Looking for a value wide angle lens

[andy_van_eynde]

<p>Old post office</p><div></div>

[andy_van_eynde]

<p>N.Y.</p><div></div>

[dcstep]

<p>If you can, pick a lens that your software will correct. It is no longer true that "all lenses in that range" have distortion.</p>

[brad_trostad]

<p>+1 for the Samyang / Rokinon 14mm f2.8. I think it's color rendition is great and it is very sharp across the frame but expect to stop down to f4 and preferrably f5.6 (at least on my copy) to get that stellar corner to corner sharpness and eliminate vignette. There are programs to address the "moustache" distortion. This distortion will be much more noticeable on a full frame. Just take a picture of anything with horizontal lines (building, power lines, etc).</p>

<p>FWIW, I have the Canon 17-40mm. I think it's a great lens. But I never use it for wide angle any more - unless I know i'll need to zoom a bit. One advange to the 17-40mm is that it takes standard front filters (77mm). But you'll need to get ultra thin filters or find something that steps out even wider as it will vignette heavily from ~17...19mm with a standard thicker ringed filter (and even worse with stacked filters). However, the Canon 17-40mm does have a rear filter holder if you want to try that route for a single gel.</p>

<p>Now, if you need ND or GND filters on the Samyang you are going to have to go with something a lot bigger and find a way to mount it because the lens itself has no filter rings.</p>

<p>BTW - The Samyang also deals with flare quite well.</p>

<p>Why not order the Samyang / Rokinon, try it for a few days and just return it if you don't like it? Set it to f8, fix focus via view to about 5ft and then just shoot with it all day in Av mode and you will be quite pleased with how sharp and wide it is.</p>