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"With a wonderful sheen, the Velvet 28 is an excellent creative tool – for the right photographer."

• Dreamy soft glow

• Robust metal construction

• 1: 2 macro functions

• Unique range of functions

• Manual focus

• You need to decrease the aperture to focus

• Not compatible with auto mode

If McDreamy were a lens, it would be the Lensbaby Velvet 28. From the company known for its lenses, which avoid optical perfection in favor of creative effects, the Velvet series was developed to capture an ethereal glow.

While most lens manufacturers aim to develop sharp, distortion-free lenses, Portland, OR, based Lensbaby is an art lens company that accepts the strange, unusual, and surprising. The simple, electronics-free lenses produce a variety of in-camera effects, from swirling blur to a controllable vignette.

Like the Velvet 56 and 85 before, the Lensbaby Velvet 28 creates a soft glow that is strongest at large openings and dissolves with increasing aperture. The larger focal length brings the popular effect on landscapes and environmental portraits for headshots and floral close-ups. Close-ups remain an option as well, as the Velvet 28 retains the 1: 2 macro functions of other Velvet lenses.

Launched on April 21 for $ 550, the Velvet 28 is a manual focus lens that is available in both DSLR and mirrorless mounts, including Canon EF, Nikon F, Canon RF, Nikon Z , Sony E, Fujifilm X and Micro Four Thirds. We tried an early Nikon F-Mount model to see what types of shots this new lens baby can imagine.

All-metal design

The Lensbaby Velvet 28 looks a little different than the other high-end lenses in my kit, but still feels ready for professional use. Although there is a lack of autofocus and automatic exposure, the all-metal housing is robust and well made.

It's a powerful lens, but the small stature and lack of an auto focus motor help make up for this. It doesn't feel particularly heavy on the front of my Nikon D850, a fairly large DSLR. This version of the lens weighs a touch over a pound, while the mirrorless version weighs about 1.3 pounds.

The focus ring takes up most of the lens barrel. As a lens with manual focus, the ring rotates smoothly and has much more degrees of movement than a typical autofocus lens, which allows the smallest settings. There is also a traditional aperture ring, because you cannot control the aperture from the camera due to the lack of electronic contacts.

The lens also includes a nice metal lens cap and can accommodate 67mm filters.

Note: We tested a pre-production model of this lens. The exterior has some minor changes from the lens shown, including the 1:22 aperture setting label.

A fun experience

Manual focus can be both good and bad. Good, because manual focus forces you to slow down. And as you slow down to get the right focus, you may be more inclined to think more about the composition.

However, the convenience of autofocus cannot be denied. While the focus tip simplifies the task with mirrorless cameras and in live view mode with DSLRs, a sharp image requires more time and effort. It is difficult to take a sharp image with a lens that is both manually focused and somewhat soft. The best way to get a sharp picture is to focus with a f-stop of at least 1: 4 and open it if necessary before taking the picture. This is not ideal and will result in manual focus taking longer.

While working with manual focus is tedious, the Velvet 28 has a wide focus range. The lens can take 1: 2 macro shots so you can focus on objects just two inches from the lens. This makes it more versatile than the typical 28 mm.

Without an electronic connection to the camera, not only is the automatic exposure removed from the table, you also have no lens metadata stored in your files.

Manual focus may be a problem, but there's nothing like the creative thrill of using such a lens. Working with the Velvet 28 is simply a blast. The soft focus effect is another tool for creativity in the camera that goes beyond aperture and shutter speed.

Dreamy picture quality

The maximum aperture starts at 1: 2.5, but a “+” symbol on the lens allows the user to rotate beyond it to achieve an additional 1/3 light stop and even more of this glow effect. With the largest aperture, the entire image is soft and bright, while with the narrowest aperture, the Velvet 28 looks almost like a normal lens.

At the widest setting, the entire image looks as if it is covered by fog. Colors bleed across edges and objects appear to glow, especially white or overexposed areas of the image. The contrast decreases again at 1: 2.8, although the middle is still soft. At 1: 4, a certain sharpness begins to build up in the middle of the photo, while the edges retain this ethereal glow. The sweet spot is 1: 5.6, which ensures decent sharpness without completely erasing the glow effect. The image center is still not quite as sharp as a typical lens, but admittedly, this can also be a user error with manual focus.

At 1:16 or 1:22, this velvety glow is much less obvious throughout the picture.

The white areas of the photo tend to capture most of the glow when shooting wide open. With this setting, the color of white objects bleeds across the edges and creates a halo effect. This can be increased if the image is intentionally overexposed. This creates another way to use the velvet creatively by adding lights to create a halo.

Despite the wide angle, I still filled the frame with my motifs to make these dreamy edges much more obvious. Otherwise, the glow fuses to the edges with the blur of the background. However, the lens can still be used for landscapes, causing deliberate hazing over the entire image or creating a soft blur at the edges.

Our opinion

The Lensbaby Velvet 28 gives wide-angle shots a dreamy shine. It's a look that, if done right, can be great, but without time and foresight, it just looks like a blurry picture. Art photographers will love it; Pixel peeper, not so much.

The metal construction and the easily rotatable focus and aperture rings give it a first-class feeling, while the macro focusing further expands the creative possibilities.

The lack of auto focus and auto exposure mixed with the deliberate softness means that taking pictures with this lens requires patience and a few tries.

Is there a better alternative?

The Lensbaby optics are unique – but in this case Lensbaby competes with itself. While the new lens is the widest in the Velvet series, the Trio 28 is a 3-in-1 lens that allows photographers to rotate a dial to switch between the Swirl, Velvet and Sweet effects. That means there is already a 28 mm option with a velvet effect.

However, there are some differences between the effect on the trio and the velvet. The trio's aperture is fixed at 1: 3.5 so that the soft effect cannot be adjusted. The trio also lacks the macro functions and is only intended for mirrorless mounts, so you can't put it on a DSLR. Some photographers may still overlook these missing features because the trio is a 3-in-1 lens that costs half the price of the Velvet 28.

Lensbaby also offers the Velvet in the 85 mm and 58 mm versions, which makes it easier to fill the frame and exaggerate these soft edges.

How long it will take?

Well built and without an auto focus motor, there is no reason why the Lensbaby Velvet 28 doesn't last many years. While other lenses with advancing technology are being replaced by sharper versions, this does not apply to the Velvet 28. However, this does not mean that you will continue to enjoy the effect in the future – some photographers may get tired of it over time.

Should you buy it

Yes, if you want to have control over creative effects in the camera. For photographers whose style harmonizes with the softness and shine of the Velvet 28, the lens could be a valuable creative tool. Do not buy it if you need autofocus or automatic exposure, or if you want the pictures to be as sharp as possible.

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