Laowa 10mm f/2 Zero-D

Ultra-wide prime for Micro Four Thirds

Part of Venus Optics, Loawa has quickly established a reputation for high-quality manual focus ultra-wide primes and macro lenses. Its 10mm f/2 Zero-D is made for Micro Four Thirds cameras from Olympus and Panasonic. Apart from going wider than any of the companies’ own-brand primes, the lens also boasts an f/2 maximum aperture that’s pretty amazing for a lens this wide.

Laowa has yet to embrace autofocus, but this lens does have a chip that can communicate with the camera and automatically trigger the camera’s manual focus aid (typically zooming in) when you try the focus ring. It also has an aperture drive motor, so that you can control the lens aperture from the camera.

This means the Laowa is a step up from a typical ‘dumb’ prime and can be used in Program AE and Shutter Priority modes, not just Manual and Aperture Priority.

The Laowa 10mm f/2 Zero-D is by no means expensive, but this is by no means a ‘cheap’ lens in its feel and handling. It’s about the same size as the Olympus 17mm f/2.8 prime, but if anything it feels better made, smoother in operation and more solid.

Performance

We’ve used Laowa’s Zero-D lenses before. This one is like the rest and really does deliver zero distortion – or so close to zero that it hardly matters. And, unlike the 9mm f/2.8 Zero-D for APS-C cameras, there’s negligible vignetting.

In real-world shots of subjects at normal distances (not test charts), the Laowa 10mm f/2 Zero-D delivers excellent edge to edge sharpness, too, and almost no chromatic aberration. The lab tests do reveal a drop off in sharpness towards the edges of the frame, but with ultra-wide lenses our lab charts have to be shot at very short focus distances. In real-world shots, any drop-off in sharpness at the frame edges is harder to spot. Rod Lawton

1

The petal lens hood is very helpful on a wide-angle lens, and is included as standard.

2

Turning the focus ring activates the camera’s own focus aid, but it’s a little sensitive. It’s too easy to touch or nudge the ring as you handle the camera.

3

While the focus ring has a precise-looking distance scale, the infinity marking does not exactly align with infinity focus in the viewfinder.