On 15 Nov 1998 18:25:59 +0200, ttsalo@iki.get.lost.spammers.fi (Tomi T. Salo) wrote:
>d_ruether@hotmail.com (Neuman-Ruether) writes:

>> (Keeping in mind that samples vary....)
>> The 17mm ATX Tokina I tried was soft (as in "not sharp"...)
>> at wide stops at the edges/corners - which I consider acceptable
>> in a super-wide, if performance improves considerably and the
>> lens is capable of acceptable sharpness at the edges/corners
>> (as in, "looks sharp enough, though it may not be quite so sharp
>> as the center") when stopped well down. The Tokina failed
>> to do this. BTW, I shot the same material at the same time
>> on the same roll of film with a Nikkor 20mm f2.8. The difference
>> was like the proverbial "night and day" - one lens produced
>> nearly uniformly sharp images center to corner by f5.6-8,
>> the other didn't at any stop. (I check film directly with
>> a good 10X magnifier - projection/reproduction/etc. can
>> often cover a variety of ills [but, as I said, "For
>> non-critical users, I guess it would be OK..." ;-].)
>> Perhaps you have a better sample than I had...

> The Colorplan shows the grain of Sensia or Elitechrome 100 so
> crisply even in the corners that I don't believe it is hiding
> anything :-) Anyways, the Tokina has 11 elements, including
> floating elements, so maybe you do have a monday morning version
> of the lens. There's no "night and day" difference between
> the 17/3.5 I own and other, very good lenses I have used...
> (All two of them :-) )
> It has some color fringing though. This affects the tangential
> sharpness of black-and-white targets (like newspapers and MTF
> charts), but it practically disappers in many real-world pictures
> (at least the ones I shoot).

Hmmm, this does bring up an interesting issue...
I checked the lens with distant land/city-scape, with B&W film...
I have seen other examples of lenses that were poor (or poorer)
in B&W than in color (or with a color filter used in B&W...).
The Nikkor 15mm f3.5 is very sharp center to edge in B&W and color,
but the corners are poor at all stops in B&W, OK in color, for
instance (one reason I choose to use the 15mm Nikkor f5.6
instead...). Also, you may be surprised by what you see with a
good 10X magnifier vs. projection (no matter how good) - but the
performance standards that the lens must meet are set by you...
(and I still shoot B&W...;-).

> What do you think about the distortion, vignetting, color
> reproduction and contrast of the lens?

I never got that far - the edge/corner sharpness was not
acceptable for me... Since it is only very slightly wider
(on film - therefore "real-world") than the really excellent
Nikkor 20, my interest in keeping the lens was very low...;-)
BTW, the lens did not show common problems that indicate
alignment error - though it could still have been below
average...