After a couple of gloomy and wet days, we had a cracking morning here, well for a while at least.

In the week we were away, autumn has rolled through with a vengeance, the unturned leaves have turned, some trees gone to bare in no time it seems, but plenty to find when it presents.

I grabbed the Vespid, GH5s (hand held, no stabe in a bulky rig, not pretty) and mounted the Neewer 5 stop ND and matt box.

The footage was shot in 4k, Q3, B-Raw, a basic power grade applied then curves adjusted as needed, more to make up for my exposure misses than anything.

I used mostly T4, a little T2.1 for the flare test and ISO 320-800 on the GH5s.

The top leaf is stunningly sharp, but my takeaway is, the whole image looks harmonious and focus was very easy to find.

Some mild flare from off axis sunlight, but still sharp and if I wanted to with curves, it was fully adjustable.

A little dark and as shot, this was subtle and contrasty on screen.

Just a lovely image. In the footage I rolled through from front to back out of focus, the result felt effortless and natural, no obvious breathing, nice Bokeh throughout.

It occurred to me a little later that this would be a good time for the a Vespid-Hope comparison.

Same camera, same filter etc, slightly different light and the extra 10mm made handling and focus slightly tougher.

Ok, not a fair comparison, because the light was harder, but still some gut feelings to go on with.

The Vespid files look more delicate, more open and gentler. Flare was full image area veiling, mostly fixable, but pleasant enough and a tool, not a problem.

The Hope files are less punchy, but again, maybe the harder light and I did apply the same power grade, which may have suited the Vespid more. They are as sharp when the comparison was fair. I found the Hope harder to work with, but I was rushed, it is longer, the light was harder and close focus was also longer.

In fairness to the Vespid though, I had never used it before, so it feeling very natural is a good sign. I was using the GH5s set up for tripod work, not hand holding (my G9II was not rigged for B-Raw), with a cheap slightly loose adapter, but I still found the whole experience pleasant.

The Hope, given a fair chance, is capable of producing quality enough to match Vespid footage. The difference in cameras will likely be more telling. The Hope 25 on the G9II and Vespid as a 40 on my S5 will probably handle similarly, the Neewer filter was excellent except for possibly some nasty purple flare I noticed when shift location on the Hope.

The Vespid is also delicately sharp enough to slot in well with the Sirui anamorphics.

The only way to make any sort of determination about a lens is to use it for a while, so time to do just that.

I also got a chance to shoot some stills with the Vespid on a G9.1. A 6k test I guess. I missed focus a few times, but mostly got what I expected.