The tiny and I mean tiny, 9mm lens arrived today. The shiping box it came in felt empty, the little box it was packed in was tiny and the lens itself……tiny.
This thing is perfect as a replacement for my already handily sized and priced 8-18. It is wide enough to handle most needs, fast enough to solve low light tight group shots and the close focus is ridiculous.
Weird huh!
To be clear, the 8-18 has done nothing wrong, but having a huge overlap with the 12-60, it is too big and slow (f4 aperture at the long end), to share a bag with the other zoom. Basically I am carrying a zoom, only to use the widest end occassionally. It’s wide front end limits insert and filter choices and the range, although good, lacks a constant f2.8 aperture or enough range to nullify the need for the 12-60 (the 8-25 Oly would have just).
The 8-18 lens has been relegated to the home, travel and landscape kit.
Stupidly close focussing with pleasant Bokeh. Not characteristics you would associate with a super wide angle.
Lovely Bokeh at normal distances wide open. This is a 9mm that can still produce nice subject separation.
Off centre performance is even and good wide open (crop from above). I have not tested the extreme corners, but it looks good so far and that Bokeh is impressive.
My ideal is to use this, the 15mm and the Sigme 30mm on the Panasonic camera, then a 45 and the 40-150 f4 on the Olympus. The 12-60 may be swapped out for the mid range primes in good light or used as a one lens solution, but the 9mm, lighter even than the Sennheisser mic I bought the other day, will be a permanent fixture.
The bag keeps getting lighter and smaller, but more capable.