Extreme wide angle lens for the Olympus camera

For a long time I had considered  the advantages of so-called ultra wide angle lenses as I found the 24mm lens a focal length  that didn't seem to offer too many advantages over a 28mm  for the inevitable extra weight of lugging it about without offering some of the advantages  in terms of getting heaps more into the frame or its creative uses building on the perspective distortion when shooting subjects such as cars close.

Around  2000 Vivitar and Cosina had out a 19 through 35mm ultra wide-angle zoom lenses in a variety of manual focus camera fittings including Olympus OM that appealed but tracking down the OM fitting proved difficult and some other options such as the Centon/Sirius 18-35 while plentiful used had terrible reputations for image quality.

As had been a while since I'd bought a 'new' lens, I ordered the Tamron 17mm F 3.5 Adaptall 2 in the high performance SP series

This is the later 151B version that dispensed with the built in black and white photo filters to simplify construction as well as reducing costs and adding a more modern feel to this longstanding lens.

Independent lens tests put this at the same quality as the Zuiko 18mm F3.5 which is some 60% more expensive used and exceeding it's equivalent by Minolta in the MD system.

As with all Adaptall 2 lenses, armed with the appropriate attachable mount they can mounted on nearly all manual focus bodies.