Fantastic Portraits, Low Budget.
The TTArtisan 23mm f/1.8 AF X-Mount
The Lens Nobody Talks About (But Should)
Has he gone mad?
I know what you're thinking. A TTArtisan lens. At a wedding. Has he lost it.
Bear with me.
The TTArtisan 23mm f/1.8 AF sits in my bag mostly by choice and partly by curiosity. It's £139 at Clifton Cameras right now. That's it. And on the X-T3's crop sensor it sits at an effective 34.5mm full frame equivalent - right in that sweet spot between wide and natural. Close enough to the 35mm I love, with just a touch more breathing room in the frame.
The obvious question is: when do you actually reach for a third-party budget lens on a wedding day? The answer is specific, and it matters.
When it earns its place
The AF on the 23mm is not going to out-perform my XC 35mm f/2 or the Sigma 56mm in a fast-moving situation. I'm not reaching for it during the aisle walk or when the speeches kick off. But it absolutely holds its own in the moments that aren't moving at pace.
The drinks reception is where it lives. Guests on the driveway, groomsmen with drinks in hand, couples catching up in the late afternoon light. Nobody's sprinting anywhere. The AF locks quickly enough and quietly enough that you can fire without anyone clocking what you're doing. That three-man shot on the Dunston Hall driveway - sunglasses, drinks raised, completely at ease - that's a TTArtisan frame. The B&W conversion helped, but the lens did the heavy lifting on rendering that background and giving the image a slightly cooler, filmic quality that I don't always get from the Fuji glass.
The ceremony is where it surprises you. Locked on a static subject, the AF is confident and the results are sharp where it matters. The ring exchange, the vows, the register signing - these are moments where the couple isn't moving much and you're picking your shots deliberately. At £139 the fact that it handles these frames comfortably is genuinely impressive.
The honest optical verdict
It's not the sharpest lens I own. Wide open at f/1.8 the edges are softer than the Fujinon glass and the centre takes a stop to really bite. But here's the thing - I'm not always after clinical sharpness. At a wedding, a slightly softer rendering can work in your favour. Skin tones, fabrics, the texture of a stone building in flat light. The TTArtisan renders all of that with a warmth I wasn't expecting at this price point.
The close crop on the gloved hand over his at the register signing, the marriage certificate just readable underneath - that's a situation where the lens is doing exactly what I need it to do. Focused on the right plane, rendering the detail with enough warmth that it feels intentional rather than clinical.
Contrast is decent. Flare is manageable as long as you're not shooting straight into a window. Chromatic aberration shows up occasionally wide open but nothing Lightroom's lens correction can't handle in two seconds. For £139 the optical performance is honestly embarrassing in the best possible way.
What the 23mm does that the 35mm doesn't
The extra few millimetres of field of view matters more than you'd think indoors. The ceremony room at Dunston Hall is not a huge space. The ceiling florals, the guests either side, the couple in the middle - to get all of that in one frame from any usable position, you need something wider than a 35mm. The 16mm is too wide and starts to distort. The 23mm sits right in between and gives you that environmental context without the barrel distortion that makes rooms look like fun house mirrors.
The confetti shot outside is the other argument for it. Standing still, the couple walking towards me, the stone manor house behind them. At 23mm with a mid aperture you get background involvement and a sense of place that a longer lens just doesn't give you. That image tells you exactly where you are. That matters for the couple looking back at their images in ten years.
The real reason it stays in the bag
Value. Pure and simple.
At £139 from Clifton, this is the most affordable way to add a genuinely useful focal length to a Fuji kit without compromising on the images you're delivering to clients. I could spend five times that on the Fujifilm XF 23mm f/2 and yes, I'd get better weather sealing, marginally better sharpness wide open, and the Fuji colour science baked in. But would my clients be able to tell the difference in the final images? Genuinely, no.
If you're building a Fuji wedding kit on a realistic budget, or you want a dedicated wider option without committing to a flagship Fuji prime, the TTArtisan 23mm f/1.8 AF deserves a serious look. It's not a lens you compromise on. It's a lens that earns its place.
Enjoyed what you saw?
All images in this post are from Lucy and Jason's wedding at Dunston Hall Estate, Chesterfield - shot on the Fujifilm X-T3.
Thinking about your wedding at Dunston Hall? I photograph there regularly and know the venue well across every season. Get in touch here.
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