Some of you may have heard of them before and some of you may not, but YONGNUO has been around for a few years now and they started out making knock-offs of Canon and Nikon’s Speedlites.
If you are familiar with them, their first generation of Speedlites had issues with getting hot while using them or failing after short periods of time, but lately their quality has improved dramatically, to the point where now many Pros are buying their Speedlites and using them full time. Their newer YN560 Mark IV Speedlite is as good as the Canon 580 EX Mark II and has all the same features, (I Know because I own both Canon’s and YONGNUO’s models). And their newer YN600EX-RT is giving Canon’s new 600EX-RT a run for it’s money.
Photography is an expensive business to get into and anywhere you can save some money, you are doing well. YONGNUO’s YN560 Mark IV costs $69.00 compared to Canon’s 580EX Mark II’s $449 and the YN600EX-RT is $119 compared to Canon’s 600EX-RT at $499.
But in the last 2 years, YONGNUO has started making knock-off lenses as well to compete with Canon, Nikon, Tamron and Sigma. The first lens that YONGNUO offered was a total knock-off of Canon’s EF 50mm F/1.8 “Nifty Fifty”. Not only does the YONGNUO model look identical to Canon’s but in reviews, it shoots about 98% as good as Canon’s. The difference, Canon’s is $130 and the YONGNUO 50mm F/1.8 runs $56!
And now YONGNUO has released their own 35mm F/2 prime lens for both Canon and Nikon. The YN35mm F/2 looks identical to the Canon 35mm F/2 but where the Canon model runs $599, the YONGNUO model runs $94. I read a LOT of positive reviews of the YN35mm so this week I bought one myself and it arrived on Saturday and I took a couple of quick test images with it and was VERY impressed myself! I also discovered when processing in Lightroom that even though Lightroom doesn’t recognize the lens by default, the Canon EF 35mm F/2 lens profile works perfectly!
So, for those of you looking to save money, especially while attending AI, you have save a ton with YONGNUO Speedlites and lenses! Now I mentioned that I would show you how well the YN35mm F/2 lens works, well here are a couple images I shot with mine.
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