Laowa Argus 45mm f/0.95 FF (Canon RF)

Testers describe it as a bokeh lens first: backgrounds at short and middle distances blur smoothly with strong subject separation, though highlights turn cat's-eye or lemon-shaped towards the corners and backgrounds at longer distances can look busy because of field curvature and vignetting. Wide open the image is slightly soft; the centre becomes very good by about f/1.4, but the corners need f/4 or so to sharpen up.

Lateral colour fringing is clearly visible in the corners and longitudinal fringing at longer distances is noticeable, vignetting is around 3 EV wide open and stays high stopped down, and flare with backlit subjects ranges from characterful to distracting. Distortion is negligible. Build quality is rated highly, and the long, well-damped focus throw and click/stepless aperture switch suit careful manual focusing and video, but the lens is chunky and the all-manual operation gives f/0.95 a steep learning curve.