Sony Alpha Blog posted its review of the 7artisans Photoelectric 50mm f/1.05 and once again it looks like 7artisans has released another good value for money lens that allows photographers to work around f/1 without breaking the bank. I really enjoy fast Chinese glass when it is well designed, but most of the best lenses have been for APS-C with the Photoelectric 50mm f/1.05 being the first I have seen for Full Frame that interests me. Below you can see the pro/cons and part of the conclusion, but if you want to read the full article visit Sony Alpha Blog for samples and more.
The 7 Artisans 50mm F1.05 (486$) full frame manual lens has vocation to be an affordable ultra fast aperture lens. It deliver very beautiful portraits with a very nice and dreamy atmosphere. Strong points are the background blur, bokeh balls , very good and natural color rendering & good contrast. Sharpness is only average on a 61Mpix but will be perfectly ok on a 24Mpix camera.
Pros
- Very Smooth background blur giving unique portraits and atmosphere for objects details
- Very good color rendition
- Excellent Bokeh Balls even when closed down
- Very good centre sharpness as of F2.8
- Reasonable price (486$) for a F1.05 lens
- Good to very good contrast even wide open
- Some Vignetting at F1.05 but gone at F2
- Low Distorsion
- Very good rendering in video
- Excellent build quality
- Smoothly dampened focusing ring and clickless aperture ring
- Compact lens
Average
- Only average sharpness wide open and good at F1.4
- Chromatic Aberrations quite visible
- Weight
Cons
- Long minimum focusing distance of 57cm not allowing to have big bokeh balls
- Average resistance to flare, subject to ghosting wide open
- Focus breathing quite strong
- Corners are weak wide open and only become good as of F11
- No well defined sunstars at F16
- No lens hood
