UWA for Z-mount

I have the Z 14-24/2.8S and it performs really great. I haven't done astrophotography so far. Sunstars are nice, but sometimes you can get reflections of the sensor bayer pattern in your image.

Martian977 said:

Hi Everyone,

I have posted this question on Nikon SLR lens forum, but that seems to be more focused on F-mount lenses, therefore re-posting here:

I am seeking advice as to which UWA will complete my Z-mount lens set. This new wide angle lens will be primarily used for landscape and travel photography. And by 'travel' I mean dedicated photography while travelling, not holiday snap shots. The secondary use case will be astro, caves & other low light settings, long exposure photography and timelapse.

So far, none of the Z-mount offerings can match all my criteria, so I guess I will have to compromise.

Ideal lens would be:

- Made by Nikon, preferably S-line

- Wider than 20mm (around 16mm is fine, but 14mm is even better)

- F2.8 or brighter

- Take regular size screw in filters (I have a collection of 67 and 77mm filters. Adding 82 or 112mm is not ideal but not a show stopper)

Click to expand...

You won't get that with a lens reaching 14mm if it's 2.8.

Martian977 said:

- Make presentable sunstars

Click to expand...

Yes this is a problem in Z mount. The 24-120/4 that you own, is about the only lens on Z mount that has a half decent sunstar. Nikon seem incapable of supplying this basic trait that many landscapers like. The 14-24.2.8S sunstar is pretty good, but you gotta be around f18-22 for it. What I do, is I take my regular shots for exposure blending, then I do an f/22 shot and blend in the star later...

Martian977 said:

- Overall good quality, reasonably sharp and not super heavy (700g+)

Click to expand...

14-24 fits that...

Martian977 said:

This leaves me with 14-24s, 20s and Tamron 16-30. Not a big fan of 14-30s or Chinese offerings, but I keep my options open.

Click to expand...

I use the 14-24/2.8S with magnetic 112mm filters, easiest.

Martian977 said:

The 14-24s is probably the safest bet with the only compromise being the 112mm filters. It's not cheap, but it is within my budget.

Click to expand...

Yes.

Martian977 said:

The 20s would be perfect if only it was a little bit wider. I am very tempted, but I fear the 20mm might not be wide enough and stitching panoramas is not always an option. Sure, for the price of 14-24s I can have 20s AND 14-30s, but I would prefer to keep things simple and have just one UWA lens.

Click to expand...

20/1.8S is a good lens...

Martian977 said:

And finally the Tamron 16-30 looks great on paper, but it is not Nikon S-line. I had Tamrons in the past and there was nothing wrong with them. But when I migrated to Z-mount I wanted to build a high quality S-line lens collection of 3-4 highly functional, no-compromise lenses (for my needs) and I am not sure Tamron fits the bill.

Any first-hand experience and suggestion will be highly appreciated.

Pictures below for reference:

Click to expand...

I am an astrophotographer (and landscaper). The 14-24 fits my strict criteria for an astro lens, albeit I mostly use primes to do my mosaics etc. Here is the 14-24/2.8 in Scotland:


14-24/2.8S at 20mm, tracked sky

I own and use the 14-24mm f/2.8 S often and it's a really great performer, kinda light and not too big.

For filters with it I use the Nisi 100mm filter adapter. With this you can have 2x 100mm filters without vignetting and 3x 100mm filters with a slight vignetting at certain rotations (not everwhere). So a great win for me as I can use those filters also with my other landscape lenses easily.

You can find some examples (night sky and filters) here: https://www.downgra.de/keyword/1424mm f2.8 S

HTH
Rico

What are the chances that Nikon will announce 14-24 MkII? Following the steps of 24-70mkII it would be lighter and would accept smaller filters.

There is also a rumour about a 14mm (or 16mm) prime...


I would hate to go ahead with older model when MKII is around the corner, but I will need a wide lens for my photo projects before the end of the year.

Martian977 said:

What are the chances that Nikon will announce 14-24 MkII? Following the steps of 24-70mkII it would be lighter and would accept smaller filters.

There is also a rumour about a 14mm (or 16mm) prime...

https://nikonrumors.com/2025/09/16/what-to-expect-next-from-nikon-30.aspx/

I would hate to go ahead with older model when MKII is around the corner, but I will need a wide lens for my photo projects before the end of the year.

Click to expand...

I think wide fast prime is more likely than a second version of the 14-24 at this point. There have also been rumors of a 15/16-35 2.8 but those haven’t really been substantiated. My recommendation: buy what you need when you need it. There’s no point in missing out on opportunities while you wait for a lens that may or may not be released.

Martian977 said:

What are the chances that Nikon will announce 14-24 MkII? Following the steps of 24-70mkII it would be lighter and would accept smaller filters.

There is also a rumour about a 14mm (or 16mm) prime...

https://nikonrumors.com/2025/09/16/what-to-expect-next-from-nikon-30.aspx/

I would hate to go ahead with older model when MKII is around the corner, but I will need a wide lens for my photo projects before the end of the year.

Click to expand...

Only Nikon knows. I'd be surprized if they can make that lens lighter. It is already extremely light for a f/2.8 UWA zoom which is class leading, approaching prime quality at several FL. Despite this, it still doesn't compete with a class leading 14/1.4 for me.

Wezre said:

Martian977 said:

What are the chances that Nikon will announce 14-24 MkII? Following the steps of 24-70mkII it would be lighter and would accept smaller filters.

There is also a rumour about a 14mm (or 16mm) prime...

https://nikonrumors.com/2025/09/16/what-to-expect-next-from-nikon-30.aspx/

I would hate to go ahead with older model when MKII is around the corner, but I will need a wide lens for my photo projects before the end of the year.

Click to expand...

I think wide fast prime is more likely than a second version of the 14-24 at this point. There have also been rumors of a 15/16-35 2.8 but those haven’t really been substantiated. My recommendation: buy what you need when you need it. There’s no point in missing out on opportunities while you wait for a lens that may or may not be released.

Click to expand...

True. I'd be interested in a 16-35. That covers all of my most used landscape FL for sure. If that came out, I would ditch the 14-24/2.8 and just use my 20/1.8 to satisfy the wide end and my 14/1.8. (both astro only lenses for me).

With Nikon apparently in the process of doing "true" cinema lenses, and given they don't have an endless supply of lens designers, I wonder what will come out next on the still side. My guess (and it's just a wild guess worth half of a single penny) is they may contract with Konica-Minolta again to flesh out/design a couple of the remaining S line wide angles, maybe a 14 and/or 28, and maybe at some point a fancy 105 plena-like lens done in-house, but then again, I never saw the 24-70 mk II coming, so perhaps that's where they are focusing their resources on - the refresh of the pro trio.

Strange/interesting times.

anotherMike said:

With Nikon apparently in the process of doing "true" cinema lenses, and given they don't have an endless supply of lens designers, I wonder what will come out next on the still side. My guess (and it's just a wild guess worth half of a single penny) is they may contract with Konica-Minolta again to flesh out/design a couple of the remaining S line wide angles, maybe a 14 and/or 28, and maybe at some point a fancy 105 plena-like lens done in-house, but then again, I never saw the 24-70 mk II coming, so perhaps that's where they are focusing their resources on - the refresh of the pro trio.

Strange/interesting times.

Click to expand...

Hi Mike. What's your guess on getting a new, longer macro lens. Maybe a refresh of the old 200mm micro, or 180mm like Lawoa is coming out with?

I have no information, no contacts.

Personally, I don't think we're going to see much in still lenses this year; maybe something new or two and a refresh of one of the other pro 2.8 lenses. I think the designers are going to be on the cinema lens project.

But again, your guess is as good as mine here.

Martian977 said:

Hi Everyone,

I have posted this question on Nikon SLR lens forum, but that seems to be more focused on F-mount lenses, therefore re-posting here:

I am seeking advice as to which UWA will complete my Z-mount lens set. This new wide angle lens will be primarily used for landscape and travel photography. And by 'travel' I mean dedicated photography while travelling, not holiday snap shots. The secondary use case will be astro, caves & other low light settings, long exposure photography and timelapse.

So far, none of the Z-mount offerings can match all my criteria, so I guess I will have to compromise.

Click to expand...

with similar reasoning, I got the Viltrox 16mm f/1.8 Z mount

Martian977 said:

Ideal lens would be:

- Made by Nikon, preferably S-line

Click to expand...

no

Martian977 said:

- Wider than 20mm (around 16mm is fine, but 14mm is even better)

Click to expand...

16mm

Martian977 said:

- F2.8 or brighter

Click to expand...

f1.8

Martian977 said:

- Take regular size screw in filters (I have a collection of 67 and 77mm filters. Adding 82 or 112mm is not ideal but not a show stopper)

Click to expand...

77mm screw in filter like the Z 24-120 mm f/4 S and the Z 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 S lenses

Martian977 said:

- Make presentable sunstars

Click to expand...

?, it has pretty high contrast, low flare.

Martian977 said:

- Overall good quality, reasonably sharp and not super heavy (700g+)

Click to expand...

reasonably sharp. 580g. Low distortion. Low astigmatism, Low coma for stars


Z8 16mm f/1.8 : 10s f/1.8 ISO 500 , 100% thumbnail from RAW

Not Nikon made, but the Viltrox 16mm f/1.8 has excellent image quality and is available on the Z mount.

Looking at your other requirements :

Martian977 said:

Made by Nikon, preferably S-line

Click to expand...

Obviously not met

Martian977 said:

- Wider than 20mm (around 16mm is fine, but 14mm is even better)

Click to expand...

it's a 16mm lens so I guess it's right in the middle

Martian977 said:

- F2.8 or brighter

Click to expand...

it's f/1.8

Martian977 said:

- Take regular size screw in filters (I have a collection of 67 and 77mm filters. Adding 82 or 112mm is not ideal but not a show stopper)

Click to expand...

it takes regular 77mm filters

Martian977 said:

- Make presentable sunstars

Click to expand...

they look pretty nice in my opinion

Martian977 said:

- Overall good quality, reasonably sharp and not super heavy (700g+)

Click to expand...

It's a full metal build, has an aperture ring, digital display that shows the focus distance, AF/MF switch and two programmable function buttons. It also has 6 seals against dust and moisture.

Weight wise it's 550g.

Image quality is sharp from f/1.8 in the center, it's acceptable in the corners wide open, but it sharpens up nicely while stopping down. Diffraction comes in betweem f/8 and f/11. It's overall a great optical performer from what ai can see.

Pretty much every review I've seen about this lens has been extremely positive. Only notable drawback of this lens is the vignetting wide open when using 0 software corrections.

It's not an optically perfect lens, but considering this is the only wide aperture wultra wide angle prime lens currently available on Nikon Z, this is worth checking out.

Otherwise you can also buy a megadap ETZ 21 adapter and use ultrawides from the Sony E mount. The 14mm f/1.8 GM comes to mind, but there is also the Sigma 14mm f/1.4 Art, which is a magnificent lens.

--
(G.A.S. and collectionnite will get my skin one day)

primeshooter said:

Only Nikon knows. I'd be surprized if they can make that lens lighter. It is already extremely light for a f/2.8 UWA zoom which is class leading, approaching prime quality at several FL. Despite this, it still doesn't compete with a class leading 14/1.4 for me.

Click to expand...

I only know about the Sigma 14mm f/1.4 in Sony E and in L mount. Do you use this lens with adapter to Z ? Do the corners hold up ?

Curiously, a friend has a Sigma 14mm f/1.8 F-mount which worked great on D850. Yet on Z7 much less so. Was it a curvature of field issue, or a sensor cover glass issue ?? we did not arrive a a clear conclusion.

Bernard Delley said:

primeshooter said:

Only Nikon knows. I'd be surprized if they can make that lens lighter. It is already extremely light for a f/2.8 UWA zoom which is class leading, approaching prime quality at several FL. Despite this, it still doesn't compete with a class leading 14/1.4 for me.

Click to expand...

I only know about the Sigma 14mm f/1.4 in Sony E and in L mount. Do you use this lens with adapter to Z ? Do the corners hold up ?

Curiously, a friend has a Sigma 14mm f/1.8 F-mount which worked great on D850. Yet on Z7 much less so. Was it a curvature of field issue, or a sensor cover glass issue ?? we did not arrive a a clear conclusion.

Click to expand...

I don't use the 14/1.4 as I have Z mount. Adapters don't favour the corners in these designs for astro, so no. I use the 14/1.8 on DSLR F mount cameras though.

I note that the 14/1.8 seems to work better on f mount than through the FTZ too. But, I am not at a conclusion with this yet, as the focusing on this lens is extremely difficult (due to it's FC), and I think I have missed focused when testing.

Photography life do confirm that when using Mirrorless designs through adapters (eg, using the sony e mount version of the 14/1.4 on Z mount, that it shows corner issues. They state though, that DSLR lenses should not be affected in this way as you suggest. No matter, I still have plenty of DSLRs to use it on; a great lens for aurora.

First, can we all cut back on the Acronyms. It took me about 2 minutes to figure out what UWA meant. BTW, this is a comment aimed at everyone, not any individual.

First question is what do you do with your images?

Because Photography was invented as a means of duplicating images for Display. And how these images are displayed does have a very distinct impact on the fine details in an image. To be blunt all you need for a Post Card is about 1200 x 1600 pixels. Currently the highest resolution display available is the old fashioned Paper Print. For electronic displays 4K only requires 8.3mp and 2K is 2mp. I will also point out that due to the limitations of Human Vision Nikon's choice of 46mp is a bit higher than what we can actually see in a print if our vision is 20/20. Because a huge print means we will view it at a much longer distance than a smaller print. Basically a super sharp lens is great for Pixel Peeping but for actual Prints a much less expensive lens can produce an image that appears to be a match for the higher cost super sharp lens. Personally when I'm checking to see if an image is sharp enough I do it at 100% and this allows me a very large selection of lenses because nearly all Z mount lenses from any maker will peep well at 100%. As for why 100%, that is because this is a 37.5 X magnification so that screen shot is actually a portion of a 36x54 inch print.

Point here is that you really should NOT turn your nose up at the 14-30mm f4 S lens. I will also point out that I own a Zf so I am well acquainted with the Noise Performance of the sensor in your Z5II and can state that F4 aperture won't cause Noise issues due to the higher ISO you may need to use.

I am not even curious about the 12-24mm f2.8 S lens. Because it's too large, too heavy, too expensive, and I would be using it at f8 or f11. With a superwide you won't ever "blow out the background" so my approach is to embrace the background and have everything sharp.

Finally I will point out that Loawa has Zero Distortion Full Frame lenses in 10mm and 12mm. Choose the 14-30 and the price difference from the 12-24 will pay for you to have both of these lenses. You did say Super Wide and 10mm is about as super wide as you can get without going Fisheye.

monte12345 said:

First, can we all cut back on the Acronyms. It took me about 2 minutes to figure out what UWA meant. BTW, this is a comment aimed at everyone, not any individual.

Click to expand...

The irony is killing me here. :-D

But the sentiment isn't lost on me as someone who has recently been working with a co-worker who constantly uses obscure acronyms and abbreviations of words.

monte12345 said:

First, can we all cut back on the Acronyms. It took me about 2 minutes to figure out what UWA meant. BTW, this is a comment aimed at everyone, not any individual.

First question is what do you do with your images?

Because Photography was invented as a means of duplicating images for Display. And how these images are displayed does have a very distinct impact on the fine details in an image. To be blunt all you need for a Post Card is about 1200 x 1600 pixels. Currently the highest resolution display available is the old fashioned Paper Print. For electronic displays 4K only requires 8.3mp and 2K is 2mp. I will also point out that due to the limitations of Human Vision Nikon's choice of 46mp is a bit higher than what we can actually see in a print if our vision is 20/20. Because a huge print means we will view it at a much longer distance than a smaller print. Basically a super sharp lens is great for Pixel Peeping but for actual Prints a much less expensive lens can produce an image that appears to be a match for the higher cost super sharp lens. Personally when I'm checking to see if an image is sharp enough I do it at 100% and this allows me a very large selection of lenses because nearly all Z mount lenses from any maker will peep well at 100%. As for why 100%, that is because this is a 37.5 X magnification so that screen shot is actually a portion of a 36x54 inch print.

Point here is that you really should NOT turn your nose up at the 14-30mm f4 S lens. I will also point out that I own a Zf so I am well acquainted with the Noise Performance of the sensor in your Z5II and can state that F4 aperture won't cause Noise issues due to the higher ISO you may need to use.

Click to expand...

For astro, (and I say this as a serious astro shooter), I would turn my nose up at an f/4 wide angle for this. Do you know the clear aperture size of shooting at 14mm and f4? It's 3.5mm! You collect barely any light. It's a huge problem at night, and it's like tying one's hands behind one's back. Not advised. Avoid, avoid, avoid if any way serious about the genre. It is a common misconception now from shooters telling people that "cameras are so good now, just increase the ISO". Noise performance doesn't trump data collection, you should look at the ops intended use case.

monte12345 said:

I am not even curious about the 12-24mm f2.8 S lens. Because it's too large, too heavy, too expensive, and I would be using it at f8 or f11. With a superwide you won't ever "blow out the background" so my approach is to embrace the background and have everything sharp.

Click to expand...

I assume you mean 14-24/2.8. I don't think anyone is seriously buying this lens to "blow out the background" as you put it. You'd use longer, faster lenses to do this. The 2.8 aperture helps people shoot with better shutter speeds (and a bit of isoloation when close up and at the longer end of the zoom) in things like weddings etc. The other reason is as I just stated, it being a suitable night astro lens. Particularly on a tracker.

monte12345 said:

Finally I will point out that Loawa has Zero Distortion Full Frame lenses in 10mm and 12mm. Choose the 14-30 and the price difference from the 12-24 will pay for you to have both of these lenses. You did say Super Wide and 10mm is about as super wide as you can get without going Fisheye.

Click to expand...

It's a fairly junk brand lens loaded with abberations though. It simply doesn't play in the big boy leagues with regards to IQ. Which is what the Z mount is all about.

Hello, I cannot believe that noone has mentioned the Z 14-30mm f/4 lens. Yeah yeah I know it's not 2.8 but just bump the ISO up a bit. It's my very favorite landscape lens and works really well in many situations.

Here's a link to my Flickr folder with lots of photos taken on my Z7II and some on a Z6. It never fails to disappoint. You'll note that the very last photo of the ballet dancers was shot at ISO 1600 with absolutely no noise whatsoever.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/klhman/albums/72157717878862071/with/52331662080

Ken

anotherMike said:

With Nikon apparently in the process of doing "true" cinema lenses, and given they don't have an endless supply of lens designers, I wonder what will come out next on the still side. My guess (and it's just a wild guess worth half of a single penny) is they may contract with Konica-Minolta again to flesh out/design a couple of the remaining S line wide angles, maybe a 14 and/or 28, and maybe at some point a fancy 105 plena-like lens done in-house, but then again, I never saw the 24-70 mk II coming, so perhaps that's where they are focusing their resources on - the refresh of the pro trio.

Strange/interesting times.

Click to expand...

To be fair I think mid range F/2.8 zooms do tend to get refreshed faster than UWA zooms, we saw 2 of the former over the lifespan of 1 of the latter in the last era of F-mount.

Honestly I would be pretty surprised if we saw a new 14-24mm anytime soon