Star Trails? Is this a lens someone would recommend to get high-end results? For example, would a 14mm f/2.8 be better or worse than this?
1324233
This lens is amazing for star photos. I will be uploading a recent picture taken with this lens of the stars in my review of this lens. Great, great lens, and most definitely worth the money! It has become my standard go-to lens for great shots!
1324234
Hi Brian....I have used the SLY358C for both star trails as well as All Sky Photography, meteor showers, and the Lunar Eclipse. It works perfectly for these uses though I might go with longer focal length and smaller F ration next time I purchase a lens.
1849073
A fantastic prime lens. Super crisp even in the corners. Depends upon how big of a group and what the perspective is. I would typically use a longer lens for most wedding group shots. Something like 35mm prime or the 16-35mm L2.8. I think the 14mm is a killer lens, but probably not the lens that i would use for group shots usually.
1601433
I really don't know. A faster wide angle lens may be better for that use. It has all of the distortion of a real fisheye, so your images would have that issue. If you're shooting artistically, no problem, but for scientific use, it may well have too much fisheye distortion. It's not particularly fast so you'd have the issue of star trails unless you shot at a high ISO (which you could with your OM-D). It's a good fisheye lens, not a toy, but I'd hate to recommend it for scientific purposes. Sorry I couldn't be of more help.
382297
This is always a compromise between cost and performance. If is this is simply to photograph your daughters, the "speed" of the lens is not that critical given today's high performance DSLRs that can easily be pushed to ISO 800-1200 without significant graininess (noise). I personally use the more expensive F2.8 fx for special views of the Milky Way photos as well as super sharp landscapes. The 70-200 is a very high quality lens which will most likely fulfill your needs and requirements.
2058088
It is a lovely lens, but I cannot see it (or any lens) doing really well with low light and fast action. I use it for landscape photography, where things kindly hold still.
1542129
The unlimited exposure time for deep sky, low light shots. Unless you have an equatorial mount it won't do you a lot of good. There are a lot of 5 mp cams that shoot just fine for planetary/ high vis but you will quickly want something that can go farther. Additionally you can downgrade this one to an autoguider since it has an st4 output
1606764
This works well for moon shots. That's one of the reasons I purchased the lens and I am very happy with the sharpness and quality of the images. This is an awesome lens.
8522
Hardy,Thanks for the info about getting better lenses. I just "bit the bullet" and bought the 24-105mm L lens. I have heard this same wise advice from other photographers, and I am looking forward to getting sharper photos with the new lens, and I will try to get only L lenses from now on. In the end, you truly get what you pay for.
1892824
It's a good lens: sharp (check DXOMark). I own both this lens and the Canon 14mm 2.8L. Both are great. The only thing missing with the Samyang is the AF, though often that's not a problem for wide angle anyway....
942879
non professional here!i am so confused by some of the pro's here ! so someone please tell me,will it work on my nikon D 60, Then, for a amature-beginner- training pants guy, how will this do for real estate, mountains, gardens, charging grizzly, kidds christmas with sants, high school photos of the kids,, antique autos, the " Hoss" an buggy, does anyone get my ideas, there is two guys on the reviewsthat sound incredibaly smart, good show, i so want to get this lens, BUT ? J.R. Massachusetts
507557
I love the lens for its sharpness. It is very good lens. If you love nature photography, as I do, you will Love the lens. Can be used as general all purpose lens, if you can accept a fixed focal length. It is one of my favorites.
1850461
I do street photography with this lens. No problem in most lighting conditions. Can hunt with low light on my X-M1, but much better with X-E2 (update your firmware). No worse than my other Fuji lenses.
1357814
Yes. It's excellent for doing long exposures like shooting stars and star trails, and for interval shots like time lapse:
1474695
Not that this will be of much help, but I'm with you. Ordered a 24mm 1.4 (later returned) expecting the same jaw-dropping results I get from the 85mm 1.4 and it's just not there that I can see. As far as your suggestion of getting closer to your subject for pop - sure, a wide angle lens will really exaggerate the perceived depth of a shot. That's how I'd roll with it for the most part; 2' from the subject (more for DX frame), avoiding top and bottom when shooting vertical (unless you want that edge distortion; maybe not so bad on DX). The sharpness you're looking for also won't exist until you get close enough to your subject to give eyelashes and things of that nature some pixels to work with. At 85mm, it pulls these details in and paints them across, say, 5% of the frame or more. With the 24mm you may be talking about less than 1% of the pixels dedicated to what you're looking for details in. I've seen some REALLY spectacular night landscape images that were made with this lens. Also, the bokeh that lens produces is right on par with the 85mm. The issues I had with the 24mm (and the reasons I returned it) were failure to find focus at 1.4 no matter how much I helped it along and a general lack of spectacular sharpness at 1.4. At this end of the price spectrum, this has to be gold. It's real close, and quite nice at 2.8, but so are lots of lenses at 2.8. That said, I've still got this lens on my mind. If it were a 20mm 1.4 I'd just suck it up and do it. At 24 there are some other close options out there.
827133
It's a good lens for my needs. I have found the 18-300mm type lenses just don't do all that well, I think too much range to cover but this does well and being a f/2.8 it's better for darker shots. Heavier than a kit lens but worth it in my opinion.
2170406
As long as you're not doing fast or low-light action, this is a fantastic outdoor telephoto - a real image-quality champ. It works quite well with the Canon 1.4X tele extender, too. (I don't have a 2X so I can't say with that one.) For fast action or action in low light, save up and get the 70-200mm 2.8 (II not I; the new version is super sharp, the old version a bit lacking). And start pumping iron ;) If you're doing birds a lot, this may not have the reach you need. In that case the 100-400mm is better - not quite the same image quality but pretty good nonetheless. If you're doing a lot of portraits, the 70-200mm 2.8 II will give you better background blur. Or go cheap with the 135mm f2.0 or the 200mm f2.8 for portraits.
2264483
I have taken some shots of the Milky Way, and it is important to get the sharpest focus you can. I do that by centering the view on a bright star, then use the live view (not sure what it's called on a Nikon, as I am a Canon guy) to view the star on the LCD screen, then zooming in the live view so the star is magnified and use the manual focus to sharpen it up. Then I make a mental note as to where that point is on the focus ring for future reference, and I don't touch it while I'm taking my star shots. It also helps to stop the lens up a fractional stop or two, as that will increase your depth of field enough to ensure the sharpest focus. The auto-focus chip probably won't help with this at all, as it's way too dim.