I almost didn’t include this lens on the list, but that would have been a bit unfair given the unique characteristics this Nokton has to offer. Like the 10.5mm, the 0.95 aperture coupled with Voigtländer’s distinctive colour rendering and bokeh gives your images a different look. It is not as sharp, contrasty or precise as modern digital lenses, but this might be exactly what you are looking for. Auto focus performance with both lenses is very impressive. Even in low light, each lens snaps into focus in less than a second. One thing that aids in the speed of these lenses is there are no external moving parts meaning the front element does not move. The Panasonic 20mm f/1.7’s front element does move which means slower AF speed when compared to the 14mm. In addition to slower AF speeds, moving front elements make lenses more prone to dust and gunk into your lens. The only time either lens struggled a little was in very dark places or in C-AF with fast moving subjects but this is also dependant on the AF speed and precision of the camera you’re using. Generally I will shoot my foreground at an ISO no higher than 200 and for 1-2 minutes depending on the composition. I then wait, this is time consuming for sure and requires you to be at your location around sunset to enable you to find a composition, set up your shot, capture your foreground and then wait to capture the night sky.

The Best Micro Four Thirds Wide-Angle Lenses for landscapes

Similar results can be seen in the corners; the Leica lens retains a very small advantage over the Olympus through the aperture range. Happily the amount of detail remains decent even at the fastest apertures. Vignetting is most noticeable the maximum aperture of each lens (f/1.4 on the Leica and f/2 on the Olympus) but stopping down a value or two is enough to fix the issue. Alternatively you can lighten the corners by using a post production software. Flare Below are center crops from the images above. Not surprisingly, both look very good but I actually think the Panasonic is slightly sharper and resolves more detail in the center than the Olympus although it could be that extra 2mm of reach, it’s debatable. While the Panasonic may be very sharp in the middle, the Olympus is slightly (and I do mean slightly) sharper and more contrasty across the image which is what will matter to most. Panasonic GF-1 with Panasonic 14mm Panasonic GF-1 with Olympus 12mmLens configuration:11 elements in 8 groups (1 DSA element, 1 aspherical glass element, 1 ED lens element, 1 Super HR element) Image quality is good, flare resistance is very good for this focal length, distortion is low as is vignetting but I actually expected more from this lens. The standout is the clutch manual focus which despite being fly-by wire provides a great feel and the Olympus system is fantastic implementation of manual focus this type of lens.

Olympus 12mm f2 photos on Flickr | Flickr Olympus 12mm f2 photos on Flickr | Flickr

A 12mm focal length sounds as if it should provide an expansive field of view but the MFT chip’s 22mm diagonal gives the 12mm an equivalent focal length to that of an old-fashioned 24mm prime, which is fairly ordinary as wideangle lenses go. Below is the worst example of flare I was able to produce with the Olympus, even after actively searching for it in my images. GX85, 1/1000, f/9, ISO 200 – M.Zuiko 12mm Colours Falloff of illumination towards the corners of the frame is well controlled, especially for a wide angle lens with a fast aperture. At f/2 the corners are only 1.1 stops darker than the image centre and visually uniform illumination is achieved by f/4. Distortion is about what you'd expect for a 24mm-equivalent lens - +0.5% barrel distortion in the corners, and easily correctable in post-processing if you like your straight lines straight.

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As you can see from the images above, both lenses produce excellent images and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend either to any M43 user. I found performance with the Olympus 12mm and the Panasonic 14mm to be very similar when shooting with my GF-1. With that being said, there are reasons to buy one over the other, see below. Laowa 4mm f2.8 Fisheye: recently announced, it offers a circular perspective with a 210˚ angle of view. Not yet tested, and I admit I’m not keen on circular fisheyes (but that’s just me). It’s cheap though.

Olympus 12mm f/2 Micro Four Thirds Lens | Park Cameras Used Olympus 12mm f/2 Micro Four Thirds Lens | Park Cameras

Both operate with precision especially when combined with the manual assists (magnification, focus peaking) of Micro Four Thirds cameras. Forgoing the plastics that make up the majority of the Panasonic, Olympus opted for and all metal construction for the 12mm. Because of the all metal construction, the Olympus 12mm feels wonderful in your hand but the weight may bother some users. The difference in weight is especially noticeable when switching between these lenses. The Olympus’ weight and length actually makes my GF-1 heavy and slightly off balance when in use. Replace the Olympus 12mm with the Panasonic 14mm f/2.5 and you would think the GF-1 just lost a few pounds. Olympus 12mm f/2. Shown with focus ring set to manual focus mode. In June 2011, Olympus made a flurry of lens announcements, revealing a total of four lenses, but only two truly new designs. Two of the lenses were newer revised models of previous zoom lenses (14-42mm and 40-150mm), while the two that excited more serious photographers were the M.Zuiko 45mm f/1.8 and the M.Zuiko 12mm f/2. These were small, attractive prime lenses with fast apertures, and they finally looked to help fulfill some of the promise of Micro 4/3 as a high quality lightweight camera system. Both lenses have been wildly popular. I reviewed the 45mm f/1.8 about a month ago, and have found it to be an astoundingly good lens. Can it’s wide-angle brother keep pace? Build Quality and Ergonomics The Olympus 12mm ƒ/2 uses Olympus' MSC (Move-Still-Compatible) technology, making the lens fast and near-silent to autofocus; the lens focuses between close-focus and infinity in less than a second. Autofocus results can be overridden at any time by simply turning the focusing ring. All Micro Four Thirds lenses from Olympus and Panasonic have a unique lens profile to correct distortion either in-camera (JPGs) or via a RAW converter such as Adobe Lightroom. For this reason, you won’t notice very much barrel distortion from either lens in field conditions.MPB puts photo and video kit into more hands, more sustainably. Every month, visual storytellers sell more than 20,000 cameras and lenses to MPB. Choose used and get affordable access to kit that doesn’t cost the earth. Both lenses feature coating to reduce flare and ghosting but the Leica lens is far less resistant than the Olympus. Given the price of the lens, I was quite surprised to find that flare could be so invasive. GX85, 1/5000, f/1.4, ISO 200 – Leica 12mm GX85, 1/200, f/10, ISO 200 – Leica 12mm If there is one true fault with this lens its that the Olympus LH-48 metal lens hood is an accessory for this lens and it does not come with the kit, why Olympus continues to follow this trend is beyond reasoning with, however it seems to be part of their practice to charge customers at each opportunity.

Lens Talk: Olympus M.Zuiko 12mm F2 - Blogger ROBIN WONG : Lens Talk: Olympus M.Zuiko 12mm F2 - Blogger

I’ll admit it. I have a huge thing for wide angle lenses. I’ve always been fascinated by the way you can represent the vastness of a place, using the lens’ natural distortion to make interesting compositions, and playing with perspective or tri-dimensionality. Since I first began photographing with DSLRs, I have always made a point to invest in good wide angle lenses. My favourites are the Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8 and the Nikkor 24mm f/1.4. Vignetting isn’t entirely corrected but it doesn’t pose a problem on either lens. In fact, it is only really noticeable at f/2 on the 12mm. FlareCertainly the lens hood should be included, as should a bag for the lens. I bought JJC hoods for my lenses and whole they work okay, they’re not as good as the branded ones (and you must not, under any circumstances, try to reverse the 9-18 hood) but having spent serious money buying the Oly lenses, there was no way I was going to unbelt again for the lens hoods. What does one say when they see this lens? I often see and here various platitudes from people who have either never owned or never shot with this lens, most of them negative, trivialised, biased and in many cases completely nonrepresentational to any sort of reality about this lens. The lens gets down trodden based on something they read once in a web review of the lens and never seems to get a second look in. The Olympus 12mm F/2 is one of the most harshly critiqued and criticized lenses but is also the most misunderstood and underrated lenses in the Micro Four Thirds lineup. If one lens receives more negative comments in the Micro Four Thirds lens lineup its this one and for the majority of cases the disparagement is entirely misdirected. Beyond f/5.6, the playing field becomes much more even. Diffraction really starts to show at f/11 but only causes noticeable softness at f/16 on the Leica or f/16 and f/22 on the Olympus. Lenses – Should have no marks on the elements andoptically clear. There may be light dust present that will not effect theimagery.