MINOLTA 24mm F/2.8

Rating:
Summary: One of my 3 basic lenses
Review: This is a fantastic lens, and has become (together with the 50/1.4 and the 135/2.8) one of the three basic lenses in my kit. The wide angle is wide enough to cover a broad range, and wide enough to give a "wide angle effect", but not so wide that the wide angle effect takes over. Just a bit wider and it would be a specialty lens, not useful for day to day shooting but only for special effect. A bit narrower, and it would be much less useful when you want to combine a foreground and background or show a small crowd to full effect (try a shot at your kids' next birthday party, and get 15 or 20 kids all in one shot gaping over the cake or the gifts).

Note that this lens has a very broad depth of field, so that you can get very sharp landscapes with the foreground and background both in full focus. It is also fast enough to be very useful in dim light situations - I have used it heavily in churches for weddings and christenings and in theatres for whole-stage shots from fairly far up close, and it produces good shots under natural lighting in each case.

The distortion has been kept under control by Minolta's floating elements design, which also helps maintain the edge-to-edge sharpness. All around, a great lens, and highly recommended in my book.