Since I made the switch to Fuji, I have been having a lot of fun with manual focus vintage glass, but when I saw the SLR Magic HyperPrime 50mm F/.95 came in an X mount version, I had to give it a try. I received the lens earlier this week and here are my initial thoughts on it.
Initial Thoughts on SLR Magic HyperPrime 50mm F/.95
This lens impressed me right out of the box in terms of its build quality and overall feel. The box itself is rather minimal, just cardboard and some bubble wrap to protect the lens. The SLR Magic HyperPrime 50mm F/.95 is all metal and right out of the box, you can feel it.
It feels solid, without feeling overtly heavy, which is especially nice shooting on smaller mirrorless rigs like it is designed to be. It is sized perfectly for my X-T1, and offers almost unmatched low-light performance. Everything from the metal screw in lens cap (which I can’t decide if I really like or not), to the focus ring, and the all metal mount just feels well crafted and top quality.
Pros – SLR Magic HyperPrime 50mm F/.95
- Very well built (all metal)
- Feels solid, but not overly heavy
- Insane light gathering performance of F/.95
- Balances well on my X-T1
- Locking Aperture screw
Cons – SLR Magic HyperPrime 50mm F/.95
- No clicking aperture ring (it’s smooth, like a cinema lens)
- Screw in lens cap adds un-needed time to taking your first image
- Minimum Focus Distance (Personally, I would like to be able to get a little closer)
Overall, I have been pretty impressed by this little lens in the first week or so since I received it. I have not been able to do a ton of shooting with it yet, but from what I have seen, it looks pretty good. It’s honestly not very sharp at F/.95, but it does have a neat dreamy effect to the shot and by f/2, it’s very sharp, so this is still a great low light lens.
I am looking forward to give it a good low light run through here in the next couple of weeks, and really nailing down if this lens is worth the $1200 it is currently being sold for. So stay tuned!
For those interested now, you can find it over on B&H in the Fuji X-Mount as well as many other mounts.
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not that excitement
It is not very sharp, so I prefer using my 1.4 lens which produces great results.
F 0.95 is not really usable on a daily routine, is it? I mean, almost everything is out of focus if you use this glas at that aperture.
It all depends on what you are going for. If you want super sharp, ‘sanitized’ imagery than no, not really a lens for you wide open. But if you are going to that sort of dreamy soft focus look than this would be a great lens for ‘getting it right int eh camera’. All depends on your needs and what your vision for an image is.
I get the dreamy look’s appeal, and I can totally dig getting it right in the camera, first. But at this price, I’d much rather dreamify it in post.
That first shot looks extremely out of focus. How can you have more in-focus detail in the lens writing (16-50) than the F/2.0 shot when the first is shot at f/0.95?
As I said, it is not very sharp at F/.95, and it has to be manually focused so there is ofcourse room for a little user error. I took many shots at .95, this one was the ‘sharpest’ on the ‘Samsung’ logo. Its more of a soft focus at .95 than a sharp focus.
I get that, and appreciate the review. Do you see what I am talking about though? How is further down the lens more in focus at F/.95 than it is at F/2.0?
Yeah, I see what you are saying. I noticed that as well.
I think the answer is that its not focused in the same area. The focus ring of the lens seems to be the “sharpest” area of the f/.95 shot, while the “samsung” area seems to be the sharpest area of the f/2 and f/4 shots. So i’d imagine either the author changed the focus or the camera was moved. That would explain why the lens writing is more in focus on the wider aperture image. You can see this in the wood as well.