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Which wide angle lens? (1 Viewer)

Steve66

Member
Hi there.

I have recently bought myself a D90 and I am enjoying the upgrade from my D40. I can use all my lenses on full AF which is nice and I have managed to get some good shots.

Now, when I am out and about I like to take some nice big landscape shots to widen up the location for me and others. The trouble is I have been so intent on taking close ups of birds from far away, and thus I only long some long lenses.

Can anyone recommend an affordable good quality wide angle lens with a good range of apertures, f2.8 would be nice. I don't mind if it is a zoom or prime but it would be mainly for landscapes.

I have looked about but I am still a bit confused as to the x 1.5 effect of my DX body.

Sub 500 pounds preferred.

Thanks in advance.

Steve
 
The Nikon 16-85mm f3.5-5.6G VR ED AF-S DX Lens, (24-127 35mm equivalent) is an absolute cracker and under £500. If you want something Nikon with f2.8 then you need to spend a lot more money. I have a 24-70 f2.8 and can honestly say I have never used it wide open, I usually stop down to at least f5.6 for landscapes, flowers etc. if your main interest will be big landscapes then f2.8 will have very little use, more like stick it on a good solid tripod and set f11 to f16.

nirofo.
 
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I like my inexpensive Sigma 10-20 fine, though the newer Tokina 11-16(?) is certainly more fashionable these days. The wider the better. Great POV type photos if you have a monitor large enough to do them justice. Look at the thread "wide angle options" on page two of this subforum. Of course you'll get a lot more info on an actual photography forum like dpreview.
 
I have the Tokina 11-16mm F2.8 but I use it primarily for cityscape and architecture. I think for landscapes a 18-24mm focal length at F5.6-F8 or slower for good DoF focus is all you need. Modern digital allows easy panorama stitches so a really wide lens is not needed for landscapes. Just make sure to shoot it with a tripod and vertical camera orientation to minimize the "bow-tie" effect of the stitch. With that in mind, the 18-55 VR is a bargain landscape lens.

cheers,
Rick
 
Hi I have a Tokina 12-24/4 which I find a very useful lens, its well built and performs well, this may well be a good one to look for in the 2nd hand market, although the newer 11-16 would be worth a gander.
 
Hi and thanks guys some food for thought there. I have stitched photos befroe and never really liked the results unless I used about 10% of each image, but then I had to take 100s.

I think the best thing to do is to go and try some at a shop just to see the comparison.

Thanks again

Steve
 
I think for landscapes a 18-24mm focal length at F5.6-F8 or slower for good DoF focus is all you need. Modern digital allows easy panorama stitches so a really wide lens is not needed for landscapes. Just make sure to shoot it with a tripod and vertical camera orientation to minimize the "bow-tie" effect of the stitch. With that in mind, the 18-55 VR is a bargain landscape lens.

Uh...if you really want to go through all that. In a moment I get a handheld photo at 10mm and continue on my way. If you want to go to the "stitch" route I'd just suggest using one of the pocket cameras that can do it.

Remember that not all "landscape" photos are of distant objects - one of the primary reasons I got mine is for close up wide angles. I take a lot of photos of plants in the understory, and of the forestscape or even just bits of groundcover, where you can't back away from it or other things will start to get in the way. The 10mm focal length is actually wider than my own eyes can see at once.
 
If you want to go to the "stitch" route I'd just suggest using one of the pocket cameras that can do it.

Remember that not all "landscape" photos are of distant objects - one of the primary reasons I got mine is for close up wide angles....

Unfortunately most pocket cams don't perform well enough in the ideal light conditions for a good landscape pic.

Proper landscapes are meant to be viewed as BIG prints, but not necessarily "wide". Ideally you would shoot medium format with lenses in the 40-100mm range at F16 to bring DoF focus, resolution and perspective to a landscape print.
With a cropped camera like the D90, if you want to keep ~1:1 magnification and perspective then best to shoot at ~35mm focal lengths or longer. Anything less, and the subject will appear further away in the pic and will probably have some distortions. So while you may get more of the scene in 1 frame with a 10mm lens, it will have smaller, less visible details perhaps with a "funny" look too.

The only way to get medium format resolution for BIG prints with a cropped camera is to put more pixels in the final pic and the only way to do this is to stitch a panorama with ~5-6 vertically oriented shots to end up with a ~35mp image.

The software and techniques for stitching have come a long way. There are plenty of panorama "cookbook" web sites to check that can help and show you what is possible.

cheers,
Rick
 
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So you blew $3000+ on a D300 + lens just to view 12mp pics on ~$100 15" sub-2mp LCD?

My point is a wider angle lens is not the best "landscape" solution since you trade magnification and distortions for a larger FoV. On the other hand, getting a larger sensor camera will give you a larger FoV without the loss of magnification. Since a larger sensor gets expensive real quick, the panorama stitch can be a fairly cost effective compromise.

cheers,
Rick
 
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I had a chance to use the Nikor AFS 14-24 f2.8 last weekend - a good friend just bought one mint/secondhand so we immediately went snapping buildings and the inside of an old market area. Though it's not within the stated budget and is a truly wide lens, it may be worth waiting and saving up cos it is an absolute beaut, and the results are outstanding.

He uses it on a full frame D700 so at 14mm the vista is quite something (and it takes amusing ultra close up portraits). I can't see him buying another wide angle for years, and I reckon he'll be trading in 3 of his prime wides for a fast telephoto.

There's a review here:
http://www.kenrockwell.com/nikon/14-24mm.htm
which also compares it to the 17-35 AFS (may be more suitable if you don't already have a 28/35mm range of lenses)

Regards
 
i'll throw in a vote for the sigma 10-20 f4-5.6. not sure why you want f2.8 for landscapes, indoors i'd understand.

bear in mind though that wide angle lens are used as much for their exaggerated dof as for the width.

what lenses do you have?

some wide images can be deadly dull. remember near middle far. and sometimes you want a telephoto for a landscape. its horses for courses.

some pics. they should show how wide you can go

sigma 10-20 all with a d80.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_oG9pguvp-2c/RurIFkm26NI/AAAAAAAAFYc/0c4M3TzOGZM/s1600-h/DSC_0065.JPG

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_oG9pguvp-2c/RydlRE-XrUI/AAAAAAAAGbo/Q6E080_aUFk/s1600-h/dsc_0025.jpg

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_oG9pguvp-2c/SQYB50Mx93I/AAAAAAAANpw/g0_1L-kxyoE/s1600-h/dsc_0010.jpg
 
I had a chance to use the Nikor AFS 14-24 f2.8 last weekend - a good friend just bought one mint/secondhand so we immediately went snapping buildings and the inside of an old market area. Though it's not within the stated budget and is a truly wide lens, it may be worth waiting and saving up cos it is an absolute beaut, and the results are outstanding.

He uses it on a full frame D700 so at 14mm the vista is quite something (and it takes amusing ultra close up portraits). I can't see him buying another wide angle for years, and I reckon he'll be trading in 3 of his prime wides for a fast telephoto.

There's a review here:
http://www.kenrockwell.com/nikon/14-24mm.htm
which also compares it to the 17-35 AFS (may be more suitable if you don't already have a 28/35mm range of lenses)

Regards

you're quoting KR? shudder!!!
 
I have looked about but I am still a bit confused as to the x 1.5 effect of my DX body.

ok VERY simplistically if you stick the 14-24 lens on a d90 it has the same field of view of a 21-36 on a full frame camera like a d700 or a 35mm field camera.
 
Pete, look at them two thinking if they crouch they are not in the pic on the last one.

I am also looking at the Sigma 10-20 for the Canon 40D so can I ask, when you are close to say a church or a nice building can you get the whole into the frame when going down to ground level for instance?

I am also thinking of the Sigma 18-50 EX which has macro but with a dedicated macro already on the list I wonder how useful the macro function would be?
 
Pete, look at them two thinking if they crouch they are not in the pic on the last one.

I am also looking at the Sigma 10-20 for the Canon 40D so can I ask, when you are close to say a church or a nice building can you get the whole into the frame when going down to ground level for instance?

I am also thinking of the Sigma 18-50 EX which has macro but with a dedicated macro already on the list I wonder how useful the macro function would be?

yeah you can get a large building at the wide end 10mm is VERY wide. in but the 10-20 will have a fair amount of distortion converging verticals and all that. so you may need to do more post proocessing,

the 18-50 f2.8? decent lens, as is the tamron 17-50. if you shoot indoors especiallly dark places like churches f2.8 is darned useful. if you are shooting outside then f2.8 is less useful.
 
So you blew $3000+ on a D300 + lens just to view 12mp pics on ~$100 15" sub-2mp LCD?

Is this directed at me? I "blew" $2400 on a D300 to have higher shutter speeds, lower noise high ISO, higher dynamic range, better autofocus, better color fidelity, larger viewscreen on the body, more manual controls, more bracketing options, etc, etc, etc. It isn't only me that views my pics on an "LCD" - the ENTIRE WORLD that can view them via the internet. (the power! ahahahahahah!)
 
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I used the Sigma 10-20 at St. Davids Cathedral in Pembrokeshire last summer and it worked really well. There are some shots in my flickr stream, err... here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/paulforsdick/archives/date-taken/2008/05/06/

I took this one of the cathedral at 10mm, I think I just crouched down a bit to take it:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/paulforsdick/2489569709

and this one at 10mm with the camera resting on the ground pointing up at the tower:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/paulforsdick/2482866970/

I don't use the Sigma very often but have been pretty pleased with it, the extra 2mm going down to 10mm has proved 'very' useful, it was certainly invaluable at St Davids. I wouldn't say that it's a perfect landscape lens if you have extremely exacting requirements for optical quality but it's certainly no slouch in that department, good detail and low colour fringing. Corner detail falls off but not to a major degree.
 
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