[Brightcolours]

I'm comparing mirrorless to mirrorless.


Many APS-C pancake lenses have bad distortions as well.

Fuji 18mm, Samsung 16 & 20mm, Sony 20mm.


Fuji 35/2 isn't a pancake but still with a focus on small size and distortions are bad there

 

What does pancake have to do with anything, though? Many pancake lenses do not have bad barrel distortion. The many Pentax DSLR pancakes, the Canon 24mm f2.8 and 40mm f2.8 DSLR pancakes, the mirrorless Canon 22mm f2 pancake to name a few.

 

Lenses from the past which are small have no very bad distortions either. It is just that now some lens designers and brands take liberty with distortion in the lens design because they can hide it with correction in JPEG conversion.

 

My very small Canon EF 35mm f2 does not have excessive distortion either.