Samyang Rokinon 12mm for Sony APS-C

[Bryan]

I recently bought myself one of these lenses for use on the Sony NEX 6.

The good news, it's easy to focus and wonderfully sharp and contrasty in the centre of the frame.

The bad news, it suffers very badly from CA, particularly at the edges, while my copy is not sharp along the edges when taking distant views. I don't know if this is due to field curvature or misalignment of components, as I have not formally tested it as yet.

See F5KKEM as an example of its use.

Bought in the USA so difficult for me to return. There's a lesson to be learnt here methinks!

[John Mitchell]

Interesting to hear that. The Samyang/Rokinon/Bower 12mm gets good reviews. I've been thinking of buying one myself, but they are tough to find in Canada. Perhaps I'll stick with the Sony 16mm / ultra wide angle adapter combo (12mm equiv.), which does a surprisingly good job. Edges are soft of course but the centre is sharp at all apertures. I generally close down to f/5.6-f/8. Purple fringing and CA clean up well in DxO Opitcs Pro, I find. No problems with QC, touch wood.

[Ed Rooney]

I bought the Rokinon 12mm, the Zeiss Touit 12mm, and the Sony 10-18 f/4 for my NEX-6. I returned both 12mm. The Touit would not stop hunting. The Rikinon I hod a problem with, which I now forget. But basically I got pissed because I didn't want to buy a puzzle I had to solve. David K liked the Rokinon, as I recall. The Sony very-wide zoom has been great. John, I think you have a better sample of the 16mm pancake than I did. 

 

I hope you can sort out your problem, Bryan. Do you have LR? Do you always click the Remove CA box? Sony shot at 10mm below.

 

[Bryan]

I hope you can sort out your problem, Bryan. Do you have LR? Do you always click the Remove CA box?

I generally check for CA and, if necessary, the Remove CA feature in LR will normally do the trick. My Pentax 28 mm lens is rather prone to it.

 

The Rokinon is in a different league however and I have at times found it impossible to deal with the CA in this way. I don't have much experience of using lenses as wide as this, and maybe this goes with the territory. It's not a problem with every shot, but, for example, leaves against the light at the edge of the frame will show severe purple fringing.

 

I need to do some formal testing of the lens to properly understand its characteristics and then decide whether or not to keep it.

[John Mitchell]

"The Sony very-wide zoom has been great. John, I think you have a better sample of the 16mm pancake than I did."

 

Perhaps. Is your pancake whole wheat? It's a quirky little lens, but it can deliver good results at f/5.6+. Sony's 0.75x wide angle converter actually doesn't affect sharpness that much, which surprised me. Hopefully my ship will come in one day, and I'll be able to afford the much superior Sony 10-18.

 

I also have Sony's fisheye converter for the 16mm. It's pretty good for the money as well.

 

Purple fringing and "regular" CA can be rampant with both these adapters before correction, but so far so good.

[John Mitchell]

 

I hope you can sort out your problem, Bryan. Do you have LR? Do you always click the Remove CA box?

I generally check for CA and, if necessary, the Remove CA feature in LR will normally do the trick. My Pentax 28 mm lens is rather prone to it.

 

The Rokinon is in a different league however and I have at times found it impossible to deal with the CA in this way. I don't have much experience of using lenses as wide as this, and maybe this goes with the territory. It's not a problem with every shot, but, for example, leaves against the light at the edge of the frame will show severe purple fringing.

 

I need to do some formal testing of the lens to properly understand its characteristics and then decide whether or not to keep it.

 

 

I try to avoid getting leaves and branches in the edges of the frame. If I can't avoid them, I'll sometimes crop 'em out. Intense purple fringing correction can look really ugly at times.

[Ed Rooney]

 

 

I hope you can sort out your problem, Bryan. Do you have LR? Do you always click the Remove CA box?

I generally check for CA and, if necessary, the Remove CA feature in LR will normally do the trick. My Pentax 28 mm lens is rather prone to it.

 

The Rokinon is in a different league however and I have at times found it impossible to deal with the CA in this way. I don't have much experience of using lenses as wide as this, and maybe this goes with the territory. It's not a problem with every shot, but, for example, leaves against the light at the edge of the frame will show severe purple fringing.

 

I need to do some formal testing of the lens to properly understand its characteristics and then decide whether or not to keep it.

 

 

I try to avoid getting leaves and branches in the edges of the frame. If I can't avoid them, I'll sometimes crop 'em out. Intense purple fringing correction can look really ugly at times.

 

 

Yes, super-wides are exotic beasts, as are super-teles. The handling is not business as usual. I find myself in a dense, tightly-packed city of crowded streets and tall buildings. For a long time I tried to avoid anything wider than a 24mm, but if I'm going to widen my view, metaphorically speaking, I need a wider lens view. I won't be flying off to Bali tonight. 

 

People are used to the drama of wind-angle distortion. I don't love the look, but I don't see it as a problem. Soft edges are demoralizing with a wind view. CA? Artifacts? Well, those things are not acceptable. As John said, sometimes cropping is the solution. "Hey, where did my wide look go?" 

[John Mitchell]

I'm not a huge fan of the distorted ultra-wide look either, but these types of images can be fun to take. Not sure how much demand there is for them, though. The novelty has sort of worn off.

 

I find wide lenses very useful when I want to leave space around buildings so that I can correct the vertical lines later on -- e.g. I shot this old hacienda building in Mexico with the Sony wide angle adapter (12mm) and was then able to straighten things up considerably in post-processing, cropping the fuzzy stuff from the edges.

[Bryan]

I'm gradually getting the measure of this lens, and have published a couple of test shots here.

 

The jury continues to deliberate, it's fun to use, but there are some technical problems.

[John Mitchell]

I'm gradually getting the measure of this lens, and have published a couple of test shots here.

 

The jury continues to deliberate, it's fun to use, but there are some technical problems.

 

Thanks for the test, Bryan. Look at it this way, you could have spent twice as much on another lens and gotten similar (if not worse) results.

 

It looks to be sharper on the sides than the Sony 16mm + wide angle converter (test of that combo here). The Samyang/Rokinon is still on my list of possible purchases. It sounds like a good value.