Just unboxed this beauty on the 25th! Very excited to start using it - my first serious investment in glass! is it foolhardy to use without a monitor? Am quite used to focusing through my varavon loupe, is this a viable approach with a wide open 17.5?

Thanks @stonebat. Any lens-specific tips on shooting with GH2? I'll play of course, and find what i like, but just wondered, in terms of picture profile set up etc...

@jules congratulations!

@valpopando There is quite lot of vignetting, how does it come? Did you use the original lens hood? I can't belive it comes out of the lens, especially in the anamorphic crop.

I use a 77mm vari ND on the lens. Then use a dirt cheap collapsible rubber hood from ebay on it. Rotating hood will rotate the filter. The whole setup looks ugly but does the job.

@tetakpatak yes I used some vignetting filter in post , but also enhanced by two ND8 filter plus a polarizer !! ...anyway that lens does vignetting at f0,95!

Ok. Since I have a growing suspicion that there´s a bit of fluctuation of the quality of the lens - with people expressing radically different views of it´s usability wide open; I thought it would be good to bring this issue to the table, to see if there are factual differences or just different views of it´s performance.

I´ll post some samples shot wide open on the gh2 and a couple slightly stopped down for reference, feel free to do the same! (and comment if you have very different experiences from the lens behavior at similar apertures)

First shot: f0.95 - Focus set on the restaurant sign with focus assist. "ok" exposure. Second shot: f0.95 - Focus set on building / lights in the background. Intentionally over-exposed to show the potential for fringing. Third shot: f0.95 re-focused up close to get rid of fringing in previous shot. 4-6: 0.95, 1.4, 2.0 no exposure compensation directly into the street light.

Oh, I uploaded jpgs directly from the camera. Shutter 1/60

FYI check out Mr.Kwon's photos. He got G5 and 17.5mm. All are OOC JPEGs.

http://www.slrclub.com/bbs/vx2.php?id=panasonic_forum&no=132637

http://www.slrclub.com/bbs/vx2.php?id=panasonic_forum&no=132700

Since OOC color looks good, no hack works just fine. Or relatively low bitrate 30~50Mbps works fine, too. In fact shallow DOF shots don't really need high bitrates.

Two questions, 1st) what ND fader are people using with this lens? I want the best one possible, but kinda have to run out and get one tomorrow in anticipation of coming snow. 2nd) any particular Follow focus well suited for this lens that one could recommend on a budget which won't sacrifice performance of this lens, ie the ability to make very fine slow adjustments. I would like to keep the FF price under $150USD.

@mee I use the heliopan variable ND. Works for me.. but it has to be said that there is no variable ND that doesn´t compromise the image somehow, in some situation. As for FF´s there are plenty of good options on here (look in the gear section). Don´t be too fuzzy about it. The voigt should work with most FF gears.

@RRRR Thanks for the tip, I do want a Variable ND eventually, but for now I went with a 58mm Marumi ND 8 Neo MC. It works for most situations. I will be getting a second soon for very bright days, as it actually doesn't seem have any vignetting when I stack two 58mm filters, and the Marumi's are very affordable in that size and available just up the street from me.

@feha, I have only just started playing around with extreme closeups, and don't have the 25mm for direct comparison of quality, but it does achieve sharp focus at about an inch and a half distance, which is simply amazing. I went in for a close up of a girls eye, and bumped her nose X D