gear

THE DIGITAL SOAPBOX OF ANDY CLEAVENGER

12-24mm AF-S G DX

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Email:  graycard18@gmail.com

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The more I use this lens the less I like it.

The image quality used to be better than my 20mm fixed, but that was only because our particular 20 was jacked. We replaced it with another 20mm that is a much better sample and now the 20 is the clear winner. Previously I had claimed that the sharpness approached the level of sharpness that our 17-35mm exhibits. Well, either I was on crack or the lens has gotten worse over time (not unheard of). The corners are pretty soft now even at mid range apertures.

The same things that I didn’t like about the lens before, I still don’t like. I can’t use it on my film cameras. I can’t stand the fact that Nikon switched the locations of the zoom and focus rings. It drives me totally, butt crazy, mother fucking INSANE. Lastly, this isn’t really the lens’ fault, but I guess I’m just not a big fan of super wide angle lenses. They stretch people and make them look weird. Sometimes that’s a good thing, but not as often as some would like to think.

I’m a much bigger fan of the moderate wide angle focal lengths, like somewhere in the 28mm to 35mm range (this would be on a full frame camera, of course). Translating those focal lengths to digital has been a challenge for those living in Nikonland. In an ideal world Nikon would get off its bloated ass and start paying attention to its line up of prime lenses.  We seriously need some better options for wide fast primes. I mean really...  Canon has good, high quality, wide, FAST primes to choose from. If I could figure out a way to use the 24mm 1.4L on my D70 I’d be a very happy guy. But even Canon’s budget lenses in that range are excellent from what I hear.

Right now, 2.8 is as fast as Nikon gets in the wide angle range, and all they have to choose from is the 20mm 2.8 or the 14mm 2.8, which is big, expensive, and for my taste is too wide (even on a 1.5X DX crop). There is also a 24mm 2.8 out there, but I suspect it may not be quite wide enough when used on a DX crop. I dunno...  I might change my mind when I actually use one. We’ll see, I guess.