Fujinon GF 120mm F4 R LM OIS WR Macro Lens Review

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Coming in at a hefty $2,699, the Fujinon GF 120mm F4 LM OIS WR Macro delivers exceptional resolution, quick autofocus, steady stabilization, and you can use under harsh environmental conditions. It’s one big performer.

Fujinon GF 120mm F4 R LM OIS WR Macro Lens Features

Built exclusively for Fujifilm GFX 50S mirrorless cameras, the Fujifilm GF 120mm f4 R LM OIS WR Macro is a moderate telephoto prime lens. The lens is constructed of 9 groups and 14 elements, including 3 ED Lens elements. It has a maximum magnification of 0.5x, corresponding to 95mm in 35mm format equivalent, high-speed linear motor, focus range limiter, and is equipped with an image stabilization mechanism correcting up to a maximum of five f-stops, which gives you handheld shooting in low-light situations and is dust and water-resistant. Because of fluorine protection of the front element, it’s easy to keep it free of debris and water droplets.

Build

The heavy but well-balanced lens is fairly long (6.0 by 3.5 inches, HD) and weighs about 2.2 pounds.

The black metal barrel has a focus ring and an aperture ring with 1/3 steps. It’s nicely dampened and gives a nice click as you move settings. It comes with three modes. The C position (Command) to take control with a dial on the camera body, A for Auto, and Manual. The A and C positions can be locked to avoid incorrect operations. You can use a range selector to choose an optimal focus range for macro and mid-telephoto use, allowing quicker autofocusing.

The focus ring is very wide, has a rubber, ridged band. It’s smooth and beautifully well-damped in action without being loose. Hard stops are absent at both ends of the 45cm-infinity focus range. In order to make use of a circular polarizer easier, a retractable cutout is provided. The only thing missing is a tripod collar.

Auto Focus

The Fujifilm GF 120mm f4 R LM OIS WR Macro produces a smooth out-of-focus area in front of and behind the plane of focus to suit shallow depth of field imagery. Equipped with a linear motor, it’s a fast, quiet and deadly accurate auto-focusing system. With good light, there’s very little hunting, even as a macro lens.

Manual Focus

Most of the ring is made up of the manual focus ring. Its large rotation angle enables precise focusing and moves smoothly without any play. Manual focusing is set by way of the camera body and is internal. There is a limiter switch for Full, 0.9m-infinity and 0.45-0.9m. Auto magnification and focus peaking are added to aid in focusing.

Image Quality

The beauty in this lens is its ability to create such rich color and amazing sharpness.

Other than in very high contrast situations, chromatic aberration (purple fringing) is non-existent, neither is distortion and while vignetting might be seen at wide-open apertures, stopping down to f/8 will fix it completely.

As expected with such a fast lens, Light fall-off is noticeable wide open at f/4. No worries though, Photoshop will easily correct it.

You’ll find that resolution is strong from the center to edge, but with high-resolution image sensors comes a bit of diffraction.

Pros

Razor-sharp optics
Optical Image stabilization
Weather and dust resistance
Fast, quiet and precise focus, with limiter function
Beautiful bokeh

Cons

Magnification of 1:2
Missing tripod foot
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