Viltrox EPIC Anamorphics - FULL FRAME 1.33x Anamorphic Lens Set 

I'm not one who ignores technical specifications on lenses, but for me they are secondary to how the image / footage looks. And I think the sample footage you showed in this video is absolutely beautiful. I was surprised by how much I liked it. Happy New Year.

The constant squeeze factor is a definite benefit of these lenses. Viltrox has been improving their products significantly over the last few years - so I imagine future iterations will improve upon these.

Im a fan of the 1.33x squeeze factor. On a 4x3 you get 16x9, on a 3:2 you get a 2:1 aspect ratio, and on 16x9 you get 2:40. As for these lenses, i like the clean look they give unless you want to make them flare. My biggest grip with their image, and with most lenses in general, is its bokeh. Im not a fan of semi oval, cat eye, bokeh. But, besides that, they are interesting lenses for sure.

I prefer higher squeeze factors, but I hope all budget anamorphic manufactures follow in Viltrox's example of having a full professional feeling set right out the gate.

1.33x on 16:9 is actually my favourite aspect ratio tbh. The wider ones are a little obnoxious to me, especially when watching on a computer screen or phone. It's different in the context of a huge cinema screen.

The thing that is attractive about these is that you can use them for 16:9 content as well. They seem very versatile and their construction seems like something you would find for a SPHERICAL prime for far more money. Low breathing, great bokeh, no aberrations, no green/purple edges.

A 1.5-1.8x stretch would have got me head over heels

Honestly: 1.33x is the main selling point for me. I usually output in 17:9 and with an open-gate recording, 1.33x is perfect. You got the flare, a subtle squished bokeh... perfect (for me). Now I just have to save up for the 35mm.... 😭

Hardcore Anamorphic seems more difficult to obtain but i can't stop dreaming about it

I guess 1.33x is more friendly towards modern day social media filmmaking, most consumer camera records in 16:9, when applying 1.33 the stretched video actually filled up the entire iPhone screen horizontal ( almost perfectly filled) .

Perfect for use in commercials, short clips and documentaries. They should sell very well. Canon is discouraging 3rd party lenses so i am not surprised

I love that you can shoot open gate 3:2 and get a 16x9 image. That's what makes it special to me. I wish my Canon r6 could do open gate like the S1H can.

I did not expect much but the footage acutally looks absolutely magical! Very nice middle ground between modern sharpness and more vintage subtle highlight rolloff and beautiful skin tones rendering in general

just ordered one set, specifically because of what you said about not going full anamorphic look when clients dont want that much but you still dont want shperical. also I dont see any CA which is great

They look like very nice quality. Great value for the money. I personally would not be interested without close to a 2x squeeze, but it does make me wonder if they are planning some sort of additional anamorphic adapter in the future to give the option to compensate for the "lame" squeeze factor. The Great Joy adapter seems like it would be much too small with a 67mm rear thread? Do you have one to check them with for vignetting levels?

Love how Viltrox actually creates them - great lenses with clean image, and decent squeeze factor and anamorphic look. Shooting 1.33x is great for my case with Komodo 17:9, utilizing the entire sensor. Had Great Joy 1.8x before but the inconsistency between lenses were killing them. Larger squeeze factors may also limit the use case for those lenses. The era of budget + great + large squeeze factor is still not there. 1.33x also makes it more usable in many more normal shooting cases.

I found these (and then this video) because I was looking for anamorphic lenses with a lower squeeze. I love the cool lense flares, but actually prefer my video to be more square than wide!

Definitely an interesting offering from Viltrox. I'd give them a rent for specific projects.

Okay so I use a Z Cam E2 S6 cam and imo, 1.33 is the right balance of subtlety to an anamorphic lens. It's like in food, you blend different flavours together to get a pleasing result. Often subtle flavours mized together gives this pleasing effect. a subtle anamorphic is just another one of these ingredients. Afterall, the story is always the ingredient in fiction, everything else is to just support it :P

Not only are these absolutely GORGEOUS lenses in terms of construction and design, but the image quality is great! I just wish the squeeze factor was greater. But I have adapters that can bring that up to at least a 1.8x squeeze, so not that big of a deal. We are soooooooo spoiled as cinematographers nowadays!!!!

Happy New Year! What a great set of lenses. If I hadn't purchased the Surui 50mm FF I would immediately jump on these. 1,33 Squeese is perfect for my S1h whan shooting in C4K or 4K, delivering Cinemascope after de-squeeze. the benefit of shooting at these formats on the S1H is that you can crop in with the push of a button with literally no quality loss, resulting in both FF and S35 aspect ratios, literally doubling the value of your lens. And, the white looks awesome, as does your test footage!

Great video. I really like the consistency across the focus range and the quality you get for the price. If I had a problem, I’d say the bokeh is a bit too subtle.

Love the white color. Even Ansel complained about everything photographic object being black.

I think 1.33 is great for certain things. I prefer it much more on a 1.78:1 sensor than having to crop if they’re not wide enough. Lens characteristics are so much more than just the squeeze factor.

They wouldn't be allowed to produce it in RF mount as Canon are blocking 3rd parties atm. Great vid as always Tito

I love that they are consistent, the color is fine, same weight, etc. all great. 1.3 ... not so much .. I don't see too much of the anamorphic characteristics on the shots for my personal taste, but if you want the aspect ratio I guess its a good choice. I think they may have gone 'too neutral' but that's my taste. I don't personally love blue flares but that is just me, a warm flare would have caught my attention more as well as more out of focus on the edges, but that's more of a vintage look which I don't think is what they are going for. I am waiting for the Mercury series to come out. Who knows, maybe one day they will do a gold or neutral flare and with a mirrorless and a mist filter .. we could get something unique. But love the build and look in general .. its great to have one more option in the market ... although the price .. hmmm ... I would have rather have it compete with the existing brands I think people who want to get started will still get the cheaper options. Like the nano morphs or Sirui

Wow. I was actually really surprised at the quality of the lenses (image) and I would like to try these out!

I feel like it is weird that they're going for PL mount hut not EF and have 2 other mirrorless formats.

Thanks for the review! Looks like the best benefit for me would be to shoot 4:3 on Arri Alexa Raw to get basically the 16:9 or close to it while utilizing more of the sensor in the 4:3 at 2.8K Mode.

two things. I think the squeeze (or lack of) is a compromise to keep the specs up and price and mass down. EF and F have a deep flange depth so lense design for them is harder than e, ef et al. These factors help deliver cost quality and consistency. I like the offer as I couls not afford the real thing and would not want to work with an imcomplete set or any of the other problems of cheap anamorphics.

This morning (from india) only i searched for this lens review from your channel 😆

I initially wrote these off because of the 1.33x squeeze, but looking at your footage I am pleasantly surprised!

We get more and more cameras that can record in 3:2 open-gate mode, so a 1.5x or 1.6x Squeeze would be perfect for that.

I'd like them more if they were natural coloured flares instead of the blue.

I’d honestly much rather the 1.33 squeeze than 1.6 or 1.8. I shoot 4K and 8K DCI so I don’t need that much of a squeeze. I just wish they’d make these with a neutral flare and they’d be perfect to me. I’d also like them in black so they don’t show up as much in window reflections. I’m actually quite interested.

As a Sigma FP user, the 1.33x is the perfect offering. The 1.6x of the Suiri FF line gives me a super intense 2.4:1 aspect ratio, so this is a perfect. 100% will be my next lens purchases.

You guy think this lenses are better choice instead of great joy on zcam e2 f6? Any zcam user right here? 🖖🏼

Honestly I wish they just had a little bit more character! That price for the lack of character is not that appealing I feel like I’d be better off buying some primes with vintage coating!

What about definition? I tested a SIRUI and had to return it.Blurry and messy colors. The Viltrox seems better. By the way, nice lighting!

You mixed up your labeling of the 35mm and the 50mm at 2:10

Would it be more helpful to talk anamorphic lenses in terms of the two focal lengths (and F-numbers) compared to just the vertical fov and squeeze?

I’m debating between this set, the Sirui Saturn set, and the Blazar Remus for my high school students to use for their short films. We have three Panasonic S5iiX cameras and I think a set of anamorphic and a set of spherical lenses, like the Nisi Athena primes will be great teaching tools for my classroom. What do you recommend for the anamorphic sets? Thanks!

Looks awesome ! Can’t wait for the atlas mercury review. It seems that there’s lot of distortion on FF…

expensive for what it is, such a squeeze ratio

it is sad that lens makers seems to be giving up on M43, which is the best for Anamorphic application for stronger squeeze factor. If i were Panasonic i would make some Auto focus Anamorphic lens, GH6 will sell like hot cakes.

Great video! Definitely a market for these

Build quality - A, look - A, mount options - B+, Size/Weight - A, Squeeze Factor - C (should be an absolute minimum of 1.5/6, preferably 1.8, price - A .... Given the price point, it must be the reason they choose 1.33x. 1.8 or 2x would definitely increase the price maybe to 3500? and increase the weight as well.

Viltrox are a fantastic lens manufacturer. I own a 20mm and swear by it. Yes, though, 1.33 is a bit meek.

The videos looked great, although with Sirui full frame + new adapter the squeeze is 2.0. Is the 2.0 extreme? Unusable? Yes maybe but with the intro of 1.33, it seems like they are late to the game. Even with Laowa Nanomorph at 1.5x the Viltrox may have tough competition with size, weight and even pricing. Do you agree?

I was expecting you with tools, loupes and a 2x Paper Mask ready to mod those babies ahah. You've gone soft Tito 😛

Will it match to large format like GFX100II or Alexa65? What is the image circle?

02:10 is wrong caption but we all know thats this is meant to be 35 mm =)))

I want to see these lenses on an arri 35 camera!😎😎😎😎😎😎

1000/10 rating on this review

Any recommendations for an RF to PL adapter?

Lol. Forgetting to hit record is the bane of a RU-vidr's life.

I guess its cool for certain light looks, but its still dreamy, the bokeh. Lens flares can sometimes be too much and distracting from the story, unless they fit the theme. I guess they could work for a short film thats not too much landscape maybe. But thats up to the filmmaker how they want to use it. Would I buy it for myself, No : D : D : D I already purchased an old 2x squeeze anamorphic and clamps but Rectilux is not replying so I dont know where to buy HCDNA from, otherwise, ill have to practice double focusing

With your oval insert modification they would be perfect

I agree these are my favourite affordable anamorphics, but not affordable enough for me!

I heard another reviewer mention how stiff the focus rings are. Your thoughts? Also, there seems to be a dominant blue square flare that pops up with these lenses (with and without filtration) Did you experience that?

Is FX3 a good camera to consider for anamorphic lens?

...to me the mixture of speed, weight and squeeze is suboptimal - in full frame focussing must be done much h more exactly (loss of field of sharpness), additionally the weight makes free hand use more unrealistic, and finally the squeeze factor is not wide enough for a real cinematographic look. it seems to be a typical product t of the "stuck in the middle approach".. 2.4 plus 1,6 for example would habe Tresen ted a more decisive approach... generally the performance of the lenses seems to be very good, sharpness, bokeh and minimal breathing: the constructors know their job

is there a speedbooster for the pl mount to rf for red komodo

Thanks for this review. I'm only seeing the PL version of the lens on their site (and on B&H). Did they announce the L-mount version for a later release?

I want them actually

This is actually how Sirui should have performed. But ig it comes with a price

Bokeh is pretty oval for 1.33x

A nice lens

These are good, but none of these budget options compare to adapters from Kowa or the like. Even with that in mind, I like these. If the PL mount is standard instead of extended, they could be an option for those that want 1.33x. For whatever reason.

Thanks Tito! These are lovely looking lenses, amongst other things. I would still go for Greatjoy though, I somehow prefer their overall squeeze factor, and the fact that they are less than half the price of ones of these. Plus while I agree with you about PL mount, I find EF mount to be the most versatile for my use case (I am a S1 user, so similar camera body as yours, but my B-Cam is a Fuji XT3) :)

1:20 the coating reveal made me nearly throw up 1:58 and still, it's not exactly that. Why not be brave, one time, and do a proper one. As if there's some book all these companies base their design on, or whatever. The images do look nice, not gonna lie. Creamy. But I'm no so sure if that's only the lens, the light was really pleasing here and your or ichidomos colour magic also do something I suppose. What I like is the flares, as in looking like anamorphic flares - and not anamorfake as on the Nanomorphs. And white lenses, what can you do, they look nice. At this price however, I don't feel it. Bokeh is boring, for example. They will probably sell, but don't woo

what pl adapter are you using in this video?

Most important question - is the squeeze factor constant?

I should also ask, do these work with the Metabones PL to RF speed booster? I’m guessing no but figured I’d ask.

Uh, well, these are still listed as PL-mount only. There is no info anywhere, even on the Viltrox site, about any other mounts. Where are you getting intel?

Bro why isn’t the test footage in 2.39?

Wow!!!

Storm trooper lens

The white color is not ideal, but the images look incredible.

No Canon mount at all? Man it becomes more and more frustrating to shoot Canon when wanting anamorphic options

hoping they would make a line for crop sensors/mft as well :(

Curious to see this shot in 3:2 and de-squeeze it.

Black mount cap on white lense 🤦‍♂️

Great video! Did you shoot both the interview and the test footage on the S1H? If so, love the grade. Did you use any specific LUT and/or conversion LUT from V-Log?

👍🏾🙏🏾

J'en peux plus de sa face en gros plan

Overpriced for what it is

Bokeh looks weird to me

In conclusion.. ehh

Yes, a little pricey. And after watching “MANY “ of your videos, I’ve come to the conclusion that anamorphic seems to be something that is very over used. And like anything else, should be used in taste.

They are wayy too expensive in comparison to the competitors.