Samyang 135mm f1.8 video review

A review of this bokeh monster of a lens, the Samyang 135mm f1.8 for Sony FE cameras. First off, bokeh. Or boh-kay, or bocka. Whatever. It just means blur. Stop trying to sound all sophisticated by using Japanese words, it probably doesn’t suit you. It certainly doesn’t suit me.

I spent a couple of months filming in Tokyo in the summer of 2021 (there was a big sporting event there), and I learnt a few things. They do excellent ramen, fascinating toilets, and bokeh is just the Japanese word for blur.

For those of you reading this on your boring non-Japanese toilets, welcome to the written review. For everyone else, you can find the video version below.

Samyang 135mm f1.8 lens review video

The Samyang 135mm 1.8 — Samyang 135mm 1.8

First off, let’s address the size of it, the Samyang 135mm f1.8 is a bit of a beast. It’s long and fat, but actually surprisingly light in weight, considering, it comes in at well under a kilo, around 880 grams. And when you remove the huge lens hood, it feels a lot more nimble, and IMO, it looks great too, with a short stubby look and a high-quality smooth plastic feel it.

The focus ring is patterned rubber, and it has a lovely smooth soft feel to it. It turns very easily, perhaps too easily for the heavy-handed amongst us. It’s also very well weather sealed in multiple places, giving what Samyang describe as light rain, snow and dust resistance. I trust it. The overall build quality is superb, and I’ve had no problems using this in almost contant light to moderate British rain so far.

It has a few cool tricks up its sleeve, four I’d say. Let’s quickly talk about the first three, those buttons and switches on the side. Who doesn’t like buttons and switches?

First is that little round programmable button at the top, great. You’ve seen it all before. I get it. Useful to some, but not so much to others.

In the middle though is that M1 - M2 switch. As standard, in M1 mode, the focus ring adjusts the focus, as you would expect, but a quick switch into M2 mode will mean that the focus ring is now an aperture ring. How cool is that? This is great for video work, where you can set your scene, dial in your focus, and then babysit your exposure by using the main ring in M2 mode. Brilliant. It’s lovely and smooth and quiet too. What’s more is that if you also have the Samyang lens station, you can program the M1 - M2 switch to do other functions instead. I’ve not tested this myself yet personally, I don’t have the lens station, but Samyang has said they’re sending me one out for free. I bought the lens through WEX, and there was a link to receive one - hopefully, it’s still active for you - TRY THIS

Below that is another fairly common switch, a s stage focus range limiter. It’s great for eliminating certain distances from your autofocus range, and for speeding things up a bit when shooting.

And onto the 4th and IMO the best little trick this beast has up its sleeve. A dedicated astrophotography mode and focus infinity indicator light!

Samyang 135mm f1.8 astro photography mode

Maybe I’ve been living under a rock or something, but this is new to me. Basically, if you turn the camera on while holding that little round side button, the lens enters astrophotography mode. The focus moves to infinity and a little light on the side lights up green.

If you manage to knock the focus out by mistake, the light will turn red, and then a simple quick press of the button will make the lens re-focus on infinity, and it’ll turn green again. I can’t believe that I’ve never had this function before. All those hours on a mountain summit at 3 AM fiddling around in the dark with high ISO and 20x zoom, when I could have just entered “Astro-mode”. Ah well, it’s nice to have now, and I look forward to checking out some deep dark skies with the 135. I could be a poet.

The infinity focus point is set at the factory. Mine is ok, but if it does need adjusting, you can, apparently, change it by using the Samyang lens station.

As is the norm, I’m not gonna waffle on pretending to be something I’m not by analysing sharpness, aberration or distortion. There’s no point, and I’m not qualified to do so. I will however point you in the direction of a little video I made called, and I need to work on my titles…. “Just coffee under a tarp, on a rainy day in July”. This was shot exclusively with the Samyang 135mm f1.8, and it should give you some great examples. Make sure to hit the 4K viewing option if you have the technology.

Just coffee under a tarp - Filmed with just the Samyang 135mm f1.8

I found the 135mm to be brilliantly sharp, and a pleasure to work with, mostly. It was challenging, and a little frustrating at times, but overall quite good fun. The 135mm threw me out a little, as I’m used to shooting with much wider lenses. It took some getting used to the idea that the camera had to be so far away most of the time.

The shots it achieves though, bloody hell they’re good. It’s definitely a lens I’ll be using more of in the future for stuff like this. I hear it called a “portrait lens” all the time. What does that even mean? It’s just a lens. A lens that shoots great portraits, yeah sure, but it’s just a lens. It’s a 135mm f1.8 and you can use it for all kinds of stuff, portraits, landscapes, or just filming yourself drink a coffee in the rain.

Interstingly, using APS-C crop mode, it knocks out shots with a near equivalent of 200mm at f1.8, or however that works. It’s phenomenal really. And better than that, it has a minimum focus distance of just 0.69 metres.

A 135mm lens with a minimum focus distance of just 69 centimetres!!! Brilliant.

Cost-wise, you can pick up the Samyang 135mm for around £700 here, which IMO is great value for money. The Sony version is more than twice the cost of the Samyang at over £1500, and for what? Slightly faster autofocus?

There’s also a Sigma version at around £1100, and while I love Sigma lenses, I’m happy to argue that the Samyang lens is the best value to performance 135mm f1.8 lens on the market. Highly recommended. Go on, treat yourself.

If you’re going to buy it, please do use my links, I earn a few quid at no extra cost to you, and check out the videos for some more examples. Hope you find this helpful. Cheers all. Chris