My Olympus and … a Laowa 10mm f2.0 C&D-Dreamer Zero-D MFT

No sharpness tests, pixel counting or other technical mumbo jumbo, just everyday pictures with the intention of showing the view angle, color pattern and character, and my thoughts of the lens.

The Venus Optics Laowa 10mm f2.0 C&D-Dreamer Zero-D for MFT is very tiny and light, and since it’s used on an MFT camera, I think that’s a good thing.
I recently wrote a review of the 7Artisans 35mm f0.95, where I liked that the lens was larger, which made it easier to operate – it was, however, it was also used on a larger camera. My new (old) Olympus OM-D E-M5 Mark II is really a very small camera, that compactness was also part of the reason why I bought this camera.
It makes it also more logical to use smaller lenses.
However, even if you have coal shovels of hands, this is an easy-to-use manual lens.

So focusing with this small lens is super easy, you can hardly miss it. The wide angle makes it also very easy to set hyperfocal distance, so that everything is sharp from near to infinity, very useful for street photography. For this, the lens is equipped with a handy DOF scale.

And sharpness ? well, at f2.0 I think it’s sufficiently sharp, but it’s very sharp from f4 to f8, and I personally would try to use it as much as possible on that settings.

Vignetting and Flare, well, it’s not a €1000 lens, so nitpickers please abstain.
Personally, I think it’s not that bad and you barely see it, yes a tiny bit of vignetting, don’t most wide angle lenses have that ?
Flare, well I have to be careful here – flare can be beautiful or disturbing – depends on the image and the flare, and sometimes a strange saucer-like spot can show up. So pay close attention in winter with low sun, or with direct frontal light.

Below original on the left, and enlarged screenshots on the right:

The aperture is another, surprising story : there isn’t one.
No, this fully manual lens does not have an aperture ring, but the aperture can be controlled on the camera – electronically!
Yes, the Laowa 10mm f2.0 is equipped with electronic contacts!
Not for AF, but for controlling the aperture and which is also very handy: your camera recognizes your lens, great! No more setting focal information on your camera, just mount and shoot.

As for that angle of view (96°), “they say” a standard lens (35mm in APS-C) roughly corresponds to the angle of view of the human eye.
That is more or less correct, although it is actually more about the magnification than the real angle.
So, do we really see so limited ?
Look really consciously straight ahead,
then pay attention to what becomes visible in the left and right corner of your eye – without moving your head.
Yes, you can see almost everything over an angle of about 180°,
not sharp of course, but visibly more or less. Then if you really pay attention to the area that is actually part of your field of view or angle, I think it’s in the direction of about 90° – a little less likely.
The angle of view of this Laowa 10mm (which corresponds to 20mm on APS-C) is 96° and feels much more natural to the human eye in my opinion.
That’s also because this is a zero distortion lens, so the horizon stays straight, and you don’t have that weird fisheye effect that other wide angle lenses sometimes have.
So, if you’re not sure if the angle of this lens isn’t going to feel too wide, I’m not of that opinion, it actually feels very natural.

Zero Distortion Lens, I just wrote it before, a great advantage ! which makes this lens great for Street photography, Landscapes, Astrophotography or Architectural photography. That is also the target group of this lens and where it comes into its own.

Furthermore, the front of the lens does not turn, and the lens focuses internally, so it does not protrude while setting sharpness.

The lens comes with a good lens hood, which also protects the lens well.
Tip : although the lens is well protected by the lens hood, I would opt for a UV or Protection filter, primarily so that the front lens cap can be removed or mounted more easily, without having to remove the lens hood.

All photos above and below are SOOC – no additional sharpening is done, no film simulation or color editing – only resized to 1920×1080 at 70% for web viewing.