[joeyc]

Staff note: This post may contain affiliate links, which means Pentax Forums may earn a small commission if a visitor clicks through and makes a purchase. If you would like to support the forum directly, you may also make a donation here.

---

I was considering the Sigma 10-20mm, figuring that I may have to zoom to 12-13mm to help minimize distortion. Unfortunately 47th St sold me the Sigma without having it in stock and they can't tell me when they will have it. Gives me a chance to reconsider. Since the 15mm has nearly no distortion, i may only be giving up 2-3mm on the wide end. I will also use this lens for landscape shots. I don't want to spend for the 12-24, especially considering the mixed reviews.

Any thoughts?

[joeyc]

Or maybe even the much larger, but faster 14mm? I see Calumet has a decent price.

[ivoire]

the 12-24mm pentax is very good. for real estate photos. i checked my pics and most are at 12-13mm. You will miss some shots with 15mm. Prodigitag200 has one for $575 with free shipping on ebay:

NEW PENTAX DA 12-24mm f4 ED AL (IF) LENS for K20D K200D - eBay (item 130314030192 end time Jun-23-09 14:57:06 PDT)


samples from 12-24mm here: http://www.redbubble.com/people/ivoire/art/everything/tags/homes

[joeyc]

Thanks for the reply. You have some nice shots. I realize anytime one goes wide in tight quarters distortion is likely, I'm just worried about having to correct for that.

Thanks for the link.

[ivoire]

Thanks for the reply. You have some nice shots. I realize anytime one goes wide in tight quarters distortion is likely, I'm just worried about having to correct for that.

Thanks for the link.

glad to help and thanks for the compliment. i use pshop and correct for distortion when required. i believe there are several free programs that will do the correction. if you ask in the Post Processing, Printing, and Software forum, someone will point you to them. when i started out, i used the 16-45mm but it was just not wide enuff

[joeyc]

I realize that correction can be done, I just prefer to not have to. I own a 9-18mm Zuiko lens (18-36mm), and it is very well corrected. It seems as if the 15mm is the same, but has soft corners until one stops down considerably - which for interior shots (on a tripod) is no problem. I will have to look at more examples of both the 15mm and 12-24mm. One big plus for the 15 is the size. I tend to like to work with as little as possible.

[Ash]

Another plug for the 12-24 in this setting.
Many times I have been found wanting trying to capture rooms in tight corners with the DA 14 and 16-45. The 12-24 shines in getting that wider perspective and IMO has reasonably acceptable distortion at 12mm, where I get most of my shots in real estate.

I don't have a 10-20 to compare, but most people with this lens are just as happy and the extra 2mm is a significant difference at the wide end.

[joeyc]

Well I realize most tend to favor the 12-24 or even Sigma 10-20 for this type of shooting, I think I am going to go with the DA15. I did some testing with my Zuiko 9-18 to see how my typical shooting would fair at 22.5mm vs 18-20mm. In reality, while I may sometimes wish for a little more room on the sides, I think 22.5mm will work well - especially with the little distortion of the DA15. All examples with straight vertical lines look great to me. Much better than the Sigma or even the Pentax.

It doesn't seem like many (if any) use the DA15 for real estate. Maybe there is a reason for that, but I can't see it being an issue if I am OK with being limited to 22.5mm.

[asdf]

Or maybe even the much larger, but faster 14mm? I see Calumet has a decent price.

Pentax SMC-DA 14mm f/2.8 ED [IF] Review / Test Report

It's a nice lens: "The DA 14mm may not be a Pentax Limited lens but the build quality feels great thanks to an outer metal shell and tight tolerances. The lens features an internal focusing mechanism and it does not change its size regardless of the focus setting." The distrotion is low and the center resolution is already "very good" at f/2.8. The focal plane may not be flat and this could explain the worse border resolution results.

[bentax]

15mm test shot. Nice Lens.

http://www.westozbmx.com/photos/runsmall.jpg

Have managed to **** up the sky a bunch though.
http://www.westozbmx.com/photos/strollsmall.jpg

Youll really appreciated the perspective this baby affords you.

[bentax]

Never shall i run this polarizer again.



Or atleast clean it..

[cwood]

I recently got the 12-24 for real estate work. This 800 square foot condo could not have been shot at 15mm. The distortion is acceptable (and easily corrected) considering this is not fine art.

San Diego Photography -- Christopher Wood

Every interior shot of this place was taken at 12mm

[audiobomber]

I recently got the 12-24 for real estate work. This 800 square foot condo could not have been shot at 15mm. The distortion is acceptable (and easily corrected) considering this is not fine art.

Every interior shot of this place was taken at 12mm

[/IMG]

Were the condo shots corrected for distortion? They look very good except for the bottom one in your post (the office). It looks a little weird.

[cwood]

Were the condo shots corrected for distortion? They look very good except for the bottom one in your post (the office). It looks a little weird.

The office is a very small loft space. I agree it is an odd angle but it makes the space look much larger than any other angle I tried.

I did not bother correcting for distortion for this shoot and you can see the curve in the bookshelves in that one picture I posted here. But for a home-buyer... they don't see that stuff and it makes no difference in the "purpose" of the images.

edit: I actually remember I did correct one shot in the set but I can't remember which one. But the others are all basically straight out of the camera (except the blue sky which came from Colorado in 2007 or 2008...)

[jfsavage]

Consider the 10-17mm fisheye and the fisheye-hemi plugin. Quite remarkable results.