Voigtlander 28mm f/2.8 Color Skopar SL II SLR Lens Review

Voigtlander 28mm f/2.8 Color Skopar SL II SLR Lens Performance

Sharpness in the centre of the frame is already outstanding at maximum aperture, with clarity towards the edges of the frame just shy of very good levels. Stopping down improves sharpness towards the edges of the frame to excellent levels between f/5.6 and f/8, whilst maintaining outstanding clarity in the centre of the frame.

Resolution @ 28mm

How to read our charts The blue column represents readings from the centre of the picture frame at the various apertures and the green is from the edges. Averaging them out gives the red weighted column. The scale on the left side is an indication of actual image resolution. The taller the column, the better the lens performance. Simple. For this review, the lens was tested on a Nikon D600 using Imatest.

Chromatic aberrations are a little high towards the edges fo the frame, exceeding one pixel width at all apertures. This level may become apparent, especially along high contrast edges near the edges of the frame and will show if harsh crops are taken from these areas.

Chromatic aberration @ 28mm

How to read our charts Chromatic aberration is the lens' inability to focus on the sensor or film all colours of visible light at the same point. Severe chromatic aberration gives a noticeable fringing or a halo effect around sharp edges within the picture. It can be cured in software. Apochromatic lenses have special lens elements (aspheric, extra-low dispersion etc) to minimize the problem, hence they usually cost more. For this review, the lens was tested on a Nikon D600 using Imatest.

Falloff of illumination towards the corners is very pronounced, with the corners being 3.06 stops darker than the centre of the frame at maximum aperture. Although falloff does decrease as the aperture is stopped down, it needs to be stopped down to f/11 before the image area is visually uniform in illumination.

Imatest detected 1.01% barrel distortion, which is an extremely low level of distortion for a wide angle lens. If absolutely straight lines are paramount, you'll be glad to know that the distortion pattern is uniform across the frame, which should make applying corrections straightforward.

Contrast is good, even when shooting into the light and this lens seems quite resistant to flare. No hood is supplied as standard with this lens but a compact-style LH-28N hood can be picked up for around £45.

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