Rokinon 24mm F 1 4 ED AS IF UMC Review | 54 Data compared

The Rokinon 24mm f/1.4 ED AS UMC is a full-frame, manual-focus lens that delivers impressive optical performance on a strict budget, retailing at a street price of $699. In bench testing, the lens demonstrated excellent sharpness and contrast, with results matching the Canon 24mm f/1.4L II and slightly outperforming the Nikon 24mm f/1.4G. It features a robust, matte-black construction, a generously sized and smooth focusing ring with a 140-degree turn, and a highly legible depth-of-field scale for easier scale-focusing. Additionally, it offers a strong maximum subject magnification ratio of 1:4.84, which surpasses both of its major Canon and Nikon competitors. However, the lens comes with notable trade-offs due to its complete lack of electronic communication with the camera body. Users must manually open the aperture to focus and then stop down to the desired working aperture to shoot, which makes dim-light focusing quite challenging. While its 0.36% barrel distortion is solid by historical standards, it still falls into the "Visible" range and is weaker than the "Slight" distortion control found on the Canon and Nikon alternatives. Edge vignetting is also...

The Lonely Speck review highlights the Rokinon 24mm f/1.4 ED AS UMC as an exceptional tool for astrophotography, boasting a fast f/1.4 aperture for superior light collection and sturdy construction with a smooth focus ring. It offers high-quality, budget-friendly performance for capturing the Milky Way. Key disadvantages include its large size, plastic exterior, and lack of electronic contacts for autofocus or EXIF metadata. These factors, while insignificant for astrophotography, make the manual-only lens less practical for general daytime photography.

The Samyang 24mm f/1.4 ED AS UMC is a modestly priced ($669) manual focus lens that features an impressive optical design consisting of 13 elements in 12 groups, including four extra-low dispersion (ED) and two aspherical elements. When tested on a full-frame Sony A99, it delivers excellent overall performance, achieving a DxOMark score of 27 points and offering better control over vignetting, distortion, and chromatic aberration than the Zeiss 24-70mm f/2.8 zoom at the 24mm focal length. Its optimum sharpness is achieved when stopped down to f/4–5.6. On APS-C cameras like the Pentax K-3, the lens serves as a tempting high-speed 35mm equivalent, where the cropped sensor naturally reduces the visible effects of full-frame vignetting and distortion. However, the lens has notable drawbacks tied to its budget price, primarily a complete lack of electronic or mechanical linkages for the Sony and Pentax mounts. This omission forces users into stopped-down metering and manual diaphragm control, requiring them to focus first before closing the aperture to shoot. Optically, its wide-open performance at f/1.4 is disappointing on both full-frame and APS-C bodies, showing...

The Samyang 24mm F1.4 ED AS IF is a manual-focus full-frame lens that offers impressive, premium-level optical sharpness at a fraction of the cost of its Canon or Nikon equivalents. A standout pro of this lens is its exceptional corner sharpness, which easily outperforms competitors like the Sigma 24mm F1.8. Additionally, it boasts excellent light transmission, functioning closer to a bright T1.4 cinema lens and providing noticeably brighter exposures than its competitors at matching F-stops. From a mechanical standpoint, filmmakers will appreciate its long, precise manual focus travel, internal focusing system with a non-rotating front element, and minimized focus breathing compared to older Samyang models. Lens coatings are also improved, helping to better maintain contrast when handling flare from bright, in-frame light sources. Despite its optical strengths, the lens comes with several notable cons. Because it lacks autofocus motors, it is entirely manual, making it less ideal for photographers who require AF for quick stills or video tracking. It exhibits a fair amount of barrel distortion—more than the Sigma 24mm F1.8—meaning straight lines near the edges may warp. The lens...

The Rokinon/Samyang 24mm f/1.4 US UMC lens is highlighted as a high-value, budget-friendly manual focus option, featuring a wide f/1.4 aperture ideal for low-light, astrophotography, and producing shallow depth of field. It offers impressive optical performance for its price, including low vignetting, well-controlled distortion, and a smooth, well-dampened focus ring for precise, manual operation. Conversely, the lens shows significant softness and low contrast at f/1.4, requiring stopping down to f/2.8 or f/4 to achieve optimal sharpness, particularly in the corners. Furthermore, the lack of electronic communication or automatic diaphragm control necessitates stopped-down metering, while the manual-only focus and heavy, bulky construction may pose challenges for users, especially on smaller bodies.

The ePHOTOzine review highlights the Samyang 24mm f/1.4 ED AS IF UMC as a high-value, manual-focus wide-angle lens offering robust construction, a smooth focus ring, and outstanding sharpness at f/5.6-f/8. It is well-suited for video and landscape, featuring low distortion and an internal focusing mechanism, while providing excellent value compared to proprietary alternatives. Conversely, the lens exhibits only fair sharpness at f/1.4, specifically with reduced edge performance, and lacks weather sealing. Additional drawbacks include the lack of an f/22 aperture lock on Nikon mounts and a poorly designed plastic lens hood.

The Samyang 24mm f1.4 ED AS IF UMC is a wide-angle full-frame manual-focus prime lens available for Nikon, Canon, Sony, and Micro Four Thirds mounts, offering a highly budget-friendly alternative to expensive professional wide-angle glass. Its primary advantage is its low price point, coming in around €500 to €200 cheaper than its closest rival, the Sigma 24mm f1.4 Art. Optically, the lens performs well for low-light and astrophotography because it exhibits the least amount of coma distortion among its direct competitors and produces a soft bokeh background blur. Furthermore, its physical construction is solid, featuring a smooth manual focus ring with a wide 110-degree throw that allows for highly precise focus adjustments when shooting wide-open. However, the significant price discount comes with several noteworthy compromises in handling and performance. The lens lacks autofocus entirely, making exact manual focusing highly critical to ensure image sharpness. Communication with the camera body is also severely limited; while the Nikon version has electrical contacts that transmit basic EXIF data, the Canon, Sony, and MFT versions feature no contacts at all, disabling advanced exposure functions...

The Samyang 24mm f/1.4 ED AS UMC lens offers excellent edge-to-edge optical quality and robust, heavy build quality at a fraction of the cost of its own-brand competitors. Its standout features include highly crisp centre sharpness—especially between f/4 and f/11—and a beautifully dampened, smooth manual focus ring. Additionally, the Nikon-mount variant stands out because it includes electronic contacts to relay exposure information and control settings in-camera. The lens uses a complex construction of 13 elements in 12 groups, including four low-dispersion (ED) elements and two aspherical elements, alongside an eight-blade circular diaphragm that yields a pleasing bokeh. However, the lens has notable drawbacks, primarily its lack of autofocus, which makes achieving sharp focus tricky, time-consuming, and prone to error on a shallow depth of field. For non-Nikon mounts, the lack of electronic communication requires manually adjusting the aperture ring, which darkens the viewfinder and leaves metadata blank. Optically, the widest f/1.4 setting should be avoided due to soft contrast, a noticeable soft glow, pronounced vignetting, and distracting red/green chromatic aberration. The lens also suffers from noticeable barrel distortion in structural...

The Samyang 24mm F1.4 ED AS IF UMC is a manual-focus prime lens that offers exceptional potential for landscape astrophotography due to its outstanding control of edge coma and astigmatism, significantly outperforming rivals like the Fuji XF 23mm when shot wide open. Built on a solid metal chassis with durable plastic components, the lens provides an excellent external build quality and value for money at under £500. For night sky photography, it delivers reasonably good images, keeping stars sharp and well-controlled near the edges of the frame. However, the reviewer received a faulty unit, highlighting widespread manufacturer quality control issues driven by complex, highly curved front elements that take a long time to cool down. Major daytime performance flaws included severe unsharpness across the entire frame, which made achieving perfect focus impossible even through live view. Furthermore, the controls present functional drawbacks, featuring a stiff aperture ring that skips intermediate detents directly from F1.4 to F2.0, along with heavy lens flare when bright objects like Venus or house lights enter the frame. Ultimately, the reviewer cannot recommend the lens unless...

The DXOMARK review evaluates the Samyang 24mm F1.4 ED AS UMC (AE) lens on Nikon full-frame DSLRs like the D800 and D610, highlighting it as an exceptional value proposition for its $669 price point. A major pros for this specific Nikon AE variant is its built-in CPU and data-bus contacts, which enable full communication with the camera body for exposure modes, metering, and automatic aperture control. Optically, the lens boasts high peak sharpness when stopped down to f/4, excellent light transmission, and highly controlled chromatic aberration due to its 13-element construction, which includes four extra-low dispersion (ED) and two aspherical glass elements. However, the review details several prominent cons, most notably its lack of autofocus and a massive, heavy footprint weighing over half a kilo (580g). While center sharpness at maximum aperture is very good on the Nikon D610, the lens struggles to maintain corner-to-corner uniformity and outright sharpness at wider apertures (f/1.4 to f/2) compared to premium competitors like the Zeiss Distagon 25mm f/2 or the autofocus-capable Nikkor 24mm f/1.4G ED. Furthermore, it displays high vignetting that drops past...

The Samyang/Rokinon 24mm f/1.4 ED AS IF UMC is a manual-focus lens that provides a classic wide viewing angle on full-frame cameras, while functioning similarly to a 35mm or 50mm lens on APS-C and Micro Four Thirds crop-sensor bodies respectively. The lens features a solid build quality, a fast f/1.4 aperture, and a smooth manual-focus control ring with a long throw that allows for precise adjustments. Notably, only the Nikon F-mount version includes a built-in processor and electronic communication, which enables focus assist lamps, stores EXIF data, and supports the full range of PASM shooting modes by allowing aperture control directly from the camera body. For all other camera mounts—including Canon EF/EF-M, Fuji X, MFT, Pentax K, Samsung NX, and Sony A/E—it operates as a "dumb lens" where the aperture must be adjusted manually via the onboard control ring. In terms of performance, the lens delivers excellent sharpness when stepped down between f/2.8 and f/16, and color fringing remains minimal across the entire aperture range. However, a major con is that sharpness drops off noticeably when shooting wide-open at f/1.4,...