Nikon Kit Lens Troubleshooting

[kramden88]

I recently bought a used Nikon kit lens to replace an old one. I'm getting weird distortion around the edges of some photos (see linked photo) but not all photos. Usually it happens indoors but I can't tell exactly why it happens sometimes but not others. This never happens with my 30' or tele lenses.
Does anyone know why this is the case? I can't return the lens so I have to buy a new one, I just don't want to spend more money if for some reason it's not the lens.
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[tirediron]

Exif data would help greatly in the trouble-shooting.

 

[kramden88]

I tried to upload the photo here before but it wouldn't let me but now I was able to. Here's the jpg and an exif screenshot.

 

[davidharmier60]

Looks to me like a bit overexposed... But I don't see anything drasticly wrong.

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[Dragster3]

18mm so it distorts... take the same pic farther away at 35mm and compare.

Try that...easy test.

When your outside you have more space, so you don't have the zoom at 18mm? maybe?

 

[snowbear]

My guess is because it's at 18mm. Try the same scene at each of the marked focal lengths and compare them.

 

[480sparky]

I see some soft corners, which is typical of wide lenses, and even more so in kit zooms.

 

[Derrel]

The edges of the picture look optically poor to me, and I see some uncorrected green chromatic aberration too; fairly common on a kit zoom lens shot wide-open at f/4 at 18mm.

 

[fmw]

The wider the lens the more difficult and expensive it is to correct barrel distortion. If you look at images made with high end extreme wide angles, you will see some stretching of the subject in the corners of the frame. This is the result of correcting the barrel distortion. So think of edge distortion as an inherent characteristic of very wide lenses and use it to your advantage in your photography.

Also understand that when you tilt the camera up or down from level, you will create converging lines, particularly with wide angle lenses. The image of the railroad locomotives shows this clearly. If you want to correct this you can either use a shift lens (expensive) or correct it in post process. Correcting it in post process will cause you to lose some of the image in a rectangular frame so you need to prepare for this in the original composition.

I love wide angle lenses. You may too as you gain experience and skill with them. Happy shooting.

 

[jcdeboever]

Nikon kit lens... As I recall, this is what your going to get. I never liked the lens. I switched to Fujifilm and their 18-55 kit lens is excellent, even at slow shutter speeds, wide open. Of course, it's twice the cost too. You may want to invest in a better lens, what that is, I don't know, maybe a Nikkor 17-55 2.8?

 

[kramden88]

Thank you everyone for your responses. I've been shooting Nikon for about five years and I never had this happen with a kit lens. But maybe it just became more apparent when I upgraded to the 7200. I'll have to play around with it and maybe consider a higher end lens, as suggested.

 

[nerwin]

Which 18-55 kit lens is it? Nikon has several.

18-55G? 18-55G II? 18-55G VR? 18-55G VR II? 18-55 VR AF-P?

The later ones are designed for higher resolution sensors and if you are using one of the first generations, they were designed for lower MP sensors, like 6-12mp. Hence, why you'd probably see poor optical quality when mounted on the D7200 which has a 24mp sensor and no AA filter.

You may want to consider picking up a newer 18-55 kit or the 18-140 kit...or perhaps something like the Sigma 17-50 2.8 or even the Sigma 17-70 f/2.8-4 C lens.

 

[kramden88]

It's the 18-55G VR II but that's a very good point. I'll look at the Sigmas.