Overall this is one of my most used lenses. Unusually for such an extreme wideangle lens, linear distortion is low enough for extreme architectural perspectives, its excellent for landscapes, real estate, close in street shooting and actually great for fun portrait work if you have a willing model!
Sharpness is generally pretty good from F4 upwards even in the corners and it does not seem to fall off much at 12mm or 24mm but remains pretty consistent. The only real difference between it and the DA21 is the slight reduction in detail contrast stopped down, but it is probably comparable for sharpness.
Quality of build is exemplary. The lens hood is a bit of a monster using up way too much camera bag space but is an absolute necessity outdoors.
There is a bit of CA on this lens especially at 12mm. Not as much as the DA 16-45 but could be better. Tokina version has been criticised for this and the Pentax has the same fault. Can be almost eliminated in most RAW converters.
Flare on the other hand is very well controlled even though I use a front filter. The front element is very vulnerable to scratches as its very prominent. Takes normal depth 77m filters with no vignetting which is useful.
Exposure accuracy on this lens is excellent with none of the underexposure issues so prevalent on the 16-45.
Incremental ratings:
Usefulness: 10 - everyone should have one. Great fun for extreme perspectives.
Build: 9 - quick focus clutch, smooth zooming, minimal slop
Sharpness: 9 - good considering its a zoom and such an extreme on at that
Contrast: 8 - good for a zoom, primes would be slightly better. PP helps
Colour: 8.5 - slightly cooler than some but generally accurate
Distortion: 10 - dont know how they managed it!
Abberations/Flare: 7.5 - CA at wide angles but flare control is excellent for such an extreme zoom.
Focus: 9 - Quick and unfussed though camera sometimes has trouble at 12mm due to extreme DOF and small detail.
Summary: Forget the sigma and tamron versions, this lens is every bit a match for the Nikon 12-24 which costs a lot more. You lose almost nothing quality wise vs the DA 21 and 14 and gain an extremely useful and fun lens. Should be in everyones camera bag.
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $1,022.00
| Rating: 9
Pros:
Its really wide zoom
Cons:
Vingetting at 12mm with the lens hood mounted
I love this lens.
It´s a light weight lens dedicated for the APS C sensors.
The lens shines at interior, citylife, architecure, and landscape photos and produces sharp crisp images.
Benefits:
It´s a wide and fast zoom and I prefer this lens as my comrade for travelling.
Drawbacks:
Lenshood makes vingetting and the internal flash is not compatible with this lens.
This lens is what finally convinced me that zooms can produce images on a par with primes. I've used for interiors (architecture) and scenics.
The amazing thing is that I could use it for interior shots of rooms and it would be possible to forgo using the Lens Correction filter if I didn't want to bother with it. I've NEVER seen a zoom that produces such clear, sharp, distortion-free images. HOW DO THEY DO THAT??
Shot directly into the sun, and there was only one teeny little point of flare. This is in a complex lens with a lot of elements. AMAZING!
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): N/A
| Rating: 9
Pros:
Low distortion, very sharp, constant aperture, low flare
Cons:
big hood
great lens, not small with big hood. But, very sharp from f4, sharp from end of lens till infinity. No bokeh at all Great for architecture and landscapes.
Big quality is very good. If you look for someting wide difficult to beat.
I use it often with slim b&w c-pol and vignetting is seen at 12mm and 13mm.
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $780.00
| Rating: 9
Pros:
Sharp, versatile wide angle zoom, very low distortion
Cons:
Bulky (but necessary) hood
Wide is good. This lens is excellent! I'm very happy with this lens since I prefer rectilinear for landscapes.
Sharpness 9
Bokeh 9 (but with huge depth of field)
Color 9
Handling 9 (hood is a bit bulky, but absolutely necessary)
Build 8
Distortion 9 (better than Sigma, etc.)
Aberations 8
Value 7 (will probably revise upward the more I use it - big investment!)
I didn't plan on getting the 12-24 right away, but my local shop had one in stock, I played with it a while and took it home. Very glad I did.
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $725.00
| Rating: 8
Pros:
Vivid color, amazing linearity, sharp to corners -
Cons:
delicate alignment - quality control issues
Pop Photo (Apr-06) praised this lens as a "Wide Winner" for spectacular performance on bench testing: excellent image sharpness and contrast; imperceptible distortion ["best of breed"]; and barely notable vignetting at the short end. I can add breathtaking color, crisp contrast and ruler-straight linearity to that list. At first glance, a 2X zoom doesn't sound impressive these days - until you realize that this parafocal zoom sweeps an incredible 100 to 60 degree viewing range that's just perfect for cramped interiors, group pictures or landscapes. This zoom is a landmark of superb engineering: combining extra-dispersion glass and aspheric lens elements into flagship "great glass".
But a finely-tuned optical engine performs optimally only if all cylinders fire in unison ... on a test run I noted hideous chromatic aberration of trees and power lines. I packed the lens up for warranty service so as to alert Pentax to quality control slippage. Irreparable misalignment [probably from rough shipping/handling] was acknowledged ;replacement with a brand-new lens was hassle-free as well as timely.
Should you detect distortion fear not -- Pentax service was knowledgeable, courteous, and helpful. To their great credit, exchange was virtually painless, and the new replacement lens at last performs flawlessly. Although the initial unit turned out to be a glass lemon, Pentax made good (try that with a new car!); I have nothing but praise for the fair and decisive warranty follow-through.
Tip: the bulbous cyclops snout of the forward element is close to the surface, just begging for scratches and smudges.
One of my favourite lenses. relatively fast @ f4 - in most cases i would just boost iso a little and it would be fast enough in most indoor situations. The lens generates sharp photos from corner to corner, straight from f4. The lens hood is massive! I haven't actually tested out the effectiveness of the lens hood, but flare and ghosting is still a problem, even with the lens hood on. If you decide to use a cir. pl. on this baby, you would have to take the lens hood off. Other than this complaint, the lens itself is spectacular. Sure it's pricy, but compared to the other brands, it is a steal! (don't steal it.)
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $585.00
| Rating: 9
Pros:
Sharp wide open, fantastic colour and contrast, build quality
Cons:
Hood creeps into the field of view at 12mm if you are not careful
I own the 77, 21, 50 and 35mm primes but frankly the 12-24 is a more consistent lens than all of them. It's sharp at f/4, sharp in the corners a stop down with outstanding colour and contrast.
I have found CA's to be minimal, my only real complaint is that if the hood is not screwed on fully it intrudes on the image severely at 12mm. The hood is large and this makes the lens hard to carry (it's not a big lens sans hood) but with this FOV you have to use the hood.
Flare is very well controlled and build quality is first rate with snappy AF and quickshift.
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $675.00
| Rating: 10
Pros:
Great Wide-angle to Near Normal range, Very fast AF, sharp and little distortion for a wide angle lens
Cons:
Really nothing
This lens is worth all the money that it demands. I thought it was really expensive at first and wasn't sure if it was worth the investment, but this has turned out to be my most used lens.
It has a good range. 12-24mm. Wide enough to capture everything you want, and long enough to make do with situations where you want a normal view. I considered this and the Sigma 10-20 and I never regretted getting this Pentax. I think the 12-24mm range is more useful than a 10-20mm range.
AF is super fast too. Works fantastic in lowlight too. If you shoot night scenes, street photography, or indoors like me, this is THE lens to buy. I don't think I will ever sell it!
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $900.00
| Rating: 8
Pros:
The speed and the range
Cons:
Lens hood size
This lens was one of my main reasons to switch to Pentax from the Minolta-KM-Sony-line a year ago. The other one was the 14mm/f2.8. Neither one has any good counterparts in the Minolta mount, and going with C or N was always a last resort for me anyway.
Apart from all the optical and mechanical quality of this lens –I agree with the other reviewers – the range and speed means it's very useful in photojournalism which is part of my work. Combined with a lens with a range of 28-105 (or something close to it) you have a two-lens set that gives you all the important pictures you need for a story: the where, the who and the how picture.
Keeping it to one body, two lenses and a flash I can fit in the sometimes indispensable laptop in the same bag.
I happen to have the Sigma 10-20 and a Sony A700 too. It seems that combination doesn't give the same IQ, and certainly not the speed (f-stops). Plus, 12-24 really is more useful than 10-20.
With extreme wide-angles many AF-cameras miss a close subject, focusing at the background instead. The K20D or K10D + this lens are no worse than the A700 with the Sigma 10-20 in this respect.
My only wish would be to have the focusing work with a USM instead of the drive shaft.
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $590.00
| Rating: 8
Pros:
Low distortion, Color Contrast, Wide
Cons:
A bit of CA under high contrast situtations, but overall not a big deal
The DA 12-24mm is a wonderful super-wide angle zoom lens. Sharp wide open and excellent color contrast. On a clear sunny day, photos looks like a CPL was used. If you are a landscape shooter, this is the perfect lens. Personally, I still need to get use to the focal length - I thought I would enjoy the wide angle a lot more. My mind may change with a bit more usage.
Build quality is good and the lens is decently sized with an extremely large hood. Overall, it's a wonderful zoom lens but it's hard for me to give it a higher score since my previous two lens purchases were the DA*50-135 and DA*300. Sometimes I miss having the extra reach and may have to change to the DA*16-50
In either case, the lens is a great performer and if you're comfortable with the focal length it provides, it's an excellent lens to add to your collection.
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $700.00
| Rating: 9
Pros:
Sharpness, Color & Contrast and its Wide Angle
Cons:
Ever so Slight Softness at the edges
I have wanted this lens for a couple of years to augment my DA 16-45 and DA 10-17 FE, and finally acquired one 8 months ago. It is one of my most used lenses. Compared to the rest - it is by far the largest, especially with the 77mm front lens element. I mainly shoot landscapes and cityscapes. The fixed f4 is a plus, especially for nights and evening images. Flare is very well controlled, especially with shooting into the sun for sunsets. The lens performs best at f5.6 to f8, with a very large depth of field. The colors are true (and I like the Pentax colors very well) and contrast is very good. I have had no problems with CA. The build quality is excellent, even though it is plastic which is noticeable against my all metal DA 10-17 FE. Distortion is really only noticeable at the extreme edge, however with this wide of angle you are left wondering why it is so minimal.
"Unfortunately it (the DA 15) doesn't come out so well against the excellent Tokina AT-X PRO SD 12-24mm F4 (IF) DX, which we'd expect to perform near-identically to Pentax's own smc DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL (IF) - in this case the zoom is sharper, and has lower falloff and equally low distortion, although it does show more chromatic aberration."
This is a wide lens, to the extent on a couple of occasions - too wide, that I had to revert to the 16-45.
With the front lens element so large and exposed, I searched for and found an ultra thin circular polarizing filter (Nikon) for additional protection. The filter had to be ultra thin so as to not add any vignetting to the lens.
I would easily recommend this lens with out any reservations. There are very few lenses this wide that can match it, let alone exceed it.
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): N/A
| Rating: 10
Pros:
brilliant optics, fast AF, quality build
Cons:
none yet
After getting used to using third party standard lenses , I have finally plunged and bought a few quality pieces of glass...and this lens is one of them.
To be honest I was stunned....I cant find any CA at all!!!
Also I took a few shots directly into a bright sun and i am staggered at what this lens did in these shots....you would have sworn that i had a starburst filter!!!!
It had the tinniest bit of glare but HELLOOOO...it was DIRECTLY INTO THE SUN!!!
It is a great picture in its own right!!!
I was floored by this....I ran to my pc to look at it on the 24 inch screen and my Mrs said "wow what a beautiful shot!!"....This was the first hour I had the lens.
AF is quick too...build quality is gorgeous...i wanted to sleep with the bloody thing that night hehehe
I cant recommend this lens high enough!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $500.00
| Rating: 9
Pros:
Unique perspectives at wide end
Cons:
No lens hood cutaway, infinity autofocus not always accurate
I had been considering this lens over the Sigma 10-20 mm because of the constant f/4 aperture and reports that it had basically no linear distortion throughout the zoom range, unlike the Sigma. I also read an excellent and convincing thread on this forum (which I now can't find with a search) comparing these two lenses that mentioned how nothing quite compares to Pentax glass on a Pentax camera, and this was the final deciding factor.
I love how, when I take a photo containing the straight lines of a building, for example, the lines appear straight at any focal length. I imagine that a pixel-peeper might notice slight distortion when viewing a crop of such an image, but I haven't noticed any to date and the findings of pixel-peepers (aka "measurebators") are rarely noticeable in real-world situations anyhow. The only distortion is due to the wide angle perspective, and this is what draws people to the unique images made by the excellent image quality of this lens.
When using a polarizing filter, I find that you need to use 14mm and above to avoid vignetting; for reference, I use the regular-thickness Singh Ray warming polarizer. However, to turn the filter ring I need to remove the lens hood each time since there is no cutaway, which is odd since lenses like the DA* 50-135 have one. This is obviously a great inconvenience. And attaching a rubber lens hood to the end of the filter to make turning easier, instead of using the supplied lens hood, bumps the focal length to 18mm before vignetting disappears. So I have resorted to removing the hood, adjusting the filter, then putting the hood back on each time; again, very inconvenient, but this is the best solution I've come up with.
The greatest disappointment is how, when autofocusing on a subject at infinity, I have to manually back off the focus ring just a touch in order to achieve perfect focus on many occasions. I have experimented by autofocusing on a subject, deliberately twisting the ring to get it out of focus, then autofocusing again on the exact same subject (under various lighting conditions, I might add). I have found that the number of times the AF has been bang-on versus out of focus is roughly split, whereas AF using my DA 35mm Limited, for example, is almost always perfect. And it is difficult to determine manual focus accuracy with this lens (unless you have something like a KatzEye) since the subject distance appears far away; you really need to have a sharp eye to notice when the subject pops into focus.
That said, with practice I have reached the point where most of my shots are in perfect focus using the 'manual back-off' technique, but I wish I could trust the AF more with this lens in order to achieve this. Since AF with other DA lenses I have tried on my K20D tends to be way more consistent, I have to blame the lens for this instead of my K20D.
But this complaint aside, I love everything else about this lens and highly recommend it based upon the results when they actually are in focus.
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $886.00
| Rating: 10
Pros:
Superb Quality of Image, Flare free.
Cons:
I cannot fault it
I have tried smc pentax-m 20mm f4 prime which gives better image quality than my 18-250 zoom at 20mm, but after reading these reviews I knew I must have the 12-24. what has been said about this lens is very true,I don't know what they have done to stop flare but they have done it. I have had this lens now for 3 days and hardly taken it off my K20D. My lens says asembled in Vietnam but I must say it feels just as good as the 18-250 and I paid £450.00 less for it than what my usual store in the UK are asking.
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $525.00
| Rating: 10
Pros:
focal length, sharpness, color
Cons:
damn lens hood
Absolutely amazed with this lens.
I'm a total amateur mostly shooting my travels to cities around Europe of cathedrals, street shots, plazas, etc. So lots of indoor & outdoor architecture shots that I think do a good job of conveying the experience of actually being there. And think this is why my first ever camera was a K200D and some nice lenses, I wanted to remember and share what it actually felt like visiting all these cool places. This lens's ability to capture the entire scene with quality sharpness & color make it the perfect tool.
Yeah the lens cap is huge and annoying when not on the camera... but it's a necessary evil I guess. No points deducted for that.
Focal Length - Great for fitting whole buildings in a shot if you're crammed into a small street without much room to back up. Love the indoor shots too - especially for floor to ceiling coverage inside a cathedral, capturing a semi normal perspective in the foreground/altar but also seeing the underside of the half-dome ceilings most have.
Sharpness - Outstanding. I shoot lots of big buildings, so even at this focal length I can be quite far away from subject. Everything still dead sharp and you can easily crop plenty of edge. I seriously think that the 12-24 is sharper than my Sigma 30 f1.4 for subjects at medium distance (but I'm still learning how to shoot with the Sigma - close up, low light, indoor pub shots are where the Sigma is deadly for me).
Color - As lots of what I do is outdoors, I'm often in VERY bright conditions (this weekend in Valencia was no exception). Colors are so vivid and I'm always impressed at how deep the mid day blue skies render.
Also does well shooting groups of 3-4, as you can hold the camera in Portrait orientation, get all 4 people head to toe in frame while standing in the same room. Ladies love it cause they can see their fancy shoes in the pictures...haha.
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $950.00
| Rating: 10
Pros:
Lack of distortion, focus speed, colors, flare
Cons:
$$$, hood size, tiny amount of PF
Hi All,
I am doing a little LENS review of the DA12-24 as well
What i will do is compare it to the two other lenses I have near this focal length, the DA*16-50 and the DA18-55.
Firstly, the lens slots in nicely between the DA*16-50 and the DA18-55 in quality of finish. It is weighty - close the the DA*, has a solid feel to it and it beautifully finished, with blend of metal and plastic parts and rubber grips.
The front lens element does not rotate and therefore is easy to use with a Circular Polarizing filter.
The hood is quite large and almost overbearing compared to the lens itself, but totally worthwhile with such a wide angle lens, helping to stop unwanted flare.
USING THE LENS
The most dramatic thing about this lens is the lack of visual image distortion, even at 12mm it is almost undetectable, while going from 13-24mm IS perfect without any distortion whatsoever.
At 12mm F4 the image is sharp and marginally sharper at F8 tapering off at F13-F22.
I dont find 24mm as sharp until F8 but elsewhere in the range up to 22mm is as good as 12mm.
Comparing images from the DA*16-50 and DA12-24 finds very little difference at 16mm and 12mm. They both have about the same Resolution and sharpness and little purple fringing where there are strong colour contrasts (white and blacks).
The DA* shows some barrel distortion where as the DA12-24 shows virtually none.
Colours on both lenses are superb, flare is really well controlled and it is impossible to say which image is from what lens.
The DA seems to lock focus extremely quick and accurately perhaps fractionally faster than the DA* and about the same as the DA18-55.
Conclusion :th3: :th3: :th3: :th3: 4.5/5
Lets face it, you buy this lens for the wider side of its design, from 12mm+ and mostly for landscapes, interior/exterior real estate and street work.
F4 may not sound like much but it locks focus fast and depth of field around this focal length is DEEP no matter how close you are.
Image quality is 2nd to none and matches the DA*. In fact it is the perfect compliment for the DA*, extending the range to 12mm and loosing nothing at all in quality and resolution.
The hood will fit on the DA* as well.
Things to look out for when using this lens-
Looking up or down when there are geometrical shapes in the image will create massive amounts of perspective distortion. This is not a lens issue just a something thats happens at these focal lengths that you should be aware of especially when taking real estate photos for example.
CONS-
Purple Fringing. It has some, not as bad as the DA* and not enough to really worry about, but look and you will find if youre into pixel peeping. K7 fixes this, so does PS.
No Bag come on, give me a bag when i spend this much
COST = $1000 to $1150 Shop around !!!
DA12-24 @12mm (notice just how much more you get for 12mm compared to 16mm and complete lack of barrel distortion! not much PF to see either)
DA*16-50 @ 16mm (note PF in the lights and slight barrel distortion)
DA18-55ii @ 18mm (slight barrel distortion)
Looking up (perspective distortion, trees bowing in towards the middle)
Looking straight out, perfect image quality, some PF, HERE is where you need 12mm
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): N/A
| Rating: 10
Pros:
12mm, very sharp, contrasty, colors
Cons:
horrible CA and PF, barrel distortion at 12mm
this lens is incredibly sharp at f4. the images, especially in dark areas are clean and free of dreaded noise signals,because of better exposure reading (though some might argue this due to camera metering and exposure setting. I had compared this against the 18-55 WR kitlens which was no match for it at set focal lengths 18-24mm. the great thing about this is it's already excellent IQ at 12mm. the Sigma's 10-20 and Tamrons 10-24 at 10mm are not that good and would require some post-processing help. 12mm is ok for both those lenses while the Pentax 12-24 is consistent from 12-20 at f4 and excellent at f8 opening in the 24mm range. colors is better than the Sigma and Tamron which are cooler and muddy. sharpness for both are sharp though at the middle range but not as contrasty.
the only downside of the 12-24 is it's evident CA against brightly lit area against dark portions. probably due to it's high contrast. it's quite a lot of work to go around and fix the CA and PF during post-processing. it also has barrel distortion at 12mm but can easily corrected on they K-7 or during post-processing.
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $699.00
| Rating: 10
Pros:
Sharp, low distorsion, great wide view, well built, CA has been minor so far
Cons:
Adjusting a polorizer with lens hood on.
I did a lot of research before buying this lens. My favorite lenses for 35mm film were the 24 and the 28. I also had fun with a 21mm. This lens take in all of those distances with the kind of quality I would have expected from fixed lenses. I love what I have seen from the 15mm ltd and 21 ltd, but for me right now this lens made far more sense. I will probably get a 15 ltd some day as some of the posts I have seen look great. (I have a 40 and 70), but I do love to shoot WA. Here are a couple of my first shoots with this lens. The first is 12mm@F7.1 next 24mm@F11
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $700.00
| Rating: 10
Pros:
Very good IQ, constant aperture, low distortion
Cons:
size, some CA
I rated this lens a 10 because of the very good price performance ratio.
The build is a nice mix of metal and plastic, feel s sturdy but not too heavy.
It delivers very even resolution numbers across the frame even at extreme focals, good colours and contrast.
Excellent for interiors and landscapes, tried it also on FF and starts to vignette at around 17-18mm so it could be used as a WA for a film camera if one does not go below 17mm.
Also a plus as being original Pentax one has all the K7 specific adjustments (distortion, CA, microfocus).
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $650.00
| Rating: 10
Pros:
sharp from wide open, build quality, flare performance
Cons:
CA sometimes, only 8 blades, price relative to Tokina, not close focus
A very good wide-angle zoom. Performance is excellent straight from f/4 @12mm. I had the Sigma 10-20mm to compare to it. Both are excellent lenses but the Sigma needs a bit of stopping to get the best of it.
Build quality is really excellent, the focusing and zoom rings are very smooth, a pleasure to use. I only wish this lens was WR.
CA is not really problematic but it needs to be corrected in-camera or in software like Lightroom sometimes. The Sigma 10-20mm is better in this regard.
There are also some minor quibbles:
- it could focus closer, at least like the Sigma 10-20mm
- it could have 9 blades like the Tokina variant
- it's much more expensive than the Tokina version (maybe due to Pentax coating?)
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $575.00
| Rating: 9
Pros:
Sharp at f/4, excellent colours, great contrast
Cons:
Good but not great build quality
This is one underrated UWA lens.
Exemplary results at 12-16mm with excellent control of distortion.
Most of my best wide angle shots were produced using this lens at the wide end.
I have not found another lens in its focal range that compares more favourably to the DA 12-24.
It's one of my best zooms and is the go-to lens for landscapes.
It's only issues to me are that it's a little clunky in the camera bag and should have been considered a DA* zoom (even without SDM), made weather sealed and given stronger build quality to match its optical quality.
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $812.00
| Rating: 8
Pros:
low distortion, fixed aperture, good build quality
Cons:
not WR
A good lens, well built and with low distorsion. Very useful for my architectural and enviroment shots. I don' t give it a 9 beacuse it' s not Weather Sealed and it' s "only" a DA wich i can' t mount on a FF film camera.
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): N/A
| Rating: 9
Pros:
Build, Contrast, sharpness edge to edge,
Cons:
a little CA/PF at 12, wish it went to 10mm
My only complaint about this lens is that I wish it was a bit wider. Very useful wide prime. With this quality of this lens, I dont think the primes make much sense except for a faster aperature (the 2.8).
Usefulness: 9 - I use the wide end quite a bit, wish it was wider (to 10mm). A bit big.
Build: 10 - tight and well made. only thing that would make it better is weather sealing.
Sharpness: 9.5 - From edge to center very good.
Contrast: 10- Very nice
Distortion: 10 - Not much give its a 12 -24. For its class it is rated a 10.
CA: 9 - Only at 12-14mm do you have some in high contrast.
I can recommend the SMC Pentax-DA 12-24mm F4 ED AL [IF]: Yes |
Price (U.S. Dollars): $600.00
| Rating: 9
Pros:
Great WA effects, excellent lens quality
Cons:
Not small or cheap.
This may be destined to be my favorite zoom, possibly edging out the DA 17-70. With this zoom in the bag, plus the 40 and 70mm DA Ltd pancakes, I have a very high quality setup for 90%+ of my needs that keeps my shoulder happy.
You really can't ask for much better image sharpness in a zoom, and the size is much larger than my WA pancake primes, but with much more range. 12mm is so addictive, that I sometimes think this lens is becoming a 12mm prime.
My only nit to pick is that it is large compared to my primes, though most of the size is in the front element and the weight is not noticeable. I find the hood, like so many hoods on WA zoom, to be seldom used, and the lens can fade a bit in certain light angles without it.
All in all, this is a super lens that belongs in every bag.
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Great for architecture and landscapes.
.
come on, give me a bag when i spend this much
