Blackmagic Forum

Hello
I just got my 4K camera
I need some advice for a wide angle lens particularly for shooting real estate interior and architecture?

I have found some good reviews on
Laowa 7.5 mm f2
Laowa 9 mm
Samyang/rokinon 7.5 mm T3.8

I don’t want to use any speed booster and prefer a prime lens instead of zoom?

Thanks in advance

I have the Laowa 9 mm on my BMPCC 4K and am very happy with it. Minimal barrel distortion, so an excellent choice for architecture work.

I think anything below 12mm will have some kind of barrel distortion. You might want to check this out.
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/ ... _lens.html

If you're after stills, you can correct for the distortion by selecting the lenses profile in Adobe Lightroom.
I agree with Ellory, the 12mm Rokinon is a good lens if you need a modern look.

The 10mm SLR Magic is a nice WA lens, that has well controlled I distortion, and is not too big or heavy, fairly fast at T/2.1., and sells for less than $500. This would be a lens I would consider for interior shoots.
Cheers

Different price point but also take a look at the Laowa 12mm Zero-D for architecture. I’m assuming you don’t want to go to a true Tilt-Shift lens.

Thank you very much All for the reply

I have bought one Meike 16 mm T2.2 already and while considering the crop factor I was thinking 12 mm might not be sufficient for interior shoots? (BTW I am a Nikon full frame shooter of stills and do have many FX lenses)

also was thinking switching between different lenses will change the lens profile? Isn't it?

SLR Magic was recommended by many though!

Thanks again for the support

rick.lang wrote:Different price point but also take a look at the Laowa 12mm Zero-D for architecture. I’m assuming you don’t want to go to a true Tilt-Shift lens.

Tilt shift might be an option but usually it is quite expensive??

Ellory Yu wrote:I think anything below 12mm will have some kind of barrel distortion. You might want to check this out.
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/ ... _lens.html

There is no inherent reason this should be or is in fact true unless you are using native M43 lenses which rely on in-camera software correction. For the OP’s intended use I’d not regard the P4k as an ideal camera for this kind of work as you will run into moire on fine details esp with exteriors. Infact given the available cameras I would suggest the P4k is probably the worst camera for this kind of work. What was the reason behind this choice?

John Griffin wrote:

Ellory Yu wrote:I think anything below 12mm will have some kind of barrel distortion. You might want to check this out.
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/ ... _lens.html

There is no inherent reason this should be or is in fact true unless you are using native M43 lenses which rely on in-camera software correction.

The suggested lens on the link is a MFT mount lens. Not sure what you meant by what you said here. Anyway, it's up to the OP and I think he's made his mind on what he wants.

Ellory Yu wrote:

John Griffin wrote:

Ellory Yu wrote:I think anything below 12mm will have some kind of barrel distortion. You might want to check this out.
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/ ... _lens.html

There is no inherent reason this should be or is in fact true unless you are using native M43 lenses which rely on in-camera software correction.

The suggested lens on the link is a MFT mount lens. Not sure what you meant by what you said here. Anyway, it's up to the OP and I think he's made his mind on what he wants.

By 'native' I meant Panasonic or Olympus. The others I'd call '3rd party'.

John Griffin wrote:

Ellory Yu wrote:

John Griffin wrote:There is no inherent reason this should be or is in fact true unless you are using native M43 lenses which rely on in-camera software correction.

The suggested lens on the link is a MFT mount lens. Not sure what you meant by what you said here. Anyway, it's up to the OP and I think he's made his mind on what he wants.

By 'native' I meant Panasonic or Olympus. The others I'd call '3rd party'.

Ah, got it. I just think of them all as MFT mount lenses. But yes, they are Panny and Oly standards.

I have owned and used some of the lenses mentioned above and other on my BMPCC4K.
The ones that cost around $500.

Disregarding very expensive cinema primes, so far, the best very wide angle for the MFT format that I have used in terms of image quality is the:

Panasonic Leica Lumix 8-18 f2.8.

So far, this has the best sharpness at wide open f stop, decent from center to edge. Fairly rectilinear. Although this is a zoom, I almost always use it at 8mm like a prime. The zoom to 18mm for me is an added bonus. This lens, has more often than not better image quality than many of the lenses listed prior. Pretty sharp at wide open, sweet spot at 5.6 or so. Sharp from center to corner too. I can focus it manually, or use the push to focus button on the BMPCC4K. I regret is is a focus by wire design. oh well. I can add screw on ND filters which is important for my style of video work. I generally prefer all manual lenses, but this ones image sharpness sold it for me.

I sold my SLR Magic 10MM t 2.1 (just too soft for my liking at the center and edges and when wide open. Whats the point of a T2.1 fast lens is the lens is not sharp at wide open)

I no longer use my Panny 7-14 (too much CA and not fast enough at f4. Cannot add ND filters. Way too much purple lens flare)

I sold my Rokinon 12mm, (too soft and focus is really touchy to nail it at 5 ft or further away when wide open. Cannot add ND filters.)

I admit, I have no experience with the Laowa D lenses. They look to be promising.

I do believe, that "you get what you pay for".

Mike, “what’s the point?” Well there may be times when you really need that T2.1 aperture versus a T2.8; in those times you’re glad you have the option. You may need the light gathering or you may want a softer focus on your talent or a shallow depth of field.

But when you can manage with T2.8, it does make sense to stop down to T2.8. It’s usually needed for many lenses that are a little soft wide open. All my SLR Magic T2.1 lenses are used at T2.8 or T4 when I can. But sometimes I wish I had T1.5. Metabones SpeedBooster would help.

If I can shoot a darker image at T2.8 when the exposure suggests a well-lit image at T2.8, I’m not going to hesitate to boost raw one stop in post for the sake of having the sharper image.

Thank you all for the input

At the end! there are plenty of lenses available in the market from $100 to $10000 range, and every person have the arguments in favour of his/her lens that is he/she has been using! I agree it depends on the personal preference, the look, the objectives etc etc etc.......

Have a great day

Fraz

I have the Laowa 7.5mm and use it extensively for real estate, albeit for stills using my Lumix G9. It's nice on my BMPCC 4K as well. It is decently rectilinear considering how wide it is. And the slight barrel distortion can still be corrected in post, though I haven't needed to for real estate photos, it is so slight. It is a completely manual lens with no electronic stabilization or auto-iris.

Have you decided what your next wider lens will be if 16mm isn’t enough?

When one says shoot “architecture,” there is likely a huge range of possibilities. At one end you’re shooting for Architectural Digest or museum quality prints of Venice or cathedrals; at the other end, you’re shooting for personal pleasure and want something more creative (distorted) than accurate (tilt-shift on a large format view camera); in-between I would think is residential real estate where you just need to please the realtor. The Laowa seem awfully good at rectilinear representation and I think that would be worth saving up for when shooting real estate to remove barrel distortion.

The tilt-shift lens is designed to correct your perspective as opposed to barrel/pincushion so you can shoot a building from the ground level across the street and make it look like your shot from a crane at a distance where the width of the top and bottom are close to the same. A very niche market may keep the cost higher. And it seems to be out of favour as the dominant styles are currently to go crazy, do anything to stand out from the crowd and certainly don’t try to capture boring reality!

Tilt-shift may not be the best option for realty since you lose that 'bigger than life' effect of a wide-angle perspective.
Zero-D is good, though, since it'll not point to cheap wide-angle

rick.lang wrote:Have you decided what your next wider lens will be if 16mm isn’t enough?

When one says shoot “architecture,” there is likely a huge range of possibilities. At one end you’re shooting for Architectural Digest or museum quality prints of Venice or cathedrals; at the other end, you’re shooting for personal pleasure and want something more creative (distorted) than accurate (tilt-shift on a large format view camera); in-between I would think is residential real estate where you just need to please the realtor. The Laowa seem awfully good at rectilinear representation and I think that would be worth saving up for when shooting real estate to remove barrel distortion.

The tilt-shift lens is designed to correct your perspective as opposed to barrel/pincushion so you can shoot a building from the ground level across the street and make it look like your shot from a crane at a distance where the width of the top and bottom are close to the same. A very niche market may keep the cost higher. And it seems to be out of favour as the dominant styles are currently to go crazy, do anything to stand out from the crowd and certainly don’t try to capture boring reality!

Hi Rick
Thanks for the detailed description of possibilities, I agree tilt-shift is a good option but quite expensive too!
Loawa on the other hand is reasonable way to go!

Fraz

Uli Plank wrote:Tilt-shift may not be the best option for realty since you lose that 'bigger than life' effect of a wide-angle perspective.

The elongation of objects at the frame edges is the same and the main effect of any wide lens is to make objects appear smaller and further away than they are in real life.

I dare to disagree, but since the OP is referring both to architecture and real estate, I'd like to explain this further. I own a tilt-shift lens (by Minolta) and enjoy it for shooting classical and historical architecture when I can't get the desired framing by changing my position. But even laypeople sometimes notice that it looks somehow 'different' to your visual experience (which it is). And then, the widest you can get is 17mm, and it's heavy and expensive. Finally, you need to stop them down for enough DoF in most situations.

Wider lenses with obvious distortion make scenes look fake in another, even more obvious way, and correction is losing a good part of their viewing angle.

What Venus Optics does is a remarkable feat, they offer 12mm, and then even 9mm (for drone or MFT) with truly low distortion, and very low weight. That makes the latter one very attractive for drones and gimbals. They are fast at 2.8 for such a wide-angle and very decently priced.

In conclusion, it would be a Laowa for me for real estate, interiors in particular, but a tilt-shift for artistic photography of architecture. Of course, the Loawas also lend themselves to art, as Li Zhe Yao and others have proven.