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It's not often that I'm blown away by a lens. The last two lenses I reviewed--the Nikon 24-85mm and the Tokina 16-28mm--I gave positive marks, but I noted significant flaws in their IQ. The Nikon 24-85 is excellent (albeit with soft edges) at the wide end, but IQ deteriorates as the focal length increases. The Tokina (I probably have a flawed copy) is poor wide opened but becomes extremely sharp by F5.6. Its IQ also deteriorates with increasing focal length. By contrast the Nikon 18-35mm is sharp wide open and sharp at both its widest and longest focal lengths. In fact it is so sharp that it actually competes--please hold on to something tight--with the Sigma 35mm f/1.4 prime at overlapping apertures! The Sigma is the sharpest lens I have ever used and rates at the top of the professional reviewers' charts for sharpness. So, this is high praise indeed.
First the negatives. It doesn't have VR like its stablemate the 16-35mm, and it starts at 18mm. I would much prefer to have 16mm like the Tokina and Nikon's 16-35mm. It is also a variable-aperture lens, which is problematic for some shooters. It is a 3.5 lens at 18mm, 3.8 at 20mm, 4.0 at 24mm, and 4.5 from 28mm to 35mm. Some may also be concerned about the build quality. This lens is the flimsiest, lightest lens I have used since using the 18-55mm DX kit lens. I can't say that it is poorly constructed, but I am amazed by its lightness. I compared it to the aforementioned Sigma, Tokina and Nikon 24-85mm lenses, and they are all heavier. In fact, going from the Tokina-a true beast-to the 18-35, it feels almost like there is nothing at the end of the camera body. Clearly, a photographer can walk around all day with this lens on their camera without concern for more than the weight of the body itself. However, its light weight is not all positive. The Sigma 35mm--a very solid, mid-weight lens--feels more balanced at the end of my D800E. However, this is not a major snit. There is some chromatic aberration when shot wide open, and some vignetting, which quickly goes away when stopped down. But both characteristics appear to be well controlled. I didn't test for distortion, but this lens seems to have similar distortion characteristics to the Tokina, which is noted for its low distortion. Now, on to IQ. I'll try to be brief.
My tests are not scientific. Rather than shoot test charts, I shoot a landscape near my home, and my shots are handheld. I try to keep the shutter speed above 1/200, but obviously shots at smaller apertures (larger aperture values) can be adversely impacted. With this proviso, against the Tokina, the Nikon is better at every common focal length. My Tokina--which is not the best sample--does not reach maximum sharpness until 5.6 where it is very sharp indeed. Amazingly, the Nikkor is sharper at every common FL for overlapping aperture values including 5.6! Against my Nikkor 24-85mm, which is a very good copy, the 18-35mm is again sharper at every common focal length. What's interesting is that the lenses are close at 24mm, but the 18-35mm's sharpness advantage increases with FL. More impressively, the 18-35mm blows the 24-85mm out of the water in terms of edge and corner sharpness. the 24-85mm which is very sharp in the center is quite soft in the corners until stopped down. By contrast the 18-35mm just loses a bit of sharpness in the corners and even less on the edges. Frankly I was amazed by this dominance. If I traveled with a lightweight two-lens kit, I would not switch to the 24-85mm until I needed a FL longer than 35mm. The 18-35mm's performance at 35mm absolutely astonished me. Edge-to-edge performance is very good like at other FLs. However, in the center the lens competes very favorably with the Sigma 35mm. There just isn't a whole lot of difference in center sharpness without intense pixel-peeping. Absolutely incredible!
Enough of comparisons to other lenses. Here is another interesting lens characteristic that--depending on how you shoot--may or may not be a disadvantage. This lens is sharp wide open. It gains very little sharpness on stopping down. Edges improve a bit more than the center on stopping down but the gains are hardly dramatic. At 18mm and 20mm, it seem to be close to maximum sharpness wide open (3.5-4.0). It actually appears to lose center sharpness on stopping down! I will retest when I can keep all shutter speeds faster than 1/500, or I get motivated to bring out the tripod. At 24mm and 28mm, f5.6 seems to produce maximum sharpness, but the lens doesn't lose much going to f8 (I did not test apertures smaller than F8). At 35mm, f8 seems to be the sharpest, however all bigger apertures were very close.
So, overall, I find this lens to be truly amazing. It is a sharp lens throughout its zoom range, which I find astonishing. For perspective, the storied 70-200mm VR II is one of the few zooms that is about as sharp at its longest FL as at its shortest and that lens cost more than $2000! And the legendary Nikon 14-24mm is truly special from 14-20mm. At 24mm, it is just ordinary (when I tested the 14-24mm against the 24-85mm, center sharpness was close with the 14-24mm winning decisively only on the edges). For this sub-$800 lens to perform equally well at both ends of its zoom range is truly incredible. The 18-35mm is among the sharpest lenses I have used in the 18-28mm range, and it competes well against an extremely sharp prime at 35mm. Plus, unlike other consumer-grade lenses that have good center sharpness but soft edges, the 18-35mm has good edge-to-edge sharpness. Frankly, I thought I would have trouble justifying the price. Now, after testing it, I consider it to be an out-and-out steal.
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