samyang 35mm f1.4

[blink138]

after looking around and researching for about a year, a lot here on iis, i picked up a samyang 35mm f1.4 lens for my 60da on ebay for $270, and as a bonus it was local pick up!
i must say that although i am a complete noob on dslr and their respective lenses, i am astounded at this lenses clarity for "normal use" (read daylight)
anybody got any astro pics from this lens for me to look at?
cannot wait to piggyback it on my scope
pat

[CapturingTheNight]

I have been eyeing off this one as well. David Kingham uses it quite a lot in his great nightscape work. From memory of the hangout that I did with him, this shot http://www.davidkinghamphotography.com/night/h5600383c#h5600383c is something like a 27 image panorama using it. If it is anywhere as good as the Samyang 14mm F/2.8 with virtually no coma, then it will surely grace my camera bag very soon.

[iceman]

Yeh I'm looking at getting one too. Lincoln Harrison uses it too.

[CapturingTheNight]

I thought he had the Sigma but I could be wrong......

[blink138]

that is one unbelievable shot is it not!
the colour is astounding and looks very naturally toned and real
mike i have seen some of your nightscapes and i think said that you use one of the samyangs....... the 24mm?
pat

[iceman]

No, you are quite right. I was wrong. He does have the Sigma.



Thanks Pat, yeh I use the Samyang 14mm, like Greg.

[blink138]

from the reports i have read the 24mm is the blogs dollocks!
maybe not wide enough for a lot of nightscapes though...... but i am just learning about it all
pat

[iceman]

At 35mm, you'd really need to be tracking. You'd only get 15 seconds or less before you start getting trailing.

[blink138]

ha yes its funny you should mention that as i cobbled it together on an old fixed tripod and let er rip
just on AV and wide open i took an exposure of about 5 seconds....... wow it sucks up some light, but yeah on zoom it was trailing even at 5 secs
cant wait to try piggyback in a week or so
pat

[CapturingTheNight]

What do the stars look like in the corner of the frame wide open at F1.4 Pat? Any chance you can post a sample pic or two please? Don't worry about noise quality or subject matter. Just a 5 sec fixed tripod of any stars wide open and at ISO 1600-3200 should tell me all I need to know.
Kind regards
Greg

[blink138]

i will greg i purposely left it wide open just to check the corners and when i zoomed in to max they still had the same amount of trailing and didnt seem to smudge "radially" into the centre
i caught antares and scorpio rising in the east a couple of nights ago and snapped it
pat

[blink138]

greg i could not work out how to get the raw image shrunk for internet
the only way i could do it was by putting the single image and "stack" it in dss then copy image in the "paint" then edit down to the 1024
anyhoo i hope it answers your question
single shot
canon 60da
samyang 35mm @ f1.4
iso 500 (higher iso far too bright)
4 sec exposure
pat

[blink138]

hmmm just edited and cropped the top one third left side of above image
dont know what it means if anyting but there does not seem any smudges
static mount of course
pat

[iceman]

Those stars are exceptionally sharp for f/1.4!

I must get this lens!

[CapturingTheNight]

Thank you so much for the pics Pat. Really appreciate it. Certainly looks the goods. Tiny bit of coma evident but a lot less than I expected for F/1.4
Definitely adding it to my shopping list.....
Cheers

[blink138]

another interesting thing......... i borrowed my brothers canon 16 - 35mm f2.8 L glass lens and i thought i would do a comparison with the samyang
so the first pic is with the canon
35mm @ f2.8 30s@ iso 340
samyang exactly the same both piggbacked on my c11 / g11
what i found was the canon was a pig to focus and it took me about 5 mins to do so as you just breathe on the focus ring and it changes too much
the samyang took a couple of seconds on zoom live mode which was an absolute dream
i am trying to zoom in on the edges and post them but having difficulty
at first glance the canon to me looked better as i could see crux standing out but that doesnt appear to be the full story
pat

[blink138]

ah..... thats not right
try that again

[blink138]

i think this is it now
pat

[blink138]

ah i think i have found how to crop
this is a zoom of the centre of each in the same order
i will attempt a corner crop now
pat

[blink138]

well after much "gnashing of teeth" the bottom left corner of each
it is very interesting
pat

[gbeal]

Difficult to follow, but from what I think you are suggesting, the Samyang is better, correct?
Definitely interesting.
Gary

[blink138]

it certainly looks better to me gary but these are the very first time i have ever used any sort of lens on a dslr
i am not even toatally sure if indeed it is a fair comparison as the canon is zoom and the sam not
i just had them both at 35mm and f2.8
pat

[gbeal]

Zoom? OK, that might be enough to make such a difference. Not really fair at all then, LOL.
Anyway, the SY seems a good lens, and stopped down a tad can only get sharper.
Gary

[gregbradley]

I don't know. Thats a fair bit of coma.

It probably would disappear around f2 to F2.2 if its the same as its 24mm F1.4 sibling I have. So in a way these F1.4 lenses are a misnomer for astro work. They are usually no good until stopped down. Coma and chromatic aberration are too high until about F2.2 and you are back to practically F2.8 anyway. In terrestial imaging these characteristics are not so much of a problem as they are bought mainly for shallow depth of field effects. But for astro coma and CA are super important.

Sigma 35mm F1.4 is the lens to get here. More expensive but hey - its the sharpest lens DXO Mark has ever tested. That's an amazing feat.

The trouble of course is they are $800.

Having said that my Samyang 24mm F1.4 is a nice lens and gives rich colours. Its also got a nice focus ring feel which is important with a manual focus lens.

Greg.

[blink138]

thanks for the input guys....... now is the comparison unfair because one of them is a zoom?
and greg i must admit i dont see much coma on the samyang compared to the canon...... i guess thats why i am interested in how fair a comparison really is as this is my first ever lens
pat

[gregbradley]

Fair enough Pat. If it responds like my 24mm F1.4 coma is not an issue after F2. It was below that.

I think you'll find that this is typical of fast lenses. They exhibit coma and false colour wide open and need to be stopped down to clean up.

So there is a slight gain compared to an F2.8 lens but not as much as it could be.

My Nikon 85mm F1.8g and 50mm F1.8g werre good from about F2.0 to F2.2 as well.

Greg.

[blink138]

ah i see what you are saying now greg
is it unfair comparison because the samyang has been stopped down but the canon is wide open at f2.8?
would the canon look a lot better stopped down a couple of stops? (because that looks awful on the edge at 2.8)
the next chance i get then i will take a short exposure with the samyang at f1.4
pat

[Hakka]

If anyone wants samples from the sigma 35 let me know.

[gregbradley]

Me please. This lens is high on my wish list.

Greg.

[gregbradley]

Most lenses peak in performance around F5.6 to 7.1 or close by. Its a very unusual and top end lens that is great wide open. I only know of a few like that.

F1.4 type lenses are designed for terrestial photographers to create a shallow depth of field background blur effect. So corner performance is usually not an issue as you are concentrating on something in the centre and the rest of the image is blurred. So coma, chromatic aberration are not important. Not so with astrophotography where we want speed and wideopen fast lenses with no aberrations. Not many meet that need.

Greg.

[blink138]

yes please lincoln!
pat

[Hakka]

These are full resolution JPGs, converted from D800E RAW files, unedited.

file #1 is f1.4 iso800 51sec
file #2 is f2.8 iso1600 71sec

The exposures aren't matched but it will give you an idea of the coma and CA at f1.4 and f2.8. I've only used it for one star shoot so I dont have any shots at other apertures yet.

There's also a city night shot in there, f6.3 13sec iso100, unedited.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/89j5iyvgqhg8q6d/OAoWBWTtJh

[gregbradley]

Gorgeous shots Lincoln.

That is unbelievable. There is no noticeable chromatic aberration in the F1.4 image. This is the first time I have seen a lens do that.

I gotta get one of those lenses. The resolution is so fine. Sigma used to be regarded as hit and miss and some good but QC issues etc but they seem to have gone to whole new level with these Art series lenses. Like a Lexus from a Toyota.

Greg.