Introduction

Ease of Use

Weighing in at just 162 grams / 5.71 ounces and measuring 5.6 cm in length, the Samyang AF 45mm f/1.8 FE is a small and lightweight lens given its focal length.

Compared to its most direct rival, the Sony FE 50mm F1.8, the Samyang 45mm lens is 24 grams lighter and 0.4cm shorter in length.

As shown in the photos below, it's a good match for the full-frame Sony A7 III camera that we tested it with, even when the lens hood is attached.

Build quality is fine, despite the lens' light weight and the mixture of metals and plastics used. The lens has a plastic housing and a metal mount. The optical elements are made of high-grade glass and aspherical lenses have been included to minimise aberration and unnecessary light dispersion.

This lens does not feature any level of weather-sealing to provide anti-dust and water-protection capabilities.

Focusing is usefully internal and manual focusing is possible when the MF mode is set on the Sony camera body. Full-time manual focus override is also available if you choose the DMF focusing mode. There's no distance and/or depth of field scale available on this lens.

The Samyang AF 45mm f/1.8 FE has a wide enough focus ring given the overall size of the lens, which is ridged for easier grip. There are no hard stops at the ends of the range, making it more difficult to set focus at infinity. Polariser users should be pleased that the 49mm filter thread doesn't rotate on focus.

When it comes to auto-focusing, the Samyang AF 35mm f/2.8 FE is a fairly quick performer, taking about 0.20 seconds to lock onto the subject when mounted on the Sony A7 III camera that we tested it with.

We didn't experience too much "hunting", either in good or bad light, with the lens accurately focusing almost all of the time. It has a quiet focusing mechanism, too, which makes this lens well-suited to video recording.

The Samyang AF 45mm f/1.8 FE ships with a very nice protective case and a slim, plastic circular lens-hood.

Focal Range

The 45mm focal length provides an angle of view of 52.31 degrees.

Chromatic Aberrations

Chromatic aberrations, typically seen as blue or purple fringes along contrasty edges, were not very apparent in our test shots, only appearing in high contrast areas. The examples below show the worst-case scenario.

Light Fall-off and Distortion

With the lens set to its maximum aperture of f/1.8, there is some obvious light fall-off in the corners, requiring you to stop down by at least 3 f-stops to prevent it.

There's very little barrel or pin-cushion distortion evident at all.

Macro

The Samyang AF 45mm F1.8 FE isn't claimed to be a macro lens, with a minimum focusing distance of 45cm and a maximum magnification of 0.12x. The following example demonstrates how close you can get to your subject.

Bokeh

Bokeh is a word used for the out-of-focus areas of a photograph, and is usually described in qualitative terms, such as smooth / creamy / harsh etc.

In the FE 45mm f/1.8 lens, Samyang have employed an iris diaphragm with nine rounded blades, which has resulted in very appealing bokeh for a standard prime lens.

We do realise, however, that bokeh evaluation is subjective, so we've included several examples below for your perusal.

Sharpness

In order to show you how sharp this lens is, we are providing 100% crops on the following page.