Fisheye lenses are a pretty divisive topic among photographers. Some love the reality warping abilities of these lenses while others will decry them as gimmick lenses. The truth lies somewhere in the middle and if your work doesn’t require the unique perspective that a fisheye lens gives, you may find it difficult to purchase a lens like this. That being said, the Brightin Star 11mm F2.8 is a solidly built, all-metal fisheye that will push your creativity and allow you to take some mind-bending images.
The Big Picture: Brightin Star 11mm F2.8 Fisheye Review
I’ve been seriously contemplating how I felt about the Brightin Star 11mm F2.8 Fisheye for about a week now. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed using the Brightin Star 11mm as a walk-around lens even though the distorted fisheye look is not necessarily the first thing you think about as an everyday carry option. Still, the 11mm F2.8 can add tons of character to a simple walk to the supermarket. When we initially covered the announcement of this lens, we were excited about the prospect of a fisheye lens with weather-sealing with game-changing affordability. Sadly, the 11mm F2.8 Fisheye is not what we’d consider a weather-sealed lens since it’s only at the mount — which marks its biggest omission. A fisheye isn’t for everyone, but this Brightin Star lens is the type of lens that I could see myself returning to for several unconventional applications.
We’re giving the Brightin Star 11mm F2.8 Fisheye a four out of five stars. Want to check it out for yourself? Hit the following link to learn more and order one for $235 USD (Amazon).
- Extremely wide 182-degree field of view gives you a fisheye effect without mini globe look of circular fisheye lenses.
- Fast F2.8 aperture will help you keep the noise down in low-light scenarios
- Lack of true weather-sealing and dust-resistance may be a dealbreaker
- Full-frame construction makes this lens feel premium
- Relatively lightweight at only 550g
- The stepless aperture control feels intended for videographers
- Extreme affordability, under $250
Experience
We tested the Brightin Star 11mm F2.8 Fisheye with the following cameras: the Nikon Z7II which I own, and the Nikon Zf which was on loan from LensRentals.
As I previously mentioned, fisheye lenses are largely a love it or hate it proposition. I’m unapologetically in the “love it” camp as I find them to push my creativity in ways that many other lenses don’t. The first real test of this lens was covering the New York International Auto Show in early April. Car shows and the resulting photography can be a very paint-by-numbers affair and while the goal is always to come back with useable images, sometimes you can get to exercise your creativity – the Brightin Star 11mm F2.8 Fisheye was able to help me unleash that creativity. So, what is it about this lens that helps draw out that creativity?
For starters, manual focus lenses by their nature require you to be far more intentional about your photography and when combined with the 11mm F2.8 Fisheye’s 182-degree field of view, each frame begs you to approach it with care and thought. To that end, the Brightin Star Fisheye seems engineered with this in mind. Focusing feels like silky, smooth but with lots of throw. In practice, it can take some getting used to, especially in a world where instant-lock autofocusing is the norm. And if you’re shooting at the lens’s closest focusing distance (0.17m) and moving focus back to 0.2m, the entire process feels like an eternity. Things do normalize from 0.4m to infinity – but you’ll have to be very mindful of your focus. Prior to using the Brightin Star 11mm, I had only previously used fisheye lenses for crop sensor cameras, and it was nearly impossible to miss focus; that’s not the case on full frame. After my first outing with the Brightin Star 11mm, I found that some images were out of focus – some by just a hair. It became clear that between F2.8 and F4 there is the possibility that you’re not in focus, so be sure to zoom in and check.
The Brightin Star 11mm F2.8’s aperture ring is just as smooth and quiet as the lens’s focusing ring. It sits at the front of the barrel, which took some getting used to – especially since I was testing other lenses at the same time where the aperture ring was typically closest to the camera’s body. It may seem picky, but there were times where I threw off focus when I was intending to adjust the lens’s aperture. Outside of this though I found the aperture ring has enough resistance to keep you fully in control of the amount of light you’re letting in. As if I haven’t already stated multiple times already, this lens is for the photographer that demands total control of their process and equipment, and that’s a net positive for a photographer like me.
Shortly after the car show, I began keeping this lens affixed to my camera. It’s not a traditional everyday carry lens, but I relished the opportunity to literally change my perspective of familiar and, dare I say, boring walks in the neighborhood. Places that I’d walked past so often that they’ve all but disappeared in my mind became brand new. That’s the power of this lens and while I’d go so far as to say that everyone should pick up a lens like this, there is one serious trade-off: this lens is NOT weather-sealed. When we initially covered the announcement of this lens we said, “Yes, this lens has weather-resistance and it’s only around $250.” Unfortunately, that is not entirely the case. We reached out to Brightin Star and they clarified further saying:
The dust resistance mentioned in the slide refers to the rear focusing mechanism design. As noted in the presentation, this design minimizes the movement of the front optical group, which helps reduce the amount of dust that can enter the lens during focusing, thereby improving overall durability and reliability.
However, this does not indicate the presence of a rubber gasket or a fully sealed structure for moisture and dust protection.
While I can appreciate the high affordability that this lens represents – again, less than $300 MSRP – it’s hard to truly recommend this as a everyday carry lens without weather-sealing. This might be a dealbreaker for some, but if you’re more adventurous or simply know you won’t be taking this lens out in less than perfect weather conditions, then you’ll find a lot of joy using this lens.
But most people afflicted with the highly common brain drain mosquito don’t understand why this is so important even if you’re not going out into the rain. The biggest reason is because it prevents the weathering away of your product. So that means that for such an affordable price, you’ll have a lens that’s designed to last you so much longer.
Image Quality
The images that I’m able to produce with this lens do feel like they are made with a sub-$500 lens. In fact, if you decide you want to correct the fisheye effect in post, you’re going to get amazingly sharp results – even when heavily cropped. While the bulk of this lens’s character is in its fisheye effect, the lens produces some pleasing colors with the Nikon Zf’s “Portrait” color mode and especially when paired with the Provia-F 100 custom profile on my Nikon Z7II.
Below are some samples straight from the camera:
The following edited images were taken with the Brightin Star 11mm F2.8 Fisheye:
Brightin Star 11mm F2.8 Fisheye Tech Specs
The following tech specs were taken from the Amazon product listing:
- 180 ° Fisheye Lens: Ultra-wide field of view, capturing architecture/starry sky/Milky Way is even more stunning, with a strong sense of space.
- F2.8 Large Aperture: Under the same brightness shooting environment, can use lower ISO shooting to achieve better image quality, with less noise in night scenes.
- 8 Elements in 11 Groups: 8 sets of 11 optical structures, 4 high refractive index lenses, and 1 ED lens, effectively control dispersion while ensuring sharpness, making the image clear and sharp from the center to the edges.
- 8-Needle Star Light: This lens is equipped with 8 aperture blades, which transform the light into an eight-pointed star when shooting night scenes, making the picture sparkling.
- Close-up Capability: This lens with a recent focus distance of 0.17m. Combined with the unique effect of a fisheye lens, it can capture images with full tension during close-up shooting.
Declaration of Journalistic Intent
The Phoblographer is one of the last standing dedicated photography publications that speaks to both art and tech in our articles. We put declarations up front in our reviews to adhere to journalistic standards that several publications abide by. These help you understand a lot more about what we do:
- At the time of publishing this review, Brightin Star isn’t running direct-sold advertising with the Phoblographer. This doesn’t affect our reviews anyway and it never has in our 15 years of publishing our articles. This article is in no way sponsored.
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