 with the Fuji stop Down to f1.8 so this is a very Impressively sharp lens get a little bit More contrast as you stop it down a bit I noted that more in real world results Than I did in my uh test chart you know In these couple of comparisons shown Here I also found that when stopped down It was very consistent in terms of Sharpness for landscape type images as a Secondary application and beautiful Beautiful results for portrait work Which included very nice bouquet quality And also very very nice color Surprisingly good in that application
Which I think pretty obviously points to What is the best use of this particular Lens you will see defraction start to Pop up on high resolution bodies at f11 And obviously by F-16 finally I found that even flare Resistance was fairly good for a short Telephoto lens wide open not a whole lot Going on there in real world images not Really any kind of major issue and to Stop down a bit more of a ghosting Pattern but nothing significant so in Conclusion I've been surprised by these Lenses in that my reaction to them as I Actually use them I don't I didn't go Into this one in particular expecting Much a little bit more because of this One in the 56 mm but actually find that They kind of tug on the same sweet spot In my heart as samyang's Tiny series and That these are lenses that just exceed Your expectation it looks so small and So inexpensive and so you don't expect Much and then it's just so much more Than what you anticipate it is a very Competent lightweight lens and the fact That it's at such a low price point is Going to make this an incredibly Appealing lens I'd say in particular for Those that are looking for a budget Portrait lens the actual results here Are gorgeous and as long as you don't Need really really Snappy autofocus this Is a lens that I think is really going
To Delight a lot of Fuji X Mount Shooters I'm Dustin Abbott if you want More information you can either read the Full text review that is linked in the Description down below there are buying Links there as well as well as a Discount code my name that will give you A 8% discount if you buy it from V Tru And if you want more information now you Can jump in with me and we're going to Do our detailed image quality [Music] Breakdown so we'll start by taking a Look at vignette and Distortion you can See just a tiny bit of pin cushion Distortion there which by the way is Often flattering in a portrait lens so May not even want to try to correct that Little bit there vignette is a little Bit heavier in the corners you can see My manual correction on the right here I've dialed in a minus three to correct For What Little dist Distortion there Was and in the corners I've dialed in a Plus 75 but to give you an idea on the left Side this is uncorrected on the right Side this is corrected and this isn't Necessarily a dramatic example but of These two if I were looking at them Blind you know just or side by side here Actually favor the uncorrected result I Like a little bit of that natural Vignette drawing the eye towards the
Subject your mileage may vary obviously Now you can see here on the left I've Got a JPEG correction compared to the Raw image on the right there's Definitely some in camera correction That is taking place for jpegs and then Also there is a correction profile for Raw images and you can see that the JPEG And this corrected raw now look pretty Similar I also noted that longitudinal Chromatic abberations were really well Corrected you don't see much before or After the plane of focus I saw that here In some specular highlights very little Fringing around these and then also in This shot I was really quite impressed Even if we punch in to a 200% Magnification you can see these really R Reflective surfaces there's very little Fringing there and if you look at this Rim where it's all just bokeh you can See that there's just no fringing taking Place there a really really impressive Result likewise if we look at the Corners of images like this you can see Next to no lateral chromatic aberration There as well so overall fringing is not An issue with this lens so we're going To check out our sharpness results this Is on the 40 megapixel Fuji fil film xh2 We're going to look at 200% Magnification as noted previously this Lens is just really really impressive For such an inexpensive lens and its
Sharpness across the frame see the Mid-frame looks fantastic if anything It's actually a hair sharper than the Center of the frame consistently as we Track down everything is nice and sharp And those in corn those Corners are Actually really really impressive now I Will note that this lens is just a Little bit softer on the left side than It is on the right side you can see if We look here and then if we come over to Here it's just a little centering is not Flawless again not surprising in such an Inexpensive lens neither is it bad Either I also note that this lens is Sharp enough that it really actually Does benefits well from the enhanced Details effect in Lightroom obviously That takes extra storage and all of Those things but you can see that the Text is just crisper still if we look up Into this Zone it's just smoother a Little bit less of the jaggedy edges Just a really really smooth allows that Sharpness to sing and even more of those Details to emerge here in the lens Making it even more impressive now as I Alluded to even if I stop down the sirai Sniper 56 mm f1.2 which I was very clear Was not a particularly sharp lens but You can see that it's destroyed by this Vrox at least in terms of sharpness and Contrast the sniper does have really Nice bouquet so I don't want to trash it
Here but you can see that as far as Sharpness goes it doesn't matter where You look in the frame it's not even a Contest like the uh the vrox is just so Much sharper just great rate Flawless Details compared to you know what looks Like kind of a haze over all the details Now taking a look at the soon to be Released uh TT Artis 56 mm f1.8 a lens That I actually really quite like by the Way we can see that in the center of the Frame the TT Artis looks great I would Say it looks every bit as good as what This lens does in the mid-frame however You can see that the TTR Artis is not Quite as soft contrast not quite as good And as we get down to the corners the Difference is a little bit more Pronounced though if we pop over to this Side where the VR is not quite as good You can see that the margins are closer Now the major test is the heavyweight in This class which is the new XF 56 mm F1.2 WRR lens and if I stop that lens Down to f1.8 in the center of the frame You can see that the food is the easy Winner it's just really really high Contrast really really sharp moving just A little bit off frame however or off Center I should say and you can see that The vro if anything is probably a hair Sharper there and you can see that as we Pan down uh throughout this Zone as well That it's just a little bit crisper and
Then into the corners it's not a by a Big margin but I would definitely take The vrs in the corners so obviously this Is a really impressively sharp lens and While contrast you know doesn't always Look like mindblowing on it you can see That it looks really really good and That's impressive considering the Demands of this sensor I found even for Shooting just in an event type setting You can see that focus is good detail is Nice and crisp everywhere on the subject No problem there and while we'll see in A moment that the lens doesn't sharpen Up particularly um in the early stages As you stop it down a bit we can see if We look at this real world comparison Where I see a little bit more result Than I see on the charts you can see That I would favor the contrast here Mostly in that the brights look a little Bit brighter allows the Shadows to pop a Little bit more and so as we stop down a Little bit to f2.2 we can see that it Just does produce a little bit better of A real world result so from F2 to f2.8 There isn't any kind of real or Significant Improvement that I can see Looking at most spots along the frame There is however a bit more of a bump From f2.8 to F4 and then a bit more from F4 to f5.6 and we can see now that we're Getting a more even performance uh Everywhere else in the frame it's
Looking very sharp even on the side Where this copy was a little bit softer We can see looking at landscape results At f5.6 that it is super crisp in the Center of the frame but even if we pan Towards the left side where the lens was A little bit softer we can see that it Is crisp all across the frame great Details everywhere this is a really Sharp lens f8 looks great as well but by F11 you'll see some softening due to Defraction and that obviously is going To become more pronounced as you stop Down to the minimum apture of F16 Contrast dips a little bit up close you Can see that there is a pretty good Amount of detail here and uh the plane Of focus is pretty flat but contrast is A little bit softer and it will sharpen Up more as you stop it down now I was Also pleased with the bouquet quality up Close uh doing a shot of that new TT Artisan lens you can see that the blur Up close is really nice and soft in this Image here you can see that while there Is a little bit of that swirl effect There's some kind of lemon or cat eye Shape towards the edge of the frame the Bokeh even in these complex areas Remains nice and soft and so for Portrait type work I'm surprised at how Good this lens actually does and here's What really surprised me on the left Side we've got the V rocks on the right
Side we've got the $1,000 56 mm f1.2 WRR Lens which is a gorgeous lens by the way But you can see that there isn't a huge Difference here if we compare them side By side it is surprisingly close as far As what surprises me is the colors here Are actually really really close if we Look down through the dress the color Rendition is very similar looking at the Background here I would see that the Fuji background is a little bit softer You can tell it's not by a wide margin Now where the Fuji Advantage comes in is The fact that it opens up to f1.2 and so Now if we take a look at this background Area look how much softer the Fuji side Is compared to the vro side all Throughout that and then what is you Know pretty amazing is that even at f1.2 The Fuji remains really sharp even on This 40 megapixel body but as a budget Portrait lens I really loved what I got You can see that I'm doing the natural Framing by shooting through branches the Bouquet is really nice and soft and if You look here at the detail on the Subject's face it's just beautiful skin Tones really really nice actually in This particular set I shot with this Lens and then also the new Sigma 50mm F1.2 and in this particular uh kind of Pose and setting I didn't like anything That I got from the sigma it just didn't Work very well and while this is not my
Favorite shot I actually still like this Shot reasonably well whereas I didn't on The sigma and here's a few other Portrait shots you can just see even at F1.7 the detail is really really nice Here the background is beautifully Blurred colors are great there's just a Lot of positive going on here for such An inexpensive lens finally looking at Flare resistance one more time this is The most wideopen kind of flare I could Induce kind of a veiling effect and if Anything it's artistic I've nothing to Complain about there and so unless You're really really stopped down you're Not going to see much in terms of any Kind of veiling or ghosting and so Frankly that's another win for this lens Just a really impressive Optical Performance so congratulations you have Made it all the way through to the very End thanks for watching have a great day And let the light [Music] In
