Samyang MF 135mm F2.0 Manual Focus Lens for Canon EF

Product Information

As photographers, we tend to be highly visual and a comparison image makes size differences especially clear to us. Used Lenses for Mirrorless Cameras Used Lenses for Canon EOS R Used Lenses for Nikon Z Used Lenses for Sony Alpha Used Lenses for L-mount Used Lenses for Fujifilm X Used Lenses for Micro 4/3 Used Lenses for Canon EF-M Used Lenses for other Mirrorless Cameras DSLR Lenses Canon Fit Lenses Nikon Fit Lenses Lens Accessories Lens Caps Lens Hoods Lens cloths and cleaning kits Lens Attachments

Fully zoomed Live View manual focusing or the equivalent (such as using a tethered laptop) is the ideal way to focus this lens. Andromeda Galaxy, our neighbouring galaxy, was my first deep-sky image taken using this lens and is a great target for beginners. Set the focus ring at infinity and set the aperture setting wide open, i.e. f/2. Setting the lens to infinity will bring you into the correct range for focusing on stars, and only small refinements will be needed from here. Sony Zeiss Sonnar T* 1.8/135 ZA (review): Same size, even heavier, stellar image quality and autofocus. The latter is only screw-driven and works only with the LA-EA4, the Achilles heel of the lens is the tendency to purple fringing wide open. The Samyang and the Zeiss APO-Sonnar are much better in that regard. The bokeh of the Sony 1.8/135 is smoother at longer distances than the bokeh of the Samyang 2/135. The MFD (Minimum Focus Distance) and most-infinite (past infinity focus usually) focusing distances are hard stops, making focus setting marks repeatable.Sure, not all 135mm lenses are lightweight— Sigma's new 135mm F1.8 is rather heavy at 1130g—but if you look at the Samyang 135mm F2, which is pretty much flawless optically, it weighs only 830g. And if you want autofocus, I would recommend the Canon 135mm f2.0L, which is incredibly light for its performance at just 750g. Extreme value for the money Although this lens feels solid, it is rather light when compared to a telescope. When coupled with my Canon DSLR camera, the entire system weighs just over 3 pounds. That means that it doesn’t require a robust equatorial telescope mount as a larger, heavier telephoto lens would. Note that there is one exception to the half stop aperture settings – the half stop between f/16 and f/22 is not available.

The Samyang has a nine blade iris that should help it achieve great bokeh. Perfectly round at f/2, the bokeh is no longer round from f/2.8. While the bokeh is not bad, keep in mind this photo was intended to show the shape of the bokeh and not the bokeh itself. Conclusion: First, the Samyang 135mm f/2 Lens shares a 31.5" (800mm) MFD (Minimum Focus Distance) spec with the Zeiss 135mm f/2 Lens. Canon nFD 2.8/135 (review): Decent but not stellar performer with excellent price-performance ratio. Conclusion good While some versions of this lens include a focus confirmation chip, I do not find DSLR focus confirmation lights to be accurate enough to count on for manual focusing.Memory Cards & Storage SD Cards Micro SD cards CFexpress cards Compact Flash and CFast cards Card Readers SSD and USB Drives Scanners Lateral (transverse) CA (Chromatic Aberration) is very well controlled and is only slightly recognizable even when trying to find it. As you can see, this lens doesn’t perform completely flawless in that category. I like that the veiling flare only affects a small area and that the contrast stays very high while shooting against the sun. The amount of ghosting can be disturbing under circumstances. Vignetting

The biggest let-down of this lens is it’s manual focus only. And this is more critical than a wide or standard lens because the larger magnifications when shooting with a 135mm lens makes the depth of field shallower and thus focus harder to nail. If you’re similar to me at manual focusing you have to cope with the risk of having around 40-70% of your shots with less than optimal focus/sharpness – unless you work from a tripod. This certainly is a killer for many photographers who need to nail their shot with only one try – and fast. They should absolutely avoid this lens and look for an alternative with autofocus, there’s no denying it. But if you work from a tripod using magnified live-view, have the chance to swap the focusing screen for one better-suited to manual focusing, or simply have the time to take a second or third shot if necessary, then you need not shy away from considering this lens. Plus if you mount it on a modern mirrorless camera, you can exploit technologies like focus peaking to further ease manual focusing. The extra low dispersion lens reduces chromatic aberration effectively to produce excellent image quality. While 135mm can work well for sports and other people in fast motion activities, many will find the manual focus requirement a detraction for this use. You should now be in focus! To guarantee that you are well within the focus sweet spot, you can stop down the lens to f/2.8 or f/4. This will give you a wider depth of field, but more importantly, it reduces the chance that your camera will drift out of focus as the temperature changes through the night.Overall, the Samyang 135mm f/2 ED UMC Lens is a very strong performer from an image quality perspective. Bokeh - the visual quality of the out-of-focus areas of a photographic image, especially as rendered by a particular lens.

The Witches’ Head Nebula; a great choice near the bright star Rigel in Orion. This reflection nebula is an ideal target for an unmodified DSLR camera. Note that the (unchipped) lens will not report the selected aperture to the camera and the aperture setting will not be recorded in the captured image's EXIF information. A 100mmL lens (which can shoot true Macro) is slightly more versatile than the 135mmL lens (which has a larger Minimum Focusing Distance of several feet!!). But the Bokeh is strong from both lenses and yet it is more powerful and distinct from the 135mmL lens than the 100mmL lens. For wildlife at a distance the 135mmL is more useful. For indoor shots and Macros the 100mmL will be more useful. You really have to think hard about which lens to buy but each fulfills a slightly different purpose with slightly different strengths and slightly different results. In the end I bought both although some people might consider the two lenses together to be too much. And, if you are using a lens with an f/5.6 max aperture at 135mm (including some of the kit lenses), the difference is huge. Used Cameras Used DSLR Cameras Used Mirrorless Cameras Used Compact Cameras Used Film Cameras Used Action Cameras and Video Used Lenses For DSLR Cameras Used Lenses for Canon EOS Used Lenses for Nikon AF Other Used LensesMore surprising is that, using a flat target perfectly aligned in the center of the plane of sharp focus, practically no change is seen over the entire aperture range until the softening effects of diffraction are reached. Mirrorless System Lenses Canon RF Lenses Fujifilm X Mount Lenses Nikon Z Lenses Sony E Mount Lenses Sony G Master Lenses L Mount Lenses Micro Four Thirds Lenses Canon EF-M Lenses