I had this lens and returned it after 5 days because of its picture
quality! More detailed:
*At 28mm seems acceptable when wide-open, and at f/5.6 is _very_ sharp.
*In the 35-50 mm range is OK when stopped down, but wide-open is rather soft.
*At 80mm, wide open is awful -- very soft with _extremely low_ contrast.
Stopped down to f/8, contrast is OK, but corners are still fuzzy. In fact,
my SP 70-210/3.5 at 80mm and f/3.5 is _way better_ than the 28-80 @ f/8!!!
Talking about flare control, also very poor. However, mine came without the
original hood, and I've heard this lens improves dramatically with it.
At least, that were the results of my particular sample. However, your
mileage may vary -- I'm very critical about wide-open performance.
Yes, this lens uses 67mm filters. And the macro focusing (0.36 m, IIRC)
works not only at f=80mm, but from f=32mm (more or less). At 28mm, minimum
object distance is about 1 m.
I have no experience with the S-Zuiko 35-70/4, but I've got the
35-70/3.5-4.5, and I _love_ this lens. Picture quality is superb, even wide
open -- at 50mm and f/4, I find it equally sharp and _more_ contrasty than
my 'made in Japan' Zuiko 50/1.8!!!. Flare control is better than the
Tamron, but even with the hood you must be careful to avoid 'blue spots' on
the picture (especially around 50mm).
Again, it might be my particular lens -- I've heard this model has a large
sample variation.
The minimum focusing distance is about 0.45 m at any focal length -- not as
good as the Tamron, but not bad in this range. As an S-Zuiko lens, it has a
lot of plastic, but don't forget this lens weights only 190 g, versus 500+
of the SP28-80 with mount -- and it takes 49 mm filters... All this with a
similar aperture (3.5-4.5 instead of the Tamron's 3.5-4.2).
Speaking of aperture, the 35-70/3.5-4.5 has an unusual feature: when set at
f/4.5 or slower, it behaves like a constant aperture zoom (f/4.5) -- a must
when doing auto-flash with an OM-1 (no TTL), or spot metering with the
OM-3/4. In the Tamron, if you need a certain aperture, you must correct the
aperture ring position when zooming.
The only thing I don't like of the little Zuiko is the limited focal range
at the wide end -- I think a 28-56 would be nearly as useful for me than a
28-80.
Hope this helps,
...
Carlos Santisteban
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