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I process a ton of images from various cameras due to using second shooters at weddings ... mostly Canon and Nikon ... and I shoot with Sony and Leica M and S cameras myself, including a M21/1.4 ASPH, 28/2 ASPH and a S35mm.do inferior wide angles (not naming brands) have more distortion then Leica's M lenses or not really?
In my experience the Nikon 18's in particular have some of the nastiest moustache distortion. Nikon's 20's were all better, as were the 15's (I have no experience with the 14), but all the 18's - the f/4, the f/3.5 and the 2.8 were all terrible and unusable, especially in the film days. The Leica 18, while hardly good, isn't as bad as that. Conversely, the Canon 17/4 FD was a lot better, and what distortion it did have was mostly quite benign barrel type.the leica M 18mm has a horrible pincushion distortion, almost uncorrectable in PP. a while ago i posted an example in the leica forum, which abolutely horrified me (you can find it by a simple search over there, my user name is the same as here). mr. daniel found it normal back then...although i have not seen anything similar from (the better lenses) of 'lesser' brands like nikon....
the interesting thing is that leica advertised the 18mm lens as an architecture lens.
i since sold it, got the 21mm SE and it is much better in the distortion department.
peter