This is a strange lens.
Panasonic's new 10-25mm f/1.7.
When I first heard about it, I thought it sounded
like a viable alternative to the Sigma 18-35mm
plus Speed Booster combination
that many Panasonic users have been using for years.
But the more I tested the more I realize
that it wasn't that simple and in many ways
proved inferior. Let's get Undone.
[offbeat music]
♪ Gerald Undone ♪
♪ He's crazy ♪
What's happening everybody? I'm Gerald Undone
and if it's not fixed don't break it.
So, I've been putting these two lenses head-to-head for the past
few days now and I want to share my results with you.
But in order to keep things flowing and logical
I'm going to be consulting my results so that
I don't miss anything and then at the end of this video,
I'll give you the, "Who should buy which lens segment."
So, let's start with the basic specs.
Now, neither of these lenses is small but the Panasonic
is a little bit lighter at 723g where the Sigma
with the Speed Booster when I weighed it is 985g
and for all the sizes and price that we can talk about here
it's for both the Speed Booster and the Sigma combined because
that's the only real way
to get a fair comparison against this lens.
Now when the barrel is fully extended the Panasonic comes in
just a little bit shorter than the Sigma.
I would say just about a quarter of an inch
or a centimetre shorter, but it is thicker.
It has-- it's more girthy. This one is a 77mm filter thread
and this one's a 72mm filter thread.
Now, both of these lens combinations are past the point
of being what I would consider small or compact.
So, to me the small differences don't really make a difference.
They're both, you know, big heavy lenses
but to put it in simple terms the Sigma with the Metabones
is about two pounds and this one is about a pound and a half
and you do notice that the Sigma is a little bit denser,
but when it's on the camera and you use it,
to me there's not a huge discernible difference
between the two. Price-wise, this Panasonic lens
is going to cost you about $1,800 US
and this one, the combo, is about 1,300.
Its about $650 for the lens and $650 for the Speed Booster
and that lens is on sale right now. It's like $639.
Normally, I think it's about $800 US
but there's been crazy deals going on on this
like right now, I think it's $639
and you get a filter and some--
some other accessory with it.
So, it's a great time to buy these
and it makes it even better of a value proposition,
but we'll get more into that in a minute
now when it comes to other physical characteristics
of the lens, the Panasonic has a declicked aperture ring,
which means that you can move smoothly through the iris
or you can set it to "A" and then you can
make those adjustments using one of the dials on your camera.
It also has a manual focus clutch, which you
can cock down like that and then you can move through
the focus range and see the witness marks here
to know, you know where exactly you're focusing.
It doesn't have hard stops, however, which I usually
like to see on a focus clutch.
So, you do hear it and feel it a little bit
but then it keeps turning after that without changing the focus,
which is actually identical to how the Sigma lenses
tend to work natively without any adjustments.
It has a little dial here in which you can see
you're focus indication and then it has sort of a soft stop
and then the ring keeps turning after that.
So, both perform the same when the focus clutch is enabled
on the Panasonic. The zoom ring on both is about equal size
and I would say has about equal dampening between the two
the Sigma might be a little bit nicer to adjust
through the zoom ranges where the Panasonic is--
It's pretty much the same though.
But the Panasonic does
have that extending barrel that goes in and out.
I think it gets arrested between 12 and 14mm, but then
when you go all the way open to ten it extrudes a little bit
and up to about 25 it starts to come out as well.
So, that might pose an issue for you.
If balancing on a gimbal is something you're concerned with
where the Sigma 18-35mm everything is internal
and there's no extending barrel.
Neither one of these lenses is stabilized.
But the Panasonic does offer a little bit
better weather sealing than the Sigma 18-35mm.
Now let's talk a bit about the focal lengths
because there's a bit of math going on here
because this one has a Metabones on it.
So, this is a 10-25mm and I did all my tests
on the GH5, which has 2x crop
that's probably the standard for most micro 4/3 systems.
So, this one becomes a 20-50mm equivalent
compared to the full frame field of view
that you would expect to get. This one on the other hand
is an 18-35mm, but it also has a 0.71x
focal reducer on it, which once you put
that focal reducer and then add the 2x crop,
It becomes a 25.6mm to a 49.7mm.
So, on the long end, they're pretty similar.
They're almost both exactly 50mm,
but on the wide end.
this one goes to 20 and this one goes about 25 or 26,
but when it comes to moving through that focal range
something you should know about the 10-25mm
is that it's not quite parfocal, at least my copy isn't
I don't know if they're different for each lens.
So, it's pretty good.
But I find that if you focus a 10mm
and then moved all the way to 25mm,
it's not quite as sharp as if you were to refocus it at 25mm
and the same is actually true for the 18 to 35.
However, as I've mentioned in a previous video
if you have the Speed Booster on,
which obviously we do in this comparison,
You can make an adjustment
to the back focus on the Speed Booster.
So, now, with that minor adjustment
I made on my Metabones
my Sigma 18-35 is parfocal.
If I focus on something 18mm and I zoom to 35mm
it is tack sharp all the way through the zoom range
and that's something we're not gonna be able to do
on the Panasonic because we can't really make
any adjustments to it because we don't have an adapter attached.
Now, I did a bunch of focus tests
and like I said, I did them with the GH5.
Oh, by the way, since I know some of you are probably asking
"Well if he's holding these lenses, which lens
is he shooting on?" I went back to the Sigma
16mm contemporary lens that I used to use on the GH5.
Right now I've got it on the Blackmagic Pocket 4K.
It's F 1.4. So, I'm getting you know about a 2.8
full frame depth of field equivalent.
And it's a great lens. I like it.
But I've been using the Sigma 18-35mm
on the Blackmagic Pocket for the last several videos.
But anyway, so we're throwing back to that lens while I test
these two. So, when it comes to autofocus performance though,
there's some weird results that I wasn't expecting.
So, first, let's talk about
video continuous autofocus because
my first thoughts was that this lens is probably,
you know a video focus lens. Now, I will tell you that
I was shocked at how bad the autofocus is
for video continuous on the Panasonic lens.
It just wouldn't focus and I have the GH5 with the latest
firmware version 2.5 which is, like, the updates for this lens
and I used the same focus settings for both lenses.
And the ones that I've come to use and made videos on
for the GH5 before that have worked really well for me
and it just-- it would just take forever.
I was holding an object up in front of the lens
and it just like sometimes wouldn't even start focus
until I like, you know, shook it around.
or brought it down and back up and then I also
did a test where I would push in and out of an object
to see if it would focus.
And again, I had that same issue anytime
moving the lens back or forward.
It just-- it was really, really slow
really, really terrible autofocus.
But strangely when I put on the 18-35mm with the Metabones,
it didn't have those problems of not being responsive.
It was pretty responsive and actually worked quite well.
There is an issue over here with this combo which is
kind of well known in that the Sigma glass is heavy
and the way that the Sigma autofocuses because
they're more photographic lenses just kind of tosses
the glass so you do get this kind of like quick to
the back quick to the front which I wouldn't exactly call
smooth or nice-looking if you're trying to keep
the focus transition in the video,
so I wouldn't probably use autofocus on either of these
for video, but if you had to, the Sigma drastically
outperformed the Panasonic for continuous autofocus in video.
But for photos it was the complete opposite.
I wouldn't trust the Sigma at all
for continuous autofocus for photo.
So, say you were doing, like, burst shooting
and you wanted to track a subject.
This did not work at all and the Panasonic worked very reliably.
Here, let me show you in Lightroom what a run of photos
looks like on these two different lenses.
OK, So, this first set of photos here
is taken on the 18-35mm
with the Metabones and all I did
was hold down autofocus continuous.
And I brought the camera closer and farther away
while holding down the shutter and as you can see.
Almost none of the shots are in focus.
When I got close and stopped moving it was fine,
but pulling in and out was not reliable at all.
And these were all shot at f/2.8
and that's the same for both lenses and you can see
it's absolutely terrible performance on the 18-35mm.
And now if we jump ahead this is where the 10-25mm
section starts and you can see that you get
much better results like yeah, it's not perfect but
it's quite usable and quite good and the majority of the shots
are in focus pulling in and out. So, the Panasonic
absolutely destroyed the Sigma for photo
but the Sigma completely destroyed the Panasonic
for video continuous autofocus
now for single AF in photo, it doesn't really matter.
Like, say you're just lining up a shot for a landscape.
You could manual focus, you could autofocus.
It doesn't really matter for autofocus single
just for tracking. This lens is much better
if you're doing tracking, photo bursts and continuous autofocus.
Now, let's talk about image quality,
which it's pretty similar between the two but there are
a couple small advantages to the Panasonic.
So, I have a couple images here. This first group
is wide open and I also have them both at f/2.8
and what I've noticed is that-- lets zoom right in here.
So, I targeted the focus here. This is a 4K recording.
That's why it's not ultra sharp as in a photo
but if we-- I targeted the focus right here
at the centre and this is the 10-25mm
and this is 18-35mm. 10-25mm, 18-35mm.
So, if we just look back and forth, I would say the sharpness
seems pretty similar, but there is one thing
that I do notice and that's that the Sigma
has worse fringing and, you know, like chromatic aberration.
If we look up here in this corner here.
This is the Sigma and this is the Panasonic.
So, that purple fringing is more subdued
but the Sigma might actually be a hair sharper.
That's the Sigma again.
It might be just a little bit sharper
than the Panasonic in the corners.
In the centre though, The Panasonic might be
a little bit sharper than the Sigma.
That's the Sigma. That's the Panasonic.
now if we look at the f/2.8 images
where we can see a difference though
is in that fringing I was talking about.
So, this is the Panasonic and then this is the Sigma.
So, we can definitely see that the Sigma is sharper
over on the sides. Like, if we look at the numbers here
and then put the Panasonic on, this definitely gets softer,
but the purple fringing is much better controlled.
You can see these purple bars
on the Sigma quite clearly as well as the green
on the other side. And if we jump over here,
you see how we have these kind of yellowish
fringes on the top and these very thin purple fringes.
But if we switch over to the Sigma, well now you can see
a clear purple fringe all the way around and then
a green yellow fringe all the way around here
including on the Rubik's Cube. So, back and forth.
But again, we see the difference with a Rubik's Cube is sharper
on the Sigma, even though it has fringing and then kind of
softer on the Panasonic with no fringing. Now another way
that the Panasonic does beat out the Sigma 18-35mm
in terms of image quality, or at least in optical design,
is its resistance to flaring. So, I just took a flashlight
and sort of flashed them on both of these lenses to see what
the flaring was like and the 10-25mm from Panasonic
did remarkably well to not have much effect when it comes
to contrast reduction across the frame or have any kind of weird,
you know, flare lines and stuff like that.
It was pretty isolated where you would only get
a reduction in contrast right at the spot where you were
shining the flashlight, where the Sigma 18-35mm
on the other hand definitely had sort of a wider flare problem
with you know, contrast reduction all the way
across the frame and it also had some of those funky,
you know flare patterns that can appear
where they were pretty much non-existent on the Panasonic.
So, whatever the coatings, or however they designed
the lens for the 10-25mm.
It's done extremely well for managing chromatic aberration
and flare and much better than the 18-35mm.
But keep in mind it's only when you do this comparison
that you can even see it. when I compared the 18-35mm
to some of the worse Rokinon lenses like the 24mm,
I found that it looked significantly better than
the Rokinon where it was, sort of, night and day
that the Sigma was way better for chromatic aberration
and flaring and all that. But then when we compare it
to the Panasonic, well now the Sigma 18-35mm looks like trash
for fringing. That's not the case. The Sigma 18-35mm
is actually quite good when it comes to fringing
and flare reduction, but the Panasonic 10-25mm
is excellent. It might be one of the best lenses
I've seen on this system for controlling those issues.
I also measured the colour accuracy here to see
if there was a shift from one lens to the other
and I found both of them to be quite neutral.
So, neither one seems to really affect the colour accuracy
and both provide a nice neutrally accurate image
without much of a lens bias. Now some people might say that this
means the lenses don't have any character but other people might
find that advantageous if they want just, sort of,
a neutral image and then they apply the character in post
but they are both pretty sterile, pretty clean
when it comes to the colours. Also, at f/2.8
the transmissions are very similar.
If we look at just, sort of,
the overall exposure here and I pop one off and one on
they're very, very, very similar. Where there is
a difference though is in their maximum apertures.
So, this is a f/1.8 lens, but when we put the Speed Booster
on it we get about a f/1.3, which then
when we put it on a 2x crop micro 4/3 sensor,
we're getting a depth of field similar to about
an f/2.6 on full frame.
This one's a f/1.7. So, we're going to get about
an f/3.4 on full frame.
So, it's about two-thirds of a stop
of light difference between them, but it does have
an impact on depth of field if that's what you're looking for.
Say that you want, you know, bigger bokeh balls
on a shallower depth of field.
This one isn't going to provide that as well
as the Sigma 18-35mm with the Speed Booster will,
which is kind of interesting because a lot of the marketing
and hype that I've seen on social media is about this lens
allowing you to bring that full frame depth of field
to your micro 4/3 and it doesn't
and I want to show you that right now.
So, I've got three clips here in Resolve, and this one,
the first one, is the 10-25mm and all three
of these are wide open.
If you examine the bokeh balls in the background there
and we'll shift them from the edge to the centre
so you can see them go from that cat eye pattern more
to the rounded pattern and, you know, they have that ringing
in the centre there-- it's not exactly smooth but they also
have a significant, sort of, fringe around the outside.
But also just gauge how large they are.
And if you look at the bus here, look at
the depth of field that you're getting from the front wheel,
which is where I focused
to the back wheel. Now, let's jump over
to the 18-35mm. And we'll do the same thing.
So, they both start with that, sort of, warped edge
and then when we bring them closer to the centre.
They smooth out and become more circular
but you'll notice that the 18-35mm
doesn't have that deep yellow fringe around the outside
of it's out of focus circles. And if you look
at the wheels here, again, I focused on the front wheel
now look how out of focus the rear wheel is
that should give you an idea of how much shallower
you're going to get with the 18-35mm
plus Speed Booster combo, but in both cases,
neither one of these is offering sort of a true, you know,
f/1.4 full frame, which I will show you now
using the Sigma 35mm art lens
on a full frame camera at f/1.4
this is what it looks like.
So, you can see that the out-of-focus areas
are much smoother in this case
with a much more pleasing result.
None of that outside ring or anything like that.
If you look at the out-of-focus
difference between the front wheel
and the rear wheel it's significant.
So, obviously this is drastically more shallow.
I'm just going to flip through. this is the 10-25mm.
This is the full frame 35mm at f/1.4.
So, this is more like f/1.4 versus f/3.4.
and that's with both of them wide open.
And then the Sigma 18-35mm is somewhere in the middle there
with about a f/2.6 equivalent. So, full frame, Sigma 18-35mm,
10-25mm f/1.7. And all of these were shot
at 35mm equivalent focal lengths
and as you can see the Panasonic lens is just not
going to give you that full frame depth of field
that you're probably looking for based on the limitations
of the focal length. In order for this to provide
that same framing on a micro four thirds sensor.
The lens has to be at 10-25mm, which is
way too wide to get as shallow as a depth of field.
Oh, and while I have you in here, I will show you
once again the difference in that two-thirds
of a stop of exposure difference.
So, if I turn off the matching grade that I put on
this is the 10-25mm, that's how bright that is at f/1.7
And this is the 18-35mm at f/1.3
So, if we just sort of flip back and forth here,
that's about what 2/3 of a stop looks like.
So, now that we know all that
what conclusions can we draw?
Well, both setups are great.
And in many ways very similar,
if you're manually focusing for video.
There's very little difference between them
the Panasonic offers better fringing and flare reduction
and has a declicked aperture ring,
which is nice, but the Sigma has two thirds of a stop,
extra light, and also provides a shallower
depth of field, and has smoother out-of-focus areas.
And the Panasonic is $500 more and more restrictive
in the sense that you can only mount it on a micro 4/3 camera
where the Sigma combo you can mount the Sigma lens on a bunch
of different systems or adapt it in different ways
and the Metabones adapter can be useful
for putting other lenses on your micro 4/3 camera.
Making this far and away the better value proposition.
If you need autofocus for video, neither is a great option,
but the Sigma definitely outperformed the Panasonic
which surprised me. For photos,
where fast-tracking isn't important,
then either solution is great and the same points
from earlier carry over, but if you need continuous
tracking and photos, well, then the Panasonic
is the only option and it absolutely destroys the Sigma
in that regard. But it's at this point that I find this lens
hard to categorize because I don't really see
the point in spending $1,800 on a lens if a shallow
depth of field and fast action photography is your goal.
It seems like that money would be better spent on a larger
sensor with a competent phase detection autofocus system.
I just don't get it. It's not stabilized
and it's too big for vlogging or travel,
and if you're using it for photos, will you don't really
need that declicked aperture or the manual focus clutch.
And even though it does focus quite well
for continuous autofocus for photos,
I don't know a lot of action or wildlife photographers
that would find this focal range particularly useful.
So, it's got to be intended for video right?
But in that case the Sigma 18-35mm
with a Speed Booster combo is definitely the better buy.
The only exception I could see is if somebody is already
invested in micro 4/3, plans on staying with that system
for a while, shoots both photo and video,
and needs a flexible option
in this specific focal range. And I imagine
there are quite a few people that fit that description,
but for me, it just seems a little bit too niche
to warrant the excitement that this lens generated.
I almost feel like this lens was made just to prove
that it could be, with this focal length
and this aperture size, instead of thinking about
if it should be. I'd love to hear from you guys though.
Where do you fit in the categories
that I just described? And does this lens satisfy
those needs of that category? Are you the perfect customer
for this lens? And if so, what are you going to use it for?
Let me know in the comments below. But that's going to
be it for me. I hope you found this video helpful
or at least entertaining and if you did make sure
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Alright, I'm done.