Laowa 15mm f/2 ZERO-D Lens voor Canon EOS R

Great lens. Unsure about the zero-d claim but it is an excellent wide lens. Very well made and feels solid despite it's light weight.

My earlier review was titled Iceland Lens of Choice. Now that's it's springtime and wildflower season I'm having fun with the close focus capability of this lens. Can compose photos showing both detail of a small flower and its habitat and background. Here are two examples from the hill behind our home in Jacksonville, Oregon. Gentner's fritillary was with an a7iii. For Paintbrush the Laowa was mounted on a a6500, effective focal length 22.5mm. This is a useful fun versatile lens of fine optics and handling.

Ive been shooting with a Tokina 11-16 for the past 4 years which was a perfect lens (only for mft so became ~18-27, now I need to buy new lenses for my a7riii). I was expecting the zero-d to mean no distortion, while it doesnt show pincushioning etc, any room is crazily distorted due to the perspective of the width of the lens. I bought it for interior real estate videos, and its completely useless as it almost has the distortion of a fisheye. Need to pan? Tilt? Track? All of those things are out of the window unless youre comfortable with huge perspective distortion everywhere outside the centre of the image. Want an OSS of someone? Then youd better be comfortable with their head being warped into the shape of an alien. I wish I could have returned this lens, unfortunately I bought it for a month long trip, didnt have time to try it before departure and now am stuck with a $1000 paperweight. Note the change in the shape of the rubbish photo on the wall as I pan:

just never fails to create great shots. Theres something there thats difficult to articulate but its definitely there. Im one of those who really likes being down there in the ultra wide world and this is by far my favorite. I had a Sony 16-15 2.8 and where that another unworldly sharp ultra-wide it just doesnt seem to have the same pop as the Laowa. The only thing that comes close for me is the Sigma 20mm 1.4. The Laowa excels at almost anything traditionalists use ultra wides for and even makes for a great, unique walk around lens as its minimum focus distance it ridiculously close. For me, this is a very special lens.

Debated a long time between this the Zeiss batis 18mm to round out my other batis primes. The trade offs in price, wider aperture, low distortion and closer minimum focus distance won me over. There is heavy vignetting, but I dont find it much of an issue for this type of lens as I rarely shoot large open landscapes, and from what I saw playing with the raw files, it corrects just fine. I do prefer the color rendition of the batis lenses more, but I can get to a similarly happy spot with this in photoshop, just takes a little extra effort. Overall, a great addition to my prime lens kit, and would buy again. It gives some cool perspectives. Only cons I see are the weight, and Im not confident in its weather sealing compared to the batis line.