Im thinking of buying this one, but cant find a decent review and dont know the angle of view on this lens. So i was hoping you guys had an idea or experience with it.
Its ok at f5.6 onwards but not so good wide open, it has reasonable contrast and does'nt really suffer much from flare. The performance at the extreme edges of frame can be slightly soft, even on crop format but its quite sharp in the centre.
Pretty nice overall! Something like 100deg. angle of view at least. I have a test of it I think (check under vivitar too, same lens) on www.edsawyer.com/lenstests/
I had one for a while, it's really not bad, esp. for the price.
The AOV for a 17mm lens on full frame should be 104 deg on the diagonal and 93 deg on the horizontal, in landscape mode.
I used a Tokina SL 17/3.5 RMC with Pentax film bodies, and it was OK, but not as good as the Rokinon Automatic wide 20/2.8 MC that I also had then. I really shouldn't have sold the Rokinon 20, as they're very rare and relatively unknown (i.e. inexpensive).
+small size
+very sharp in the middle already wide open
+handles flare very good
+not too much distortion
+very nice build quality, equal to average MF Nikkors
-corner sharpness sucks really bad at all apertures
-focusing goes "the wrong way" for Nikon users
Well, I think that's it. Awesome lens if you don't shoot landscapes. A hundred times sharper in the middle at f/3.5 than my Nikkor 18-35, but equally a hundred times unsharper in the corners.
