Best wide angle lens for a crop?

texaspancake wrote in post #9043971
So how do you avoid all that flare on the tokina? Can you put a filter and call it a day?

I've only gotten it to flare once out of thousands of pictures. The 12-24 has big flare issues/CA issues. The 11-16 fixed most of them from what I can tell.

plasticmotif wrote in post #9044013
I've only gotten it to flare once out of thousands of pictures. The 12-24 has big flare issues/CA issues. The 11-16 fixed most of them from what I can tell.

Cool. Do you have a filter on the tokina?

texaspancake wrote in post #9045037
Cool. Do you have a filter on the tokina?

Nope.

Canon 10-22mm is my pick... Love mine...

texaspancake wrote in post #9043971
So how do you avoid all that flare on the tokina? Can you put a filter and call it a day?

No, there is no filter anywhere that will reduce flare. Adding more glass will just increase flare.

The best way to avoid flare is to not shoot with a bright light source in the viewfinder.

As others have said, the flare on the Tokina is overly exaggerated. I seldom get any noticeable flare in my night shots. With daytime shooting you will probably never see any flare.

I don't know why but...

I don't know why but, I have not been troubled with flare when using my 12-24mm Tokina. I absolutely love this lens.

I have the original model. Obviously there is some flare problem with this lens because Tokina has introduced a Mark-II version which is said to be more flare resistant.

The original version is selling for $400 at Adorama while the Mk-II version costs $500. Both of these have free shipping and, of course, Tokina provides a lens hood while Canon does not.

If I were to purchase a wide lens today, I would seriously consider getting the 11-16mm f/2.8 Tokina because of the wider aperture. However, I don't lust after this lens badly enough to trade in my present 12-24mm.

There is one good aspect to the 12-24mm focal length. I will be carrying two cameras and three lenses to China this Spring: 17-55mm f/2.8 IS, 70-200mm f/4L IS and the 12-24mm f/4 Tokina. If, perchance, my 17-55mm lens would go down on me for some reason - I could actually do a fairly good job of coverage with the 12-24mm and 70-200mm focal lengths. The 24mm gives me about a 38mm equivalent which could be considered a short normal lens. I think I would have coverage problems using the 11-16mm and 70-200mm pair of lenses.

Been happy with my Canon for 3 years. It continues to amaze me with it's quality, but I won't admit to being a little envious of the Tokina with it's fixed f2.8. Given the choice again, I would still buy the Canon.

I vote for the Canon 10-22. I have it. Excellent lens.

+1 for the Tokina 11-16 f/2.8. I love, love, love mine. And, it only flares when you point it at the sun...imagine that!

I have and use the Tokina 12-24 version 1... Great lens at a very good price.

I imagine the Version 2 is even better, and it still sells for the same price that the first version did. The remaining Version 1 that can still be found new are selling discounted and are an exceptionally good deal.

My Version 1 has only minor flare and CA issues. No big deal. The several copies of this lens I tested (including the variants Tokina makes and relabels for Pentax and Nikon) all were excellent.

By the way, I suspect that the Version 2 lens merely gets the same coatings as were used on the Pentax version all along.

Fitting a filter will potentially increase flare, not reduce it. You can minimize this to a degree by using only very high quality filters, but it's still best to remove any filter when shooting into a sunset, for example, or any other situation highly likely to cause flare. (In fact, IMO it's not a good idea to leave "protection" filters on lenses most of the time, only use any filter when it serves a "real" purpose, which only rarely is "protection" against blowing dust/sand or similar.)

Use the lens hood to help reduce flare with any lens.

And avoid pointing the lens toward bright light sources. Also be sure to keep the lens' optics clean.

Besides, a bit of flare can be useful in some situations. There are even softwares you can buy now, to add flare effects to your images! We are accustomed to seeing certain types of flare in images.

Yeah, if you'd search you'll find my response. I'm tired of continuously reposting on this topic. I did it three times in two days on 3 threads. This is all too common.

Tokina 11-16 F2.8 hands down. I don't have it but I've used a friend's copy for some time. VERY well built and dead sharp corner to corner .. Of course the best thing is the constant F2.8

qbfx wrote in post #9051435
Tokina 11-16 F2.8 hands down. I don't have it but I've used a friend's copy for some time. VERY well built and dead sharp corner to corner .. Of course the best thing is the constant F2.8

Why?

I've been shooting for 30 years and really can't understand any significant need for f2.8 on an ultra wide angle lens?