Rokinon 21mm f/1.4

Courtesy of some of the 1,500 "saved" shots from swapping readers...

f/2

f/1.4

f/2

f/4

f/1.4

f/1.4

f/1.4

All shots are f/1.4, except otherwise noted...

All of these are "saved" shots...

f/2.8

f/3.5

Great to see you got most of them back! It looks like a treasure trove of interesting and nicely done shots too.

User1303423862 wrote:

Great to see you got most of them back! It looks like a treasure trove of interesting and nicely done shots too.

A big +1.  I'm so glad some were salvaged!

R2

I really like the colors and the bokeh from this lens.
Did you do anything special processing to these Raw files or they come like that as JPEG from the M6ii ?
The rendering looks like L glass.

Photato wrote:

I really like the colors and the bokeh from this lens.
Did you do anything special processing to these Raw files or they come like that as JPEG from the M6ii ?
The rendering looks like L glass.

No and yes; nothing special on post, in fact SOOC JPEGs are strong.

Yes in that it looks like L glass. Again, you have to put up with MF to get the results, but they're potent results when you "hit".

The contrast delivered is strong I should add. Matters as the ability to push files in RAW, is notably better on the Rokinon's, than on Canon EF-M AF native glass. I overexposed this shot accidentally by more than 3 stops; you'd never guess I recovered 4-5 stops from it.

Rokinon 50mm f/1.2 @ f/1.2

RLight wrote:

Photato wrote:

I really like the colors and the bokeh from this lens.
Did you do anything special processing to these Raw files or they come like that as JPEG from the M6ii ?
The rendering looks like L glass.

No and yes; nothing special on post, in fact SOOC JPEGs are strong.

Yes in that it looks like L glass. Again, you have to put up with MF to get the results, but they're potent results when you "hit".

The contrast delivered is strong I should add. Matters as the ability to push files in RAW, is notably better on the Rokinon's, than on Canon EF-M AF native glass. I overexposed this shot accidentally by more than 3 stops; you'd never guess I recovered 4-5 stops from it.

Rokinon 50mm f/1.2 @ f/1.2

Wow ! Over or UNDER exposed ?
Did not know +3 EV exposures are recoverable like this.

Photato wrote:

RLight wrote:

Photato wrote:

I really like the colors and the bokeh from this lens.
Did you do anything special processing to these Raw files or they come like that as JPEG from the M6ii ?
The rendering looks like L glass.

No and yes; nothing special on post, in fact SOOC JPEGs are strong.

Yes in that it looks like L glass. Again, you have to put up with MF to get the results, but they're potent results when you "hit".

The contrast delivered is strong I should add. Matters as the ability to push files in RAW, is notably better on the Rokinon's, than on Canon EF-M AF native glass. I overexposed this shot accidentally by more than 3 stops; you'd never guess I recovered 4-5 stops from it.

Rokinon 50mm f/1.2 @ f/1.2

Wow ! Over or UNDER exposed ?
Did not know +3 EV exposures are recoverable like this.

Over, and neither did I. I can dig up the original RAW if you’d like but I mentally said the same thing and noted the contrast available in the RAW may have something to do with it.

Oh, my God! Rokinon 21mm f/1.4!

I didn't know this lens until I came from you. I like the 35mm focal length very much, but the aperture of canon22 does not meet my requirements. The picture quality of Viltrox23's largest aperture is too bad. Rokinon 21mm f/1.4 is exactly my dream full-frame 35mmf2 lens!

The information you provided is very helpful to me. Unfortunately, I found that China does not have this lens for more information, and it is not sold. Due to strict epidemic prevention policies, I can't even buy it from Amazon.

Yaixi wrote:

Oh, my God! Rokinon 21mm f/1.4!

I didn't know this lens until I came from you. I like the 35mm focal length very much, but the aperture of canon22 does not meet my requirements. The picture quality of Viltrox23's largest aperture is too bad. Rokinon 21mm f/1.4 is exactly my dream full-frame 35mmf2 lens!

The information you provided is very helpful to me. Unfortunately, I found that China does not have this lens for more information, and it is not sold. Due to strict epidemic prevention policies, I can't even buy it from Amazon.

My 2 cents? I've noted many bans on products, even in the states, for "pandemic" reasons, appear to be trade-war related.

It's notable that Rokinon/Samyang are produced in South-Korean; the ban in your case sounds geopolitical.

Wish I could recommend an alternative, however I'm unaware of another strong 35mm equivalent other than the Rokinon (Samyang) 21mm f/1.4 for EF-M. I don't see the trade-war issues subsiding as they were here before 2019, the "pandemic" just gave countries good-sounding reasons to ban other countries goods that they always wanted. In your case, you're victim to lack of domestic produced alternative of equal quality.

You could have a look at the new Laowa 25mm f/0.95; 25mm isn't 21mm but it's fairly close.  I believe it's domestically produced (China), however I've found Samyang gives a unique rendering of both colors and bokeh. The Laowa sounds promising on paper though as the optical design is a double gauss; gives traditional bokeh rendering vs the more modern "cookie jar" lens designs that favor sharpness at the expensive of bokeh rendering. The Laowa 25mm 0.95 notably lacks special lens coatings which give the Rokinon/Samyangs not just flare protection, but very strong contrast resolution. I think that's going to be your best bet though. It's likely going to perform better in low light, produce more bokeh, sharp, but color and contrast rendition is the question mark. It's APO though, that's unique, you should get some extra bokeh-oomph.

Hopefully it's cheaper for natives though; that lens is a bit pricey for crop.

f/1.4

Notably, our cat of 19yrs, passed last week. She was a sweet heart, but she lived most her life under our bed, skittish from birth.