Visit Page
Skip to content

The Wide You Know

Back in July I posted on the search for the holy grail, wide angle lenses for the Canon EOS-1Ds Mark III. I ended with some hope about the new Zeiss 18mm f/3.5 lens coming this summer.  This morning there is news on that front.

First:  Zeiss announced today that they will be releasing lenses in the Canon Mount.  They are starting with the 50mm f/1.4 and the 85mm f/1.4.  One can assume that the other Zeiss lenses already available in the Nikon mount will follow.

Second:  There are now Zeiss 18mm f/3.5 reviews online:

Andi Dietrich

SLR Lens Review

Diglloyd.com

What I am seeing, especially in Andi’s review, is that the Zeiss 18mm might be a touch sharper overall but that it suffers barrel distortion and corner softness.  If you don’t go wider than 20mm on the Canon 16-35 II, you calibrate your Canon 16-35 II and you are shooting stopped down (e.g. f/8~f/11) then the Canon may be in the running.  I know that’s a lot of “ifs” but if it’s an architecture shoot then the only real if is not going wider than 20mm on the Canon lens.  Also, factor in that we don’t know if Andi’s 16-35 II is calibrated and I’m going to sit tight and revisit this down the line when the Zeiss lens comes out in the Canon mount.

Update 9/17/08:  Zeiss will be coming out with a 21mm f2.8 Distagon T* in the Canon mount.  Very exciting.  This could be the lens and especially useful for architecture.