Went to Scarecrow fest yesterday to test out my new Tamron 10-24 and to my surprise spotted a few familiar faces!
Its taking some getting used to - especially since it turns in the opposite way of my Canon lenses but Ill live. I notice a little softness around the edges on some shots but nothing I cant live with. ; It is REALLY fun to be able to stand close to something and get the whole thing in while the crowd passes by behind you and not through your shot!
Never thought about the turning direction issue (it goes the same way as Sony/Minolta)...guess that would be a little weird! The only times I see corner softness at all tends to be in the very open apertures at full wide - F3.5 to around 5.6 or so. ; Once I get to F8 and up, it's sharp all over on my copy. ; (The Sigma 10-20 I tested was ever so slightly better in corner softness at F4, but not as sharp on center - I tended to prefer the center sharpest...and since it was only wide open that the corner softness mattered, I tended towards the Tamron). ; All UWAs exhibit mild corner softness and distortion wide open - haven't seen a sample yet from the Tamron, Sigma, Tokina, Canon, Nikon, or Sony UWAs that doesn't have a wee bit of compromise in the corners at the widest aperture and focal range. Getting close to subjects is very cool - almost freaky! ; You can just get impossibly close, where you think you're going to ram the glass into the subject. ; Definitely wouldn't want to walk around looking only through the viewfinder with a UWA on full wide - that whole 'objects in mirror are closer than they appear' effect would have you running into people!
