Steve Perry wrote:
All that said, and although I sent mine back, I still think the 16-35 is a good lens. It's just that after shooting with the 14-24, it's hard to step back in IQ. I think there's a perception that people think the 16-35 is junk, and that's simply not true. It's just that 14-24 is sooooo gooooood you can't go back.
I think that is my point. There is no other UWA 35mm full frame zoom lens that compares to the Nikkor 14-24 for image quality. It's even better than most primes in its focal range.
If Nikon never introduced the 14-24 people would be saying how the 16-35 produces better image quality wide open at F/4 than the 17-35 does stopped down to F/4. But nope, it's crap because it's not a filter using image quality equivalent to the 14-24 for 2/3 the price.
gman1339 wrote:
I think that is my point. There is no other UWA 35mm full frame zoom lens that compares to the Nikkor 14-24 for image quality. It's even better than most primes in its focal range.
If Nikon never introduced the 14-24 people would be saying how the 16-35 produces better image quality wide open at F/4 than the 17-35 does stopped down to F/4. But nope, it's crap because it's not a filter using image quality equivalent to the 14-24 for 2/3 the price.
Exactly. And that's why the poor 16-35 takes a bit of a beating. People want to use the best equipment possible, and a lot of us 14-24 shooters were hoping this lens - at least stopped down - would be as good as the 14-24. Since it's not, it gets returned and a few bad marks.
Mine arrived today -- it's waiting for me at home. Very much looking forward to checking it out.
I haven't gone back through the profiles of everyone who's made comments -- but I wonder if part of the gap in perceived performance is based on sensor density. There's still the matter of distortion, but in terms of sharpness, the D3x is much more demanding than the 12mp FX sensors (D700, D3/s).
Just opened it up, and it makes a good first impression. Nice build quality, and it's not as heavy as you'd expect for the size, though I'm old-fashioned enough that the idea of a wide lens that's 6" long kinda freaks me out a bit....
The VR works better than I would have expected -- I can see it being very handy.
I'll play around with it for the next few days, then I'm taking it on a short trip. Hopefully that will give me a good chance to put it through its paces.
I took my 16-35 with me to the Eastern Sierra's instead of my 17-35. I'm quite pleased with the lens. Because of the contrast, it seems to have more of a 3D effect to my eyes than the 17-35. It's incredibly sharp.
This is a shot taken at 16mm, using a circular polarizer. Normally I wouldn't do that at 16mm with sky in the shot, but because of the position of the clouds, it allowed me to use it to enhance the clouds and shave a bit of glare off the river. This is the reason I never purchased a 14-24, I couldn't use my polarizer.
ddietiker, pretty awesome shot. Your web gallery is pretty amazing too! Do you happen to have a larger size of this shot to look at? I do agree it does have a 3d look to it. What kind of sharpening did you use on this shot?
The image will be for sale soon, so I am hesitant to post larger sizes, sorry. The sharpening was just basic CS4 sharpen, nothing special. It may look a little more sharp as the camera used was a D3x.
I should add, my goal was to get better image quality than my 17-35, which this lens does plus I gain an extra 1mm. Distortion is really a non-issue with my type of shooting.
I've been testing mine out a bit at home doing a few comparisons on my new D700. It seems very usable at all focal lengths and f/stops, with the corners coming in better at f/5.6, and better still at f/8.
I don't have anything conclusive, but it seems to me to be sharper on the wide end than it is at 35mm. In particular, my 35/2 (a very sharp copy) seems sharper than the 16-35 @35mm, especially in the corners, at the same f/stops. Might just be field curvature, close focusing distances, or some other quirk, though -- and I'm pretty sure the 16-35 is better in terms of flare and CA.
It seems that it's sweet spot may be from around 18mm to 28mm, where it's pretty tough to beat (I've never shot the 14-24, though).
I don't see what the hub-bub is about - the images I'm seeing from the 16-35 look great.
Lighter weight, takes a filter, VR II but you lose a stop, and it's cheaper than a used 14-24.
I'll be buying one shortly (probably) - The 14-24 I'm sure is dead sexy, but that bulbous front element 1) scares me and 2) makes me cry I can't put my CPL on it.
Ok, don't expect the corner to be as good as the 14-24, it is better than my 17-35. For me, the reference lens is the 17-35 since it is replacing that lens for me. If you are expecting a 14-24 replacement, it may be tough for Nikon to repeat that feat with any lens. Look at the new 70-200, cant compete in the corners but it still an improvement over the older version.
Thanks a lot for the crop! This is the best corner crop I have seen with shrubs, branches, or weeds for this lens. So far I haven't seen any that were acceptable for landscape, but this just is not bad at all. Maybe some AF fine tuning could consistently pull off results like this for the other examples I have come across? I would hope that the D3X resolution is not what is keeping the corners acceptable in the shot since I am using a D700... It is very tempting to list that 14-24 to lighten the load when travelling...
Iron_Dreamer wrote:
If anything the D3x should be harder on the corner performance than the D700, which has a pretty forgiving pixel pitch.
Yup, the D700 is more forgiving. Even on the D700, though, it won't pull the far corners into perfect sharpness at 16mm, even at f/11. Other than the 14-24, what lens will? Short of that, this lens is really very strong. By 20mm (and maybe shorter, I'm still experimenting), you've got a lens that is very usable across the frame at f/4, tack sharp to the corners by f/8, and awfully close at f/5.6 -- that beats every 20mm Nikkor prime I've used. The barrel distortion is pretty much gone by 20mm, too. Plus, you get VR, which WILL help in many low-light circumstances.
