Macro lens advice

[Yvonne X-T4]

Since one month I am the happy owner of an X-T4

In the past I did shoot some macro, but I was more into bird photography so I am not very experienced.

Together with the X-T4 I use the XF 70-300 for insect/flower/butterfly photos and enjoy this a lot.

I am thinking about buying a macro lens to find out if I enjoy it, next to my bird photography.

Crucial for me is lightweight and I would love to have a lens with a 1:1 or 2:1 factor.

I have read about the Laowa 65 mm f/2.8 and the 7Artisans 60mm mkII

Both lightweight and reasonably priced to start with trying out macro.

Online and on dpreview I can find info about both lenses.

Do you know if there is a review/user experience where both lenses are compared to each other? Or can anybody in this forum give advice out of experience with both lenses? Or maybe you have a better suggestion that I didn’t think of!

Thank you in advance! Love to learn from your experience and get good information to help me decide what option might be best for me.

 

[Rightsaidfred]

Both lightweight and reasonably priced to start with trying out macro.

Hi Yvonne

At least the Laowa is a really professional lens, not only good for a start.

I have it and am still very happy with it. Resolution is excellent.

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www.dpreview.com

Unfortunately, I cannot provide you a comparison with the 7Artisans. But I find the price of the Laowa pretty acceptable.

Kind regards,

Martin

 

[Chris_84]

The laowa 65mm macro is an excellent Lens. Very sharp, even wide open. But it is manual focus (which is no Problem at all).















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[Clive99]

As others have said, the Laowa is excellent. APO design is really nice with bright background and near complete lack of colour fringing. Spectacularly sharp. No experience with the 7artisans, but I'd expect it to be much more budget oriented.

 

[Diacyclops81]

What if cats had a second pair of prominent eyes, like jumping spiders.

 

[Tim van der Leeuw]

I don't have experience with the 7Artisans macro, but I cannot recommend enough the Laowa 65mm macro.

It's small and light for a macro lens, the picture quality is outstanding, the manual focusing is quite easy to do actually.

You can go up to 2x magnification and see amazing details in everything -- but you don't have to, and focusing is a lot easier to get right when you have a bit more distance from your subject.

You can also use it as a medium tele lens or a portrait lens easily, with the 65mm focal length.

I think it's well worth the extra money you spend on it vs the 7Artisans, and it's half the price of the Fuji 80mm macro.

Edit:

See this thread for pictures taken with the Laowa 65mm taken by various forum users:

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www.dpreview.com

 

[pictograph]

Since one month I am the happy owner of an X-T4

In the past I did shoot some macro, but I was more into bird photography so I am not very experienced.

Together with the X-T4 I use the XF 70-300 for insect/flower/butterfly photos and enjoy this a lot.

I am thinking about buying a macro lens to find out if I enjoy it, next to my bird photography.

Crucial for me is lightweight and I would love to have a lens with a 1:1 or 2:1 factor.

I have read about the Laowa 65 mm f/2.8 and the 7Artisans 60mm mkII

Both lightweight and reasonably priced to start with trying out macro.

Online and on dpreview I can find info about both lenses.

Do you know if there is a review/user experience where both lenses are compared to each other? Or can anybody in this forum give advice out of experience with both lenses? Or maybe you have a better suggestion that I didn’t think of!

Thank you in advance! Love to learn from your experience and get good information to help me decide what option might be best for me.

i recommend the xf 2.4/60 macro.

this lens is optically excellent, has a magnification of 0,5 and with a macro ring reaches about 0.8.

this lens is a real all-rounder with a excellent bokeh, sharpnes throughout the frame and lightweight as well. Very good for Portraits, landscape, stills and macro.

together with newer X-bodies the former slow AF is sufficiently fast and very precise as well.

note that Laowa and 7Artisans are strictly manually focussing.

a big advantage is that you can use the xf 2.4/60 lens in modus „focus bracketing“ which is a fantastic, game-changing modus in landscape, but more so in macro-photogaphy!
. At the moment this modus is implemented only in the X-T4 IIRC but I am sure that this modus will soon be available in firmware-upgrades for other bodies as well.

 

[Tim van der Leeuw]

a big advantage is that you can use the xf 2.4/60 lens in modus „focus bracketing“ which is a fantastic, game-changing modus in landscape, but more so in macro-photogaphy!
. At the moment this modus is implemented only in the X-T4 IIRC but I am sure that this modus will soon be available in firmware-upgrades for other bodies as well.

Fuji hasn't backported such features from newer to older bodies for a while now; the X-T3 got improved AF and that probably only because it was still considered a flagship-model. However the X-T3 did not get several other features found on the newer bodies even if the hardware is capable of them, such as double-exposures with more than 2 frames.

However, fortunately, focus bracketing exists in Fuji cameras since at least the X-H1!

Unfortunately I often find it less than useful because some lenses exhibit a lot of focus-breathing and this can cause ghosting and artifacts in the images.

 

[pictograph]

a big advantage is that you can use the xf 2.4/60 lens in modus „focus bracketing“ which is a fantastic, game-changing modus in landscape, but more so in macro-photogaphy!
. At the moment this modus is implemented only in the X-T4 IIRC but I am sure that this modus will soon be available in firmware-upgrades for other bodies as well.

Fuji hasn't backported such features from newer to older bodies for a while now; the X-T3 got improved AF and that probably only because it was still considered a flagship-model. However the X-T3 did not get several other features found on the newer bodies even if the hardware is capable of them, such as double-exposures with more than 2 frames.

However, fortunately, focus bracketing exists in Fuji cameras since at least the X-H1!

Unfortunately I often find it less than useful because some lenses exhibit a lot of focus-breathing and this can cause ghosting and artifacts in the images.

Thank you for yoir information....

I wasn‘t aware that focus bracketing is already existing for most cameras... since I stayed with my old XE1 bodies until some months ago and thought that focus bracketing is only implemented in newest cameras.



AF function with older bodies AND older lenses was sometimes PITA - but even with the very first three older lenses like 1.4/35, 2.4/60 and 2/18 the AF got sufficient fast (if not for sports or running dogs) and very precise on newer bodies. I imagine that this combination should be efficient as well for macro?

thanks again for the good news about focus bracketing on older cams, which should be even better with last generation cams.

 

[Rod McD]

Hi,

I doubt you'll find many people who own both lenses. I suspect people would have purchased one or the other and they aren't substitutes - they have different features and are in different price brackets.

For some years there was just the Fuji 60mm (or you could adapt legacy SLR macro lenses.) The XF 60mm was optically very good, but only reached 1:2, as your research has probably told you. Then Fuji offered the XF80mm, but although it reaches 1:1, it's a very heavy and very expensive lens.

I still have the 60mm but bought the Laowa about 6 months ago. I like both. I can only agree with others here.... The Laowa is great - well made, small, light (335g), and exceedingly sharp. It offers 2:1, which neither Fuji lens can reach. It's also apochromatic which neither Fuji macro lens offers either. To me, that's the icing on the cake whether you shoot macro or not - no PF or CAs.

The only limitations I can think of - and this applies to both lenses (and any other fully manual lens) - is that you don't get AF or instant aperture stop down. I'm not AF-dependent, but the aperture issue is more important.... You either 1) focus at maximum aperture, then stop down to the working aperture and shoot, or 2) you focus at the working aperture and shoot instantly, but with less focusing precision. The first option takes a little time - fine for many subjects, but not all. The second is quicker, but you don't get the accuracy of focusing wide open. Only a macro lens with full electronic coupling will give you instant aperture stop down and right now that means a Fuji XF lens.

Enjoy whatever you decide.

Cheers, Rod

 

[Morris0]

It is great that you are enjoying close up photography with your 70-300. Two common and inexpensive ways to get closer include using extension tubes and/or close up filters. Canon makes an excellent close up filter and there are many brands of tubes that provide full connective including AF. I have the MEIKE MK-F-AF3 tubes which are inexpensive and work well. Depending how small your subject is, you may need tubes to get close even with a macro lens making them a great first purchase. Before getting a manual focus lens try manual focusing your 70-300 and see how you like it. Many use manual focus for macro yet you don't have to. As you get closer focusing gets trickier due to the very narrow DOF. Many use a tripod with special attachments to get to the needed location. It's a new world and can be a lot of fun.

Morris

 

[baobob]

With a MF macro lens without OIS using a HSS flash does help a lot.

I use a Godox 860 at 1/500 sec and moreover this allows f16 for DOF, evnthough I use a Xf macro lens.







--
Good judgment comes from experience
Experience comes from bad judgment

 

[Yvonne X-T4]

Thank you all very much for all your info about the different lenses (with great examples), all the extra info about tubes and filters and the suggestion to try MF with my 70-300 first.

@rod thank you for your clear explanation about how the manual focus with stopping down works!

Great to be member of a community with so much knowledge and expertise
A lot of options to consider

 

[Tim van der Leeuw]

a big advantage is that you can use the xf 2.4/60 lens in modus „focus bracketing“ which is a fantastic, game-changing modus in landscape, but more so in macro-photogaphy!
. At the moment this modus is implemented only in the X-T4 IIRC but I am sure that this modus will soon be available in firmware-upgrades for other bodies as well.

Fuji hasn't backported such features from newer to older bodies for a while now; the X-T3 got improved AF and that probably only because it was still considered a flagship-model. However the X-T3 did not get several other features found on the newer bodies even if the hardware is capable of them, such as double-exposures with more than 2 frames.

However, fortunately, focus bracketing exists in Fuji cameras since at least the X-H1!

Unfortunately I often find it less than useful because some lenses exhibit a lot of focus-breathing and this can cause ghosting and artifacts in the images.

Thank you for yoir information....

I wasn‘t aware that focus bracketing is already existing for most cameras... since I stayed with my old XE1 bodies until some months ago and thought that focus bracketing is only implemented in newest cameras.

AF function with older bodies AND older lenses was sometimes PITA - but even with the very first three older lenses like 1.4/35, 2.4/60 and 2/18 the AF got sufficient fast (if not for sports or running dogs) and very precise on newer bodies. I imagine that this combination should be efficient as well for macro?

thanks again for the good news about focus bracketing on older cams, which should be even better with last generation cams.

Well, for macros, the AF has really let me down: when you accidentally get a bit too close for the lens it starts focus hunting.

Even when you don't, it starts to focus hunt frequently and then it will focus on something further away than you want, and what you want to focus on will be so much out of focus (due to short distances) that you can hardly see it in the viewfinder to refocus on...

Now that I have the Laowa manual focus lens, I'm actually just finding it _so_ _much_ _easier_. So much less frustrating than with failing AF.

 

[Birdmanfriday]

I pretty much rely on AF for my close up work. Shooting active insects that settle or stop moving only fleetingly makes manual focus difficult and often almost impossible. Even if you pre-set the focus then move closer yourself my hit rate is low and often the butterfly, or other subject, will have moved. The biggest errors are often caused by your own movement, amplified by the close working distance - even a few millimetres is huge.

However, focus bracketing while using AFS makes a huge difference. One key problem is that, when shooting a three dimensional subject, it’s very hard to judge optimal focus position on a two dimensional screen. Focus bracketing can really help - I simply try to judge which element of the subject is nearest and focus on that; the bracketing then increases the chance that one of the frames will be optimal. I will also often merge some of the frames in post, providing they align successfully, but it really depends on how they look. Even just merging two frames will substantially improve depth of field. It also allows shooting at a wider aperture which maximises lens performance - I now usually use f8. Focus limiting helps focus speed significantly too.

Since I adopted this approach, my hit rate has vastly improved. The following images were all taken this way, using an X-T4 and 80mm macro.

 

[Yvonne X-T4]

Thank you once more for your advice! Still practicing ‘macro’ with the 70-300. Do you use the Meike tubes with your 70-300 too?

I love this lens so far for ‘macro’ and am curious to try the option with those tubes.

Here are some of yesterdays try-outs;











If you have any questions or suggestions, happy to hear! Thank you in advance.

 

[baobob]

I work with the 80mm xf macro which is not light nor cheap but so easy to use handheld I also have the 60 macro which reaches the 1.1 ratio with the ext tubes

I don’t like to work MF in macro I usualywork in AFC handheld