Irix presents new Irix team photographer - Iwona Sikorska
Hello Irix community!
We are happy to present you our new Irix team super talented photographer, specialised on macro Photography!
“Hey everyone! My name is Iwona Sikorska and I come from Poland. I live in a picturesque region of the country, surrounded by the mountains of Bielsko-Biała, which is where I also work, as well as bringing up two children. In my free time I like to pursue my passions such as my garden, trips into the mountains, and, of course, taking photographs. Photography is a passion that’s been with me for many years. Macro photography and close up photography have become the closest to my heart. Seeing the macro world is really fascinating as it allows to notice the beauty that is hidden near us, which is often imperceptible. I love to experiment with light and colour to show this little world in an original and interesting way. I like challenges. I’m also self-taught and I’m still trying to develop myself firther every day in this field of photography.”
Her first impression about Irix 150mm macro:
At the beginning I was concerned that the Irix 150mm f/2.8 macro would be very bulky and heavy.
But then came my first big surprise. Yes, the lens is rather on the big side but it’s very neat; it’s quite short, and it’s without a lenshood. One could say exactly that this is a 105-bit macro, and the weight is very reasonable. Now when hooked up it looks really good on the camera; it doesn’t overload it, and when set up it’s quite stable.
At first glance you can see that the lens is solidly made and well-sealed. Particularly noteworthy is the focusing ring; it’s rubberised with special insets, it’s very pleasant and velvety to the touch. It works smoothly, and due to resistance it has a very long turnover; you have to work on this a little bit, but thanks to this you can set the focus with a precision equal to the accuracy of a surgeon’s scalpel. The Irix 150mm f/2.8 Macro is a manual focus lens– in macro photography, manual focus is essential; using autofocus at larger scales becomes completely useless. So above all, the work of the focus ring enchanted me; it’s a great pleasure and comfortable when shooting. I think, however, that some practice is needed when shooting both closer and further moving objects.
Another thing that surprised me pleasantly is the sharpness of the lens. Of course, most lenses dedicated to macro photography are precise devices, but the Irix 150mm has knocked me out with its sharpness from a fully open shutter, or f2.8. Even on a 1:1 scale, despite the fact there was already low depth-of-field, what’s in it is just… well, sharp. It’s slightly closed-down brilliantly sharp, contrasting, it beautifully separates the object from the background even if the subject is photographed with a similar-coloured background. It doesn’t behave so well against the light (there is a slight haze), but this is only on the wide open aperture. With sun protection attached or lightweight closing, this effect is eliminated.
When it comes to out of focus area, there’s only full satisfaction here. 11 leaf-shaped aperture blades do the job, the bokeh is very pleasant; you can get a beautiful creamy blur as well as stronger scratched lines. Depending on the distance of sharpening, the aperture value, the light and what else is located in the background, you can conjure up very effective images.
I’m very happy with the work of this lens. It’s a really solidly-made piece of glass with its small dimensions for this focal length. You can easily take pictures of the “hand” but after a while, you could feel the weight of the lens within just a few hours of use and use of the tripod is very helpful.