It’s been a while since the last time I posted something related to my hobby other than installing the most cutting edge Linux distros, which is taking photos 🙂 I am fairly a noob in this field, so I’ll steer away from writing something technical, and keep the content of my post as light as possible.
Anyway, the newest entry for my collection of prime lenses is a 14mm Pentax prime lens, the SMC Pentax-DA 14mm F2.8 ED(IF), equivalent to 21mm in APS-C format. At first I was planning to use the lens for taking landscape photos, but turns out, this lens is a whole lot more than just your average ultra-wide lens 🙂
The lens is built like a tank!. It’s metal all around, and while not as beautifully-crafted as the Pentax limited glasses, the finish is still amazing. The lens is very heavy, and sports an internal focusing system. Filter diameter is 77mm, and due it’s massive size, you won’t be able to use the K100D’s internal pop-up flash, as the lens will cast a shadow on the lower part of the image. As with most ultra-wide lenses, the barrel distortion is pretty evident.
Most of the time ultra-wides are used for taking landscape pictures, sceneries and so on, and so on. But turns out, most of the time I use it for something entirely different 🙂
What I like about this lens is that, the minimum focus distant is so small, I think it’s about 17 cm. And due to that, I was able to take pictures such as these :
Overall, I am very satisfied with the lens. This lens is currently the default lens that is always attached to my K100D 😀 Click here to see more pictures that I have taken using this lens 🙂
I went to the store and picked up the newest Sigma 10-20mm and did a lot of test shots but was not satisified with the quality of the images at the wide end. So I went to back to the store and tested both Pentax 12-24 and the 14mm. I felt better with the 14 mm than both the 10-20 and 12-24, so I ended up with the 14 mm.
I know that most posts on the internet credits the two others, and the 15 mm Limited higher. But I liked the 14 mm and I also see the advantage of the 2.8 at close ups, like you show in the pictures. I have not used it for serious photography yet, but looking forward to it. Should I have chosen the 15 mm? I dont know…
Well, Obviously I don’t really have the answer to that question too 😀 But what I can tell you is that, to this date, this is my most used lens. I have taken landscape, food and product shots, even a little bit of street photograph with this lens. Please check out my flickr page for samples
Of course I’m by no mean a pro shooter, and I’m taking photos only for fun. So yeah, I like this lens very much, but I’m sure that if I went with the 12-24 instead, I will find a way to have fun with that lens too 🙂
Sure, thats true. Most lenses are of good quality so in the end, what feels best for one person, may not give the same feeling to another. I will stick with this lense since I like it. I have seen a lot of nice photos taken with it (including yours) so it shows to be a good performer. Thanks for the reply by the way!