21mm vs 24/25mm

[jonmanjiro]

I prefer 21mm over 24/25mm, mainly because 24/25mm is too close to 28mm which is my main wide angle focal length, and as wide as I'd normally go for people shots.

You get a bit of "the stretching in the corners" effect (perspective distortion) with a 28mm, but its still manageable for in close people shots. IMO its much more pronounced with a 24/25mm lens or wider.

 

[gommy]

Both got very obvious distortion for street photog. The question is whether you like street shots to have distortion.

IMHO, 21mm is better for wider panoramic pic when doing street. 25mm is better for closeup shots (if you like Garry Winogrand + Bruce Gilden type).

OF a little, but artspraken, I remember you shot a wedding in 21mm, how do you find it?

 

[artspraken]

OF a little, but artspraken, I remember you shot a wedding in 21mm, how do you find it?

I was so traumatised by the results, I quit photography since late Dec 2010.

Shooting from 4am morning until 1130pm night also made me realise I can only do this once. Never again do I want to bear the responsibility of being main wedding photog. Its a very tough job. Unlike the bridesmaids/groomsmen (who can take breaks), the cameraman has go the entire hog with the bride/groom (almost) and still have to think creatively and compose. I only managed to finish coz the groom is a good friend I cannot let him down.

The table-to-table shots done with 21mm were a disaster. This is because (i) the distortion made people's faces out of shape, (ii) the dinner table looked like it was protruding out of the picture; and (iii) the TTL in my SF24D flash was really quite retarded. (I should have ditched the flash and asked the hotel to turn up the lights). After nightmarish reflections what happened on that night I shot 72 tables, I suspect I might have tilted the 21mm too far downwards at an angle (to avoid the chandelier lights), which resulted in (i) the people's faces at the top left/right corner of the picture to be badly distorted; (ii) every dinner table looking like star trek spaceship jutting outwards from the picture.

The rest of the wedding day: morning makeup, gatecrashing, tea ceremony, church, solemnisation, family photo etc were all satisfactory by my amateur standards, all shot with M9 + mixture of 35mm, 50mm and 21mm. On the whole, the M9 was disappointing: (i) the AWB is bad; and (ii) responsiveness of M9 is SLOW (compared to M2/3 that I own now). M9 write speeds for memory cards really slow slow slow.

I will never do group photos with 21mm again. Let me put another way: a local celebrity + photogenic model was present at the wedding, and when I saw his picture (face was distorted coz he was standing at the side), I knew I got it all wrong with the 21mm. Somebody so photogenic cannot possibly look that bad unless I seriously screwed up.

After a hiatus of 3 months, I returned to photography recently only because (i) my friend became a leicafan; (ii) I developed an interest for film; and (iii) okay theres a bit more GAS.

p.s. ok better stop rambling off topic, wait mod beat my backside

 

[NazgulKing]

I was so traumatised by the results, I quit photography since late Dec 2010.

Shooting from 4am morning until 1130pm night also made me realise I can only do this once. Never again do I want to bear the responsibility of being main wedding photog. Its a very tough job. Unlike the bridesmaids/groomsmen (who can take breaks), the cameraman has go the entire hog with the bride/groom (almost) and still have to think creatively and compose. I only managed to finish coz the groom is a good friend I cannot let him down.

The table-to-table shots done with 21mm were a disaster. This is because (i) the distortion made people's faces out of shape, (ii) the dinner table looked like it was protruding out of the picture; and (iii) the TTL in my SF24D flash was really quite retarded. (I should have ditched the flash and asked the hotel to turn up the lights). After nightmarish reflections what happened on that night I shot 72 tables, I suspect I might have tilted the 21mm too far downwards at an angle (to avoid the chandelier lights), which resulted in (i) the people's faces at the top left/right corner of the picture to be badly distorted; (ii) every dinner table looking like star trek spaceship jutting outwards from the picture.

The rest of the wedding day: morning makeup, gatecrashing, tea ceremony, church, solemnisation, family photo etc were all satisfactory by my amateur standards, all shot with M9 + mixture of 35mm, 50mm and 21mm. On the whole, the M9 was disappointing: (i) the AWB is bad; and (ii) responsiveness of M9 is SLOW (compared to M2/3 that I own now). M9 write speeds for memory cards really slow slow slow.

I will never do group photos with 21mm again. Let me put another way: a local celebrity + photogenic model was present at the wedding, and when I saw his picture (face was distorted coz he was standing at the side), I knew I got it all wrong with the 21mm. Somebody so photogenic cannot possibly look that bad unless I seriously screwed up.

After a hiatus of 3 months, I returned to photography recently only because (i) my friend became a leicafan; (ii) I developed an interest for film; and (iii) okay theres a bit more GAS.

p.s. ok better stop rambling off topic, wait mod beat my backside

. That's... quite... an eye opener.

Hmm... I think I'm leaning towards the 25mm at the moment. Maybe I would invest in the CV 28mm/f2 or even get a CZ 21mm/f4.5 or f2.8 in the future .

Thanks all for the advice.

 

[Royale With Cheese]

I was so traumatised by the results, I quit photography since late Dec 2010.

Shooting from 4am morning until 1130pm night also made me realise I can only do this once. Never again do I want to bear the responsibility of being main wedding photog. Its a very tough job. Unlike the bridesmaids/groomsmen (who can take breaks), the cameraman has go the entire hog with the bride/groom (almost) and still have to think creatively and compose. I only managed to finish coz the groom is a good friend I cannot let him down.

The table-to-table shots done with 21mm were a disaster. This is because (i) the distortion made people's faces out of shape, (ii) the dinner table looked like it was protruding out of the picture; and (iii) the TTL in my SF24D flash was really quite retarded. (I should have ditched the flash and asked the hotel to turn up the lights). After nightmarish reflections what happened on that night I shot 72 tables, I suspect I might have tilted the 21mm too far downwards at an angle (to avoid the chandelier lights), which resulted in (i) the people's faces at the top left/right corner of the picture to be badly distorted; (ii) every dinner table looking like star trek spaceship jutting outwards from the picture.

The rest of the wedding day: morning makeup, gatecrashing, tea ceremony, church, solemnisation, family photo etc were all satisfactory by my amateur standards, all shot with M9 + mixture of 35mm, 50mm and 21mm. On the whole, the M9 was disappointing: (i) the AWB is bad; and (ii) responsiveness of M9 is SLOW (compared to M2/3 that I own now). M9 write speeds for memory cards really slow slow slow.

I will never do group photos with 21mm again. Let me put another way: a local celebrity + photogenic model was present at the wedding, and when I saw his picture (face was distorted coz he was standing at the side), I knew I got it all wrong with the 21mm. Somebody so photogenic cannot possibly look that bad unless I seriously screwed up.

After a hiatus of 3 months, I returned to photography recently only because (i) my friend became a leicafan; (ii) I developed an interest for film; and (iii) okay theres a bit more GAS.

p.s. ok better stop rambling off topic, wait mod beat my backside

Maybe you went too near?

Usually further away, the distortion is not that bad.

72 tables :sweat:

 

[gommy]

I was so traumatised by the results, I quit photography since late Dec 2010.

Shooting from 4am morning until 1130pm night also made me realise I can only do this once. Never again do I want to bear the responsibility of being main wedding photog. Its a very tough job. Unlike the bridesmaids/groomsmen (who can take breaks), the cameraman has go the entire hog with the bride/groom (almost) and still have to think creatively and compose. I only managed to finish coz the groom is a good friend I cannot let him down.

The table-to-table shots done with 21mm were a disaster. This is because (i) the distortion made people's faces out of shape, (ii) the dinner table looked like it was protruding out of the picture; and (iii) the TTL in my SF24D flash was really quite retarded. (I should have ditched the flash and asked the hotel to turn up the lights). After nightmarish reflections what happened on that night I shot 72 tables, I suspect I might have tilted the 21mm too far downwards at an angle (to avoid the chandelier lights), which resulted in (i) the people's faces at the top left/right corner of the picture to be badly distorted; (ii) every dinner table looking like star trek spaceship jutting outwards from the picture.

The rest of the wedding day: morning makeup, gatecrashing, tea ceremony, church, solemnisation, family photo etc were all satisfactory by my amateur standards, all shot with M9 + mixture of 35mm, 50mm and 21mm. On the whole, the M9 was disappointing: (i) the AWB is bad; and (ii) responsiveness of M9 is SLOW (compared to M2/3 that I own now). M9 write speeds for memory cards really slow slow slow.

I will never do group photos with 21mm again. Let me put another way: a local celebrity + photogenic model was present at the wedding, and when I saw his picture (face was distorted coz he was standing at the side), I knew I got it all wrong with the 21mm. Somebody so photogenic cannot possibly look that bad unless I seriously screwed up.

After a hiatus of 3 months, I returned to photography recently only because (i) my friend became a leicafan; (ii) I developed an interest for film; and (iii) okay theres a bit more GAS.

p.s. ok better stop rambling off topic, wait mod beat my backside

Thanks for sharing. So sorry to hear that you were so traumatised. Yea, that's problem with ultra-wide if we forget and are not careful.

 

[paisatge]

Sorry to hear that artspraken. I used to be very "greedy" trying to fit everything right to the edge of the frame too. Now I just stick to the framelines that come with the camera and not use external finder to match the focal length. Like the widest framelines on the M9 is 28mm. So, if you compose according to those framelines, that would prevent the subject from being too near to the edge and show up distorted. Anyway, lesson learnt

 

[Shahrie]

Digging out some older thread coz I don't want to start a new one.

So NazgulKing. What lens did you get in the end? Whats your take? Coz I'm torn between 21 and 25mm too. Intend to get from Chiif as I'm going to Cambodia in a couple of days. The only lens I have now is the Cron 50 on my M3. I would like some wide, street, landscape photos. Tight on a budget but would love to have a wider lens to go with me other than the 50mm.

I don't actually actually care about sharpness, color fringing, corner softness. More to the 'usability' of the lens. Is it too wide and distorted for streets? I've read the above thread. There's still mixed reviews. I don't have a 35 coz I'm using the M3. Is the 21mm too far out for me or 25mm is the better choice? I would love to have the 'wide angle' look. A bit of distortion is fine and I don't intend to put people's faces in the corners.

Thanks guys. Any further inputs is appreciated.

 

[Benji77]

Zeiss 25/2.8 @ F4 (I think)

It is on the costly side as compared to the VC 28 (F2), the distortion control, nice ergonomics make up for it I guess.
Shot with an M3, no viewfinder. Based on 'aggar-ration'. This saves me a bit of cash from a VF, even though the nice Voigtlander 21/25mm viewfinder is about $280 from Chiif.

 

[NazgulKing]

I bought the 25 in the end. I don't see too much distortion, at least judging from my relatively not so nice scans. The 25 is quite useful for street because of the dof it offers.

 

[Shahrie]

@Benji77, Wow. ZM doesn't show distortion. And its sharp lar. Hmm. But a bit too ex for me leh.

@NazgulKing, Thks. I'll go down to Chiif's tommorow to hands on the 21 and 25. I believe both same size. Same design. Same weight. I need to try both out myself. Mr Chiif Fei, hope you have stock. Hee.

 

[Royale With Cheese]

@Benji77, Wow. ZM doesn't show distortion. And its sharp lar. Hmm. But a bit too ex for me leh.

@NazgulKing, Thks. I'll go down to Chiif's tommorow to hands on the 21 and 25. I believe both same size. Same design. Same weight. I need to try both out myself. Mr Chiif Fei, hope you have stock. Hee.

Hmmm 21mm & 25mm quite close but I guess you can try which one distorts more. I've never tried the CV lenses for 21mm & 25mm so cant comment.

I use the Avenon 21mm F2.8 it does distorts at the sides but still acceptable for me. Still works well for street. Here are some I took lately within the past 2 months.

I like the wide-ness of 21mm for street. These shots are shot at a distance of 1-1.5 meters but still you get the side more on the sides due to the wide perspective.

 

[anerjee]

Would a 21mm lens mounted on a crop sensor like the Sony or the new Ricoh still have the distortion?

 

[NazgulKing]

Would a 21mm lens mounted on a crop sensor like the Sony or the new Ricoh still have the distortion?

You might want to test it to see for yourself because distortion is only one issue to worry about. There'd be chromatic aberrations due to placement of the lenslet array on the sensor itself.

 

[tcy81]

Anyone tried Zeiss Biogon 21mm f4.5 lens ? I am thinking of getting a 21mm lens too.

 

[Benji77]

To be honest, how you practice a lens is distinctive to you. How you exploit it to its potential can take time.
Gary's technique, I would say, is unique to him as his preference to shoot 'up close and personal', works especially well for him.

This is my simple use of the ZM 25/2.8. Its a regular, ''lift the camera, and just shoot lah'' kind of practice. If you ask me, it lacks punch.

This is another shot with the same lens while I was walking by these residents.
If it was a 21 or a 15mm, I could go even nearer and get a more dramatic shot.

Saying that, it takes a while to get to 'know' your lens and how you 'exploit' it.

Enjoy!

 

[pikapig]

To be honest, how you practice a lens is distinctive to you. How you exploit it to its potential can take time.
Gary's technique, I would say, is unique to him as his preference to shoot 'up close and personal', works especially well for him.

This is my simple use of the ZM 25/2.8. Its a regular, ''lift the camera, and just shoot lah'' kind of practice. If you ask me, it lacks punch.

Reading this just strike me. One of the reasons i sold my 15mm was becos of the "just shoot" kind of experience. All i need to do was to get near and close and snap from hip...at around f8, it was like a point and shoot camera to me...which subsequently, i was too lazy to even use the viewfinder anymore. To me that is the character of this lens and it just didnt work too well for me. Afraid of distortion on my subject, i tend to center frame them on each shots...this again limits my creativity.
However, i do see people who do alot better than me with this lens...instead of the distortion as a flaws, they uses it to their advantages...I am just lazy, and lack creativity for the 15mm..haha

 

[Royale With Cheese]

Reading this just strike me. One of the reasons i sold my 15mm was becos of the "just shoot" kind of experience. All i need to do was to get near and close and snap from hip...at around f8, it was like a point and shoot camera to me...which subsequently, i was too lazy to even use the viewfinder anymore. To me that is the character of this lens and it just didnt work too well for me. Afraid of distortion on my subject, i tend to center frame them on each shots...this again limits my creativity.
However, i do see people who do alot better than me with this lens...instead of the distortion as a flaws, they uses it to their advantages...I am just lazy, and lack creativity for the 15mm..haha

I had the 15mm as well. Very dramatic lens but I found that for street, I'm almost close to the point of banging into my subjects, so I sold it off to mr hookonclassic! haha

Its good for stuff like these imho:

 

[Royale With Cheese]

Saying that, it takes a while to get to 'know' your lens and how you 'exploit' it.

:thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

Very true

A lot of people are actually guilty of not full "exploiting" their lenses to the maximum potential before selling them off.

Unfortunately I dont have that luxury, I'm a poor man, whatever gear I buy, I have to consider it carefully & really "exploit" them fully to discover what is the best way they can be used in a shoot

 

[jonmanjiro]

Unfortunately I dont have that luxury, I'm a poor man, whatever gear I buy, I have to consider it carefully & really "exploit" them fully to discover what is the best way they can be used in a shoot

maybe less beer = more gear

what say the drunken photographer??