Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 9-18 mm F4.0-5.6 Lens, Wide Angle Zoom, Suitable for All MFT Cameras (Olympus OM-D & PEN Models, Panasonic G-Series), Black

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As it stands in the range, it is currently the best value ultra-wide for MFT and the collapsible, lightweight design means that it is perfect for taking on your travels. Sample Images Panasonic Leica 8-18mm f/2.8-4.0 GX85, 1/4000, f/3.1, ISO 200 – 9mm (HDR) GX85, 1/10, f/2.8, ISO 200 – 8mm GX85, 1/160, f/11, ISO 200 – 18mm GX85, 1/60, f/4, ISO 6400 – 8mm GX85, 1/250, f/8, ISO 200 – 9mm GX85, 1/640, f/4, ISO 200 – 18mm GX85, 1/250, f/8, ISO 200 – 9mm GX85, 1/640, f/4, ISO 200 – 18mm GH5, 1/320, f/8, ISO 200 – 8mm Olympus M.Zuiko 9-18mm f/4.0-5.6 Pen F, 1/320, f/8, ISO 200 – 9mm Pen F, 1/640, f/5.6, ISO 200 – 9mm Pen F, 1/400, f/8, ISO 200 – 18mm Waiting for the snow storm to end… These who like to travel light, but can't be without an ultra-wide zoom will love this lens. It's capable of producing excellent results at moderate apertures, is incredibly resistant to flare and ghosting and isn't priced too highly either. This is the final part in the series reviewing the Olympus 7-14 and the 9-18. In Part 1 we reviewed the 9-18mm. In Part 2 we reviewed the 7-14. Now we look at these two lenses compared to each other. Is the (relatively) larger, faster, more expensive lens the better choice to the small, lightweight, lens? Let’s see. 7-14 vs 9-18

Olympus 9-18 vs Panasonic 7-14 - Digital Photography Review Olympus 9-18 vs Panasonic 7-14 - Digital Photography Review

I use the 8-25 lens when covering outdoor large crowd events like a Veteran's Day memorial commemoration on Thursday of last week, or a local outdoor car show. I thought it was perfect for those and I enjoyed having the additional 8-11 mm focal length range that I have never had before. Finally, we mustn’t forget that the Leica lens is approximately twice as expensive as the Olympus, and since the latter is one of the older lenses for the system, it can often be found for less than the official retail price. The only focal length the two lenses don’t share is 8mm, which is only available on the Leica lens. The good news is that the performance remains excellent at this value with sharpness peaking at around f/5.6. If you want to see some real world result on this, have a look at my recently uploaded photo set dedicated to this lens: Now why people take so many great images with it? well it's so small it's owners will bring it everywhere creating that wide FoV for interesting images.Chromatic aberration is, despite the application of Extraordinary Dispersion (ED) and High Refractive (HR) glass, a point of attention. Here, performance is not bad for a wide angle lens, but chromatic aberration is visible. See for example the following two images. Chromatic aberration is easy to correct afterwards, using photo editing software. Panasonic does it for her lenses in the camera. Why not Olympus? It’s not an exaggeration to say that all three of these lenses are extremely sharp, particularly in the center. The resolution of the 9-18mm falls off a little more toward the extreme edges and corners, but even there it’s a very strong performer. Somewhat surprisingly, the Panasonic 7-14mm shows more CA toward the midway point and edge of the frame, but it's sharper at the edges and corners than either Olympus lens. The Micro Four Thirds system utilises software to correct certain types of lens aberrations including distortion. These correction parameters are encoded into the RAW file, so it is unlikely you’ll notice any of the lens’ native distortion as long as you use a popular RAW converter such as Adobe Lightroom that is capable of converting the files correctly. Note that these corrections are also applied in-camera to the JPGs.

Olympus Zuiko Digital ED 9-18mm f/4 - 5.6: Digital Olympus Zuiko Digital ED 9-18mm f/4 - 5.6: Digital

The lens is designed for the four-thirds sensor system, meaning it will provide an effective field of view of 18-36mm (a 2x ''crop factor''). The lens is compatible with regular four-thirds camera bodies via an adapter. This lens isn't a "constant" lens, in that as you increase the focal length, the maximum aperture size decreases, though the minimum aperture size remains the same. The following table reflects the changes as you zoom: Focal length Between 9mm and 14mm, Chromatic Aberratons are extremely well-controlled, with Imatest barely being able to detect over a quarter of a pixel width of colour fringing during testing. As the lens is zoomed in further the performance in this area tends to deteriorate. At 18mm colour abberations exceed 1.25 pixel widths at f/5.6, which may start to become noticeable in high contrast scenes. Stopping down only makes matters worse, in fact I had to alter the scale on the CA graph to fit the reading toward the edge of the frame on there as it exceeds 4.25 pixel widths.Focusing through filters is a little easier with f/2.8 aperture vs f/4. With a 10 stop ND it is sometimes difficult to frame/reframe the shot and focus with a filter in place. Yes, I can unscrew or slide the filters out of the way each time but that is another chance to drop or scratch a filter or twist the lens/camera out of position. No lens hood is supplied as standard with this lens and this lens is quite prone to flare and hazing with a bright light source in the frame. Although a hood for a lens covering such a wide angle-of-view would provide little protection against this, it still would've been good to have one included. The large, bulbous front element of the Panasonic lens creates distracting purple flare, despite the built-in petal lens hood. This single lens is reason enough to get into m4/3! It makes the EPL1 really shine in IQ, AF and portability. On the epl/2 it shines equally. Buy this lens! Waiting for the OMD5 to try this gem. Downrated the construction quality by one point. Only for the wobbly feeling, no IQ effects. Waiting for the mkII, because I really like what Olympus did with the 14-150 mkII !

Olympus Zuiko 9-18mm f/4-5.6 ED Interchangeable Lens Review

It's not surprising to see a fairly high level of distortion in this wide angle lens, though the distortion is consistently barrel-shaped and easily correctable in post-processing software. At the widest setting (9mm) the lens shows a full 1% distortion in the corners. However, the lens is optimized nicely, and by 18mm there is very little distortion to speak of at all. ED 9-18mm 1:4.0-5.6 (18-36mm) * extreme wide angle lens will go on sale from September 2008 in Olympus’‘standard’ range of lenses. I like the range of the 8-25, it is a very convenient for walking a city. I originally had the 7-14/2.8 but sold it for the reasons others have cited, heavy, flare, field curvature etc. I replaced that with the Panasonic 8-18 and I really love that lens, it is a reasonable size and weight with excellent image quality/rendering. I do not plan on selling the PL 8-18. It really is a tough call between the 8-18 and the 8-25 since it starts out at f4 and there are instances where I would like to have f2.8. Image quality wise, the Olympus 8-25 is excellent and like others have said, most of the time it will be used at an aperture greater than f4 anyway. This is not a ringing endorsement of the lens because I have found the PL 8-18 to be so good. I like the 8-25 but I don’t love it even though it does an excellent job. And just for fun, here is a corner crop of 7mm wide open compared to 9mm wide open. Basically both lenses wide open at their widest focal length. 7mm vs 9mm Top Left Corner Wide Open The Olympus 9-18mm f4.0-5.6 M.ZUIKO Digital ED wide-angle zoom (35mm equivalent focal length: 18-32mm) expands the Olympus Micro Four Thirds lens system. Its ultra-compact build, lightweight construction of 155g and a total closed length of 49mm is made possible through the retractable parking mechanism. But it's not just the compact size that surprises - the excellent image quality is equally impressive. With the Olympus 9-18mm lens you can easily create powerful effects of perspective by using it at the wide-end for excellent close-up shooting with a minimum distance of just 15cm from the front of the lens. The lens is also ideal for landscapes, interior and architectural photography.Enjoy the impeccable optical quality inherent in all ZUIKO DIGITAL lenses with this bright model: 13 lens elements in nine groups, including one aspherical ED lens and two aspherical elements award the ED 9-18mm 1:4.0-5.6 (18-36mm) * with a pronounced advantage over the competition. Coupled with the ZUIKO DIGITAL ED 18-180mm 1:3.5-6.3 (36-360mm) * lens, this affordable combination provides you with an incredible 9-180mm range (18-360mm) * for unparalleled versatility. A minimum focusing distance of 25cm round out this 2x-zoom model’s list of convenient attributes. Do you have any idea what I could do, if at all? Service is not an option since I'm nowhere near a big city.