Looking for an ultra wide in the 10 to 12mm range. Since I want to use it for event photography f2.8 or f4 is nice. If it starts at f5.6 this might be ok as well, but it must be tak sharp at f5.6. AF or MF is not important, either is fine.
Wide angles capture a lot of bright lights and contrasty edges. Excellent LOCA correction would be rather important.
From Sony only the rather heavy zooms come to mind. But I do do not need a zoom range to 20 or even 24mm, since I have other options there. Any other offerings out there from Japanese, Korean or even Chinese manufacturers? (I don‘t believe there is anything German). Who has the best corrected lens in this range?
Laowa 10 and 12 f/2.8
New Tamron 12-20, haven't looked at it, but since you didn't mention it I assume you've ruled it out.
The Sony zooms you mentioned.
CVs, but I believe the Laowa are stronger from what I remember.
No first hand experience with any of them.
But this is probably the one I would look at, if I didn't want to spend the money on the 12-24mm GM.
I have not personally used it, but the recent 12mm autofocus from Laowa has been well received. Here is a link to Bastian's review over at Phillip Reeves' site.
For a time the Voigtlander 10mm and 12mm were the best options available then Laowa came out strong and I recall several reviews indicating the Laowa's were better overall.
I used to own the Sony 12-24/4. I had no complaints optically. I liked to use ultrawide in churches so f/4 is a bit slow. I also learned I’m not real skilled in ultrawide.
I really enjoy the Sony 20/1.8, but that doesn’t sound wide enough. Sony alpha blog has a list of about all Sony lenses with ratings, I would look there.
Thanks for pointing to the Laowa 12mm.
As I understand, there is also a cine version of this lens which is manual focus. Since it is twice as expensive I wonder if it has better performance? (coatings, more stringent control of centering etc.?)
BTW: This is a bit offf topic for this thread, but I have noticed that several lenses from different manufacturers are available as standard and as cine lens. Why is it that the cine version is regularly more expensive? Can I expect a better lens or better quality control?
