Lensbaby Velvet 56mm f/1.6 Macro Review

Lensbaby Velvet 56mm f/1.6 1:2 Macro Handling and Features

Build quality is very good, reminiscent of Soligor / Panagor / Vivitar lenses from the 1980s, with a metal barrel finished in gloss black. The lens has a bit of weight to it, but isn't overly heavy at 400g, so it balances perfectly with the Nikon D600 used for testing.

The manual focusing ring is a pleasure to use, with damping that is smooth and neither too stiff, nor too light. Those who shoot video on a DSLR and tend to use manual focus anyway, may find this lens ideal due to its pleasant manual focusing action. Closest focus is 13cm, which provides magnification of 1:2. 62mm filters can be used with this lens and the filter thread does not rotate, which makes it ideal for use with graduated and polarising filters.

This lens has no electronic or mechanical coupling with the camera, so stop down metering has to be used. Due to the nature of the lens, and the hazy effect it produces, the electronic focus confirmation feature of Nikon cameras does not work with this lens at fast apertures. In fact, even when using live view, confirming focus can be tricky with the aperture open beyond f/4.

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