Kamlan is a fairly young brand, I believe that they started life in 2016 when they released their 50mm f1.1 mk1, on paper this lens was promising and good value proposition but ultimately it was too optically simple and lacked an acceptable level of sharpness. Since then they have followed up with a range of other focal lengths improving their optical designs.
The Kamlan 21mm is an interesting piece of kit, it combines fairly unique choices of both focal length and maximum aperture.
Manufacturers tend to design around full fstop points such as f1.4 and f2 as well as fairly standard full frame focal length equivalents such as 35mm and 50mm. In this case at 21mm this lens on my Fujifilm X-T2 APS-C camera is a full frame equivalent of 31.5mm placing it squarely between the more common 28 and 35mm equivalent primes.
As can be seen from the images it is fairly compact, for a point of comparison without its included plastic lens hood it is extremely close in size to the Fujifilm Xf35mm f1.4 but almost a third heavier at 265g vs 186g. That extra weight is most likely down to the all metal construction of the body.The build feels to be high quality with good tolerances on the visible external parts, the mount for example fits snugly to the camera body with very minimal wiggle. However I have noticed that the knurling on the focus and aperture rings has started to lose paint or possibly even wear down, I wouldn’t say that I have treated this lens in any particularly harsh manner so this could suggest that the metal used is fairly soft compared to those used by more premium brands.
Usabillity of the lens is very good, the aperture ring is de-clicked and both it and the focus ring are smooth but with a high level of resistance. The grips for both rings have a good distance between them making them easy to identify blind and use without interfering with the other although even if they are knocked accidentally due to the high resistance they are unlikely to move much. The only nitpick that I have is that the focus throw could be slightly longer to help with focussing at wider apertures as it is under 180 degrees and weighted heavilly towards close focus.
The Images that this lens can produce punch well above its price point, stopped down at f5.6 to f8 the centre frame is pin sharp with the mid frame only falling off ever so slightly. Noticeable degradation only appears at the extreme corners which can look smeared, this is a shame as the rest of the frame is exceptional.
Wide open at f1.8-f2 the centre frame is still surprisingly sharp but with noticeable loss of detail from the mid frame to the edges. This isnt an issue though as I would expect situations that may require the lens wide open would be portraits or other scenes that have a central subject in focus and expect the rest of the frame to fall out of focus anyway.
The depth of field wide open can provide reasonable background seperation but the out of focus areas are not completely blurred which is to be expected with a lens of this focal length on APSC.
If the background is busy the bokeh can appear a bit harsh and a bit more chaotic than I would like to see however on simpler backgrounds it can render very nicely.
The colours produced both wide open and stopped down are natural and punchy with good levels of contrast that can make the images pop nicely.
Vignetting hasnt appeared to be of any concern in any of the images that I have taken so far however I have noticed that there is a small amount of barrel distortion that is visible in architectural scenes or other scenes with strong lines through the frame. It is not a large amount by any means and is easilly fixed in raw processing but it is worth been aware of if you plan to take sooc jpgs.
Overall my thoughts on this lens are very positive, In the UK it can be imported for under £100 and for that price point im not sure there are any other lenses that can provide anywhere near the image quality and experience that this one can.
Attempting Art 
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