[Rover]

I took delivery of the Laowa 10mm AF in Z-mount today (shipped from China and not without issues because the tracking data indicated that it arrived in St. Pete's on Jan. 20th, then promptly vanished and sat without motion somewhere for two full weeks until I started tickling the support... but it's all over now). I'll keep you posted on the findings (first off, procuring a fitting filter for it is going to be an adventure).

All in all sounds like a good lens to mesh with my 16-35mm, more separation than the 14mm (which sucks on FF anyway) has. Amazingly compact, too.

P.S. Klaus is to blame because his review was what tipped the scales for me. :-) Another from Bastian of the Phillip Reeve's portal was also a factor.
P.P.S. It's only the second native lens that I have, after the 16-50mm DX. If I ever start buying more Z-mount stuff, the 24-120 is the prime candidate. :-)

[Rover]

kay, the first reports from the first few proper shoots (though of course limited due to the extreme nature of the lens):
1. It is sharp to edges stopped down some, which could never be said of my old Sigma 14mm f/2.8, the previous Da Ultrawide in my stable. That lens sucks serious rhino on FF!
2. It vignettes like heck.
3. In crop mode it's still wider than my go-to lens, the Canon 16-35mm f/4L IS, is in its default mode. It's crazy. But it's a useful 15mm equivalent.
4. The hood is super stiff to remove, AND at the same time doesn't "click" into the designated position, always making me worry that I have it ever so slightly misaligned.
5. A regular 77mm filter does not seem to give more vignetting by itself (I've had no spare money to buy a new slim filter for it, so I just unscrewed the old one from... the Canon 24/1.4 lens? w/e)
6. The keystoning and edge stretching is... something else entirely compared even to the 14mm lens. That needs some getting used to.
7. It's super fun to use!

A random frame from between shooting architecture in downtown St. Pete's yesterday.

(Nikon Z9, 10mm full frame shot, f/8, ISO 200, exposure time 1/800. Should have gone to ISO 32 or 64 for this kind of shot, probably)

[MLonlooker]

...... "sucks serious rhino" ?? ........ I like to keep abreast of optical phraseology but here I'm at a loss .....
The next rhino I encounter will be a "suck and see" scenario .....

of course I'll try to find the most serious one ....

......... sometimes the only way to go is "lips on" ........

[Rover]

Okay, it was an expression I took up from a webcomic from some sort. Probably has something to do with the shape of the rhino's horn.
But seriously, the Sigma 14mm f/2.8 is bad on FF. As in, actually quite bad all along the edges (and corners of course). It's just how that lens is, since it's a film era design from 25+ years ago.

Anyway, Laowa 10mm f/2.8. Another discovery I made is that it sometimes goes way OOF when shooting in AF-C mode. The 16-35 didn't seem to have that behaviour. But it's there, thankfully pretty rare so far.

[Rover]

Okay, this lens kicked the bucket the other day (mid-shoot). Stopped registering with the camera and since it can't focus, I now have a very cool looking paperweight. At least it's blue in colour... The novelty!

Okay, morbid jokes aside, I'll hopefully find a way to repair it, but this still blows. After all, this is the most expensive lens I currently have (the Canon 24/1.4 L cost more in absolute terms when it was new, but that was over 10 years ago and it's worthless on the second hand market now because they're so plentiful and nobody wants them).

I'd be "tentatively withholding" my recommendation for this lens until I can learn what happened and how the lens can be revived.

[MLonlooker]

Man, what a bummer! ...... where's Loawa service center ?

..... that is so frustrating after such a short time ... keep us posted !

[Rover]

I've found three repair shops that work with Laowa lenses, locally, but haven't phoned or otherwise contacted any of them yet. I have a nagging suspicion that an AF lens from Laowa might give them more problems than an MF, stone age unit that might have a misaligned element or stuck helicoid at worst, while this issue I'm having is clearly electronic.

Unfortunately I'm very short on time this week, so I might not even find a spare day to get this sorted out until uh, the first days of June at worst.
Maybe I'll dust off the Sigma 14mm in the interim.