[davidmanze]

I am curious what would be Klaus's answer to that. Basically many lenses show a curved image field at close focusing distance, even "bold" ones like the 12-60 at 60 mm and MFD.

It would be also interesting to know how long is the object distance at 7 mm in the test.

Regarding field curvature: my ex-Tamron 17-50 non-VC had it, the workaround was either hyperfocal distance or focus at2-3 m or so, when doing landscape.

By the way I also suspect that the FT version has a slight bit of it too, however I never digged into that. Other than that it is a bit disappointing the the best µFT-glass is sort of underdesigned here; I suppose that is the price to pay for the moderate dimensions.

 My guess is the curvature "will" be there at infinity, judging by the way Klaus describes it's influence in the real world, it is generally less noticeable at closer distances unless you're artistically photographing brick walls.

  In fact it's such a shame that the lens has this problem,especially at it's price point, when you consider the small dimensions of the µ4/3 sensor, it's so small it hardly has any edges!

 Regarding the Tamron 17-50mm non VC which I have, the curved field is noticeable at 17mm in the corners with landscapes, also the Sigma 10-20mm F4/5.6 suffers a similar fate, DPreview tested it using compromised/hyperfocal focus.

   Maybe also the Nikor AF20mm F2.8, either that or soft extreme corners, (how could I say anything against the AF-D range?) but hey, I'm talking about a cheap S/H lens here, God bless it!