Zenitar 16mm f/2.8 or Samyang 14mm f/2.8

[sleepinghouse]

I am trying to decide between these 2 lenses for my 5d mkii and have come here for advice/recommendations.

I am looking at the samyang 14mm f/2.8, also known as Rokinon or Bower. Same build and lens.

video:

stills: http://www.flickr.com/groups/14/

russian zenitar 16mm f/2.8
review: http://www.kenrockwell.com/zenit/zenitar-16mm.htm
video:

stills: http://www.flickriver.com/groups/zenitar/pool/interesting/

pros of the samyang are that the aperture controls would be read by the camera, and the zenitar is full manual so I would have to set aperture manually and guess. They say the zenitar is actually a 12mm horizontal and 14 vertical.
Price difference- Samyang 14mm- $296, Zenitar 16mm $189

I will be using this lens for skateboarding, music videos, and city landscape shots.

Has anyone used or know of someone using the zenitar or the samyang 14?

[Chungdha]

Zenitar is not the sharpest lens used all open and f4 it is sharp. I never tried samyang, but I advice going for the 10-22mm f3.5-4.5 and its much wider and can use on full frame just removing the top on the back.

[ilguercio]

I got the Samyang on my 6D and it's a blade.
It's sharp from 2.8 and mantains impressive quality throughout the corners even on FF.
I would have no hesitation, just remember that the Samyang has no chip for Canon, i guess, so aperture can't be read by the camera.

[jose_ugs]

I can actually recommend the T3.1 Samyang if you're after a wide-angle lens. Downsides: all-manual which can get in your way if u're not used to it, pro's: long focus, focus ring ready for follow-focus, everything click-less... And you can use it on your FF Canon w/o hard-vignetting, etc...

[bzhwindtalker]

+1 for the Samyang, I have one and it's a great lens! really resistant to flare for such a wide lens

[1%]

Going by the flickrs the samyang has much better shots.

f3.5-4.5

That's way slow.

[Fergus Kennedy]

I have the Samyang and it's good for the money. The only downside for me is the distortion. It has quite complex 'moustache' distortion of straight lines, so if you shoot a lot in cities or other places with lots of straight lines you might find it annoying. A possible life-saver is that if you shoot in raw and process with Lightroom or ACR, there is a custom made lens profile you can download which pretty much sorts out the distortion.

[jose_ugs]

@Fergus Hey, would you mind sharing this custom profile?

[Fergus Kennedy]

@Fergus Hey, would you mind sharing this custom profile?

This is the one I used. Be sure to follow all the instructions. The effects are particularly noticeable if you have straight horizontal lines close to the top or bottom of the frame:

http://joopsnijder.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/lightroom-lens-profile-for-samyang-14.html

[docwaechti]

Hello folks out there!

@ilguercio
Can you confirm the 6D works fine with the _M42_ Version of the Zenitar 16 2,8 adapted to EF-mount?

I somewhere learned there may be issues with the mirror hitting the last glass-element, because it protrudes one milimeter or so beyond the edge of the EF-mount into the mirrorhousing.

Thanks

docwaechti

[swinxx]

I had both.. You can not compare because zenithar is a fisheye and samyang or walimex is a wide angle lens. So the distortion is different. I sold my zenithar and bought the walimex 14mm 2.8 cause i wanted a wide angle lens.. Greets