I have both. The f1.4 hunts a bit for focus and is noisy. The f2 gains focus fast, is silent, and weather proof. I got the f2 first and bought a square lens hood for it because I like that aesthetic. Later I got the 1.4 because everyone raved about the low light and magic quality. In the end, I didn’t see much difference. Image quality was similar in both. The f2 bokeh is almost as nice as the 1.4. I enjoy both, but if forced to choose, I think the f2 with its weather sealing, silence, and quick autofocus stands out.
Your comment is where I am at right now. I too have the F2, but have that urge to buy the 1.4 for the same reason you mention. I like to be quite arty with my shots, and love soft backgrounds/bokeh. Your observation of not seeing 'much difference' is interesting and helps to dampen that 'urge'...... a little lol
Thank you for your comment. I have been looking EVERYWHERE on youtube, but most RU-vidrs don't talk about the noise. Although I mainly shoot outside (duh..), the focusing noise is a huge no no to me. Plus, the f2 is WR. Now I know which one I'll put on my non WR XT20 I recently purchased for a very good price !!! Thanks again !
@@jojoaugustus1383 Yep, the older motor in the F1.4 emits some noise. Not terrible, but if you do video or want super stealth street photography, then the f2 is the way to go. And as I noted before, it's fast, nice bokeh, silent, and the auto-focus is superior to the 1.4. And it's weather sealed and smaller. Kind of a no-brainer!
The f1.4 has a more 3D, spherical look to the image. I think this is due to the in focus area being less sharp, so that the falloff is more gradual. The f2 has a more 2d, flat representation because it goes from very sharp and then quickly to out of focus; it kind of sometimes looks like the person could have been pasted onto the background. With the 1.4 the subject looks a part of it.
Just a quick comment to thank you for doing an outstanding objective video comparing these 2 excellent lenses. I have the f2, and it's fantastic. But I wouldn't mind adding the 1.4 simply for the larger aperture in low light.
I had both, returned the f1.4. Not sure if it was my copy but images wide open were no where near as sharp as the f2 version. Ended up with the f2 trinity. The difference is very small, the spherical effect of the f1.4 provides a more classic depth of field and it has very subtle softer tones. To get the best out of it, you have to shoot it in a specific way, such as using side light with depth behind the subject or in golden hour, then it really shows its strengths. The f2 has more punch, WR, is nicer to handle and a lot smoother to focus in my opinion. It's a better all-rounder.
I have the 1.4 myself and what i can see on the images is that both are pretty similar. But I would say that I prefer the 1.4 for the softness of the skin tones on portraits as well as the slightly better bokeh. The F2 seems a little bit too sharp and contrasty for my taste. That's why I like to use the 1.4 on my xpro1 which produces very organic pictures. I don't care about the slower autofocus, if I miss one or two shots it's not the end of the world. I am not a pro anyway !
Very solid points and I agree. Im planing to put a mist filter on the f:2 and see how it reacts. Funny that you mentioned X-pro1 I just finished editing the X-Pro1 film. It's way shorter than Episode 2 haha :D
I have both lenses, and will always have both lenses. I tend to use the f/1.4 lens at full aperture just for the rendering. It has an intangible look, can't measure or quantify it, but can see it. I tend to look at the images as complete photos, not zooming in at the pixel level. I love the look for certain subjects from the faster lens. I had the f/2 lens for a couple of years before getting the f/1.4 and was very happy with it. It is small, light and fast to focus. The addition of weather sealing also makes it my go-to lens for outdoor shooting. I tend to shoot at f/4 or smaller with this lens for more moderate to deeper focus. I could be happy with the f/2 lens, but I'm happier having both.
@Albert Smith If you where only allowed to use one of them for the rest of you life witch one would it be? All images in this film are made wide open at both lenses. They are both awesome lenses and my plan is to keep both. At some point i say that i'm going to take the f2 9 out of 10 times for street photography. I don´t think thats quite true. But i think the hype on internet if slightly over the top at least if it's compared to the f2 . But many times the films that hype up the 1.4 is just about the 1.4 by it self and a that point of view it lives up to the hype. I'm probably going to do a follow up on the 1.4 later down the road when i have more experience with it so for a have 3 street sessions, 3 client portrait shots and 2 editorial client shots done with it. And i cant say that it stand out that much from the f:2 witch kind of makes it a special occasion lens. Thats probably why i went into some heavy pixle peeping as well as showing only zoomed out samples.
@@Kim_Alexander Wow, hard to choose. I also have redundant fast/slow examples of the 23mm (f/1.4 and f/2) and 16mm (f/1.4 and f/2.8). I probably have more money than sense. I use my 35mm f/2 more on the street for the focus speed and the weather sealing a d have never felt that it is anything but terrific. And then, when I do use the faster lens for the right subjects, I feel so happy that I own it. Only one? I would have to keep the f/1.4. I could go with a 23mm or the 27mm for street photography and use the 35mm for portraits. A third option might be the new 33mm f/1.4 which combines the speed of focus of the f/2 with the aperture of f/1.4 and weather sealing. If I had no normal lens for my Fujis, this looks attractive.
@@albertsmith9315 im not quite sure on my answer yet, and today I also picked up a Zeiss Touit 32mm 1,8 just to make things even harder. Have a strong feeling that I going to end up having 3 35mm lenses. Have a fun job tomorrow where I shoot a party going to bring 23 on my XE3 And swaping between the Zeiss and 56 on my X-pro3 the 1,4 would make more sens since its a lot of low light but its more fun to bring something new haha
There's no lens noise in the world (well, maybe with exception of the really old 1st gen AF lenses from Nikon & Minolta from the mid 80's) that will rival any standard shutter noise from the camera, period.
Hmm.. without reading comments or knowing the answer in advance, I'd say the left side is the f/1.4, with smoother bokeh, shallower DOF and slightly lower contrast. And if I'm correct the f/2 on the right is slightly sharper and has better contrast. It'd be a tough choice based on these observations.. since each excels in different areas.
Thank you for the great review., very informative. One thing that I would have liked to see though is the image comparison with both lenses at f2. Anyway, everything else was very well explained.
I got first the 35mm f2 what I really love, for the WR, Autofocus and overall better build quality (in my opinion) After a while i picked up a second hand 35mm f1.4 in mint condition and i loved the retro legacy style and the soft/filmic rendering. If u can get both 🙏❤
Thank you, I am outside in a street situation mostly, and live in the uk and it rains a lot So the f2 lens for me I think, having both would be great though for sure.......
I asked my girlfriend which picture left / right or top / bottom she liked more regardless to model pose or emotion. And in every pair except for the one she preferred picture from f1.4.
imo, with Fuji, it s about color rendition, contrast, sharpness, 1.4 give much better shallow depth of field, with a cost of color and contrast, for that I wouldn't trade actually. 35 F2 is a winner to me.
I was really conflicted (fuji seems to be good at making it hard to choose). F1.4 lets in more light, but F2 isn't too bad. F2 is also sharp and is cheaper with WR but doesn't have edge to edge sharpness (which i don't mind but I also want to use for landscapes). In the end I decided I wanted more light, edge to edge and some level of softness wide open so I went for a second hand F1.4.
Nice review! Totally agree on the sexy look of the 1.4 35mm... the new 33m is ugly as hell. And the "loud" AF is a joke. You are completly right. I don't think it is loud by any meaning....
Thanks! I'm a raw shooter so the recwpies don't work all the way for me. Shooting with film simulations and editing in capture one. Men technic is base's on what you would do in the dark room back in the days. Try light up my subject and make is pop bringing the eye of the viewer where I want them to look. Colors are igen än result of adjusting WB & tint
I couldn't see any difference between your f2 series and your f1.4 series, oh well. The 35mm 1.4 was my first Fuji lens and WOW! The images really have something. If I ever sell out of the Fuji system, I will keep this lens and my X-Pro2 because they are in my heart. I later bought the 35mm f2 and didn't like it one bit and couldn't wait to get rid of it Quite possibly my f2 was a victim of sample variation. Some Fuji lenses have kinda loose focusing or aperture rings, mine were good. I vaguely recall that the focusing ring on the f2 was fiddly to grasp, but it could be a false memory.
Comparing f1.4 to f2 is of course going to have different looks. It would have been interesting to compare the older lens at f2 to the newer lens, as well as other apertures.
@Gordon Brown Thanks for your comment! Personally when I buy a lens what interest me with is is how I performs wide open. I also think it's more interesting to compare a 1.4 wide open against a f2 Especially since the result not always are as big, and mostly only noticeable when haven same image side by side. Many people might think that f2 not going to give enough backgroundblur, that's not quite the case. Ss soon as you start to stop down the 1.4 it don't really makes any sense to use that lens if you own both. Same goes if you often shoot stoped down then the f2 version makes much more sense to buy.
@@Kim_Alexander It is ridiculous to make any judgement on lenses when comparing them at different apertures. One would always expect F1.4 to be softer than F2 the fact that they are not much different shows the excellence of the 1.4 version.
@@johnhoward2577 it's not ridiculous many people buy lenses to know how they are wide open and lenses becomes sharper as you stop them down. Hence if you stop down an 1.4 to f2 that lens get an advantage since its not using the edge of that glas, and it's the glas we are comparing! Therefor there is just two logical ways to compare lenses, wide open or at the sweet spot where that lens suppose to perform at its best witch ofen are around 5.6 or 8. But that's not how I do it there is many technical reviews that uses charts for that purpose. My Sony g Master 50mm 1.2 is not soft wide open it's even sharper than most of the fuji lenses I tired. Same goes for the new fuji 56mm 1.2. You can't generallise and say that a smaller apature means a sharper image when comparing two different lenses, optics doesn't work that way.
13:05 I purchased Xpro3 , 3 years back Along with this camera i purchased 35mm f1.4 new. I was confused to choose between this two lenses but because of retro look of lens hood design and also this lens is made in japan i purchased this 35mm f1.4,since then i have never removed this lens from my xpro3. I find pic quality very good.
I have the viltrox 33 in red bought direct from viltrox as it came with a square lens hood it’s a really nice lens very fast to auto focus i also have the 35-1.4 and 35 f2 i like and use all three lenses
I miss a side by side of the 2 lenses @ same apertures , it seems only normal that 1.4 is softer , has more prenounced bokey etc then a 2.0, ... question is are they quality wise as good on similar apertures ?
same apature is irrelevant since one would be using more of it's glass and the other less en therefore perform differently. And if you stop it down so much that they both use the best part of the glas most lenses perform similar. By gradually getting sharper, outwards the edges and with less vignetting and so on. if you intend to use the 1.4 stopped down it makes no sense to get that over the f2 version.
@@Kim_Alexander so if you don't really need the 1.4 then the f2 (if similar over the rest of the aperture range) is the better (and waterresitant) choice :p (at least in my opinion)
@@LucScheltens yes, if you stopping down the 1.4 you got a slower performing lens and a larger one than the f2 with as you say also is weather resistant. a lot of people prefer the 1.4 due to its "special" look but I'm not so convinced it's something that is aprent in some just a few situation I think there partly is placebo effect as well around what many says around the older fujifilm gear.
I bought the X-PRO1 with the kit zoom and the 35/14 when the X-PRO1 was released. The X-PRO1 was a slow performer in all expects. The 35/1.4 was very unreliable if you tried AF-C. You had to use AF-S and really check that it nailed the focus. I now use it more on my X-T5 and X-H1. The focus on Fujis latest cameras are much more reliable and faster. Even AF-C works in most cases. However the 56/1.2 give me more keepers because the AF is more reliable. If you compare the 35/1.4 with the 35/2 the later needs the help of lens profile to get the bet result. I can compare the magic EF 85/1.2 lens for Canon. A fantastic lens for portraits but that sometime could kick your ass with peculiar optical effects. I later got the EF 85/.4 IS to get faster AF and IS. A lens that was presumably much better optically but lacked that special character that the (%/1.2 gave me. I feel that 36/1.4 have a little bit the same but you don't notice it in every pictur and yes AF-c still hunts a bit.
Jag gillade inte 35mmF2 speciellt mycket. Bilderna var för digitala och klara. Svårt att se skillnad på en youtube kanal när kvalitén är mindre än 2mp. Men 35mm1.4 har mjukare bokeh, snyggare falloff och i print påminner den mer om film jämfört med 35mmf2.
Håller delvis med, men det förutsätter att den används på 1,4.. Jag använder ofta mist filter på mina optik, eller hårspray. Dock inga filter i denna jämförelse. Sen vet vi alla att kungen är Zeiss 32mm Planar - håller du inte med så har du fel haha ;)
omg dude whta they mean by loud means when recording video on the camera the lens noise gets recorded. I like your video though just thought you really misunderstood that.
Depends on how you look at it, it lets in more light for sure. If you could only keep one of them witch one would it be? Today I picked up a Zeiss Touit 32mm 1,8
@@Kim_Alexander sure xf35mm f1.4 because more light is important - I couldn’t find f1.4 first because of that I bought f2 wr version now I don’t use f2 but I will keep it maybe for rainy day it’s better
The bokeh is not the only criteria. The micro-contrast and saturation are higher at f2 than at f1.4 but for micro-contrast and saturation it would be more fair to compare both the lenses at f2.0 or f2.8
comparing at f2 means one is wide open and the other is not, that's not fair. At 2.8 one is more stopped down than the other hence not fair. There is probably some way to figure out where the opening is the same in relation to the apature stopped down. But we also know that all lenses performs bether stopped down so that output is boring. Hence I always compare wide open. That is when a lens use all the optics that was put in there..
@@Kim_Alexanderyes, absolutely, but in real life we don’t always take pictures wide open for pixel peeping. So wide open for both is interesting for bokeh, but for micro contrast and saturation which you express as “clarity” both lenses at f2.8 or f4 is interesting Perhaps even comparing both at their sweet spots, say at f5.6 It is possible that if both lenses are at f4, the micro-contrast and saturation would be favourable to the 1.4 version. Also in a library, meeting room or wedding ceremony we can use manual focusing If I were rich and took two lenses I might have chosen f2/35 and 1.2/56 In any case thank you so much for your very helpful video