Fujifilm XF35 mm F2 R WR, Black

Product Information

While this lens imitates the exterior appearance of a 50mm LEICA SUMMICRON-M, it has nothing in common with it. When considering the use and feel and the overall design of this lens, the Fujinon 35mm f2 is one of Fujifilm’s best. It’s no wonder it’s one of their best selling lenses. With the XC35mm F2, Fujifilm has created a nifty lens that’ll be extremely popular with entry-level and amateur X-series photographers who’d love to own a 50mm equivalent prime for half the price of the XF35mm F2 R WR. The weather sealed metal body of the Fujifilm XF 35mm f/2 houses 9 optical elements in 6 groups, and has 9 rounded diaphragm blades that produce a very pleasing bokeh. The maximum aperture of the lens is f/2 which is fast, but not quite as fast as I’d like. The speed of the Fuji 35mm f1.4 in certain shooting situations would be much nicer. The 9 blade rounded aperture makes a really smooth and creamy bokeh, but the blades are only rounded when wide open and it seems the foreground bokeh still has a little shape when wide open.

The images coming out of this lens are quite frankly great. This is one of the most amazing lenses you can get for relatively cheap for your Fuji camera. It produces sharp images with shallow depth of field, and don’t get me started on the rounded diaphragm blades (aperture blades) that create pleasing Bokeh. This is one of the best prime lenses you need to get for your Fuji. The Fuji XF 35mm f/2 works very well as a street photography lens as the focal length allows for a lot of versatility. It’s just wide enough to capture a street scene, but also close enough to snap scenes that are more intimate. The autofocus is the shining feature for street though, as the fast and accurate autofocus of the XF 35mm gives me a ton of keepers at the end of each day. Thanks to the IF mechanism the front of the lens does not rotate on focus, which is very good news for anyone looking to use the lens in conjunction with a polariser or graduated neutral density filter. Sure lens construction metal of plastic doesn’t add nor detract from the image quality but there’s something undeniably attractive about them. This is not one of those larger lenses from Fuji’s stable. This is a small enough lens that can be taken anythere. It is also one of the rare real metal lenses you can get outside of the Leica world. If you want real metal lenses nowadays only those two make them.

The Fujinon XC35mm F2 looks like a lens nobody needs… until you start doing the maths

This is the third 35mm lens Fujifilm has made for its X-mount cameras, which might sound confusing, but each has its place. At first, this one might seem unnecessary because the regular XF35mm F2 is hardly expensive – but at the entry-level end of the market, its new low price could make a considerable difference to photographers just starting out and with a restricted budget. We hope we see a few more low-cost XC lenses like this one!

Lens construction of 9 elements in 6 groups delivers sharp, high quality images, even at the widest aperture of F2.0. While the lens is actually a 35mm lens, it performs more like a traditional 50mm because of the APS-C crop. This is considered to be a normal field of view and is often compared to how the human eye sees the world.Fujifilm has taken the right step forward with this lens design and it also solves all the problems that many of their lenses suffer from, such as very loose aperture rings, no weather sealing, and slow AF. Light falloff is completely invisible, even at f/2, as shot on the X-Pro2 which is probably correcting it automatically. This lens is a lot of fun to use at night because at f2 we can still get some nice quality even in these low light conditions. And thats how I tested! In all aspects of my photographic life. Samples are processed in Lightroom 6. Samples are mostly to show how I used this lens during the test period. What you do with it is up to you 😉

The lens hood for the XF 35mm f/2 is so small that it almost seems useless. I’ve shot with and without it and haven’t noticed much of a difference in harsh lighting situations with directional sunlight. It does offer protection to the front element though, so it’s nice to have in crowds or while hiking. It's not that sharp wide-open at f/2 at macro distances. The Fuji 35/2 has much more spherical aberration at macro distances than at normal distances which leads to this hazy flare effect: In the bottom of the micro-corrugated cardboard box is a gray pulp-formed cardboard holder for the plastic-wrapped lens and hood. A small folded tray of microcorrugated cardboard lies on top to hold the manual and lens wrapping cloth. Open-loop systems of DSLRs and LEICAs can't compensate for these errors and sometimes have focus errors (offsets) which we don't have in the Fuji system. Bravo!

Fujinon XC35mm F2 review: So what’s different?

Fuji's focus system is closed-loop, read directly from the image sensor, so it automatically compensates for any mechanical errors. Although the Fujinon 35mm f2 is by no means perfect, the lens is priced in such a way that many of its flaws can be forgiven. It’s also incredibly durable, making this lens one of my first choices for anyone looking to jump into some primes.

With Iridient Developer you can turn off the baked in distortion. Here you can see the Fujifilm 35mm f2 lens has some pretty significant distortion. The in-camera profile above even has some difficulty correcting it perfectly. The lightweight is weather and dust-resistant and can work in temperatures as low as -10°C. The XF35mmF2.0 features the smallest diameter in the XF lens line-up and thanks to the inner focus system and stepping motor, it achieves an autofocus time of just 0.08 sec.

Fujinon XC35mm F2 review: In use

First time, when I read your review of this lens, I was disappointed, because few months ago I bought 35mm f1.4. I knew that f2 is coming and I didn’t wanted to wait. Now when I read your article second time few hours later I realized that both lenses are great and I don’t have to panic. I don’t have to be worried about that I have older version. It’s great, results from this lens are very satisfying for me and I don’t have any complains for AF on my X-T10. I will be happy user of f1.4 version, but it is funny for me when I am thinking about Fujinon lineup. 35mm f2 has more pros than older and it is cheaper. More people will buy f2 I think. So lets wait and see what will happen to 35mm f1.4. I am thinking about other lenses, so I can’t wait for other informations from Fuji. When they are releasing their roadmap of lenses? 🙂 The Fuji XF 35mm 2 is built much better than anything from Nikon or Canon today. It's built as well as LEICA lenses, with much newer technology. For less money, the B+W 43mm 010 is an excellent filter, as are the multicoated version and the basic multicoated Hoya filters, but the Hoya HD3 is the toughest and the best. Filters last a lifetime, so you may as well get the best. The Hoya HD3 stays cleaner than the others since it repels oil and dirt. If you want shallow depth of field, there is little difference between f/1.4 and f/2. For shallower depth of field, use a longer lens like a 50mm or longer, not a 35mm lens. The Fuji XF 35mm f/2 R WR is optically very good, and there are no better-made lenses from the Orient today. Even Sony's much more expensive made-in-Thailand Zeiss lenses are merely thin metal vanity shells over plastic, and nowhere near as well made as this Fujinon lens.