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.