I love how Laowa makes tons of 7.5 to 15mm lenses and then a couple of long macros and, that's it. They don't bother with the standard lenses that everyone else makes. Truly a specialty lens manufacturer.
@@fredriksvard2603 It makes sense for the vast majority of situations. Ultra wides require a specific vision, subject matter, and skill to use properly, and telephotos are of course for things far away. 20ish-80ish is a range where most people will take most pictures. It being a zoom allows you to be ready for anything. Having fast primes is of course "better" for a bunch of reasons, but any experienced photographer will tell you that the lens and the body are completely irrelevant if you didn't get the photo. Fumbling around changing lenses is totally fine in some scenarios, but having a single lens on your camera that you have on you at all times and you can whip out in a second allows you to get that photo.
@@johnz5359 Sure. I don't shoot anything at less than 70mm though even if i have something like a 24-105. I don't think 50mm is "safe", or versatile. I adjust so my 85mm works, and that's typically the argument against zooms. Know what you want and make it happen instead of staying put and zooming. I do want a 28mm for certain video shots though.
Yeah I've accidentally shot with a 12mm crop and 16mm FF lens at f8 set to MF@ infinity and didn't find out until I tried to do a closeup shot and realized the lens was toggled to MF.
I just rediscovered you today!!! I used to watch Digitalrev many years ago. I learned so much from you in the early days of my photography, techniques and what equipment to get. I was only starting out then, but I am pleased to say that all these years later, I am one year away from graduating art school! Thank you so much for all the content you have made, keep making it! 😊👍❤
I'm so glad you've continued making videos after DigitalRevTV. I remember watching those videos almost religiously back in the day, but I fell off the "camera game" at some point and moved on to other things. However, recently I started wondering what you might be up to these days so I looked you up, and here you are, still posting videos. I don't think there's a better channel for camera reviews on RU-vid. :)
Gotta love how Kai is 1: still delivering real, relevant, and informative gear talk, and 2: Still 16, and 3: still the illegitimate lovechild of Jeremy Clarkson
Laowa CEO: "So how wide should our next lens be?" Laowa lead designer: "Yes." I love Laowa for doing crazy stuff. I currently enjoy their 15 mm macro lens. It's weird, and I love it :-).
This is what I love about photography, there is always something new out there that makes you stop and say 'oh that's cool'. Even if you are never going to buy it... but really want to.
I've had one for years, it's lots of fun. Try taking circular, close up portrait photos of your family and friends for a good laugh. One of my favourite uses is at 8mm on a tripod pointing straight up in churches, cathedrals etc. for a 360deg dome view. Make sure you use a remote or timer, and duck down if you don'd want be in it.
I own it and its amazing lens favorite street lens (I own the APS-C version). I feel that the APS-C version of this lens is sharper and better looking photos than the full frame variant.
@@Wabajak13 the only one that pops up in my searches is the LAOWA 9mm f/2.8 Zero-D which is advertised as "for crop sensors" but is still a solid 580 euros =l
@@Wabajak13 that lens is very good until there's a source of light in the picture. Worst flare , it has a filter ring you can't even use due to the ring flare circle you get on the entire frame
I'm utterly astonished, that Kai didn't elaborate inside-out on the term rectumlinear. I was waiting for that throughout the entire video, but to no avail.
Be careful if you use the Laowa 9mm m-mount lenses with an adapter on mirrorless cameras. The wide lenses and especially the ultra wide m-mount ones have height incident angle and are usually endocentric. The micro-lenses above the sensor's photodiodes don't work well with the height incident angle. That's why the Leica micro-lenses above the photodiodes are offset and the Leica low pass filter is much thinner for that reason too. In other words wide lenses designed for Leica m-mount cameras don't work well when they are used with adapters on mirrorless lenses. In that case the corners have inferior optical quality. Film cameras don't suffer from height incident angle. Also digital Leica m-mount cameras are compatible with much older wide angle endocentric m-mount lenses of the film era because their sensors have offset micro lenses at the corners of their digital image sensors. New wide and ultra wide lenses that are designed for digital cameras and especially the mirrorless ones are tele-centric. They have have low incident angle and that is good with the micro-lenses at the corners of the digital image sensors and the thicker low pass filter above the digital image sensor. In general the ultra wide angle lenses are very challenging optical and artistically. Nevertheless they give unique results that are very distinguishable.
Presumably the lens is designed for mirrorless as Laowa are releasing the same lens in E, L , and Z mounts in addition to M mount. Not that the corners seems to be that sharp anyway.
Interesting filters. I personally use Xume adapters for smaller circular ones, but that stacking feature is novel. The nice part of really dark ND filters are smooth water and removing people from popular tourist destinations via long exposure. You usually focus before shooting on a tripod.
Ha ha! This was actually the very first removable lens I ever bought. (Well, not including the kit lens that comes with mirrorless cameras.) -I was trying to duplicate what my little action cam could do for vlogging, but on a bigger camera with more options. Works great! That rectilinear is super weird, but it's a cool look.
Would this do well for skate photography? I think many photos use fish eye lenses, so I guess there is a difference between using a super wide lens like this 9mm and using a fish eye?
Panorama shots. Hmmmmm, forced perspective shots maybe. RECTALinear is choice. I have a Sony mount a7 too. Hmmm, interested in this niche lens. Kai, you doing another video with Lok soon? Another new meaning for my 9mm.
Thanks for your review! I'm wondering what this lens is like compared to the Panasonic Lumix 9mm F/1.7 LEICA? What is the difference between F2.8 and F/1.7 ? Is one better than the other is shooting in low light? I ordered the panasonic one 2 months ago and all the webshites say its out of stock and waiting for it to be sent to them from panasonic, really sloppy!! Anyway ye just wonted to know cos I'll maybe need a refund and get the Laowa asap if this continues
I wonder at what point diffraction becomes a problem with this lens: F8 already is one millimetre apature, meaning F16 would be literally like poking a hole with a strand of hair. I assume one shouldn't stop this lens down any further, and if you want to take even relatively long exposures, you will need that big ass box
I wanted this thing when I heard about it. Would be great on my Leica M. Too expensive though. Also dunno why they can't adapt it to Canon. I've adapted a couple Leica lenses to my EOS R without issue.
There is a 10mm, 9mm for crop. And 7.5mm and 6mm for MFT. I want to try the 6mm lens on MFT, it will not be as crazy as a 9mm on FF - but might be interesting
Nikon made an 8mm lens and a 7.5 mm lens too. I actually saw examples, including prototypes, at the Nikon museum in Tokyo. Some of them were the size of a small dinner plate.
That's not only a shameless plug, also it is not even the truth. You used the APS-C version of this lens, which is considerably tighter due to sensor crop of your Fuji X-E3. Have a nice day.
