Panasonic Leica DG Vario-Elmarit 50-200 mm f/2.8-4 ASPH. review - Autofocus

Have you rated your lenses yet?

Panasonic Leica DG Vario-Elmarit 50-200 mm f/2.8-4 ASPH.

25 June 2018

Arkadiusz Olech

10. Autofocus

After attaching the tested lens to the Panasonic GX9 the focusing mechanism is completely noiseless – you can’t even hear the whirr of moving elements. Its speed is also beyond reproach, running through the whole distance range and finding the focus takes about 0.4-0.5 of a second. It is a good result, especially if you take into account the fact that this lens boasts the shortest minimum focus value in this class of equipment. Still the focusing time is not always that short. When you decrease the AF field to the minimum and you take photos at the maximum focal length in worse lighting conditions and your object not properly contrasted the autofocus might miss the right position and find it only after the second or even the third try.

When you attach the Panaleica 50-200 mm to the Olympus E-M5 Mark II the performance of the autofocus unit doesn’t change a lot. The speed is very similar although the autofocus play happens a tad less often, usually when you set the focus from short distances to infinity. Then the mechanism can go in the wrong direction and return to the proper position only after a while.

Please Support Us

If you enjoy our reviews and articles, and you want us to continue our work please, support our website by donating through PayPal. The funds are going to be used for paying our editorial team, renting servers, and equipping our testing studio; only that way we will be able to continue providing you interesting content for free.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - advertisement - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

In the case of studio shots, outdoor sample shots and during our week-long trip to Farroe Islands we didn’t have any reservations concerning the autofocus. We had some difficulties when the day was cloudy and I tried to photograph something not properly contrasted with the small autofocus point. In such a situation the mechanism got lost and played a bit but it happened once every ten-dozen shots. I admit it is a certain inconvenience but that fact is able to lower our autofocus assessment only a bit.

I think it’s also worth mentioning that Panasonic could have added a focus limiter in such an instrument as the tested lens. It is able to focus already from 0.75 of a meter and a limiter decreasing that to a range, say, from 2-3 meters to infinity would make the already good autofocus performance even better. There would be also less chances of misses and focus play.

The lens didn’t show any distinct front or back focus tendencies, no matter what camera it was attached to or what focal length we employed.

Panasonic DMC GX9, 100 mm, f/3.6