| Latest Review Posted | HD Pentax-D FA 15-30mm F2.8 ED SDM WR
I love this lens and feel like a fanboi, but I'm not alone--just read the bazillions of reviews of this lens with the Tamron badge. Ricoh did well to pluck this best of breed lens and offer it with Pentax labelling, coatings, and seals.
There's not a lot that I can add to all the other reviews (you can grow old reading them, there's so many), but can concur that the lens is super sharp (possibly better than the DFA 24-70), low in chromatic aberration and purple fringing (the only aberrations I easily recognize), and like the other Pentax D FA f/2.8 zoom offerings, enormous. I hate the size, but the performance makes it easy to overlook that.
So here's a few things I haven't seen emphasized in other reviews:
- Least important, but still fun--it's the only lens with the possible exception of my A* 600mm that anyone has ever commented to me about in public. The bulbous front element can't be ignored.
- It's the only lens I've ever owned that exhibits significant pincushion distortion--this is at the 30mm end, of course. If you favor brick walls as your creative muse, this might be a problem, but it probably would never be an issue for most other subjects. Mentioned as a point of interest, but not as any practical issue.
- Some have described this lens as being configured with internal zoom. If you count the fixed lens hood as part of the external dimensions, this would be 100% true. However, one would be missing the full story, which is quite interesting (to me, a... |
