Photoclubalpha

Dusty,
I see what you mean. In fact, on my recent trip to Peru, I felt wanting on the wide side than zoom more often.
I thought I would sorely miss the 70-400. I just had 16-80 on A77II. Very unlikely setup compared to my typical
outfit.

Sury

Note that there were two Minolta A Mount 17-35mm lenses, an f/2.8-4 (D) and an f/3.5 G

sury wrote:Tony,
Thank you for the examples. I thought I would see more distortion at these focal lengths.
Sury

Sury, the link I provided to Dyxum is really quite informative. If you click on a lens, towards the bottom of the lens description you'll see a link to "Dyxum Forum Sample Images". These are for the lens in question and should satisfy any distortion problems you have.

harvey wrote:Note that there were two Minolta A Mount 17-35mm lenses, an f/2.8-4 (D) and an f/3.5 G

Harvey,
Thank you. Did not know that two versions exist. I was looking at f/2.8-4 as recommended anyway.

Sury

Cogito wrote:

sury wrote:Tony,
Thank you for the examples. I thought I would see more distortion at these focal lengths.
Sury

Sury, the link I provided to Dyxum is really quite informative. If you click on a lens, towards the bottom of the lens description you'll see a link to "Dyxum Forum Sample Images". These are for the lens in question and should satisfy any distortion problems you have.

Tony,
I did check the Dyxum images. I meant I thought I would see more distortion but was pleasantly surprised that your photos did not have any distortion. I am convinced.

Sury

What with our nephew having a baby and all that excitement and tension (due to a premature new born), I was quite preoccupied and everything else was put on a back burner for now. Will take it up later.

Sury

sury wrote:What with our nephew having a baby and all that excitement and tension (due to a premature new born), I was quite preoccupied and everything else was put on a back burner for now. Will take it up later.

Sury

What? No photos yet? It's already the 8th!

You're slipping, Sury!

Dusty

sury wrote:

harvey wrote:Note that there were two Minolta A Mount 17-35mm lenses, an f/2.8-4 (D) and an f/3.5 G

Harvey,
Thank you. Did not know that two versions exist. I was looking at f/2.8-4 as recommended anyway.

Sury

If you decide that you want a Minolta 17-35 2.8-4, let me know. I have one which seems to be in very good condition that I got several years ago in the original box as part of a multi-lens package deal. I have only used it a couple of times, as it never seemed to be as good a match for what I wanted to do as one of my other lenses. Now that I am shooting almost exclusively with my E-mount APS-C mirrorless cameras, I am even less likely to be using it, especially since I just shot a number of images a couple of weeks ago with the Sony 16mm pancake lens that I have found to be quite satisfactory for my needs, and the lens that is most frequently installed on my camera today is the Zeiss 24mm.

I'll be happy to sell it to you on the basis of shipping it to you for you to try, with payment expected if you decide to keep it, and you ship it back if you don't like it. Price would be the going market rate. (I have not looked, so I have no idea at the moment what that is.)

- Tom -

Tom,
Thank you. Will let you know.

Sury

All I can say on wider than 24mm is, greatly depends on what you do
I've found good use of the 11-16mm on a crop body for interior shots, whilst you could get there stitching it's extra work IMO
On FF the 17-35mm has worked well enough. I do think it's worth having a wider than 24m lens, how wide is wide enough? For me those 2 are wide enough
For general use out and about 28- something zooms 95% of the time do the job. I only really got the other lenses for interior shooting
Some like the 20mm prime.
Strangely I don't find UWA that useful for landscapes, it can work wonders for some shots. I'm using tele lenses more and more for that type of shooting to isolate areas of interest

Up until 1990 my widest lens was 28mm. In 1990 in Tokyo I bought a Sigma 24mm f2.8 (A-mount) and I still have it. I used it sometimes on my Minolta film SLRs and on my A700 I would sometimes use it because it was a very small 36mm-efl. In 1991 I bought a Tokina 20-35mm f3.5-4.5 (A-mount) and I still have that one too. 20mm gave me an ultrawide look that was fun sometimes. In 2006 I bought a Sigma 10-20mm f4-5.6 (Canon EF-mount) which was 16-32mm-efl. And in 2008 I bought a Sony 11-18mm f4.5-5.6 for my A700. Since 2012 though I have been using m4/3 so back then I bought the Olympus 9-18mm f4-5.6 (18-36mm-efl). 20mm, 18mm, 16mm are all plenty wide for me. I don't use those focal lengths a lot, but they are fun to have sometimes and I occasionally make good use of them. Not for architecture or rooms, but more to get interesting perspectives (foreground/background and so on).

Sadly the days of affordable UWA lenses are a thing of the past, E mount F4 16-35mm is £1000+ and the Tamron 17-28mm F2.8 is £800+, the 17-35mm isn't the best UWA lens out there no question the newer ones are better. It's still pretty decent for a lens that price, stop down fairly hard at 17mm it's good enough, from 20mm on doesn't need as much stopping down. I have used the KM and Tamron not a lot in it, worth a look at that price easily. Coming from a 35- something zoom on a bridge camera anything 28mm was a revelation to me, I'm not sure I get the obsession with 24mm or wider for general use I always go for the 28-105mm RS even though I have a good copy of the 24-105mm

The 17-35mm covers a good range, and I also like the Tokina 11-16mm for crop. Sony missed a real trick on that one, they carried on with the old 11-18mm and never bothered to replace it, baffling strategy really. At the asking price the Tokina was the clear winner, probably why they released it for A mount - they saw Sony had dropped the ball big time. A more affordable A Mount 16-35mm never turned up just the expensive F2.8 CZ one, never used it not sure it was worth the price. No wonder the 17-35mm is still a sought after lens for FF users