Fujifilm Fujinon XF 16-80 mm f/4 R OIS WR review - Vignetting

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Fujifilm Fujinon XF 16-80 mm f/4 R OIS WR

15 December 2019

Arkadiusz Olech

8. Vignetting

Very high distortion, provided by the optics of this lens (and practically at every focal length too) means that images converted from RAW to JPEG format have to be significantly cropped. It is obvious that vignetting results for both these formats have to differ no matter whether JPEG files vignetting is or isn't additionally corrected by software (and it is).

That cropping and correction are so strong that in JPEG files you can't notice any vignetting at all. There is even no need to show you thumbnails because, by and large, all of them look the same. The maximum vignetting we noticed at 16 mm and it amounted to 15% (−0.47 EV). At 30 mm and 80 mm we got 13% (−0.39 EV), and at 50 mm just 8% (−0.23 EV).

If you want to see how optics really deal with that aberration you have to examine RAW files developed by independent software such as dcraw. Appropriate thumbnails you can find below.

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Fujifilm X-T2, RAW, 16 mm, f/4.0	Fujifilm X-T2, RAW, 16 mm, f/5.6

Fujifilm X-T2, RAW, 30 mm, f/4.0	Fujifilm X-T2, RAW, 30 mm, f/5.6

Fujifilm X-T2, RAW, 50 mm, f/4.0	Fujifilm X-T2, RAW, 50 mm, f/5.6

Fujifilm X-T2, RAW, 80 mm, f/4.0	Fujifilm X-T2, RAW, 80 mm, f/5.6

As you see the results are much higher than in the case of JPEG files. At a difficult combination of 16 mm and f/4.0 aperture vignetting might reach a very high level of 47% (−1.83 EV). It would be difficult to compare that to the results of direct rivals because lenses, described in this test differ in focal range and aperture fastness. Still compared to the Nikkor AF-S DX 16–80 mm f/2.8–4E ED VR it looks bad because the Nikkor, with an even better f/2.8 aperture fastness, had a lower light fall-off that the Fujinon by f/4.0.

The second bad news is slow vignetting decrease on stopping down. By f/5.6 the aberration reaches 37% (−1.33 EV), by f/8.0 it's still noticeable, amounting to 29% (−0.98 EV), and it doesn't disappear completely even by f/11 and f/16, where it is, respectively, 24% (−0.79 EV) and 23% (−0.77 EV).

At 30 mm focal length the situation seems to be noticeably better because at the maximum relative aperture brightness loss in frame corners amounts to 28% (−0.97 EV). Once again stopping down is not especially effective because by f/5.6 vignetting is still 22% (−0.73 EV), by f/8.0 it amounts to 17% (−0.54 EV), and by f/11 it reaches 15% (−0.49 EV).

Even better results you observe at 50 mm. Here by f/4.0, f/5.6, and f/8.0 apertures we got, respectively: 23% (−0.77 EV), 15% (−0.47 EV) and11% (−0.32 EV). Further stopping down of the relative aperture didn't have any measurable influence on vignetting.

The 80 mm focal length makes higher vignetting values return. At the maximum relative aperture you get 35% (−1.24 EV) and by f/5.6 the aberration decreases to 19% (−0.61 EV). Vignetting becomes practically imperceptible by f/8.0 and f/11 where it is, respectivelly, 11% (−0.33 EV) and 8% (−0.25 EV).

Fujifilm X-T2, 16 mm, RAW, f/4.0