It finally happened. Canon released the lens we’ve all been waiting for since they started fully shifting to a mirrorless platform viable for professional photographers. Introducing the RF 35mm f/1.4 VCM lens! Ever since we switched to mirrorless in 2020, we’ve been eager for canon to release a new RF 35mm option on par wth their previous L-series 35mm for DSLR. As you know, a great performing 35mm is one of the most popular focal lengths among photographers. Whether you’re primarily wedding and portrait photographers like us, or you need a good overall travel lens that’s wide enough to capture most scenes but still able to produce beautiful portraits, it’s hard to beat the simplistic versatility of a 35mm. Admittedly I’ve always been more of a zoom lens person when first starting off in our photography careers but as I continued to grow in the industry it seemed like I kept seeing all of positive feedback other pros would give about their 35s.
(All of the images in this blog minus the cover have been shot with the new Canon 35mm)
Background
Right at that time, Sigma had just introduce their Sigma ART 35mm 1.4 and to say everyone was raving about how much they loved that lens was an understatement. You could not hop on to a photography social media group for about a year without seeing at least one post per day about that lens. Given the feedback and price, we decided to pull the trigger on one at a trade show a few years back. Initially we were stoked to pick it up. The lens was solid in it’s design, and by far one of the sharpest lenses I’ve ever shot on. The problem? (at least in our experience) It would miss focus half of the time if not more, especially if you dropped it down below f/2.5. Let’s be real, you pick up a 35mm f/1.4 to shoot it at f/1.4, at least some of the times. There were instances where I would should a sequence of a couple maybe walking towards me within a scene, and it would miss 9 out of 10 shots. I know some of you may be thinking, 'that wasn’t my experience', or maybe I was doing something wrong. Unfortunately this was the only lens I ever had that issue with. We even tried getting it calibrated several times and it would always end up worse. It was bittersweet because the lens produced gorgeous images when it would hit, but when you shoot 80-100 weddings & elopements per year, missing focus half of the time isn’t something you can sustain. I would end up shooting 2-3x as much volume than was really needed because I just couldn’t trust the lens. Eventually it made it’s way to our back up camera bag and would rarely find it’s way out as it just couldn’t be trusted for moving subjects or when my subjects were too close to the background (back focusing issues like crazy!). Please note this isn’t a knock on Sigma. I’m not a Canon snob or native lens purist. We also own the Sigma 105mm f/1.4 and I would argue that its one of the best portrait lenses on the market it you’re looking for that buttery smooth bokeh’d background and this one rarely misses focus, even wide open. I just wanted to give some background on my experience with other 35s as a reference point for my feedback on the current offering from Canon.
Finally
Let me preface the feedback by saying. If you’re looking for a Sam Hurd level tech review or DP review in-depth analysis on color science and aperture blades, this review probably isn’t for you. We didn’t do distance tests on black and white charts on tripods, etc. We’ve only been using it in the real world to see how we like it. Essentially asking, does the Canon RF 35mm f/1.4 VCM check all of the boxes I need it to? And the answer is a resounding yes! Like I mentioned above, we’ve been waiting on this lens to be released since 2020 so when the announcement finally came that they were taking pre-orders, we purchased one immediately. We received it about a month later and have been steadily putting it through it’s paces ever since. We’ve been utilizing it as apart of our overall workload for weddings, elopements, engagements, and family portraits for the last 6 weeks and the lens has definitely met our expectations.
Focusing
I’ll jump right into the aspect I was most worried about given my experience with my previous 35. So far, the new canon 35 has been nothing short of spectacular when it comes to nailing focus, even wide open at f/1.4. In the 6 weeks I’ve been using it, I honestly don’t think I’ve missed focus, at all. We primarily shoot on the Canon R6 and R6 mk2 and use a variety of focal points from clusters, to single, to eye tracking and the new 35 has been money in all situations so far!
Color
Again making the comparison to my previous Sigma 35, when we initially purchased this Sigma, we weren’t huge fans of the color rendered on the DSLR. It always seemed to have a slight magenta tone in our experience. Not a huge deal, but definitely something that had to be corrected in post. When we switched to mirrorless, the color of the new cameras seemed to balance that out since the R6 had a slight shift towards green. With the new Canon RF 35mm f/1.4, the color (for our taste) was spot on from the get go!
Low Light Performance
For us, we like to be able to go natural light during times of the day where the light is low. As much as I love my Canon RF 28-70 f/2 for just about everything, the maximum aperture of f/2 can be a little limiting during those low light portions of a wedding day like getting ready or certain reception situations. While we’re known for our flash work as well, sometimes we like to mix it up and give our clients a little bit of both. Being able to drop it down to f/1.4 and not having to crank up our ISO too high is huge for creating a clean image. Naturally we’ve all ran into that scenario where one of our your engagement clients runs late and you’re stuck watching golden hour fade away while it gets darker and darker. We’ve used our new 35 in this scenario too and again, the performance has been solid. Nailed focus, great color, and helps us keep the noise down. We’ve even used it in a few reception scenarios where one of us would go flash and one of us would go natural light to give two looks and it has been reliable for these scenarios as well.
Vignetting
I’ll keep this one short and sweet. The first couple of weeks the vignetting was a little rough because LR didn’t have a profile correction for this lens yet, but ever since our last update, no complaints. The new profile corrections looks great from our perspective and corrects most, if not all of the vignetting.
The little things
It comes with lens hood.
The price isn’t bad compared to some of the new mirrorless offerings from Canon (we actually thought this lens was going to be around $600-$800 more than we paid.) Fun fact it was actually more affordable than the last L-series version for DSLR
The lens is fairly light and compact compared to our previous 35. If you do any adventure sessions or elopements like us, or travel often, it’s nice not having a lot of extra weight for long hikes in the mountains, and it doesn’t take up too much room in the camera bag allowing for multiple options when you travel. As we said, we love our 28-70 but the size and weight make it a beast for some scenarios.
The lens glares and flares haven’t been terrible for us (with our style).
Overall
If you’e been holding out for this lens or simply waiting to pull the trigger on a 35mm, I would say this new one from Canon is worth your consideration. At a minimum it’s worth renting one to see if you like it but our experience so far has been great! It definitely checks all of our boxes and seems to be well worth it’s weight in gold as a versatile lens to do it all no matter what your photography endeavors.
We hope this helps and if you have any specific questions we didn’t cover about this one, drop us a line, we’re always happy to help!
Cheers!
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