@CrazyPete its not trees I want to film but houses and other building. So a next test should be on a house. @Jleo building picture looks real sharp at 2.0 ! What iso setting do you recommend for making a test picture? I will try a lowlight test tomorrow. When returned I want a replacement. On this test picture, iso 320 , f4.0 I also think the focus is still at about 2 a 2.5 mtrs instead of infinity.

Maybe the file size is too large.

@fosterchen it is a little awkward getting everything to mesh with this lens. Because the focus ring is at the back, I had to slide the camera to the front of the quick release plate and then clamp the quick release plate as far forward as I could securely get it, to get the gear ring to engauge with the follow focus gear. I'm not sure that you could get this to work if you were also trying to use a matte box (I don't have one to try) - but I had the camera base as close to the rails as it could go in order to get the gears to line-up.

@fosterchen Yes you can get the Lanparte gear ring to work with a follow focus on this lens. You have to be careful to mount it with the adjustment knob facing away from the camera or it will get caught.

Has anyone successfully tried a follow focus with this lens? I have the fifty dollar follow focus from hondo garage with the gear attachment, and was looking at the Lanparte gear ring: http://www.ebay.com/itm/251008672222

Think it would work with the 12mm's small focus ring diameter (approx. 45mm)?

My lens was delivered yesterday. I breathed a sigh of relief that it was not in pieces and didn't have anything rattling inside of it after reading about @jackbayer 's broken lens experience.

Like the other posters who've received their lenses in the last couple of months, I am disappointed in how soft the image becomes when focused to infinity at f1.6 and while f2 is somewhat better it really has to be f2.8+ before I would call it sharpish. I notice that it is still sharp for close focusing at maximum aperture but anything more than 1-2 meters away is destined to be mush. I've gone back to re-read some of the reviews of this lens that came out about 6-7 months ago and all of them are as positive as I was remembering with no one mentioning problems with focusing to infinity. Looking at image samples from those early reviews, particularly Steve Huff's amusment park shots, look much better than what I have been able to get from this lens. It makes me wonder if the pre-production lenses and/or the first production run weren't built with greater care than what they've been turning out since receiving those positive initial reviews. I'll have to play around with it more and shot some video before I decide ultimately how usable it is.

Was not sure what to do after reading this topic but made up my mind and bought it (in The Netherlands) today for 399 euro, hope to recieve it in good condition tomorrow or monday.

Here's a recording of one of my projects. Noktor 12mm lens, GH2, Cake2.3, 24H, smooth all -2. F around 2-2.5. ISO 1600 or more, don't remember.

2 things before you go judging sharpness from this clip:
- the space is filled with thick fog from a hazer, it makes the light rays come out but surely makes the picture softer as well.
- I'm filming AND performing. Which means I set the camera beforehand as good as I can, press record and move in front of the camera. I'm sure it can be improved by tweaking in shot.
(And of course the clip's downscaled to 720p and recompressed by Vimeo)

Password: preview

@eiji I have maybe a third to half a millimeter play between the lens and the mount.

@JackBayer Glad you got your lens replaced and that the new one is working to spec. I didn't know about the stepped focus in MF mode on the Oly 12mm, one more reason to choose the SLR Magic for video-leaning users.

I think this is something that rarely gets discussed on these forums - some lenses are better at video than stills and vice-versa. If I was primarily a stills shooter I'd probably go with the Oly, as it's sharper and has AF. I shoot the occasional photo with the SLR Magic and in this respect it's just okay, I feel. But for video, the samples I've seen of the Oly just don't have the appealing character and cinematic look of the SLR Magic/GH2 combo.

Some of my lenses are great for both stills and video, like the Canon FD35/2, Minolta 24/2.8 and Pana 20/1.7. But I see the SLR Magic primarily as a video lens, where its shortcomings are largely irrelevant and its strengths are abundant and welcome. This is the lens I've been waiting for since I started shooting M43 video.

@bheath Since I ordered it from an Amazon Market place dealer, who had two more in stock, replacing was no problem. And as with my first order which I "Evening Expressed" with DHL so came the second just 20 hours after setting up the complaint on amazon.de. (Shipment was handled by amazon)

As of now I can recommend the lens to the degree described in my previous post. F2 is what you get and an awesome wide angle. Spend a little more and you´d get the Olympus F2, which would probably be much more usable wide open as the SLR Magic @F2. But at the loss of manual focus (it seems to step-focus when set to manual on the lens, or when set to manual on the cam it motorizes its manual focus)...and then you get auto focus for photos.

In the end my decision was purely moneybased, "how much can I spend right now"...

I received a replacement 12mm yesterday evening and I it´s 1000 times better than the broken one before, obviously.

My overall impression (now) is pretty much the same like the ones I´ve read here and there: A little on the softy side, rock solid (although I´m not sure what that really means, since my first one was broken right out of the box), smooth aperture- and focus ring, vignetting.

All pictures have been shot Raw and then converted/downsized a bit to Jpeg, all sharpening and noise reducing deactivated.

@ F1,6: (first two attached images) For such wide "landscapy" shots I guess it´s sharp enough only for video purposes. But I´d rather not. F2,0 is already much sharper.

Those flary highlights are always there at wide open, but at least the object (my blooming thyme) is in focus underneath all that flaring.

And then @ F5,6 and F11, both as sharp as it gets with this lens.

Edit: I added two samples of F2 to show the difference between 1,6 and 2,0

So, will I keep it? I guess so, but I´ll need to find a solution to use it with a follow focus...