Wanted to throw this out there. I have the 24mm and 35mm 2.8 Tamron. I'm really happy with these lenses. Not just for the price, but the performance is in my opinion excellent. I've never owned Tamron lenses before and I also like the overall rendering in terms of color, bokeh, etc.
I'm thinking of going wider and I'm wondering how the zoom compares to the 20 and 24mm primes. I can see from reviews that there is less distortion with the zoom (Not something I'm bothered by anyway) and..at least in comparison to the 24mm...the zoom is sharper in the center but weaker in the corners.
I can't find anything on the 17-28mm in comparison to the 20mm 2.8 (Only the Sony 20mm 1.8). If anyone has any experience with both of these. I also imagine the bokeh isn't as good with the zoom and even though it's a wide, I do shoot a lot close up.
Just thought I'd ask for some all around impressions between these lenses. Thanks.
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-Tim
ReleaseDrive wrote:
Wanted to throw this out there. I have the 24mm and 35mm 2.8 Tamron. I'm really happy with the lenses. Not just for the price, but the performance is in my opinion excellent. I've never owned Tamron lenses before and I also like the overall rendering in terms of color, bokeh, etc.
I'm thinking of going wider and I'm wondering how the zoom compares to the 20 and 24mm primes. I can see from reviews that there is less distortion with the zoom (Not something I'm bothered by anyway) and..at least in comparison to the 24mm...the zoom is sharper in the center but weaker in the corners.
I can't find anything on the 17-28mm in comparison to the 20mm 2.8 (Only the Sony 20mm 1.8). If anyone has any experience with both of these. I also imagine the bokeh isn't as good with the zoom and even though it's a wide, I do shoot a lot close up.
Just thought I'd ask for some all around impressions between these lenses. Thanks. ...Show more →
It seems a bit redundant to own both those two primes and the zoom in the same range, and from the same manufacturer. You will tend to get very similar images from either set. I would settle on just the zoom, or add a wider prime to my kit. There will not be much to separate the the images you get with setup from either the primes or the zooms.
Unless you intend to eventually build both a prime kit, and a zoom kit. I do this. My prime kit tends to be manual focus lenses with lots of character in their rendering, like the CV primes. They also give a completely different shooting experience. Which set I bring depends on the subject, and shooting conditions. But is more often based on my mood. I enjoy both AF and MF shooting experiences. But whichever I am shooting I want the lenses to be top performers in that method. The Tamron lenses do an excellent job in the AF area, and CV lenses are the best I have found for the MF experience.
Thanks. I'm also in the same camp so far as manual focus lenses go. I have a few Voigtlanders. I think I may just go the 17-28mm 2.8 route although it's been awhile since I've shot below 20mm. I bought the 70-300mm as well and was considering the 28-75mm 2.8 and 17-28mm 2.8 as my zoom kit. That probably makes the most sense I suppose.
I bought the 17-28 after buying the full set of Samyang primes and then the full set of Tamron primes. And I have the Sony 2/28 too. All of these have pretty high variation. Individual sharpness comparisons can vary wildly.
The zoom has some minor complex distortion at 20mm. The barrel distortion of the prime can be useful for preserving shapes in corners. My copy of the 17-28 is softer on the right side and quite sharp on the left side. The 20 is a bit sharper on the right side than the left side--much more even side-to-side than the zoom.
Yeah, I've looked at the 24mm GM and no doubt it's a fantastic lens. I'm trying to focus more on zooms, although I do like my primes. For travel though, zooms all the way. Took me awhile to realize that but after a few trips lugging 30lbs overseas I realized I was either missing shots due to lens swapping or to pre-occupied with my gear.
Jay Sonyalphalab posted a review I just watched on the 17-28 and 28-75mm on Youtube. I'm pretty sure I'm leaning toward the 17-28mm at this point rather than any more primes under 24mm.
Yes the Tamron 17-28 is great.. I had the 16-35 f4 then sold it for the Zeiss battis 18mm but found I missed the zoom range. Then went for the 16-35 GM but it was so large and heavy for travel.
Sold that GM forthe Tamron 17-28 and love it. I also sold some other GM because of size and went for the Tamron 70-180.
For travel I rather have light/smaller lenses, if I did more local paid events I would maybe of kept some of the GMs.
No experience with the 20mm but I've had the same internal debate between those two lenses. Did I want a lightweight sharp fast prime or the versatility of the zoom with some sacrifice of sharpness? I ultimately went with the Tamron and had been happy with it. With my two months of ownership, I never wished that it can go up to 1.8. I don't think I will trade it for the Sony just because you can go wider and zoom to 28mm. Difference in sharpness is negligible to my eyes.
