Total winner. No-brainer RF lens

Canon hit a home run here. It's a must-have if you're into the RF system.

For a "non-L" lens, the weight, tight tolerances and substantial feel are very welcome. The focus and function ring are snug, precise and reassuring.

While not a 1:1 ratio - the macro function is useful for all-purpose photography and the performance at close, non-macro distances is fantastic and a bit of a hidden "feature" of the lens. By comparison, the old EF 35mm f/2 was a bit weak at the minimum focus distance.

Performance? I'm sure others will shoot brick walls and test charts and show you MTF graphs, so I won't. What I will say is that the optics are substantially better than the price point. It's neutral, balances sharpness and contrast well, deals with flare nicely, and renders font and back out of focus areas in a pleasing way.

Taking digital corrections off, you'll notice quite a bit of falloff in the corners. I like it for things I'm doing at f/1.8 but it's correctable easy enough.

It's in some ways milquetoast. It just does what you ask it to. A home run in my book - and leaving me not caring one bit about whatever 35L they cook up for the system.

100% Crop

I totaly agree , it,s a beautifull lens especialy for it,s price point.

Qulity  images by the way …. they show what the lens is capable off 

That model railroad setup might be a good candidate to try focus stacking with.

It’s a nice lens, a decent value at $450 for sure considering it doesn’t come with a hood, and is made in Taiwan instead of Japan.

Ill get shouted at by hoka, but it still exhibits some pretty bad CA, even for the price point.

I just really like the weight/size/IS.  It’s a nice fit on an R for a walk about/random video type of prime.

J A C S wrote:

You posted closeups. If this is what you need it for, fine.

I downloaded a bunch of images from IR taken with this lens and the RP. What I see there is mediocre, at best. I cannot believe that Canon would make such a lens at whatever price point. Strong PF, double line bokeh, you name it.

https://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/canon-eos-rp/canon-eos-rpGALLERY.HTM

I didn’t have time to go through the entire set on IR, but if the white flower closeup is the one you looked at to check the bokeh, I agree that it looks horrendous with busy bokeh and double-lines all over the place, my goodness. If that was the best my RF 35mm could do, I’d be as acerbic about it as you!

However, that frame has so many fine-grained features in the foreground and background that I have a hard time imagining any lens looking good shooting that at 35mm and F2.8.

If I were asked to shoot that subject matter, I’d put away the RF35 and use an EF100F2.8L wide open to blow away the background, and even then I won’t feel confident about getting a nice blurry background. If forced to use the RF35, I’d try shooting either wide open to try to clean up the background a bit more, or stopping way down to drag the annoying foreground blur on the flower petal into the DoF—in any case, I’d avoid the half-baked compromise at F2.8 used by the tester.

I'm getting a kick out of the "This image was taken wide open in broad daylight and the corners aren't to my standards!!!" stuff. Keep it coming!

PGSanta wrote:

It’s a nice lens, a decent value at $450 for sure considering it doesn’t come with a hood, and is made in Taiwan instead of Japan.

Ill get shouted at by hoka, but it still exhibits some pretty bad CA, even for the price point.

I just really like the weight/size/IS. It’s a nice fit on an R for a walk about/random video type of prime.

I think lens designers have come to the conclusion that CAs are easy enough to deal with. Vignetting, CAs and mild distortions seem to be the "go-to" compromises. I'm ok with that.

LMOE wrote:

It's a 'meh' lens. Nice, but has its issues. No better, no worse than other similar primes. Priced right at $450-$500 USD. I think many are overly excited about this lens at is the only one that is small and a good "fit" with the current R series bodies. Shame there are no decent R bodies - yet.

This may possible be the most internet forum thing ever said... until... "Some of us have higher standards I guess"

Canochrome wrote:

That model railroad setup might be a good candidate to try focus stacking with.

Agree. The point of focus here was more distant that it appears, and shot handheld in this instance, With the IS of this lens (which is fairly good for photography) - maybe I could have pulled it off.

Glenn Haley wrote:

There's a Video test of the RF 35mm on YouTube that shows the IS is not very good. I hope your new lens is better;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-SxdWzRxNmY

The IS is excellent for photography - hit some printable shots at 1 second without much trouble.

I don't think it'll be a revelation for shaky-hands videography stabilization, though. It performs well when it's not being jostled about, but you won't be bouncing around town like in that video and getting steady-cam footage with it.

Also - and I can't believe I am doing this - here are some terrible photos to illustrate what torturing this lens looks like. I ran outside and took many of these when I saw how off the rails the comments here got.

If you love to use your fast 35mm to take wide-open-in-broad-daylight photos of foliage or busy backgrounds - it's good to know what you're getting into.

First - this is what the out of focus rendering is generally like with this lens. Neutral, basic, nondescript.

Next - here's the old "brick wall" test. This is an extreme corner at 100%. Handheld, focused on the center of the frame. So ... BAD NEWS... if you spend $400 on this lens and really really wanted to take handheld photos of brick walls, wide open and have perfect corners - you won't. You also need a new hobby.

Extreme corner for you brick wall enthusiasts. Yes, I turn off all the software corrections.

NEXT. Bad Bokehs.

Here's a Leica Summicron M 35mm ASPH. Known for its terrible, low-rent rendering and awful bokeh. Wide open at f/2. It looks bad.

Bad bokeh, bro.

I KNOW, LITERALLY THE BADDEST.

Bad Leica Summicron M 35mm f/2 ASPH photo.

Similar photo - with this 35 RF. Don't take photos like this. But if you have to - it's not a disaster.

Another attempt at really bad bokeh with the 35RF

By the way - here's strong backlighting with the 35 RF.

Ok, one more bad blurbutter. The Leica. Nervous, busy. Not particularly pleasing.

Also, tell me all about the magenta corner/edge shifts with this lens on the EOS R with this lens and how that makes it totally useless.

The RF with a similar "bad bokeh" situation:

Or this one with the 35 RF

Summary: I can't believe I just took garbage back yard photos to try and make the blur of this lens look as bad as possible. But here it is.

J A C S wrote:

LeicaBOSS wrote:

I'm getting a kick out of the "This image was taken wide open in broad daylight and the corners aren't to my standards!!!" stuff. Keep it coming!

Right, because low light improves the IQ.

Here is an f/5 shot, BTW.

EXIF shows taken at 24mm. For a 35mm lens to take shots at 24mm is very impressive indeed.

Joe - I like this question- and it's good to have a few perspectives.

1. Is there a significantly better 35mm AF FF lens at this size and price point?

Let's set aside for a moment that the notion of a "better" lens doesn't mean "fares better on test charts" and look at mirrorless system 35mm options. In this price range the only peers are Lensbaby, Samyang, Rokinon, etc. So let's focus on main brand options:

• Canon RF 35 1.8. Close focus, Image stabilization.
• Sony Sonnar T* FE 35mm f/2.8 ZA Lens - slower, .12x Maximum magnification, $300 more, some serious problems with optics
• Nikon NIKKOR Z 35mm f/1.8 S - $846. No close focus. Good performer. Probably most would agree has more attractive blur
• Sigma 35 f/1.4 ART: $899. Faster (but not by much). Not stabilized. No close focus. Busy blur (I owned this)

In SLR lenses, the comparables would be Nikon AF-S NIKKOR 35mm f/1.8G ED Lens and the Canon EOS 35 f/2 IS - both over $500. I would have doubts that many would view the Canon 35/2 IS as an attractive upgrade from the 35 RF.

2. If not, what 35mm AF FF lens is the first moving up in size and price point that you would consider to have good bokeh, no PF and no significant compromises that would make it undesirable for other reasons?

I like how you wrote this question. In the hierarchy of things that matter in the field - you can ask yourself where PF ranks or "needs to be perfectly free of CAs out of camera" ranks for you and for what you shoot. Once you enter premium-priced lenses, there are always compromises. Even "technically near-perfect" lenses pay a boredom tax over lenses with more character.

To wit - there are a few personal choices that guide this answer - 1. What kind of blur matters to you - and what kind do you like?  2. What will you use this lens for?

Remember - I own that silly Leica Summicron M ASPH, which for many kinds of photography would be considered a complete joke from a technical standpoint. It also makes intensely beautiful images for me. Which point of view is correct?

That said, looking to the Zeiss designs is often a good place to start for attractive blur. The 35L II has a very clean look. The options are more limited that you'd imagine.

3. How much trouble is it to get rid of the PF you note in PP?

Thanks.

Joe