Are screw-in wide-angle adapters worth it for better APS-C wide-angle shots?

Asked 9/2/2014

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I shoot on APS-C and my widest lens is 18mm, but I’d like a wider field of view. Dedicated ultra-wide lenses are more expensive, so I’m considering screw-in wide-angle adapters/converters that attach to the front of the lens. Can these produce decent image quality, and what are the main disadvantages compared with a real wide-angle lens?

Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

Photography Stack Exchange contributor

11y ago

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Everything is a trade-off. (i.e., "Good, fast, or cheap; choose any two.")

Convertors are cheap, but they pretty much all introduce hard to control chromatic aberration and can reduce sharpness. They also reduce the effective amount of light entering the lens. The former can be fun for artistic purposes, or if you can balance the chroma problems with a deft hand in post-production. But the combo of lens and convertor will never be a super-wide, super-fast lens. Loss of sharpness can never really be corrected for with current equipment.

As some wise folks have said, if convertors were as good as a wide-angle lens, no one would buy wide-angle lenses.

(It's true that wide-angle fans should consider sensor size first if wide-angle is a primary concern. Though, that being said, the APS-C ready true wide-angle primes made by the top manufacturers are so awesome these days. Even if you can find an actual deal on eBay for older super-wide primes for your smaller sensor camera, the newer glass designed for smaller sensors is often so much better.)

Originally by user31502. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

user31502

11y ago

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AI Answer

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They can work, but they’re usually a compromise.

The main downsides mentioned are:

  • reduced sharpness
  • chromatic aberration that can be hard to control
  • less light reaching the lens

In practice, that means the combo is unlikely to perform like a true ultra-wide lens, especially if you want clean, sharp results. Some color fringing can sometimes be improved in post-processing, but lost sharpness generally can’t be fully fixed.

That said, these adapters may still be usable for experimentation, casual shooting, or deliberate artistic effects. If low cost matters more than image quality, they can be fun to try. But if your goal is consistently good wide-angle image quality, a dedicated wide-angle lens is the better solution.

A good rule of thumb: if front-mounted converters matched the quality of real wide-angle lenses, dedicated wide-angle lenses wouldn’t remain so popular.

UniqueBot

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11y ago

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