Senior Member Registered: November, 2006 Location: Germany Posts: 127 2 users found this helpful | Review Date: April 2, 2014 | Recommended | Price: $90.00
| Rating: 8 |
Pros: | Very close focusing distance | Cons: | Strong barrel distortion | Sharpness: 8
Aberrations: 5
Bokeh: 9
Handling: 6
Value: 10
| | The 04 is anything but a toy lens - it's very sharp considering its f7.1 aperture, and sharpens up very nicely with some capture sharpening to give even better results. It shows considerable barrel distortion and some CA at the corners and edges, but both can be dealt with using some lens correction tools; with e.g. Lightroom 5 removal of CA is just one click away.
The barrel distortion can also be dealt with easily, but of course one sacrifices some border regions because of the necessary crop after the distortion correction.
Where the 04 really shines is its close focusing capability. It has a maximum magnification of 0,15 or 1:7; combined with the tiny sensor of the Q/Q7 that offers really macro capabilities: an object only 32 millimeters wide will fill the frame of the Q7's sensor - and that's even closer than you'll get with a 1:1 macro lens on a full frame body, where an object has to be 36 mm wide to fill the frame. And the f7.1 helps to achieve a good DOF for macro work.
There are some downsides of course. The short focal length commands you to get really close to the subject for macro work, and the manual focusing makes this lens definitely a "slow lens" - you have to check focus carefully in magnified view.
If one is prepared to work slowly, this is a very nice lens to have and to use - not only for macro work, but also for more general photography. It's one of the tiniest lenses of the Q system (only the 05 and the 07 are smaller), so it doesn't need to much space to have it with you. All in all an IMO undervalued and surprisingly versatile lens.
Some macro shots - all done with Q7 and 04: | |
Loyal Site Supporter Registered: March, 2009 Location: Cotati, California USA Posts: 4,460 1 user found this helpful | Review Date: December 31, 2012 | Not Recommended | Price: $60.00
| Rating: 7 |
Pros: | field of view | Cons: | not really toy like, 03 lens makes this sort of redundant | | If this seems like a bad review it's not really intended to be. I took the hook on buying this lens before doing enough research. The 'toy' aspect gave me hope for a Holga or Lensbaby like performance lens but what I have found is that this is a manual focus wide angle lens of limited usefulness. Other than it's modest cost, if you have the 02 or 03 lens I see no purpose for this lens in your camera bag. Once I figured out how to use the focus assist magnifier and focus peaking on the Q, I was able to get decently focused images and evaluate this lens a bit. Simply put, it's reasonably sharp and that's the problem, I wanted a Holga performance and I got something ok but not really that interesting.
So who is this lens for? Not sure but if you just had the 01 Prime lens, this lens would give you some range on the wide end over the 01.
Advice, forget the 'toy' lens designation, it's just a wide angle lens.
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