Laowa 15mm f4 Wide Angle 1:1 Macro

Fortkentdad

Senior Member
So, my NAS - Lens Lust is acting up again....
What else is new?

15mmF4IAOWA.JPG
Promo shot from Vendor's website

Vendor site: Laowa 15mm f4 Wide Angle 1:1 Macro - Nikon F-Mount
Review (one of many I've read) https://www.dpreview.com/reviews/venus-laowa-15mm-f4-wide-angle-macro-impressions-and-samples
Makers website for this lens: Laowa 15mm f/4 Wide Angle Macro ? LAOWA Camera Lenses

I've been thinking about this lens ever since I had a chance to try it out at a photoshow a while back.
At $650 CDN this isn't the most expensive lens on my wish list but still that's a nice hunk-a-change.

Anyone using one of these.
 

Bukitimah

Senior Member
My widest is 24-120mm. although 24 is good for walk a bout for FX, I am always loooking for something around 14mm for landscape. of course cost is a big factor. Would you say this is a good buy?
 

Fortkentdad

Senior Member
My widest is 24-120mm. although 24 is good for walk a bout for FX, I am always loooking for something around 14mm for landscape. of course cost is a big factor. Would you say this is a good buy?

I have not bought it -- yet.
Price seems good but it is all manual.

I do have a 17-35mm and that works very well for me. Bought it used for about $350 at Henry's Camera store. I have the Tamron one.

A 20mm 1.8 prime is another option - autofocus, faster, and a prime. But more money.
 

Blacktop

Senior Member
I have found that for me 14 mm is much too wide for landscapes . Just spent the last 4 days shooting landscapes in the Rockies in Colorado I hardly needed to take my 24-120 off my D750. I shot a few with my 20mm prime but not much at all. I think the 14-15 mm is more of an architecture lens for shooting indoors.

That being said, I have seen some great landscape shots done with the 14 mm but I would not shoot like that all the time.
For general landscape shots, for me the 20 mm would be as wide as I would want to go .
 

Fortkentdad

Senior Member
I was most intrigued by the macro shots shown in this youtube review of the 15mm


I do find that when I have my 17-35mm lens I shoot at 17 a fair bit. Not for landscapes but children at play in the house or other groups of people (or things) inside. I wish that lens was wider and longer - a 14-50 would be loverly. The 16-85 is a DX - it would be wonderful if that was an FX lens
 

Bukitimah

Senior Member
I have found that for me 14 mm is much too wide for landscapes . Just spent the last 4 days shooting landscapes in the Rockies in Colorado I hardly needed to take my 24-120 off my D750. I shot a few with my 20mm prime but not much at all. I think the 14-15 mm is more of an architecture lens for shooting indoors.

That being said, I have seen some great landscape shots done with the 14 mm but I would not shoot like that all the time.
For general landscape shots, for me the 20 mm would be as wide as I would want to go .

woukd that 4 mm be a great difference then? (24mm vs 20 mm)
 

Fortkentdad

Senior Member
woukd that 4 mm be a great difference then? (24mm vs 20 mm)

With focal length I've learned that the smaller the number the bigger the difference each increment makes.
In other words the difference between a 20mm and 24mm may be 4mm but the difference in view between a 20mm and 24mm is greater than the difference in view between a 50mm and 60mm.

84 to 73.7 degrees of view from 20 to 24. A 15mm like this macro would be 100° wide where as 50mm is 39.6 and adding 10 more mm gets you to 33.4 or about 6 extra degrees for 10mm more focal length. While those 4mm extra between 20 and 24 adds 10° more FOV.

This is from a chart I found over at Nikonians: https://www.nikonians.org/reviews/fov-tables

It is all in the "FOV" or how many degrees wide you view will be.
 

Yelemusic

New member
Some pics I took with the Laowa 15mm Macro lens. Great fun lens! Used an off camera flash with a reflector attached, to give it some dramatic look. And those plants were small, especially those dried up flowers on the first image!
img_5956.jpg
img_5955.jpg
 
Last edited:
Top