Viltrox EF-Eii Focal Reducer

[rpcrowe]

I bought a mint copy of the Viltrox Canon EF to Sony E mount (EF-Eii) focal reducer for less than $100 online and I actually am becoming quite fond of this piece of gear in adapting Canon EF lenses to the Sony E-mount on my APSC Sony mirrorless cameras (A6400 and A6500). The focal reducer allows me to get decent quality imagery with some older lenses such as the Canon 135mm f/2.8 Soft Focus lens. Although the Auto Focus of this lens with the focal reducer doesn't work very well; it is easy to manually focus using focus peaking.



I purchased the 135mm f/2.8 SF lens many years ago when I needed a lightweight 135mm f/2.8 lens for portraits. It is a bit difficult to use on a Canon APSC camera for portraits since the crop factor ends up with an equivalent 216mm f/4 lens. The focal reduction makes the lens more versatile on an APSC camera because I don't have to figure the crop factor into the equation and the reducer gives me an extra stop of light. I seldom used it with Soft Focus dialed in but, will be playing with that capability next time I shoot a live subject...

The lens would be an equivalent 135mm f/2.0 but, I will stop it down a bit, This image is an effective f/3.2 aperture with no soft focus dialed in...

BTW: with some relatively new lenses such as the EF 100-400mm f/3.5-5.6L IS ii, the auto focus actually works quite well with the Viltrox on my Sony APSC cameras giving me an equivalent 100-400mm f/1.8-f/4 lens... However, a native Sony mount lens will often focus quicker and more accurately.

[Rufus]

Thanks for widening my knowledge - I had not heard of focal reducers before your post.

[rpcrowe]

I did some math and when I use the 0.7 focal reducer, the crop factor of my APSC Sony camera is reduced from 1.5 to 1.05. That is really a negligible crop factor making, for example, a 100mm lens into a 105mm. Not much crop at all...

To correct my above posting, the focal reducer gives me an equivalent 105-420mm lens when used withe the 100-400mm Canon glass.

Metabones has a focal reducer for Canon lenses but, that is really expensive. I am quite content with my Viltrox focal reducer...

It looks like I got the reducer at a very good price since Adorama is listing a used Viltrox EF-E ii reducer for $200...

The effective focal length of the above shot is actually 141.75mm