Mike Gunter said:

I had the 18mm on my F4s and really liked it and used it a lot.

I really like my 18mm f/2.8 also. It's pretty darn wide on an FX body, and is a metal-barreled lens, so it feels like it's built like a tank. But, as I said, it's softer than my cheap $99 AF-S 18-55 VR lens. Can Nikon "fix" it by recollimating?

Hi,

I had the 18mm on my F4s and really liked it and used it a lot.

My best,

Mike

I can't really compare it to the 24 mm lens. I use the manual focus version of the 20 mm lens - which is identical to the AF version as far as I know - and the 28 mm f/2.8 manual lens. This difference is quite big. As other posters mentioned it is light and compact and I think is does have very good optical quality. It is one of my favorite lenses.

Is it wide enough on FX? Well, that depends (as always). I would say that if there are many situations where the 24 mm is just not wide enough for you, then go for it. But if you don't really miss the wider field of view, then why bother?

woh, that simulator is cool!

I can see your point. I was just reading mountain light and I can see that Galen Rowell often brought both 20 and 24, so I'll take back my comment about them being too similar, since he is often meticulous in packing light, preferring cheap plastic lenses to the heavier metal ones, and sometimes not even bringing a tripod.

If this were me, I still wouldn't bother with 20, although you guys do bring up a good point that Nikon doesn't have any compact, light ultrawide autofocus lenses with good optical quality. Even if you include MF, I'm not sure there's many options available.

jerl said:
Definitely true, but I'm not sure there's a good enough reason to stick with primes for the wide end.

The biggest reason for me is, bulk and weight. I almost never take my 14mm f/2.8 prime out because it's so heavy. And, while being only a few dollars cheaper than the 14-24mm zoom, the 14mm prime, while still quite heavy, is noticeably less heavy and more compact than its zoom-able counterpart.

As for the 20mm, it's fairly wide on an FX body. The best thing about the 20mm Nikkor is its size--it's super-compact and very light. This alone may be reason enough to justify its purchase. Compared to other Nikkor wide zooms, this thing is tiny. The 18mm is larger and has a reputation for being soft. I think the 20mm is a nice compromise between performance, size, and weight.

One can pick up any of the three mentioned primes for 1/2 the cost of the ultrawide zooms, and they weigh about 1/2 as much.

Definitely true, but I'm not sure there's a good enough reason to stick with primes for the wide end. Image quality-wise, the primes don't offer any real difference from the new zooms (which may be even better than the primes which are of an older design, depending on who it testing them), and certainly there are no fast aperture prime lenses- they stop at 2.8 just like the zooms. Size-wise, you can get smaller lenses with the 18, and 20, but the 14 is similar in scale as the 14-24.

jerl said:
The difference between 20 and 24 is not really that big, whether or not it's "wide enough" depends on what you do. In my opinion, if 24 is not wide enough, 20 is only going to be a little bit better. For a prime to complement 24+, I'd look at 18 and below.

The 14 f/2.8 does not take filters (unless you count the gel slot in the back for us B&W film shooters). weighs quite a bit, flares at the drop of a hat, and ain't cheap.

The 18 f/2.8 takes filters, weighs half as much, doesn't flare as much, and goes for around $650 minty used. So it's competitive with the 20 there. Not as small as the 20, but not much more expensive and definitely significantly wider than 24.

But that's about it for AF primes. Then you got the 16-35 and 17-35 lenses.

The difference between 20 and 24 is not really that big, whether or not it's "wide enough" depends on what you do. In my opinion, if 24 is not wide enough, 20 is only going to be a little bit better. For a prime to complement 24+, I'd look at 18 and below.

http://imaging.nikon.com/products/imaging/lineup/lens/simulator/

After much soul searching I'm going to pass, on going to primes, and stay with the 24-70. I've been looking at adding a wide prime..preferable the 20/2.8 I guess this ? is geared toward the 24-70 FX'ers here, but is the 20 going to be noticeably wider than the 24 on the 24-70? I guess I can order and see for myself..but hoping for experienced people who use the 20/2.8.