First review of the new NiSi 15mm f/4.0 FE lens by Phillip Reeve

You can now preorder the new Nisi 15mm FE lens at BHphoto and Adorama.

Phillip Reeve tested the lens and concludes:

As I know many of you just scroll down here let me remind you that this was a pre production sample and there may be slight changes for the final production model.

Sometimes lenses from new manufacturers leave a lot to be desired and lately we have often seen lenses with staggering specs at low pricepoints that ended up not being really useful because too many compromises had to be made.
Luckily this is not the case here, I found the NiSi 15mm 4.0 to be a useful lens that did not disappoint in the field.
I especially like that it was fully usable at f/4.0 (very little field curvature) and that vignetting at this aperture is comparably moderate.

It should be noted though that there is also some competition in this focal length range, so let us discuss how the NiSi 15mm 4.0 fits in here:
First we have the Voigtlander 15mm 4.5 E, it has noticeably higher vignetting, similarly nice sunstars, but is a bit lighter and comes with electronic contacts, better flare resistance and with a 58mm filter thread. For some the non-removable hood may be a no-go though, as it makes using filters significantly harder, it is ~40% more expensive.
Then we have the Laowa 14mm 4.0, a lens that is very small and light but showed some issues with field curvature in our review and again comes with very high vignetting at f/4.0 (about 1 EV higher), no electronic contacts, nice sunstars, 52mm filter thread and a non-removable lens hood, it is similarly priced.
Then we have the Laowa 15mm 2.0, full two stops faster while similarly sized (heavier though), same vignetting at shared apertures, no electronic contacts, not well defined sunstars (early pre 2019 E-mount version) also 72mm filter thread and a removable hood, ~50% more expensive.

None of these options is a slouch, I told you about the differences, choose depending on your applications and budget which would work best for you.

7Artisans 50mm f/1.05 FE lens review by Marc Alhadeff: “A very nice artistic lens to discover the world of F1.0 lenses at reasonable price”

 

The new Full Frame lens is now in Stock at Amazon US, Amazon DE, Amazon UK.

Marc Alhadeff from Sonyalpha.blog tested the new 7Artisans 50mm f/1.05 FE lens:

The 7 Artisans 50mm F1.05 (486$) full frame manual lens has vocation to be an affordable ultra fast aperture lens. It deliver very beautiful portraits with a very nice and dreamy atmosphere. Strong points are the background blur, bokeh balls , very good and natural color rendering & good contrast. Sharpness is only average on a 61Mpix but will be perfectly ok on a 24Mpix camera.

The lens is very well built and its ergonomics are very good for manual focusing. Compared to the Mitakon 50mm F0.95 – Dark Knight (800 euros) the lens is more compact and less heavy.

  • The Mitakon is definitively sharper both in the centre and in the corners but its color rendering is more vintage , contrast is less good and the bokeh balls are more polygonal than rounded as of F1.4
  • The 7Artisans is globally less sharp but has a better color rendering , bokeh balls , and better contrast

The choice will depend on which criteria is more important for you. A very nice artistic lens to discover the world of F1.0 lenses at reasonable price