Review: 7Artisans 35mm f/1.4 Lens for Leica M

By Anthony Gyzen and Sara Long

For the last two months, I’ve been testing the 7Artisans 35mm f/1.4 lens for Leica M-mount, which 7Artisans sent me to review. I’ve shot one one roll of Portra 400 on the Leica M6 and one photoshoot on the Sony A7III, but most of the time, I used this lens with the Leica M 240.

This lens is the second 35mm M-mount lens that 7Artisans has produced. It isn’t made in the DJ-Optical factory, but is still manufactured in China. This lens retails at $429. In comparison, Leica’s current 35mm f/1.4 costs $5,895.

If you have experienced 7Artisans M-mount lenses, you’ll know that you may need to calibrate your lens for your rangefinder. Calibrating on a digital Leica is much easier than calibrating on an analog Leica, which may take several attempts to get correct. On digital, simply follow the calibration instructions included in the lens box. On an analog Leica, open the film back, put a piece of scotch tape across the film plane, and then follow the calibration instructions.

You’ll also notice that this lens has a distinctive new design language, unlike the previous M-mount lenses, which were heavily inspired by Leica’s design. The body has a different black paint than previously released lenses, as well as red accents on the distance markers and the Chinese character Wen, meaning “Street Photography” or “Social Documentary Photography,” in red on the hood. The markings around the front element aren’t painted like the markings on the barrel of the lens, and it doesn’t look quite as nice.

It’s a very solid feeling lens, made of all metal and glass, weighing 377g or about 13.3oz without caps. This is not the smallest 35mm f/1.4 M-mount lens on the market, for example, Leica, Voigtlander and TT Artisans all have more compact offerings.

This lens takes 49mm filters and has a built-in retractable lens hood, which, in my experience, gets snagged on the front of the lens while opening and closing. Besides that, it’s very convenient to have a hood built in.

Viewfinder blockage is just the bottom right corner. The focusing is done all internally, so whether you’re at minimum or infinity, this lens isn’t going to get larger and block more of your viewfinder. This lens has a native minimum focus distance of .7 meters, or about 2.3 feet. If you are planning on adapting this lens to another camera system, like E-mount, you can get a close focusing adapter to greatly increase that minimum focus distance. The focusing ring is smooth, but also has a nice resistance to help achieve precise focus. You can always add a focus tab if that is your preference. This lens has a short focus throw at 100 degrees.

This lens has a very large aperture range, from  f/1.4 to f/22. Equipped with a 10 bladed aperture diaphragm, the aperture ring is smooth to adjust and has a nice tactile click for each stop.

When I went out, I was excited to get back into shooting 35mm focal length—I’d been using a lot of portraits and telephoto lenses for the previous few months. I did worry that it would be tough to get focus at f/1.4, but upon reviewing my images, I don’t think I missed focus even once. This makes me confident that I’ll get accurate focus in low light.

As with most lenses in this price range, the lens is sharpest at f/4-f/8. Shooting faster than f/4 still provides images that are very sharp in the center, but the corners do become softer. I noticed slight vignetting when shooting with wide apertures; however, it was never overwhelming, and could be corrected in Lightroom.

I absolutely love the colors and contrast that this lens produced while shooting on the M 240. I didn’t notice any focus shift during my use, always a plus for us Leica users. When shooting at f/1.4-f/2.8, I noticed some chromatic aberration and color fringing. I also noticed some distortion when shooting towards buildings or straight lines. This can easily be corrected in Lightroom. I also noticed flare when I was shooting towards the sun.

Leica M 240 Sample Images:

I really like the images I got from this lens. The transition from in focus to out of focus is so lovely. The bokeh is very pleasing! This really is the kind of lens that I can leave on my M6 and work with in almost all shooting scenarios and lighting conditions.

Kodak Portra 400 Sample Images:

I think that 7Artisans makes fantastic lenses. They’re great for Leica shooters who want to try out different focal lengths and not spend thousands in the process. Considering the price, it is impossible to find a better 35mm f/1.4 M-mount lens.

Pergear 25mm f/1.8 Review: Ultra Budget Manual APS-C Lens

by Anthony Gyzen and Sara Long

The Pergear 25mm f/1.8 all manual lens is available for multiple camera systems like Fujifilm, Olympus, Panasonic, and the one that I tested, Sony E-mount. This small lens is a good affordable companion to the lower-end Sony APS-C cameras.

Due to stay at home orders, my testing with this lens has been limited. I mostly used it to snap pictures on the trails between neighborhoods and on simple solo photo walks.

This lens has a 12-bladed aperture with a range of f/1.8-f/16. The aperture transition is declicked and smooth, which is ideal for video shooters who don’t need hard stops.

The minimum focus distance is .2 meters, or about 8 inches. The focus throw from minimum to infinity is short, which I find convenient in a manual only lens at this focal length. The aperture ring is more smooth than the focus ring, but it requires a little more force to move. I like that the focus ring uses a different style grip so that I don’t accidentally change aperture when I wanted to change focus.

Some things to note:

Shooting with a 25mm lens on an APS-C camera is equivalent to using a 37.5mm lens on a full frame sensor. It’s close enough to being a classic 35mm field of view.

If you’re not accustomed to manual focusing, your mirrorless camera probably has some handy features to assist, like focus peaking and focus magnification. Check your camera settings so that you can get accurate focus.

Without caps, this lens weighs about 7 ounces. Only measuring 1 and 1/4 inches from the mount, this lens doesn’t add much bulk to the small a6000 series camera.

The Pergear is extremely small and pocketable, and because of that convenience, I tend to take it out shooting more often than not. It’s one of the most affordable lenses for Sony E-mount, so I’m not too concerned with keeping it pristine. The metal exterior makes the lens feel more premium than the price would suggest, and it’s solid in the hand.

At times I was pleasantly surprised at how well this little budget lens performed, but sometimes I was puzzled by the occasional soft centers of the photos. Around f/1.8 to about 2.8, I noticed some vignetting.

The sharpness and contrast was adequate for what I was shooting, but it was definitely not something that I would use in a professional environment. I liked the color rendition, but that can vary greatly based on your personal camera and color profile settings.

Overall, it’s a decent performer for less than $70. Keep in mind that this is an ultra budget lens, so you should not expect to get image quality that is comparable to Sony, Zeiss, Sigma or other such lenses. But if you are looking for a budget manual APS-C lens, this might be one of your best options.

Viltrox 85mm f/1.8 AF STM Review - Specs, Image Quality, Build Quality

By Sara Long and Anthony Gyzen

Viltrox sent me their 85mm f/1.8 AF STM lens for Sony E-mount to review. It also comes in a Fuji X-mount, and you can get either on the Viltrox website for $399.

A budget friendly option is the Viltrox 85mm f/1.8 MF for $199, which does not have autofocus, only manual. The MF will give you just as good images as the AF, but for my purposes, the convenience and versatility of the autofocus is worth the $200 more. In comparison, Sony’s 85mm f/1.8 costs around $550-600 depending on where you buy.

The Viltrox 85mm lens has a 9 bladed aperture with a range of f/1.8-16, which is a pretty standard aperture range for a portrait lens. The minimum focus distance is .8m or 31.5”.

It does not have lens stabilization, so you’ll have to rely on your camera body’s internal sensor stabilization.

When shooting portraits at the max aperture f/1.8, the image quality was surprisingly sharp, with high contrast for being shot wide open. The autofocus and the eye detect worked well together. I also noticed really smooth, rich bokeh when shooting at f/1.8.

From f/1.8-f/2.8 there is noticeable, but subtle vignetting, and it doesn’t show up beyond f/2.8. At these wider apertures, images come out with slightly softer edges and tack sharp centers, but at f/4 and beyond the whole image comes out sharp. The color rendition and accuracy was very pleasing to me, but that can vary greatly based on your camera color profile settings.

During the day and in good lighting, the autofocus can be fast, smooth and accurate. However, when Sara and I did a photoshoot in overcast weather, 7 of 75 images came out completely blurry. When this started happening, I had to turn the camera off, demount the lens, remount, and turn the camera back on. That fixed the issue in the moment, but I had to do it twice in the ten minutes we spent shooting. It seems like something that could be fixed with a firmware update.

When shooting in low light or at night, the autofocus spent a lot of time hunting, so I found it easier to simply switch to manual focus. The giant focus ring is easy to adjust for precise focus, though the focus throw is far too long.

When shooting video, the autofocus didn’t feel as smooth as it did when shooting still photos. It felt almost choppy, and when it did get the focus, it locked in hard.

For a $400 lens, the build quality was better than I anticipated. Constructed of all metal and glass, it feels more premium than the price tag would suggest. The glass elements are coated with Viltrox’s HD nano multilayer coating with water resistance and antifouling, which helps reduce flaring and ghosting. The coating on the front element is debris repellent. There is one extra-low dispersion element that helps prevent aberrations. It also helps improve color accuracy.

Some other things to note:

Since it’s an E-mount lens, you can use it on any Sony E-mount camera. If you’re adapting it to the a6000 series or any Fuji X-mount, you need to take into account the crop factor. This 85mm, for instance, would function more like a 127.5mm equivalent lens.

There are no gaskets or any type of weather sealing on the body of this lens, though the coating on the glass elements does help to protect them somewhat. I have taken this lens out in mild weather, and it didn’t affect the lens. The included detachable lens hood does a good job of blocking rain, snow, and sun flare from coming in contact with the front element.

When editing photos, the image metadata will just say 85mm and the aperture, and will not list any other information, which can make filtering through images difficult. Keep this in mind for organizational purposes.

When the electronic aperture changes, I notice a slight grinding sound. This lens is advertised to have noiseless STM autofocus motor, but several times now I’ve heard audible sounds of the motor acquiring focus. In most cases, a slight noise isn’t a dealbreaker, but when you’re trying to be discreet, it can be inconvenient. I find that when the focus motor is making an audible noise, turning the camera off, detaching the lens, reattaching and turning back on solves the issue.

Viltrox sells this autofocus 85mm FE Lens for $399, and you can use my code ANTNIE for 10% off of your entire purchase. I do make a small commission that directly supports this website and the Antnie YouTube channel. More information can be found in the video below.