I guess probably only springtide will be interested in this, but I just went out with my A900 + CZ 16-35 and D700 with 17-35. Having both those around my neck got some funny looks as I swapped from one cam to another in quick successing. But its really the only way to test things!
Anyhow, I tried to take the same shots as far as humanly possible. D700 on the right, Sony A900 on the left. The CZ 16-35 is not as fast as the Nikkor, and gives 1/3rd stop less shutter (same as the KM 17-35) so I am sure the CZ is slower than f/2.8 and more like f/3.2 as this is consistant over two lenses npw.
Anyhow.. is how the raws open in Lightroom, everything "as is"
[While I don't think the CZ 16-35 is any better than the Nikon 17-35 (too be honest I think the Nikon is the better lens, both in build quality and optically), the A900 is pulling more detail (check the wood grain on the door crop above) And at Lightroom defaults, I prefer the A900 colours.
Thanks for that, that's interesting.
Pants day yesterday weather wise so didn't take a single photo, but managed to do a quick comparision between my old KM 1735 and the CZ1635 before my friend left today.
I will agree with you about the exposure and the CZ, as it was constantly underexposing by around 0.5 EV compared to the KM.
Will post some crops later (or my friend might beat me to it - in which case I'll post the link), but....
The KM is sharper in the centre, even wide open (not much in it though). The KM performs best at around f8 and does a very good job at the borders. Extreme boarders the KM are not great. The KM suffers from CA's pretty badly, but seem to be prety easily corrected.
The CZ performs very well at the borders (not much drop off from the centre), and the extreme borders are much better than the KM. The CZ also handles CA's better, but does suffer a little.
Basically once you start moving from the centre of the frame, the CZ pulls ahead and it stays that way. Contrast also seemed better on the CZ.
Unfortunatly because of the exposure differences between the two lenses, the test images are not ideal.
The results are similar to what was posted at:
http://artaphot.ch/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=161&Itemid=43
But we agreed that the KM copy that I used to own performed more like the KM 17-35/3.5 'G' in the linked test, as the borders seemed much better than the Tamron (maybe the Tam was a poor copy?)
I think my mate was very surprised in how well the KM performed, and it will be interesting to see his comments later in the week.
But bottom line, considering I sold my KM for £140 (as he's a mate) and I bought the CZ for £1260. For £140, the KM seems like the bargain of the century..