Venus Optics announces the Laowa RF 10mm f/4 ‘Cookie’ lens for APS-C sensors
- Thread starter Canon Rumors Guy
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I have the laowa 16mm at f/4 and I still see the difference on people's eyes. Try to shoot a video at f/4 in tight space, such as inside a car, say 3/4 body, focus to the person's eye and you will see why you would need autofocus when he moves his head back and forth while singing.
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Sure, if you regularly shoot videos inside cars and focussing on eyes, it’s not the lens for you. I wouldn’t buy a manual focus lens for birds in flight either. But, most people use ultra wide angle lenses where setting focus to infinity or a hyperfocal distance or closer is more than adequate.
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Yes, it's a one trick pony.
I personally find these lenses a gimmick for hipsters. I used to have the EF14mm with broken AF out of warranty and used it a lot on hyperfocal, but there is so much more you can do with an ultra wide lens, and autofocus is very handy. For my eyes, it is paramount.
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People complain about everything. This lens is cheap and gives beautiful absolutely rectilinear images which is great for a pancake lens you can slip into your pocket and take with you on vacation or for more serious work, but it won't of course do everything. The RF 16mm f/2.8 has really great AF, is dirt cheap, very sharp in the centre but requires serious digital correction for distortion, and so the optics is derided by others. It's said "Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good". But, the perfect is the enemy on forums. Sure, buy an expensive and possibly huge lens that will do everything, and, for some, such lenses are essential. But, far more people will buy and be very happy with these cheaper offerings that are good but not perfect.
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One trick pony??? An UW 16mm lens is popular for landscape, nature, gardens, interior, architecture, real estate, and general outdoor photography, the kind of things that don't move, where shots can be carefully framed and set up, and in those situations manual focus is not an impediment.
This ultrawide focal length is not good for close up portraits/headshots as the perspective will be unnatural and distorted, it does work though when using a distant view of the subject.
If you want photos like the one shown below, where the nose is enlarged and the face is stretched thin, then just use a smartphone and get the same funky distortion, like all the smartphone users who don't quite understand focal length distortion and shoot portraits really close with an UW! (PS - in case of any confusion, the image on the right is closer to how the subject really looks!)
From https://annawu.com/blog/2011/09/focal-length-comparison/
This ultrawide focal length is not good for close up portraits/headshots as the perspective will be unnatural and distorted, it does work though when using a distant view of the subject.
If you want photos like the one shown below, where the nose is enlarged and the face is stretched thin, then just use a smartphone and get the same funky distortion, like all the smartphone users who don't quite understand focal length distortion and shoot portraits really close with an UW! (PS - in case of any confusion, the image on the right is closer to how the subject really looks!)
From https://annawu.com/blog/2011/09/focal-length-comparison/
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Don 't you love it when people stick to what they know and treat it as a bible?
You won't be able to shoot a bathroom scene with a 200mm lens.
I do realize that perfect photographers want top notch quality at all times. It took me 33 years to get rid of that imperfection and to realize that storytelling is about more than beautiful pixels. If technology cannot keep up with the need of curious mind, then it is nothing more than an obsolution.
I do have both the Laowa 16mm and the canon RF 16mm, but ever since I acquired the canon, the Laowa sits in the box: doesn't have autofocus.
I have been intrigued by Laowa for their ability to get out of that bubble of experienced photographers, and to get many to the land of curiosity and new ideas, yet, unable to get themselves out of that manual world. You give people abilities they have never experienced before, yet you drag them back to the age of my forefathers.
What good is rectilinearity for, if you miss the shot?
I know, we do not shoot the same thing. This gives me the right to have an opinion that manual lenses are useless. It is not a complaint, it is a statement of need.
On a side note, why would I use a smartphone to take a picture, if I have an R5? I don't understand the suggestion.
UW lenses are not just for static subjects. I use it to shoot volleyball and basketball games, I use mine to shoot tight space scenes such as in a metro and in a fridge. I use it on gimbal, I shoot manual macro with it, I shoot band rehearsal, and for all these examples, I need autofocus, and never missed rectilinearity. It would be great to have it, but not a must as much as autofocus is.
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What you meant to say is "This gives me the right to have an opinion that manual lenses are useless FOR ME AND MY NEEDS". That's better now, nobody will argue against that!
You can shoot action with a manual lens as long as you are the correct distance away, so that the subject falls into the very deep depth of field that UW lenses have. This way, AF speed and accuracy won't really matter.
Why use a smartphone to take a picture if you have an R5? If you want to use lenses incorrectly, and take UW portraits really close up to produce badly distorted images of people's faces, so they look like every other smartphone face snapshot/selfie, you don't need a premium full-frame camera worth several thousands of dollars badly paired in a very mismatched way with a low image quality, entry-level cheap plastic 16mm lens. You can do it much more cheaply, easily and conveniently with any smartphone, and post it on social media instantly.
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