Last Updated on 04/21/2018 by Mark Beckenbach
Venus Optics, the company behind the Laowa lens brand, announced four new lenses today
It’s not every day that a company drops four lens announcements at once. Yet here we are, as Venus Optics has just announced four brand new lenses, including what will be the world’s widest zoom lens for the Sony FE mount. Today wasn’t all about Sony love as the Chinese company also announced some goodies for Micro Four Thirds and even Fujifilm’s GFX system. These new Laowa lenses are sure to peak your interest in some way.
Starting at the top, as noted above, the new Laowa 10-18mm f4-5.6 will be (barring any newer announcements before it’s on shelves) the widest native zoom lens for the Sony FE system on the market. This is just yet another example of Sony’s system starting to get a ton of attention as the greater photography industry starts to get the hint and focus on Mirrorless technologies for investing in the future.
In addition to the 10-18mm FE lens, Venus Optics also announced the 17mm f4 lens for the Fujifilm GFX mount. This lens has Laowa’s ‘Zero-D’ designation, which indicated that the lens has little to no perceptible distortion – quite impressive for a 17mm lens on Medium Format. This lens will also be, as of launch, the widest lens currently available for the GFX system.
The other two lenses announced were a 4mm f2.8 Fisheye lens for Micro Four Thirds, and 100mm f2.8 2x Ultra Macro APO. Venus Optics did not announce pricing for any of the lenses yet, and in terms of availability all they were willing to say at this time was to expect these lenses to ship in mid-late 2018.
Additional details and specs can be found over on the Venus Optics website, and be sure to stay tuned here for an update once the pricing and official availability are announced.