gdanmitchell
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gdanmitchell wrote:
The 60mm f/2.4 macro is sort of OK, and could be better than that depending on your needs.
As a non-macro its optical performance is excellent. The only real downside is that it has rather slow AF.
As a macro, it isn't ideal. It doesn't focus as closely (e.g. produce as large an image of the subject) as a real macro like the 80mm f/2.8. I'd prefer to describe it as a "close focusing" lens more than as a macro. If that is OK for your purpose, it could work fine... but it is a step down from the 80mm macro.
Yeah, I'm replying to myself. That 60mm f/2.4 will make you do things like that. Here's why:
The Fujifilm 60mm lens is not a "bad" lens, it just has a particular package of unusual qualities that don't exactly fit the usual expectations of a "macro" lens. Depending on what you are looking for and how you would use it, the lens could be the wrong thing or it could be exactly the right thing.
If you need "close focus," but not necessarily the "closest possible focus," the lens can work quite well. As pretty much everyone agrees, the lens is optically excellent. This makes it quite suitable for certain situations. For example, my wife's photography focuses on macro, most often plants and flowers photographed very closely as abstracts of shape and color more than as literal reproductions. For much of this work she uses more traditional macro lenses — a Canon 100mm f/2.8L on a full frame system or she "borrows" my 80mm f/2.8 Fujifilm lens occasionally.
But a lot of her photography is done handheld and while wandering around. For this she prefers to use a smaller Fujifilm camera, and she often takes the 60mm as her only lens, or perhaps just that and the 27mm f/2.8. The 60mm works as a 90mm equivalent long lens, but it also works fine for many of the floral/plant subjects that she photographs while on these walks.
So, if the latter (close up but not at the close edge of potential distance) is what you are after and if small size with good optical quality is important, it could be an almost ideal lens. (I'm still not a fan of its relatively lazy AF.)
But... if the work you do pushes the 80mm f/2.8 to its close distance limits... the 60mm is going to come up a bit short.
Dan
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