For a first attempt, I am pretty pleased with the sharpness and the exposures. Believe it or not, this is actually a great improvement over the old video camera I had been using for interviews!
I stuck to manual settings, I didn't try auto-tracking focus using the Yongnuo's auto-focus as this is the weakest feature in the lens. To be honest, the auto-focus on this lens is horrendously noisy!
But that's not all...
As well as trying out my cheap Yongnuo lens I got to play with a couple of other items of equipment while shooting this short test. The first item of note was my Rode Smartlav+ Lavalier Microphone and the other bit of kit in use for the first time was a 52mm ND2 Neutral Density Filter.
I've never used a Lavalier (or lapel) mic before and had no idea what to expect from it. In the past, I have used a pretty expensive shotgun mic which plugged directly into my video camera via an XLR plug. To be honest, the lav mic was a little noisy compared to a full sized shotgun mic, and it gave me a bit f hiss. But this may have been due to my inexperience. We shall see.
The Neutral Density Filter is a small bit of kit but quite important. Simply put, it is like having sunglasses for your lens!
I have been quite amazed at the low light abilities of my DSLR and it's lens (particularly the 50mm f1.8), but this performance comes at a cost - particularly if you want to shoot on bright sunny days. The lens actually lets in too much light (never thought I'd complain about that) and so you have to bang on an ND filter to turn down the amount of light you let in for particular exposure and shutter settings.
Without the ND filter, my test subjects would have been grossly over-exposed!
(Big thank you to Katey for helping me out with my sound test!)
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