Laowa 35mm f/2.8 Zero-D Tilt Shift 0.5x Macro review

I tested the Laowa 35mm f/2.8 Zero-D Tilt Shift 0.5x Macro on a Sony A7 III, but it’s also available in Nikon Z, Canon RF and also L-mount versions – though we’re told it’s not compatible with the Lumix S5 II/X, S1 II, S1 R II.

Tilt shift lenses like this Laowa offer two unique features. First, the lens can be tilted, or angled, relative to the camera. This offers extended depth of field for angled surfaces, which is great for studio product shots, especially of flat objects. Or, if you tilt the lens in the other direction, you can create extra-shallow depth of field effects to make street scenes shot from high viewpoints look like tiny models.

The shift movement is especially useful for architectural photography, where you can use it to avoid perspective distortion by keeping the camera level while photographing tall buildings.

These tilt shift movements require some very precise engineering, both in the optical construction and the lens movements. The optics have to be designed in such a way that the image circle produced is much larger than normal, to allow for these tilt and shift movements,. This is one reason why tilt shift lenses are both expensive and heavy.

There are some restrictions that tend to be common with all lenses of this type. It’s not possible to maintain mechanical or electronic connections with the lens’s movements, so this is a ‘dumb’ lens where you have to focus manually and your aperture settings are not recorded in the EXIF data.

And while you can apply tilt shift movements both horizontally and vertically, this is done by rotating the lens so that the movement axes work in the direction you want. You can’t apply horizontal and vertical correction at the same time, so it’s not like using a large format analog camera where both the camera back and the lens panel can both move independently in any direction you like.

So is this Laowa one of the best tilt shift lenses you can get? Maybe the focal length is a bit too long for a lot of architectural or interior work, but while its 0.5x macro capability is not quite a true 1:1 macro, its tilt movement is something that even the best macro lenses don't match.

The size, weight and complex movements mean that the Laowa is not designed for handheld use, though. You would use it for tripod shots where there’s time to set up the lens movements very carefully.

Can you not do all these things digitally and save yourself the trouble? You can, kind of, but it’s really not the same. Digital keystone correction sacrifices detail in the stretched areas, and digital ‘miniature’ effects use fake bokeh which isn’t hard to spot. And there’s no digital equivalent of the depth of field extension you can get with a controlled shift movement.

Laowa 35mm f/2.8 Zero-D Tilt Shift 0.5x Macro: specs

Laowa 35mm f/2.8 Zero-D Tilt Shift 0.5x Macro: price

The Laowa 35mm f/2.8 Zero-D Tilt Shift 0.5x Macro goes on sale at a price of $1,249 / £1,269 (about AU$1,930). That’s towards the upper end of the Laowa price scale, but well below own-brand perspective control lenses from Canon and Nikon – both of whom still sell DSLR PC lenses but don’t bother with mirrorless versions. There are cheaper third-party alternatives to the Laowa 35mm f/2.8 Zero-D Tilt Shift 0.5x Macro, but not with Laowa’s reputation for optical and engineering quality.

Laowa 35mm f/2.8 Zero-D Tilt Shift 0.5x Macro: design and handling

The Laowa 35mm f/2.8 Zero-D Tilt Shift 0.5x Macro is beautifully made, but it’s not an easy lens to use. Part of that is because lenses like this never are, and partly because of a couple of design aspects of this lens in particular – though ours was an early sample, and some details may change.

We tested it on a Sony A7 III, and even fitting the lens was a puzzle. That’s because (I found out) the Sony E-mount uses unequal spacing between the bayonet lugs (bet you didn’t know that!) and because this lens can rotate on its mount through 360 degrees, you can’t simply line up the markings on the top in the usual way. In fact you need to look for a small red dot on the mount base to line it up for mounting. Once you know, you know, but it’s just one respect in which this lens (and others like it) are different.

Another issue is that this is a big, wide lens that doesn’t leave much of a gap to the grip on our camera, so some controls are quite awkward. The lens release button on the body is harder to get to and the mount rotation button can become hard to keep pressed as you rotate the lens. There’s really very little space between the lens and the camera grip for any kind of hand-holding.

The vertical shift movement isn’t ideal either. Like the tilt movement it has a locking screw on one side of the lens and a geared screw on the other – but with the lens rotated for vertical shift movements, the weight of the lens completely overpowers the click-stops on the adjustment knob, so that you have to take the weight of the lens as you adjust it.

There's another thing. If you want to use some tilt to create a miniature effect for a seen-from-above cityscape, infinity focus is no longer available at higher tilt settings – you have to set infinity focus first then adjust the tilt as far as it will let you. Hmm.

This lens feels like a piece of real precision engineering, but it’s also big and heavy, and its operation foibles make it just a little more difficult to use than I'd like.

Laowa 35mm f/2.8 Zero-D Tilt Shift 0.5x Macro: performance

Any tilt shift lens needs patience and precision to get the most from it – but here it’s absolutely worth it. The Laowa 35mm f/2.8 Zero-D Tilt Shift 0.5x Macro has a complex (and, we guess, expensive) optical design that shows no obvious drop-off in quality at the extremes of its movements. The only quality issue is some flare shooting wide open into bright light with lots of tilt, but that's not really a common set of circumstances.

It’s a ‘dumb’ lens, so it won’t automatically trigger your camera’s focus magnifier mode – you’ll have to activate it yourself if you need it. With a good EVF or rear screen, though, you may be able to judge focus well enough without zooming in.

Shooting with the Laowa 35mm f/2.8 Zero-D Tilt Shift 0.5x Macro can be hard work at times, but the quality of the results it delivers are absolutely first rate.

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Laowa 35mm f/2.8 Zero-D Tilt Shift 0.5x Macro: verdict

You don’t buy a perspective control lens for fun effects. You buy one because your work demands the perspective control and focus plane adjustment that only a lens like this can deliver. It requires time and concentration to use properly, but this Laowa lens can do things that other lenses simply can’t. It’s a shame that it’s only a 0.5x macro, not a ‘true’ macro lens, but this will still get you close enough for all but the tiniest subjects.

In a sense, you’re getting three lenses in one – a perspective control lens for architecture, a shift lens for product shots and miniature effects and a macro lens (sort of) for close-ups. But is it trying to do too many things. I admit, for architecture I’d rather have a much wider lens and maybe I wouldn’t need the tilt movement… but if the 35mm focal length suits your work and it’s of a precise and paintaking nature, then the Laowa 35mm f/2.8 Zero-D Tilt Shift 0.5x Macro could be exactly what you need, and at a very competitive price.