Fujinon XF18mm f/2 R Lens

March 2012

Photo Review 9

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Fujinon XF18mm f/2 R Lens

In summary

Buy this lens if:
- It's offered with the Fujifilm X-Pro 1.
- You require a wider angle of view than the 35mm lens.
- You want superior performance and robust build quality.
- You like shooting with filters.

Don’t buy this lens if:
- You need close focusing and macro capabilities.

Full review

The Fujinon XF 18mm f/2 R lens is the only wide-angle lens currently available for the X-Pro 1 and covers an angle of view equivalent to 27mm in 35mm format. As such, it's best suited to landscape and architectural photography but has low enough distortion to make it suitable for group portraits and is fast enough to be used for candid and street photography, even in quite poorly-lit situations.

Angled view of the 'pancake-type' Fujinon XF 18mm f/2 R lens without lens hood or lens cap. (Source: Fujifilm.)

Eight elements in seven groups make up the optical design of this 'pancake-type' lens. Glass-moulded aspherical elements are used at the fifth and seventh positions in the optical sequence. The former to provide a suitably wide maximum aperture and the latter to reduce the overall thickness of the lens.

The optical diagram of the Fujinon XF 18mm f/2 R lens, with the aspherical elements coloured yellow. (Source: Fujifilm.)

The final element has been positioned as closely as possible to the sensor to reduce the incidence angle of light reaching the sensor. This reduces the chance of vignetting and colour shading, while helping to keep the overall size of the lens small.

Build and Handling

A high-quality metal barrel makes this lens robust and gives it a quality look and feel, while its all-black exterior blends well with the X-Pro 1 camera body. The 'pancake' design makes the camera+lens combo almost pocketable. It's a good choice when you want to shoot without attracting attention.

Affixed to the front of the lens is a 52mm diameter Super EBC Fujinon Protector, which appears to be a UV-blocking filter. Behind it, the lens diameter increases slightly to accommodate the focusing ring, which is approximately 10mm wide and carries an annulus of fine ridges. This ring is well-damped but turns through a full circle.

A white indicator mark is located on the lens barrel just behind the focusing ring. Aft of it is the 6 mm wide aperture ring, which has eight click-stops. Seven cover one EV steps from f/2 to f/16, The eighth is marked with an orange 'A' and indicates the automatic aperture setting position.

The lens barrel angles gently inwards from the rear of the aperture ring, ending in a metal mounting plate that appears to have been made from aluminium. Ten gold-plated contacts are situated inside the inner edge of the mounting plate, with the rear element of the lens a little further in, protected by a surrounding black metal ridge.

Both end caps and a lens hood are supplied with this lens, which comes packaged in a handsome presentation case made from heavy card and with contoured interior padding. The lens hood is attached with a bayonet mounting and has a rectangular front section that does a very good job in suppressing stray light and protecting the front element.

The hood reverses over the front of the lens for transportation and storage, which is handy. However, it's impossible to remove the lens cap once the hood has been fitted without first detaching the hood. The cap is also easily dislodged, so you could lose it while fumbling to take the hood on and off.

To make using the lens easier (and reduce the change of losing the cap), Fujifilm also supplies a fit-over lens cover that pushes onto the lens hood when it's in place. It's made mostly of soft rubber but, unfortunately, doesn't fit tightly enough to prevent accidental dislodgement.

Performance
The review lens produced excellent results in our Imatest testing, based on JPEG files from the X-Pro 1 camera. Resolution exceeded expectations for the sensor's resolution across a relatively wide range of apertures, from f/2.8 to f/5.6, with f/4 just pipping the post with the highest resolution.

Diffraction began to kick in at f/8 but resolution remained acceptably high at f.16 and produced acceptably sharp images. Corner softening was least visible at f/5.6, although corners remained fairly sharp at f/8 through to f/16. The graph below shows the results of our Imatest tests.

Lateral chromatic aberration was mostly at a 'negligible' level, just creeping into the 'low' level at f/16. In the graph below, which shows the results of our Imatest tests, the red line marks the boundary between negligible and low CA.

Rectilinear distortion was very low for a wide-angle lens and would only be of concern for architectural photography and some types of copying. Slight vignetting could be seen at f/2 but became almost invisible at f/2.8, where the corner darkening was less than a quarter of an f-stop. Slight astigmatism contributed to this darkening.

The minimum focusing distance of 18 cm limits this lens's capabilities for close-up shooting. Bokeh at wide apertures was as you would expect from a lens of this type.

Backlit subjects were handled extremely well for a wide-angle lens, thanks in no small way to the combination of an effective lens hood and excellent anti-reflection coatings in the lens.

Don’t buy this lens if:
- You need close focusing and macro capabilities.

SPECS

Picture angle: 76.5 degrees (27mm in 35mm format)
Minimum aperture: f/16
Lens construction: 8 elements in 7 groups (includes two aspherical elements)
Diaphragm blades: 7 (circular aperture)
Lens mounts: Fujifilm X-Mount
Back focus distance: 11.0 mm
Focus drive: DC coreless motor
Stabilisation: No
Minimum focus: Approx 18.0 cm
Maximum magnification: 0.14x
Filter size: 52 mm
Dimensions (Diameter x L): 64.5 x 40.6 mm
Weight: Approx. 116 grams (without lens cap and lens hood)