[Guest]

An ultra-wide lens is still missing to complete my MFT set-up. However, I just realized that the money to buy the Pana would almost suffice to get me a Nikon D3200 together with the Sigma 8-16. Amazing! Eventually I buy the Sigma and determine first whether I can live with manual focusing on my GH1.

[thxbb12]

If you value price more than compactness and weight, then yes you could buy a DSLR + Sig 8-16.

Most people go for MFT because they're after a much smaller kit than with traditional DSLRs.

Why not get the Oly 9-18 instead?  It's much smaller, cheaper and it takes polarizers...

Personally, even if someone were to give me a D3200 + Sigma lens, I'd not use it over my MFT kit because it completely defeats the purpose of having a small package to begin with.

Despite entry level MFT bodies can be had for very cheap, overall MFT is more expensive than APS-C systems. You basically pay a premium for compactness.

 

An ultra-wide lens is still missing to complete my MFT set-up. However, I just realized that the money to buy the Pana would almost suffice to get me a Nikon D3200 together with the Sigma 8-16. Amazing! Eventually I buy the Sigma and determine first whether I can live with manual focusing on my GH1.

[Guest]

There are a couple of threads on dpreview and fredmiranda that tend to favor the olympus 9-18. The 7-14 is clearly better optically but it has a few annoying flaws:

 

a) price

b ) can't take filters

c) in certain cases nasty purple fringing or flare that is hard to remove in post processing

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The 9-18 is cheaper smaller and punchy just lower resolution in the corners (and not as wide). Not sure about the distortion factors.

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These comments are hersey as I do not own either lenses or use either lenses (though if I don't switch to fuji I might pick up the 9-18 one day).

[Sylvain]

I own the 9-18 and it's quite a pleasant lens. It's a nice performer but I'm sometimes skeptical about its retracting construction, some play appeared over time. It doesn't seem to have a visible effect on IQ but I still wish it had a conventional construction. Other than that, lightweight, silent, really nothing to complain about. 9mm is wide enough for me because I still don't have proper 12-xx lenses (the 12-35 doesn't have a wide enough range for my taste and the 12-50 is totally unimpressive optically). If you would end up owning the 12-35, I'd probably think it's not worth swapping to a 9mm lens.