What is honestly the sharpest wide-angle zoom available for the SL2 right now because I am seriously losing my mind with these soft corners. I have been shooting L-mount for over four years now mostly for high-end architectural work and some landscape stuff around the Pacific Northwest but I keep hitting a wall. I bought into the Panasonic 16-35mm Pro thinking it would be the workhorse but the edge performance at 16mm is just killing me lately. I am seeing way too much smearing even when I am stopped down to f/8 or f/11 which just shouldnt be happening on a sensor this good.
I have a massive gallery print for a client in Seattle coming up next month and I need a lens that actually resolves the 47MP properly across the whole frame without looking like mush. I have been looking at the Leica 16-35 Super-Vario-Elmar-SL but that 6k price tag is honestly eye-watering even by Leica standards. Is the native glass actually that much sharper than something like the Sigma 14-24mm Art? I know the Sigma is supposed to be a beast but that bulbous front element makes using my ND filters a total nightmare for long exposures. Is the Leica glass really the only way to get true edge-to-edge sharpness or is there some other L-mount zoom I am missing...
> Is the native glass actually that much sharper than something like the Sigma 14-24mm Art? Honestly, I have been super satisfied with the Sigma 14-24mm f/2.8 DG DN Art L-Mount on my SL2. It is basically a beast for sharpness. Since you hate that bulbous front, my quick tip is to grab the Haida M15 Filter Holder for Sigma 14-24mm f2.8 DG DN Art. It makes using NDs way easier for those long exposures and the setup works well without breaking the bank like the Leica glass would.
Gutted by that Pana too. For my Seattle prints, I eventually settled on:
- Sigma 16-28mm f/2.8 DG DN Contemporary
- NiSi V7 100mm Holder Edges are way better for the price.
^ This. Also, if you're doing high-end architecture, the Leica Super-Vario-Elmar-SL 16-35mm f/3.5-4.5 ASPH is genuinely the king of edge resolution. Its specifically optimized for the SL2 sensor stack, which helps avoid that smearing you're seeing. The MTF charts show it stays way flatter across the frame than the Panasonic. Plus, the 82mm thread makes using standard NDs easy. Its expensive tho... basically the only way to max out 47MP imo.
