Street shooters are going to love this lens. I would have liked to have the lens focus a little closer than it does, but this might have lengthened the size too, and that is not what a pancake lens is about. A pancake lens is generally thought of as compromise, but the Fuji 27mm breaks that prejudice by coming in a package that is not only tiny but speedy to focus, and with superb optics to boot. The pleasant surprise is that such fine image quality comes with the overall package. It should be apparent that achieving bokeh is not one of the reasons for using this lens.Ī lens such as this Fuji 27mm f/2.8 pancake is intended for one purpose, its compact size and convenience, and it achieves that perfectly, particularly when mounted on one of the smaller Fuji X bodies. This photo and the one above were taken wide open at f/2.8. This photo of tiny seckel pears was taken at the closet focus range of 13.39" (34cm) for this lens. I found this to be quite nice for casual shooting - short enough to be inclusive, and not long enough not to distort faces when coming in this close. The focal length of 27mm translates to a 40mm equivalent, somewhere between a normal 50mm and 35mm wide angle.
#Fuji 27mm vs 35mm lenses iso
The Fuji X cameras are so good in low light situations that having an f/2.8 aperture on the 27mm lens was not a problem for this shot taken at ISO 3200 where the face was illuminated only by the light coming from the cell phone. It focuses down to 13.39" (34cm) for a magnification ratio of 1:10.ĭownload a high res version of this file by clicking here. Its aperture range goes from f/2.8 to f/16. The lens has a 2.41" (61.2mm) diameter and is only. On a smaller camera body, like this X-E1, it easily fits in a pocket for those times you want to have something unobtrusive with you. You can see the low profile of the 27mm f/2.8 pancake lens here. Fuji has been working on focus issues since the introduction of its first camera, and the results of their efforts appear to be showing up here. It seems very fast, even compared to other Fuji lens. One thing that was quite noticeable was the speed to focus. Nonetheless, I think it would still fit nicely in a coat pocket. On an X-Pro1 the camera/lens package lost some of the small-size convenience it displayed when mounted on an X-E1. Maybe its just that I am used to changing apertures that way from using my pro-Nikons with G lenses. Frankly, I found it to be quite convenient, and maybe even preferable to using a ring on the lens. Instead, you control the aperture by rotating the top dial on the rear of the camera.
To further reduce its size, this lens does not have an aperture ring. There was very slight corner softening wide open at f/2.8, but it was definitely not a deal breaker, and at f/4 this baby was tack sharp everywhere. As with most Fuji prime lenses, the 27mm f/2.8 pancake passed with flying colors. The first test I ran on the lens was for corner sharpness and distortion.
The 27mm lens mounted on a Fuji X-E1 creates pretty much a perfect package of convenience - small enough to carry around conveniently, yet large enough to still feel comfortable while also producing pro-quality results.