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Full frame fisheye recommendation


chuck

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I need a full frame fisheye for night sky photograph. The criteria is good sharpness across the field at large aperture, say f/2.8. Tried

16mm f/2.8 AI-s. Found edge sharpness highly unsatisfactory down to F/8. Any recommendations?

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<p>I don't know of any full frame fish-eye lenses which have decent edge sharpness below f/8. Will be interested to see other responses. Have you thought of using two cameras using a 20mm lens in each, synching them and then stitching the two images?</p>
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<p>This is a <a href="https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-1/mswv1_17.htm"><em>contradiction</em></a>:</p>

<blockquote>

<p>fisheye aperture < f/4<br>

full frame sharpness to edges</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Or as Katherine Hepburn said</p>

<blockquote>

<p>You can't have it all-you have to make choices-win here, lose there.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>You might do somewhat better if you give up the full frame part of the requirement.</p>

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Why should full frame fish eyes be softer on the edges than circular fish eyes? Fullframe fisheye so at least cuts off the extreme edge of the image circle, so what remains as the edge should be sharper? No?

 

I suppose decent sharpness at f/2.8 depends on what I mean by descent. The edges of the 16mm ais I have is so soft at f/2.8 that you can clearly see the mushiness even in the optical view finder. At f/8 the edges are sharper, but still very soft when viewed on an iPad

screen. Stars near the edge look like comets or nebulas.

 

What I consider decent if for stars near the edge to at least be more or less star like.

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Silly question, Chuck: why do you want a full frame fish

eye rather than a circular one? I have an 8mm Sigma

(f/3.5) that I use sometimes at night pointing straight

up. I can't say I've evaluated it for perfect sharpness

(last time I saw an online comparison it was

competitive), but I've not heard anyone report a fish eye

that has perfect sharpness. They don't get tested often,

though. I've never really seen the point of a diagonal

(assuming that's what you mean by full frame) fish eye,

so I can't really vouch for them - there's something to be

said for stitching, though not if you're meteor watching.

 

KR, IIRC, said good things about the Samyang fish eye if

you cut the shade off. I used to be fairly happy with my

manual focus Peleng 8mm on Canon, though I doubt it's

sharper than my Sigma (but it WAS cheaper). I've not

seen so much about full frame fisheyes, unless you're

prepared to switch to Canon's zoom.

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Belatedly: bear in mind it wasn't until the 14-24 that

anyone made a decently sharp wide lens (at least for

35mm - I can't speak for super angulons). Now we have

the Zeiss 15mm, Canon 12-24 and arguably Samyang

14mm, but wide is still hard. Fisheyes are less popular

than ultrawides - it may take time for someone to

manage a major step forward in design. Bear in mind

that even the 6mm f/2.8 isn't all that sharp, and that was

pretty much no-compromise (albeit not exactly modern).

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<p>The Samyang 12mm/2.8 is very good at the larger apertures. Cool color balance compared to Nikon. The Samyang 12/2.8 is the newest FF fisheye design in the marketplace right now. Watch out for sample variation.<br>

All other designs from Nikon are ancient, including the current AFD 16/2.8. The Sigma 15/2.8 is often cited as a good FF fisheye, but I haven't used one. </p>

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<p>When investigating Fish Eye's you might , or might not also be interested in the lens's "projection. Samyang (also sold under different brand names" is the only manufacturer who produces Fish Eyes having stereographic projection, which gives a different effect when used for different subjects.<br /> <br /> You can find a bit more information on Wikipedia when searching for "Fisheye Lens" and for "Fisheye Projection" , from there you can click further to what the different types of projection mean. (look also for the key word "Stereographic" )</p>

<p>Some more comparisons you can find on "lenstip" in the lensreview for the Samyang 8mm f/3.5 (DX) or the 12mm f/2.8 (FX)</p>

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<p>I agree the Sigma 15mm f2.8 is a good one. Good sharpness across the board at infinity and f2.8 though: not sure, never really examined it like that. The lens has good sharpness in general although it usually needs a sharpness boost in LR or PS to match a good 50mm lens. The Canon 15mm is better and I am told the 8-15mm Canon zoom is better still: not much help to you though, I realize.</p>
Robin Smith
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<p>I am looking at full frame fisheye primarily because I want around 180 degree of coverage that can be post processed to resemble a rectilinear view. For example, an image of the Milky way spanning 18 degrees like an arch. A circular fisheye might capture the whole hemisphere of the sky, but does not provide much opportunity for providing an image that mixes terrestrial foreground with the sky.</p>

 

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Hi,

I use my 16mm f2.8 AF-D Nikkor for astrophotography and get very good results. I don't think you'll find anything better.

Some reviews favor the older f3.5 MF version, I have not tried that. Back in the film days I used a Minolta 7.5mm circular

fisheye for the sky, but film can't compare to digital. I stop down to f4 most of the time, you have to expect some corner

loss with any fisheye. Your camera should be mounted piggyback on a guided telescope or mount, as I'm sure your

aware of, over 5 seconds stars will trail. Unless that is what your after.

Regards,

Rick

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