Zuiko OM wide angle question

<p>Well I am finally taking the plunge on getting a Zuiko wide angle. I have the 50/1.4 MC, several 50/1.8s of various flavors, a newer 85/2 and a 135/3.5. My wide angles not counting zooms are a Sigma 24/2.8, Sigma 28/1.8 and Tamron 28/2.5. The Tamron is decent, especially stopped down and the 28/1.8 is very sharp. However, the Sigma 24/2.8 is a weak wide open, very bad astigmatism in the corners until you stop down below f/5.6 where it pretty much disappears and is very sharp thereafter through the frame (sharp in the center even wide open).<br>

My two most used focal lengths at the wide end are 24 and 28, mostly because I like primes and don't have a 35mm lens, but even in zooms I tend to use 24 and 28 the most.<br>

So that is basically a round about way of asking about the Zuiko 24mm f/2.8. Everything I have heard says it is very sharp and of course tiny. Both sound good to me. The 49mm filter thread is just icing. So I am thinking of replacing my sigma 24/2.8 with a zuiko 24/2.8. Reading a bit it seems like there are two versions of the 24/2.8, the early single coated and then the later multicoated. Is there any real differences between the two other then the coatings? MIR lists a weight difference of 5 grams between the two flavors. Was this an optical change (I know the number of elements and groups is the same)? Or simply construction change. I know some of the lenses changed their construction through the years I assume for either ease of building or ruggedness without changing the optics at all (other then coatings), is that the case here?<br>

Also questions for the future, other then the extra stop of speed, is the 24/2 any better then the 24/2.8? Or for that matter is the 24/2.8 better then the 24/2 and I'd be sacraficing quality for speed if I went that route at a future date?<br>

Also how is the 28/2.8? I have the high speed covered with the Sigma 28/1.8 which is very, very sharp, especially stopped down, I really can't see the Zuiko equivelent being much if any better (the 28/2 that is), but the Tamron 28/2.5 is a little soft wide open and never gets shaving sharp when stopped down (still good though)...so I am thinking I will replace it eventually, supposing the Zuiko 28/2.8 is really good. Or am I better of keeping the Tamron 28/2.8 and getting a Zuiko 28/3.5 for when I need an even smaller lens and speed is not an issue?</p>

<p>Hello</p>

<p>I didn't see in your discussion which camera you intend to to use this on. I'll assume its a 35mm film camera like an OM-1 or something</p>

<p>Soon after I got my 24mm it became my favourite lens ... At this time I was using Canon and I bought an EF 24 f2.8 ... I liked this so much that it and my 50mm f1.8 became my regular pair of lenses. Recently I added an OM 21mm to my outfit (and yes, I use this on my EOS film body) and I love it. I don't know if it has something to do with me becomming used to the 24 but the extra width is just wonderful ... I can get in close and still get great background perspective which is softly rendered.</p>

<p><img src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_UFDhrGObeFc/SuQmFuusxZI/AAAAAAAABRQ/udJ1qMiH6Is/s400/backlitLeaf-fineIce.jpg" alt="" width="400" height="257" /></p>

<p>this is on Sensia slide film about 20cm from the leaf.</p>

<p>I don't think that the difference between 2 and 2.8 will appear more in your images as much as it will on your bank statement... they are popular with collectors.</p>

<p>Personally I would not get a 28 at all ... it was never wide enough for me. I always felt that 28-80 zooms were pointless for me as 28 wasn't wide enough, my 50mm was nicer and 80 wasn't quite right either. I bought a 100 f2.8 years ago and found 100 was more the step up I wanted from 'standard view'.</p>

<p>So I am recommending you consider the 24 f2.8 if budget is tight and the 21 f3.5 if you want to put an enormous smile on your face</p>

<p> </p>

<p>"I have the high speed covered with the Sigma 28/1.8 which is very, very sharp, especially stopped down, I really can't see the Zuiko equivelent being much if any better (the 28/2 that is)"<br>

The Zuiko 28/2 is one of the best of the best, don't underestimate it.<br>

I will also suggest going with a 21mm lens. 24mm is just too close to 28mm to show any distinct difference in perspective.<br>

That said, the 24/2.8 is a very very nice lens, you really won't be disappointed. In fact, you may just end up selling all of your 28mm lenses and using the 24mm exclusively. I've read anecdotal evidence that suggests the earlier version of the 24/2.8 is better, but I've not seen any definitive tests or test photos to back up such claims. You really can't go wrong with either version. I sold my copy because I wanted to go wider, and was using my Zuiko 28/2 a whole lot more than my 24/2.8.<br>

Can't speak for the 24/2. I know Skip Williams loves his copy.</p>

<p>Here's a shot with the Zuiko 24/2.8:</p><div></div>

<p>I find I use my 28/2.5 more then my 24/2.8 only because I don't have a 52mm polarizer. A little bit of a weak excuse because I could just drop $20 to get a polarizer for it. In this case though my Sigma 24/2.8 just isn't strong wide open, in fact it is darned near unusable in the corners, not something I really noticed until recently, I think in large part because of the type of things I take pictures of tend not to have much details in the corners when I am going wide. Here is an example done wide open, you can see the astigmatism in the corners in the forest picture. It really does disappear by around f/5.6...but very annoying as I don't want to have a 24mm f/5.6 lens. Hence my hunt for a replacement 24mm lens with the Zuiko seeming to fit the bill. In this case yes, it is for use on OM-1 and OM-1n cameras.</p>

<p>I'd certainly love to look at a 21/3.5, but the prices seem to be as much or more then a 24/2, which is also out of my price range right now. The Zuiko 28/2 may be better then the Sigma 28/1.8 aspherical, but that 28/1.8 is pretty darned good, even wide open, at least as sharp as my 50mm f/1.8 mij comparing test shots to each other at similar aperatures.</p>

<p>In an ideal world I'd collect one of each Zuiko just because, but with my wife staying at home with our kids for another few years till they're all in school any lens purchases of more then about $200 are going to be very few and far between (heck, any lens purchases are). So that limits me to the Zuiko 24/2.8, 28/2.8 and 28/3.5 on the wide end (and of course a 35/2.8 and maybe just a 35/2 depending on condition). 35mm I just don't really use, though I wouldn't mind trying out a 35/2.8 some day and 28mm I have covered with one excellent fast, if a little large lens and one resonable sized and good lens, but 24mm is really lacking which is what I am looking to fill for now before looking at improving my 28mm end.</p>

<p>I really don't like zooms in the super wide through portrait focal lengths (I do like them for short to medium telephoto). So that means more often then not I am carrying a 24, 28 and 50mm lens with me along with whatever I am using for longer focal lengths (85, 135 and/or 70-210). That formula usually works pretty well for my photography, though of course one of these days I'd love to give 21/28/50 a shot.</p><div></div>

<p>All my Zuikos treat me really well though.</p><div></div>

<p> I have the three 24mm Zuikos. I personally prefer the tiny bit of veiled flare in the SC version, but they're all good. The 24/2.0 doesn't seem to have an edge on the other two besides speed. All were used by pros in their day to produce double-page work in major magazines.</p>

<p>I like my Zuiko 24/2.8 In fact I'm about to go hiking tomorrow and I'm taking it with me!</p>

<p>I prefer it to the Zuiko 28/2.8. Better image quality and a better focal length. </p>

<p>Just a personal opinion, but i feel that 28mm is so common in point and shoot digital cameras, it's a focal length that gets boring and doesn't really look 'wide' anymore because everyone's happy snaps are taken at this length (concerning statistic maybe... it used to be 50mm, then 35mm, then 28mm). 24mm is wide enough to actually look wide, yet not so wide to look like a fisheye lens.</p>

<p>I can't say anything about the other lenses, but the 24mm f/2.8 is def one of my favorite lenses of all time. Set it to infinity and walk around and snap shots and they come out wonderful. Even wide open, it performs well, and I typically shoot my lenses wide open! That being said, I have a 28mm f/2.8 Minolta Celtic that I think is the bees knees as well. The wonderful thing about 24mm though is that is can be a very versatile focal length. It can do landscapes and interiors no sweat, and if you are careful and attentive to your corners and distortions, it can do portraits as well! </p>

<p><img src="http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b15/patrickjdempsey/Laurel/Laurel1_14.jpg" alt="" /></p>

<p>50mm just can't do that!</p>

<p>Hello Matthew,</p>

<p>I currently have three wide angle zuikos; 21mm F2, 24mm F2.8 and 35mm F2. They all have their place. The 21mm gets used when I need the extra speed (and angle of view). The 35mm is great for a more 'natural' perspective and image quality is comparable to my other wide angles when it is stopped down to F4 and beyond. The 24mm is a real gem though. It is tiny compared to the other two, and they are not exactly huge. Image quality is every bit as good as the 21mm and, as others have mentioned, it takes 49mm filters. This is a real benefit to me, when I wish to take a lightweight kit out, consisting of the 24, a 50 and 100 lenses. </p>

<p>I find the 24mm is a little easier to use that a 21, due to its slightly narrower angle of view. For me, it is just 'right'. I have had two 24's - both of them 2.8's and both copies were late ones. The one I have now was purchased new in 2003, so I guess it was from the last batch. It is razor sharp and quite contrasty. Having never owned the F2 version, my opinions of it are based solely on what I have read. I did have an interest in replacing the 2.8 with an F2, but I concluded that image sharpness and contast would be no better, and all that would be gained was the stop of extra speed.</p>

<p>Zuiko 24 2.8's can be found easily within your budget, and from many years of use, I can highly recommend them. The 35mm F2 can also be found within your budget, but you may have to hunt a bit. I found one new in the box about four years ago for slightly less than $200. I have read many less than favorable reports about it's sharpness, which is what prompted me to buy one. I could not believe that Olympus would have kept it in its line up until the system was discontinued, if it were a dog. My copy performs very well, except at F2, where it is a bit soft at the edges. This does not make it unusable wide open - I am just careful with my composition. Stopped down, it performs as well as many of my other Zuiko's.</p>

<p>To sum up - go for the 24mm F2.8, I think you will be very pleased with its aesthetics and the image quality produced.</p>

<p>Regards, Steve Lane. </p>

I would second the positive comments about the 24mm f2.8. Its very sharp from f4-f16 with the performance at f5.6-f11 being indistinguishable (except for depth-of-field) and just a tad sharper. It has no chromatic aberration (CA) I can see. It's a superb landscape lens because of its large depth-of-field. My 28mm f3.5 is also a superb lens with optimum performance from f8-11 and almost optimum performance at f5.6 and f16. It also has no CA that I can see. The largest print I can handle is 50cm by about 30cm and for this size I would stick around f8 to squeeze the last drop of performance from either lens. I would not carry both lenses, they are too similar, but if I lost my 24mm, I would happily take up my 28mm. Surprisingly (perhaps) not all Zuike lenses are sharpest at f8. My 85mm f2 has a peak of sharpness at f2.8; however, I still think f8 is optimum because there is a touch of CA at f2.8 but it is well under control by f8, so f8 is optimum for me. f4 is the worst because the sharpness dips and the CA is still present. This peak at f2.8 was found by Gary Reece in his comprehensive tests on Zuiko lenses. Both the lens he tested and my lens are 'later MC', so it appears to be a characteristic of this version of the lens.

<p>Thanks everyone, I'll take the plunge on a 24/2.8 (probably later model, because I shoot in to the sun a lot and I fear the lens hood)!<br>

I agree, my 85/2 is sharpest at 2.8 as well, but f/2 is very sharp as well. I didn't notice a drop in sharpness at f/4, but I might not be looking hard enough. Mine is also a later lens, but not marked MC (it is the final version with the last multicoating, that appears to be the only difference between the MC marked ones and the even later ones with no MC marking is that the coating was changed, but otherwise identical optically, the SC ones had different optical formula and appears to be much softer then the later MC lenses).</p>

<p>It's a bit of a diversion but I thought I would post the results of a recent Zuiko 85mm f2 test I did. I place the 'Feuerhand' label in the scene because the various sizes of lettering enable sharpness to be judged. I also place a hurricane lamp in the scene because the highlights enable chromatic aberration ('colour fringing') to be judged (FYI Feuerhand make hurricane lamps and provide them with the label!). The label occupies about 1.5mm x 1.5mm of the negative. You can see from the sequence that f2.8 is sharpest and f4 is the least sharp. In the next post I show a section of the hurricane lamp and you can see some purple fringing, at f2 and f2.8 particularly. Let me say that at any aperture this a good lens: I have arranged this test to reveal the differences as a function of aperture, differences that exist to a greater or lesser extent with any lens. I do these tests because I'm curious and because a lot of the comments on the net tend to be overly positive ('fantastic lens') or negative ('absolute rubbish, can't take a picture with it!'), so I decided to find out for myself. </p>

<p>Sharpness</p><div></div>

<p>Chromatic aberration ('colour fringing')</p><div></div>

<p>I have a 28/3.5 black front Zuiko which is nice and sharp. The 24/2.8 Sigma I have is in Konica mount and always seemed sharp. The 24/2.8 Vivitar TX and Fixed Mount are the same and are decently sharp. Vivitar made two different 24/2 lenses. The larger and heavier one (22XXX...) often has oil on its blades. The smaller and lighter one (28XXX...) usually has no oil problem. Tamron also made a 24 Adaptall II lens which people seem to like. Although I have a number of 24mm lenses I prefer a 20 or 21. I have the Vivitar 20/3.8 Fixed Mount for Konica, Minolta MC and M42. I don't know whether it was ever made in OM mount. </p>

<p>Matthew, get the dedicated metal hood for the 24mm... glare is an issue with any lens, no matter how many coatings it has! It's also a nice feeling to know your $200+ lens is somewhat protected by a nice big metal hood.</p>

<p>I would agree that 24 is too close to 28 to be of great interest. I happen to have a 3.5/21 from which I could be convinced to part at reasonable cost. What kind of price do you have in mind? I am switching more and more to digital and the 21 does not work well on 4/3 bodies so I am inclided to just keep my 50 macro with the OM-1. That was my first SLR and I will never get rid of it. Oh, and the 21 uses 49 filters as well, and it is very small.</p>

<p>I must disagree about the 24mm being too close to the 28mm to make a difference.<br>

I personally feel that that 24mm is just right and it has a little extra wow factor that 28mm somehow doesnt have. I shoot mainly canon FD and lately about half my shots are with the 24mm, the other half with a 50mm. I just recently purchased some Olympus gear including 50mm, 35mm, 28mm, and 24mm lenses. <br>

The olympus 24mm with hood fits into a case that takes up no more space than most other lenses without hoods. I have not used it very much yet but I'm sure it will become a favorite.<br>

FYI the f2 version has a floating element for close range correction, but I doubt it will make much of a difference with such a wide angle lens. </p>

 

<p>Yes, the 24 adds a bit of vow factor to the 28. The 21 adds a lot more vow factor. You can always crop the exact same image from the middle of an image made with a wider lens. With 24, you need to crop just a little to get the same coverage as 28. With 21 you need to crop a lot more. With 21, you can crop just a little to get the same coverage, exactly the same image, as taken with 24 from the same camera position. One really does not need the full set of lenses camera manufacturers make. The only thing you lose in cropping is a bit of quality (and gain depth of field). Also, to correct another often mentioned misconception, lens does not affect perspective. Wider lens only affects perspective if you then move closer to the subject to get the foreground object to reproduce in same relative size in the frame. But the lens does not change the perspective, it is your moving closer to subject that does.</p>

<blockquote>

<p>lens does not affect perspective</p>

</blockquote>

<p>I respectfully disagree. The same focal length fisheye lens has a completely different perspective from the same distance as a rectilinear wide-angle. Barrel distortion is an example of differing perspective. Lenses with very low barrel distortion will typically show straight lines as being straight. Lenses with very severe barrel distortion will show straight lines as curves. In a way, a fisheye lens is a type of lens that systematically suffers from extreme barrel distortion. At the same distance from a subject, a 100mm, 50mm and 24mm lens for the same format will display differing distortions and background compressions. This gets confusing because digital cameras for instance have different focal lengths than film camera... but the same rules apply. The lens design is what effects perspective. If you took a 25mm lens from a 4/3's camera and could mount it to a 35mm camera, it would have the same perspective effects of a 50mm lens (with one heck of a vignette) because they are probably the same design. But when you mount a 24mm OM lens to a 4/3's camera, you are not getting equivalent perspective effects of the 25mm lens, you are just getting a CROPPED version of the original. With a very nice rectilinear lens with very low barrel distortion, this might look similar to the results of the normal focal length lens, but it will not be 100% the same.</p>

<p>Matthew it's great you are just now getting into OM Zuiko wide angles. OM Zuiko wide angles are legendary and once you start using them you will find them a joy to use. But you haven't seen a Zuiko wide angle yet until you shoot with the Olympus OM Zuiko 18mm f3.5 ultrawide angle lens. I posted a photo here that I shot with the OM Zuiko 18mm f3.5 lens. Perhaps one of the best ultrawide lenses ever made next to the Olympus OM 21mm f2 lens like the one Steve Lane has. Only problem (besides being difficult to find because it's a really rare lens) is because of the bulbous glass you need a 49>72mm step up ring just to put filters or a lens shades on! :)</p><div></div>

<p>Patrick, sorry to say, but you are just plain wrong. This is not a matter of opinion, but fact. Fisheye is an interesting exception, because that really is the only lens which you cannot crop to get an identical image as with a longer focal length. But even with that lens, the perspective does not alter, because perspective means how the objects within the frame relate to each other and the choice of lens cannot move the objects around. They only move, relative to each other, when you alter the camera position.</p>

<p>There is some good, simple discussion of this topic of perspective here:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.photo.net/canon-eos-digital-camera-forum/00ROvq">http://www.photo.net/canon-eos-digital-camera-forum/00ROvq</a></p>

<p>I use the Tamron SP 24-48mm. Its best perfomance is at its wide end, where it is very good. The lens is quite rare and you have to get the hood with it to hold (77mm) filters.</p>