Search the Community

Hi all,   I'm shooting a camera test for my upcoming short on a GH2, and I wanted to test with an SLR Magic 12mm T 1.6 Hyperprime, because of all the great reviews, and example footage I saw.  My test is during the day so I took notice of all the warnings to get a large ND filter to avoid vignetting.  I bought a Fader MkII Variable ND filter at a 77mm size, and then bought a 58/77mm step up ring for the SLR Magic Hyper Prime.   To my dismay, when I received the lens from my mail order lens rental place, without any filter and just shooting on the GH2, I saw some very undesirable distortion on the corners.  I sometimes like imperfections in classic glass, like my Canon FD primes, but this distortion I was seeing on the SLR Magic lenses was pretty unacceptable.  Also...I like flaring, but it seemed this lens in particular has some serious flaring "issues". Next I put my ND filter setup on the camera, and regardless of my larger ND Fader, I experienced pretty bad vignetting. Here's where my question comes.  I'm looking to get the equivelant of a 24mm focal length on my GH2.  The 12mm seems like the likely candidate, but I'm wondering a.  Do I have an damaged or defective lens, or b.  Is this the nature of the lens. If that is the case...does anyone have a good alternative to the Nokton SLR Magic 12mm?  I know the 12mm Olympus is talked about a lot and I also see a fair share of folks talking about the Tokina 11-16 zoom.   I may be running out of time, and may have to shoot on my Canon 5dmkII for this test, but ideally I really wanted to use my GH2, since I specifically bought it for video since I'm not a fan of the Canon look on video.   Any of your advice would be greatly appreciated.  Thanks!!!