Fujifilm XF 18-120mm F4 LM PZ WR Review

Introduction

Ease of Use

The Fujifilm XF 18-120mm F4 LM PZ WR is a compact, lightweight standard zoom lens, weighing 460g and measuring 123.5mm in length.

Unlike most zoom lenses, zooming is internal, so the lens barrel does not gradually extend as you zoom out from 18mm to 120mm.

The overall build quality of the Fuji 18-120mm is good, certainly in keeping with a high-end X-series body like the X-H2 that we tested it with.

The Fujifilm XF 18-120mm F4 LM PZ WR lens has a metal mount, mostly plastic construction with some metal elements, and a non-rotating 72mm filter thread.

It features a dust-proof and waterproof structure with weather resistant sealing applied to various different areas of the lens, making this lens a perfect partner for the weatherproof X-H2 camera that we tested it with.

This lens has three control rings – the standard zoom and focus rings and an unusual third zoom lever that can be used to adjust either the zoom or focus using internal motors.

The zoom ring is generously wide and has a ridged, rubberised grip band. Both the zoom and the focus rings are smooth in action without being loose. Note that the power zoom mechanism is distinctly audible.

The focus-by-wire focus ring is wide enough for easy use but has no “hard stops” at either end of the focus range, making it more difficult to focus on infinity.

The Fujifilm XF 18-120mm F4 LM PZ WR lens has an internal auto-focusing (IF) system with a very quiet linear motor. In practice, we found the auto-focus to be fast, virtually silent and accurate, and well-suited to both stills and video.

Thanks to the IF mechanism the front of the lens does not rotate on focus, which is very good news for anyone looking to use the lens in conjunction with a polariser or graduated neutral density filter.

The combination of internal zoom and focusing makes this lens easier to use on gimbal stabilization devices as the balance and length never change.

The lens features full-time manual focusing. After half-pressing the shutter button to autofocus on the subject, adjustments can then be made using the manual focus ring. You can even engage manual focusing by rotating the focus ring while pressing the shutter halfway during AF lock.

The Z/F button next to the zoom lever switches its action to Zoom to Focus modes. The zoom lever offers variable zoom speeds which are proportional to the speed at which the ring is rotated, lone of the main reasons why you would use this lever instead of the more conventional Zoom and Focus rings that the lens also offers.

Fujifilm haven’t stopped there – in addition to the innovative zoom lever, this lens also has two custom function buttons which provide the ability to preset either a constant zoom speed, focal length, or focus point, set the camera’s menu.

The Fujifilm XF 18-120mm F4 LM PZ WR lens doesn’t have a traditional aperture ring on the lens barrel. Instead you have to set it using the controls on the camera body.

This lens also doesn’t feature any optical image stabilisation (OIS), again relying on the camera to supply stabilisation via its in-body system (if available). Recent models that do offer IBIS include the new X-H2S and X-H2 and the Fujifilm X-T4, X-H1 and XS-10.

In terms of accessories, the lens ships with a large plastic petal shaped hood and the usual Fujifilm soft lens bag.

Focal Range

The 18mm focal length provides an angle of view of 76.5 degrees on a full-frame camera.

18mm

The 120mm focal length provides an angle of view of 13.5 degrees on a full-frame camera.

120mm

Chromatic Aberrations

Chromatic aberrations, typically seen as blue or purple fringes along contrasty edges, were not too apparent in our test shots, only appearing in very high contrast areas. The examples below show the worst-case scenarios.

18mm

120mm

Light Fall-off

With the lens set to its maximum aperture of f/4, there is obvious light fall-off in the corners, especially at the wider focal lengths, requiring you to stop down by at least 3 f-stops to completely prevent it.

18mm

120mm

Distortion

There’s a lot of distortion evident at both ends of the zoom range which you’ll need to correct in post-processing.

18mm

120mm

Sunstars

The Fujifilm XF 18-120mm F4 R LM PZ WR is capable of producing quite nice sunstars when stopped-down to f/16 and f/22, as shown below.

The lens is quite susceptible to flare when shooting directly into the sun, though, even with the supplied lens hood fitted.

18mm

120mm

Macro

The Fujifilm XF 18-120mm F4 R LM PZ WR isn’t really a macro lens, offering a minimum focusing distance of 60cm / 23.6in. and a maximum magnification of 0.2x. The following examples demonstrate how close you can get to your subject.

Bokeh

Bokeh is a word used for the out-of-focus areas of a photograph, and is usually described in qualitative terms, such as smooth / creamy / harsh etc.

In the XF 18-120mm F4 LM PZ WR lens, Fujifilm have employed an iris diaphragm with 7 circular blades, which has resulted in fairly appealing bokeh for what is after all a rather slow standard zoom lens.

We do realise, however, that bokeh evaluation is subjective, so we’ve included several examples below for your perusal, all shot wide-open at f/4.

Sharpness

In order to show you how sharp this lens is, we are providing 100% crops on the following pages.