Voigtlander Ultron 21mm f/1.8 Reviews
Superior quality at a great price
By Jay
Rated 5 out of 5
Date: 2021-04-10
I use this lens on my sl2, and it renders images beautifully. It handles the extra mega pixels of the sl2 very well, and produces great colors and contrasts.
I love this lens so much.
By Xopher
Rated 4 out of 5
Date: 2016-12-28
I shoot with this and an A7. It handles like it was made for this camera body. For people shots, f/1.8 is highly usable and in the context of street photography it's sharp enough for low-light work. Its distortion is negligible and I feel comfortable using it for interior architecture as well. It's not a perfect 5 because it does have a pretty strong vignette until it's stopped down f/8 and sometimes displays color fringing. Both of these are easy to correct in post or by using the Lens Correction App in camera, but it's an extra step either way. It makes up for this in its rich and contrasty color rendition. Also, because this is a rangefinder lens, it bears note that the extreme corners are not as sharp on an A7 body due to the thicker filter stack. But, honestly, unless your primary use for this lens is fine art landscapes, you won't be disappointed. It's a beautiful, compact, and sharp tool. I recommend using it with the Voigtlander Close Focus Adapter if you're using it on an A7 series camera.
Substantial Lens. Very Good Optics.
By Albert
Rated 5 out of 5
Date: 2016-12-26
Although I already have a Voightlander 21mm f/4.0 lens purchased several years ago, the excellent review by Sean Reid (Reid Reviews) and my desire for a larger and faster lens prompted me to make this purchase ... that and a sale going on at the time! The first thing I did was to set up my camera indoors on a tripod and compare their optics. The f/1.8 lens, while acceptably sharp fully open, improves at f/2.8 and especially at the same f/4.0 aperture as the smaller lens. I believe, however, that at f/4.0 the edges are sharper with the larger lens. Color and contrast with both are very good. Focus is maintained with change of aperture from its f/1.8 maximum, allowing sharp focus wide open then stopping down for desired depth of field. This is a very substantial lens, much larger and heavier compared with the 15mm f/4.5 and 35mm f/1.7 Voightlander lenses also now in my collection. I don't mind that, because it fits my large hands better than the smaller lens, with control rings more distinct and more widely separated than those crowded in the f/4.0 lens. The aperture ring's half-stops are more positive and the focusing ring is broad and operates smoothly, I also much prefer the abbreviated built-in lens hood, as opposed to a screw-on or clamp-on hood that takes up more room. The question to be answered is whether its increased bulk, weight and additional cost can be justified in light of the very good optics of the smaller 21mm f/4.0 lens. For low light conditions and street shooting the more precise focusing and faster shutter speed favor the larger lens. With the 1.5 crop factor of my Fujiflm X Pro2 with M-adapter, this lens' 35mm equivalence is 33mm, which means it will be used often. For me, all of the above factors make the choice of the f/1.8 very sensible and preferred over its smaller sibling. For others, the smaller size and cost might lead them to choose otherwise. The good thing is that there is no wrong choice here. I gave this lens a 5 star rating for its very good optics, top notch construction and excellent control ring function.
Superb lens
By nick
Rated 5 out of 5
Date: 2016-03-31
I use this lend with my Leica M for street photography. Its absolutely perfect for this and I used it with great effect recently in New York. B and H is the go to place for all such gear and the staff are highly knowledgeable and great to deal with
Love this glass
By otho
Rated 5 out of 5
Date: 2016-03-24
Perfect match witch my A7R via Novoflex for night photo, street, landscape, architecture, etc.
Good Lens
By Hector
Rated 4 out of 5
Date: 2016-03-13
I like this lens a lot because if goes to f/1.8 and also it goes very nice with my A7sII
excellent wide angle lens
By luis
Rated 5 out of 5
Date: 2018-02-25
I bought this lens as an alternative to the equivalent Leica lens and I am very happy with the decission.
When set in the Leica camera as a 21 or even 28 mm lens it works flawlesly.
A great lens for its price for the Leica M system
Perfect for interiors
By Andrew
Rated 5 out of 5
Date: 2018-01-27
I bought this lens mostly for interesting interiors--it's fast enough to use indoors even with slow film (the attached was taken with TMax 100, handheld at, I think, 1/30 and f/1.8). It pairs well with the Bessa R4M, which has frame lines at 21mm. Really remarkable, unique lens. It also has an extremely close minimum focus, but note that the focus range actually extends beyond the minimum point of the rangefinder coupling. In my experiments so far I haven't found this to be a problem--it's just about a foot between the rangefinder limit and the lens limit, so that's easy to estimate.
