Vazen 85mm T2.8

• Anamorphic Lens by Vazen
• Single Focus : Linear Compensator
• Mount: PL, EF

The Vazen 85mm yells “Vazen goes full frame and beyond”. Vazen is a fairly new company and, along with Sirui, seems to be the only ones making new anamorphic lenses for a budget-limited market. Their initial offerings, the 28 and 40mm only supported MFT, but this 85mm aims at a different audience.

I’ve had this lens for longer than usual. I loved using it. I used it throughout my feature shoot on both Panasonics GH5 and S5. It’s a lens that’s very easy to use on the field and it’s lightweight enough to not maim my shoulders when going handheld, especially comparing it with the rehoused LOMO beasts.

The Vazen 85mm offers the same 1.8x squeeze, aiming to maximize the use of a 4:3 sensor for a perfect 2.4:1 aspect ratio without any crop. This squeeze also means you get a 47mm horizontal field of view when using this lens.

The lens body feels solid, made of aluminum, it weighs 1.5kg or 3.3lbs. It isn’t light but, in comparison it is almost half of what an Atlas lens weighs. The lens measures 17.5cm or 6.9 inches, and that’s pretty long. This is the Vazen 85 side by side with a DIY rig of similar capabilities - Contax 85mm, Schneider Cinelux and Rapido FVD-35a. The DIY rig is considerably longer, and it weighs almost twice as the Vazen.

Focus comes down to 1.15m, but all markings are in feet. Here I have a bit of a qualm. Close focus reads 3.8 feet, but no one measures feet with decimal cases. It’s always feet and inches. 3.8 feet translates as 3 foot 10. It’s never a huuuuge difference, but many 1st AC’s will be tricked by this. A 1st AC pointed this out for me, I might not have noticed it otherwise. To fix the issue, I’d say switch to meters or do feet and inches, but not fractions of feet.

Rant over. Focus throw is about 180 degrees, and it makes a swooshing sound. You can watch Duclos’ live analysis for more experienced info on the lens’ construction. Iris is marked in T stops, going from 2.8 to 16, it has 12 aperture blades and aperture remains pretty circular throughout the range. Both focus and iris rings are geared.

The front has an outer diameter of 95mm, which is compatible with lots of cine accessories, and the filter threads are 86mm.

The lens has an interchangeable EF and PL mount, and it comes with a couple shims so you can adjust backfocus and Vazen claims it can cover full frame open gate. This lens is also to be part of a set with a 55 and 105mm coming out later in 2020 and 2021. I hope Vazen has been listening to feedback regarding standardizing focus methods, gear placement, lens size, focus scales and everything else that should match on a proper cine lens set. Those were some of my issues between the 28 and 40mm - which also don’t match this lens.

Sharpness: There are lots of chromatic aberration wide open (magenta/green). Center sharpness is pretty good and both center and edges improve greatly when stopped down. Performance is consistent through the focus range.

Flares are strong purple and teal.

Bokeh is smooth thanks to the circular aperture. 1.8x is strong enough to create noticeable ovals

The longer focal length helps keeping distortion under control. The Vazen 85 shows a bit of bulging in the center and slight barrel distortion on the edges. Very subtle and very easy to correct if needed.

Breathing is noticeable as you focus. The image contracts and expands as you rack focus

Coverage is a topic that I can’t properly… cover… here. I cap sensor size at full frame, but the Vazen 85 covers much more. According to New York DP Michael Della Polla, it covers the entire sensor of the Fuji GFX 100, which is 43.8 x 32.9mm, which is a whole new tier of sensor coverage. You can get started on your medium-format anamorphic journey by picking up a Vazen 85mm. A lot of the footage in this video was shot on the S5 6K Photo mode, using a sensor crop that’s taller than regular full frame video.

The Vazen 85 uses the same focusing style as their 28mm. It is a different focusing mechanism from the one used in Sirui, so you don’t have squeeze changes through the focus range. It’s also different from the Vazen 40 along with DIY setups and their variable strength diopters. That leaves you thinking about Panavision’s focusing style, but that’s not the one either.

I still have a bit of quarrel with Vazen’s visual style, the orange color and typography could be fine tuned a bit more. The logo on the lens cap is different from the logo on the side of the lens and there are too many fonts used here! Oh, one last thought, the lens cap is a bit of bubble, which makes the lens pretty unstable when sitting on the cap. I don’t really love that and I think a flat lens cap would land much better.