I'm shooting with a Panasonic G7 and soon with a GH5s. I 'd like your opinion on high quality lenses vs cheap cine lenses such as Rokinon and Veydra. I totally understand what cine lenses are, I understand their usage for focus pulling etc. BUT... I've noticed that cine lenses made by Rokinon and Veydra are simply not optically as good as MFT lenses made by Sigma or Voigtlander or Leica. So if you had to film a trailer that doesn't involve focus pulling, would you rent cine lenses, or would you go for the best optical quality delivered by Leica, Voightlander, etc? Am I correct to assume that cine lenses made by Veydra and Rokinon are not as good as the MFT higher quality lenses I've mentioned? Thanks for your time.

I've noticed that cine lenses made by Rokinon and Veydra are simply not optically as good as MFT lenses made by Sigma or Voigtlander or Leica.

How did you test this and could you share some examples?

From all I have read and seen the veydra's have higher quality build and optics compared to the Rokinons which is also reflected in their pricing.

Sorry, but I didn't kept the test footage. I hooked up my cam via HDMI to my computer, I did play with the footage in Resolve 14, I didn't have time to render everything and upload it to Youtube like most people do. I know it's selfish and I should have done it, but too time consuming. I just observed what I got on my computer.

I rented the following:

-Sigma 18-35 nikon mount, so I used a focal reducer called Turbo Lens 2. I found that lens amazing.
-I also rented the Sigma 20 mm Art, Nikon mount- That lens blew my mind!
-I rented the Veydra, 16mm native MFT, I thought it was not as good as the two Sigmas.
I own the Bower 16mm T2.2, which is a Rokinon, also Nikon mount tested with Turbo Lens 2. Very, very close to the Veydra, almost as good if not the same at f5.6
I rented the Rokinon 24 mm, that was the worst of the lenses tested.

The two sigmas are way ahead of the rest. Sharper, better color and contrast. But they're not cine lenses.

I’m trying to follow what you’re saying... cheap cinema lens don’t look good as an expensive Sigma 18-35... why would that be surprising? You don’t need to pull focus and yet you want to know if you should rent expensive cinema lens instead of the Sigma that you prefer?

If your job requires pull focus then any non cinema lens won’t cut it no matter how great it is. And that’s where those cheap cinema lens come in.

Lenrentals recently tested three of the Veydras and found outstanding optical results, way better than the Zeiss CP.2's used for comparison:

https://www.lensrentals.com/blog/2018/03/veydra-cine-mini-prime-mtf-optical-bench-tests/

Just one data point ... I've never used either.

- Greg

Meike lenses are worth checking out now that Veydra is gone