Vast Vistas With Half Vast Lenses

The season is nearly upon us. Winter is about to hit with all the fury it can manage - lashing gales, scudding clouds, massive gas bills. Now is the time to head on out to the coast or the forest or the desert with your digital camera and make yourself thoroughly miserable.*

Ahem, I'll amend that. Think of all those wonderful landscapes throughout Western Australia that are just waiting for your artistic vision...And what better way to express it than through a wide-angle lens. Here are four of the best.

Zeiss 21 Distagon, Nikon 20 Nikkor, Canon 20 EF, and Leica 18 Super Elmar-M. Wise photographers will pick the one that suits their camera body - and those that want to use the Zeiss can obtain a variant to fit either Canon or Nikon.

They are not zoom lenses - if you want to change the angle of view you walk further forward or further back. Because they are not zoom lenses the manufacturers have been able to optimise their resolution and reduce the various distortions that lenses are subject exhibit to the absolute minimum. These are the lenses for the big print.

As they are not zoom lenses, they do not carry extra elements and you do not carry extra weight. If you are capturing landscapes you need to go where the landscapes are, and this means stalking them through the bush. And up hills, and over rocks. Welcome the compact size and light weight.

They
will all take filter systems in front of them so you can mount ND grads, polarisers, star filters, diffusers, and heart-shaped masks for that special landscape - all at once. Don't laugh - eventually someone will, and if they are good at selling the idea, will get an arts grant for it. I refuse to accept responsibility for this suggestion...

Can you use them in a studio? Yes you can - I use a 20 Nikkor for toy car shots. Can you use them for architecture and interiors? Yes you can, and quite a few of the pros do.

Big crowd shots? Wedding parties? School groups? Custom street cars? Yep.

Put down that zoom and come in and try one of them - you cannot fail to be impressed.

* I'll be by the fire with the plate of muffins and the copy of "Handley Cross". Off you go.