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suggestions for wide angle (< 24mm) for landscapes?

panda81

New member
my wife and i are taking a trip to brazil this december. her relatives in brazil will take us around the city and various nature-y hikes while we're there. i'd like to try landscapes on my M9 because i imagine bringing my dslr (d700) will be quite a bit heavier during these long outings.

my wides M lens is a 24mm lens, but i'm also borrowing a CV 21/4 (i think??) lens from a friend right now. however, i would prefer to bring my own lenses just because i don't want to accidentally scratch his or worse.

since i care mostly about landscapes for this purpose, speed really isn't a factor (yet).

price is somewhat of an issue - i don't mind paying a bit more for a lot of bang for my buck. basically, i'm eyeing the zeiss 18mm or 21mm lenses because i feel they have the best price/performance ratio. however, i might be wrong because i'll probably be hovering around f/8 - f/11 for landscapes anyway, so maybe voigtlander will perform just as well in those settings? (btw, what f-stop does diffraction start to play a factor? just read a review regarding the zm 18mm, and they said diffraction already starts to set in at f/8 on the M8?? i usually shoot very fast, so i never looked into this before...) another factor for price is the external viewfinder too. basically, i guess i'm saying the leica lenses will probably be out of my budget - i haven't looked specifically, but i'm assuming the leica equivalents are all more expensive than the zeiss or cv lenses.

one concern regarding the zm 18mm is that diglloyd's article mentions color shift at the corners from photos on the m9. anyone with this lens, have you noticed this before? is there an easy way to correct for it?

alternatively, will bringing my dslr end up being a better choice anyway? if bringing a tripod is a must-have for good landscapes, then i may as well just bring the dslr anyway - it will also end up being overall cheaper. tripod certainly feels more attractive too because it'll give me flexibility for long exposures, which i really love to try.

will appreciate everyone's opinions! thanks!
 
Last edited:

ramosa

Member
you may also want to consider the super elmar 18m. it's not cheap, but it's very sharp, easy to handle and focus, etc. (i have one, but use it on an M8; thus, it "becomes" a 24mm.) also, although i used to consider wide lenses to be "nature friendly," lots of great landscape photography uses telephoto lenses (e.g., 90mm, 135mm). of course, it just depends on what you hope to do ...
 
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