NEX 16mm + Digital zoom = Excellent normal lens

The 16mm f2.8 NEX is an average wide-angle lens, but I also believe it can serve as an excellent 'normal' lens.

Its centre is extremely sharp. The trouble arises at the corners, where it starts suffering softness, CA and barrel distortion. If we crop out these edges, we are essentially digitally zooming into a 'normal' focal length with excellent optical qualities.

This is a comparison page between the 16mm NEX and the Olympus 17mm of the m43 system: http://www.dpreview.com/lensreviews/widget/Fullscreen.ashx?reviews=87,59&fullscreen=true&av=3.667,3.667&fl=16,17&vis=VisualiserSharpnessMTF,VisualiserSharpnessMTF&stack=horizontal&&config=LensReviewConfiguration.xml%3F2

The NEX 16mm is much better than the Oly 17mm at the centre. At the edges, the NEX is indeed optically bad, but it's nevertheless better than the Olympus 17mm which cannot display these edges in the first place due to its crop factor.

godd idea, but you will have to deal with barrel distortion, particularly when takng shots of people that are close. SInce the distortion pattern is somewhat unusual and complicated (if I understood dpreview correctly), it is going to be difficult to postprocess this, I assume. But generally it is much better to be creative with the cons of a cam rather than complaining about reviews....(as in the other thread)

I don't think barrel distortion is apparent in the centre as it is in the corners, and that you can't minimize it just because it has a complex pattern. I also don't believe you will easily notice it unless you are looking for it.

Compared to m43 and Samsung's NX, the Sony NEX is cheaper, smaller (yet achieves better ergonomics), has an aluminum body, a better sensor, 1080i recording, and gimmiky features that work very well. The interface indeed sucks and is a dealbreaker for many, but not for me.
I personally think NEX + 16mm is a better choice than m43 + 17/20mm.

TheInfernal said:

I don't think barrel distortion is apparent in the centre as it is in the corners, and that you can't minimize it just because it has a complex pattern. I also don't believe you will easily notice it unless you are looking for it.

Compared to m43 and Samsung's NX, the Sony NEX is cheaper, smaller (yet achieves better ergonomics), has an aluminum body, a better sensor, 1080i recording, and gimmiky features that work very well. The interface indeed sucks and is a dealbreaker for many, but not for me.
I personally think NEX + 16mm is a better choice than m43 + 17/20mm.

Click to expand...

It's more than just barrel distortion though. Shorter focal lengths exaggerate the apparent distance between near and far objectives. (By contrast telephoto lenses compress foreground and background together.)

This cannot be compensated for with post-processing - it's inherent to the optics.

100mm (full frame) is not only favoured as a good portait focal length because of it's framing; it's also because it produces a "flatter" image than say 50mm cropped. The two don't produce the same picture.

Chippy99 said:

TheInfernal said:

I don't think barrel distortion is apparent in the centre as it is in the corners, and that you can't minimize it just because it has a complex pattern. I also don't believe you will easily notice it unless you are looking for it.

Compared to m43 and Samsung's NX, the Sony NEX is cheaper, smaller (yet achieves better ergonomics), has an aluminum body, a better sensor, 1080i recording, and gimmiky features that work very well. The interface indeed sucks and is a dealbreaker for many, but not for me.
I personally think NEX + 16mm is a better choice than m43 + 17/20mm.

Click to expand...

It's more than just barrel distortion though. Shorter focal lengths exaggerate the apparent distance between near and far objectives. (By contrast telephoto lenses compress foreground and background together.)

This cannot be compensated for with post-processing - it's inherent to the optics.

100mm (full frame) is not only favoured as a good portait focal length because of it's framing; it's also because it produces a "flatter" image than say 50mm cropped. The two don't produce the same picture.

Click to expand...

I think this article illustrates your point: http://www.oyster.com/hotels/photo-fakeouts/dc-hyatt/

I'm not sure if this is an issue though. Otherwise, compact/bridge cameras which have large crop factors would have been useless; and four thirds users would have also complained about their 2X crop factor.

TheInfernal said:

Chippy99 said:

TheInfernal said:

I don't think barrel distortion is apparent in the centre as it is in the corners, and that you can't minimize it just because it has a complex pattern. I also don't believe you will easily notice it unless you are looking for it.

Compared to m43 and Samsung's NX, the Sony NEX is cheaper, smaller (yet achieves better ergonomics), has an aluminum body, a better sensor, 1080i recording, and gimmiky features that work very well. The interface indeed sucks and is a dealbreaker for many, but not for me.
I personally think NEX + 16mm is a better choice than m43 + 17/20mm.

Click to expand...

It's more than just barrel distortion though. Shorter focal lengths exaggerate the apparent distance between near and far objectives. (By contrast telephoto lenses compress foreground and background together.)

This cannot be compensated for with post-processing - it's inherent to the optics.

100mm (full frame) is not only favoured as a good portait focal length because of it's framing; it's also because it produces a "flatter" image than say 50mm cropped. The two don't produce the same picture.

Click to expand...

I think this article illustrates your point: http://www.oyster.com/hotels/photo-fakeouts/dc-hyatt/

I'm not sure if this is an issue though. Otherwise, compact/bridge cameras which have large crop factors would have been useless; and four thirds users would have also complained about their 2X crop factor.

Click to expand...

That demonstrates it precisely!

Of course the example there is somewhat exaggerated by taking a crop from perhaps a 500m lens, and comparing it to maybe a 28mm shot perhaps.

But nevertheless the effect exists and it makes the 16mm on the NEX particularly unsuitable for any sort of portraits... unless you want people to look like this:

I agree barrel distortion shouldn't be a problem and the lens loses its wide-angle qualities when cropped so no problem there.

But if you crop to a perfect normal, 28mm on DX, you are shooting with a sensor section that's substantially smaller than a 4/3" sensor, just a bit over half the area.

You'd lose 1.6 stops of high ISO performance and 0.8 EV of dynamic range. And you'd only have about four and a half Mp.

TheInfernal said:

Compared to m43 and Samsung's NX, the Sony NEX is cheaper, smaller (yet achieves better ergonomics), has an aluminum body, a better sensor, 1080i recording, and gimmiky features that work very well. The interface indeed sucks and is a dealbreaker for many, but not for me.
I personally think NEX + 16mm is a better choice than m43 + 17/20mm.

Click to expand...

--
Just my two öre,
Erik from Sweden

I never said the 16mm could be used as a portrait lens. I said it could be used as a 'normal' lens. That is 35mm equivalent. You will remove only the outside third of the picture (the bad part) leaving the good central two thirds of it. You will have a 2X crop factor, which is equal to the m43 crop factor. You will be essentially having the same experience as someone using the Olympus 17mm lens on an m43 body, except that your lens will be optically better.

Obviously the 16mm will never work as a portrait lens. To avoid perspective distortion, you will have to shoot from far away and crop a large part of the picture. You will also suffer a big DOF and no background isolation due to the short focal length.

TheInfernal said:

At the edges, the NEX is indeed optically bad

Click to expand...

I'd say, compared to the competition, it is -- on the contrary -- exceptionally good. Not even the 24/2.8 fixed focal lens is particularly good wide open in the corners on full frame. That's just the way lenses are and anyone with some experience know this (as do dpreview staffers). Of course, this is conveniently ignored in the review, and that's why it's so funny to read.

Providing such a lens at such a price is nothing short of a stunning feat, and previously dpreview has had other things to say. For example, in the Ricoh GR Digital review, its fixed 28mm was instead called, yeah, read yourself: "the 28mm wide lens and pocket-friendly dimensions make it a fantastic 'walkaround' camera for landscapes and immersive street photography".

Now a fixed 24 is completely unusable.

As I said, funny stuff! Can't make it up.

TheInfernal said:

I never said the 16mm could be used as a portrait lens. I said it could be used as a 'normal' lens. That is 35mm equivalent. You will remove only the outside third of the picture (the bad part) leaving the good central two thirds of it. You will have a 2X crop factor, which is equal to the m43 crop factor. You will be essentially having the same experience as someone using the Olympus 17mm lens on an m43 body, except that your lens will be optically better.

Click to expand...

One point you're missing here is that cropping and enlarging stresses the lens more - the picture height decreases (because you're cropping), so the lp/ph obviously goes down too. This just is the nature of MTF profiles, and is why full frame lenses always look less sharp on APS-C cameras:

http://www.dpreview.com/lensreviews/widget/Fullscreen.ashx?reviews=77,80&fullscreen=true&av=3,3&fl=200,200&vis=VisualiserSharpnessMTF,VisualiserSharpnessMTF&stack=horizontal&&config=LensReviewConfiguration.xml%3F2

The visibility of the lateral CA will also increase, and it will become more obviously green/magenta in character, which isn't pretty. You will at least remove the worst of the pincushion distortion and any vignetting though.

Personally, I'd not bother with digital zoom, I'd just shoot wide and crop. It's exactly the same thing, with the same quality hit, but with more flexibility to fine-tune composition after the shot.

--
Andy Westlake
http://www.dpreview.com/lensreviews

Magnus W said:

Now a fixed 24 is completely unusable.

Click to expand...

Of course, that's almost exactly what we didn't say. How about having a read here before diving in:

http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/SonyNex5Nex3/page8.asp

For those unwilling to follow hyperlinks and read the text that's actually in the review, here are some teasers:

'this is the type of lens you're likely to shoot at stopped down most of the time anyway, and the performance at the most commonly-used apertures (F5.6-11) should satisfy all but the most demanding of users.'

'No doubt some of our readers will be wondering why we don't think the 16mm is the best choice for the NEX system at launch. Let's make it clear that we don't object to the lens at all per se; indeed we actually like the idea of having a compact wideangle prime to complement the kit zoom (arguably every system should have one). '

It's the bundling of the 16mm as a single-lens kit aimed at beginners we're concerned about.

--
Andy Westlake
http://www.dpreview.com/lensreviews

Andy Westlake said:

It's the bundling of the 16mm as a single-lens kit aimed at beginners we're concerned about.

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Yeah, because the excellent kit zoom does not exist, and 100% of the beginners you describe WILL choose an unstabilized prime before the kit lens to save fifty bucks. Fo' sho'! You must realize how completely ridiculous that argument is.

A fairer way to say it would be "we applaud Sony's way of giving consumers a choice between a reasonably priced wide angle prime and an excellent kit zoom".

Would this particular criticism have went away if the lens didn't exist -- leaving only the kit zoom -- or if it had been more expensive?

Magnus W said:

Yeah, because the excellent kit zoom does not exist, and 100% of the beginners you describe WILL choose an unstabilized prime before the kit lens to save fifty bucks. Fo' sho'! You must realize how completely ridiculous that argument is.

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Again, you seem intent on misrepresenting what we've said. Noone's claiming everyone will buy the cheapest kit - but it seems fair to suggest that some inexperienced users might choose it (after all it's also the most portable). We're pointing this type of buyer is unlikely to be as well-served by the 16mm as, for example, by the Samsung 30/2.

Magnus W said:

A fairer way to say it would be "we applaud Sony's way of giving consumers a choice between a reasonably priced wide angle prime and an excellent kit zoom".

Click to expand...

Fairer, or just more positive towards Sony? We've clearly said we think the lens is a good complement to the kit zoom.

Magnus W said:

Would this particular criticism have went away if the lens didn't exist -- leaving only the kit zoom -- or if it had been more expensive?

Click to expand...

It would have gone away if it wasn't a 24mm-equivalent wide being marketed in a single-lens kit with a camera aimed at beginners. How much more clear can we be?

--
Andy Westlake
http://www.dpreview.com/lensreviews

I concluded the 16mm wasn't very good based on the samples posted by dpreview, the discussions in the forum and the MTF chart. The reviewers never said it was a particularly bad lens, but they didn't point out it could be cropped and used as a normal lens, which is what I'm pointing out in this thread.

Magnus W said:

TheInfernal said:

At the edges, the NEX is indeed optically bad

Click to expand...

I'd say, compared to the competition, it is -- on the contrary -- exceptionally good. Not even the 24/2.8 fixed focal lens is particularly good wide open in the corners on full frame. That's just the way lenses are and anyone with some experience know this (as do dpreview staffers). Of course, this is conveniently ignored in the review, and that's why it's so funny to read.

Providing such a lens at such a price is nothing short of a stunning feat, and previously dpreview has had other things to say. For example, in the Ricoh GR Digital review, its fixed 28mm was instead called, yeah, read yourself: "the 28mm wide lens and pocket-friendly dimensions make it a fantastic 'walkaround' camera for landscapes and immersive street photography".

Now a fixed 24 is completely unusable.

As I said, funny stuff! Can't make it up.

Click to expand...

Andrew Westlake said:

Again, you seem intent on misrepresenting what we've said. Noone's claiming everyone will buy the cheapest kit - but it seems fair to suggest that some inexperienced users might choose it (after all it's also the most portable). We're pointing this type of buyer is unlikely to be as well-served by the 16mm as, for example, by the Samsung 30/2.

Click to expand...

On the contrary, all beginner compact cameras in days of yore had wide angle lenses (35mm or wider), not normal lenses. What you are describing -- a "normal" as a beginner's lens -- is an opinion from the 70's rangefinder compacts. And again, it's up to the consumer (and store clerks) to make the choice between kit zoom and wide prime. You are essentially complaining over the existence of that choice while saying that consumers are very, very stupid.

Andrew Westlake said:

Andrew Westlake said:

A fairer way to say it would be "we applaud Sony's way of giving consumers a choice between a reasonably priced wide angle prime and an excellent kit zoom".

Click to expand...

Fairer, or just more positive towards Sony? We've clearly said we think the lens is a good complement to the kit zoom.

Click to expand...

And here I thought you in the phrase "Cheapest bundle (which only provides the 16mm lens) is not a good combination, particularly for beginners" complained over the existence of that kit. This is a negative bullet point, you know. Again, if the prime kit would have been more expensive than the zoom kit, would that criticism have went away?

Andrew Westlake said:

It would have gone away if it wasn't a 24mm-equivalent wide being marketed in a single-lens kit with a camera aimed at beginners. How much more clear can we be?

Click to expand...

So, the existence of the choice IS bad after all! I'm glad we agree in the meaning of your phrasing. Why do you dislike the existence of this choice so much?

TheInfernal said:

I concluded the 16mm wasn't very good based on the samples posted by dpreview, the discussions in the forum and the MTF chart. The reviewers never said it was a particularly bad lens, but they didn't point out it could be cropped and used as a normal lens, which is what I'm pointing out in this thread.

Click to expand...

Sure. However, I didn't comment on that; I commented specifically on your phrase "the NEX is indeed optically bad", which I don't find to be even remotely true.

Magnus W said:

On the contrary, all beginner compact cameras in days of yore had wide angle lenses (35mm or wider), not normal lenses.

Click to expand...

But notably, none had 24mm wides. It's true that a few of the more upmarket had 28mm lenses, such as the lovely little Olympus mju-2; then again I'd hesitate to call that a 'beginner compact'.

Magnus W said:

What you are describing -- a "normal" as a beginner's lens -- is an opinion from the 70's rangefinder compacts.

Click to expand...

Are you really saying that lenses which make great general purpose, carry-anywhere solutions, such as the Panasonic 20mm F1.7, are somehow invalidated just because similar ones were found on compact rangefinders such as Canonet QL17s, which were hugely popular in their day and have retained a cult following ever since? That seems odd.

Magnus W said:

And again, it's up to the consumer (and store clerks) to make the choice between kit zoom and wide prime. You are essentially complaining over the existence of that choice while saying that consumers are very, very stupid.

Click to expand...

No, not 'stupid', but perhaps 'uninformed'. Noone is born with an innate knowledge of which focal lengths are most broadly useful on APS-C sensors, so I can easily imagine perfectly intelligent people without much knowledge of the subject buying the 16mm on the gournds that it's the smallest combination and cheapest kit. Portability is a key attraction of ILCs, after all.

Magnus W said:

And here I thought you in the phrase "Cheapest bundle (which only provides the 16mm lens) is not a good combination, particularly for beginners" complained over the existence of that kit. This is a negative bullet point, you know. Again, if the prime kit would have been more expensive than the zoom kit, would that criticism have went away?

Click to expand...

It might have been less strongly-put, but it wouldn't have gone away. I would venture most people factor price into their purchasing decisions on a regular basis.

Magnus W said:

So, the existence of the choice IS bad after all! I'm glad we agree in the meaning of your phrasing. Why do you dislike the existence of this choice so much?

Click to expand...

Because we don't feel it's a good one for the beginners the camera is aimed at:

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1037&message=35522904

--
Andy Westlake
http://www.dpreview.com/lensreviews

Chippy99 said:

100mm (full frame) is not only favoured as a good portait focal length because of it's framing; it's also because it produces a "flatter" image than say 50mm cropped. The two don't produce the same picture.

Click to expand...

Actually they produce exactly the same picture. The variation in perspective you are talking about is a function of subject distance, it has nothing to do with focal length.

Wide angle lenses aren't used much for portraits because of the perspective distortion, but this distortion isn't caused by the lens, it's caused by having to take the picture from a close distance to have the subject fill the frame. If I take a 10mm lens and a 100mm lens and take the same picture from a tripod then crop the 10mm image so that the subject size matches that seen in the 100mm image. The two images will look the same apart from the obvious difference in resolution.

Alright, I stand corrected.

Magnus W said:

TheInfernal said:

I concluded the 16mm wasn't very good based on the samples posted by dpreview, the discussions in the forum and the MTF chart. The reviewers never said it was a particularly bad lens, but they didn't point out it could be cropped and used as a normal lens, which is what I'm pointing out in this thread.

Click to expand...

Sure. However, I didn't comment on that; I commented specifically on your phrase "the NEX is indeed optically bad", which I don't find to be even remotely true.

Click to expand...

Andrew Westlake said:

Andrew Westlake said:

On the contrary, all beginner compact cameras in days of yore had wide angle lenses (35mm or wider), not normal lenses.

Click to expand...

But notably, none had 24mm wides. It's true that a few of the more upmarket had 28mm lenses, such as the lovely little Olympus mju-2; then again I'd hesitate to call that a 'beginner compact'.

Click to expand...

It's true that they stopped at 28mm then. However, wider isn't inherently bad for beginners -- wider is "better" for indoors shooting to a beginner, and you can easily make the argument "you get more in the picture" to a beginner (I did this just the other day to my mother, which decisively made her choose a 28mm over a 38mm camera despite the latter's much longer tele reach because her current 35mm "didn't get everything in the frame indoors" -- her own words).

The Mju I and II had 35mm lenses, not 28. They were distinctively beginner cameras with no particularly advanced features. Despite their fixed wide angle lens they were top sellers of their day (and excellent cameras, one might add) and not "upmarket" at all.

Andrew Westlake said:

Andrew Westlake said:

What you are describing -- a "normal" as a beginner's lens -- is an opinion from the 70's rangefinder compacts.

Click to expand...

Are you really saying that lenses which make great general purpose, carry-anywhere solutions, such as the Panasonic 20mm F1.7, are somehow invalidated just because similar ones were found on compact rangefinders such as Canonet QL17s, which were hugely popular in their day and have retained a cult following ever since? That seems odd.

Click to expand...

No, perhaps you misread me or forgot what you yourself wrote? You were saying that a "normal" lens (Samsung 30/2) was better than a wide angle lens for consumers. I pointed out that the trend the last forty years for fixed focal length compacts have been for wider lenses. Consumers don't seem to mind, rather the contrary. So, your assertion is incorrect or at least highly dubious. Me, I love me my Yashica Electro 35 GSN with its 45/1.7, but were I to recommend such a camera to my mother I would rule myself to be clinically insane.

Are YOU saying that a 40-45mm (equiv.) is the best focal length for a beginner?

Andrew Westlake said:

Andrew Westlake said:

And again, it's up to the consumer (and store clerks) to make the choice between kit zoom and wide prime. You are essentially complaining over the existence of that choice while saying that consumers are very, very stupid.

Click to expand...

No, not 'stupid', but perhaps 'uninformed'. Noone is born with an innate knowledge of which focal lengths are most broadly useful on APS-C sensors, so I can easily imagine perfectly intelligent people without much knowledge of the subject buying the 16mm on the gournds that it's the smallest combination and cheapest kit. Portability is a key attraction of ILCs, after all.

Click to expand...

So the existence of the choice is bad as choices can fool uninformed customers. Bad, bad Sony. Perhaps the existence of two camera models is equally bad?

Andrew Westlake said:

if the prime kit would have been more expensive than the zoom kit, would that criticism have went away?

It might have been less strongly-put, but it wouldn't have gone away. I would venture most people factor price into their purchasing decisions on a regular basis.

Click to expand...

So a cheaper lens is, in fact, also bad. Bad, bad Sony for BOTH having a choice, and making it too inexpensive.