Maybe this is more a philosophical question, but still I'm going to ask.
Searching for distortion free lenses for digital I was asking myself: Equals distortion correction via software a well corrected lens in quality terms?
Hi Heinrich,
The answer is no, they are different, but
both can affect image quality negatively. The question then becomes, which deteriorates the image more, the residual lens aberrations or the software resampling. In addition, it can be a combination of improvements, some are better done in lens design and others better in software, thus producing fewer design compromises for the lens designers, and a better combined result.
I do not hope that it results in a; sloppy-design, we'll fix it in post, attitude. And as e.g. the OTUS and Sigma Art lenses show, it helps to get both the lens design and the postprocessing right, but at a cost.
There is also a difference how the software correction is implemented. When it is a part of the Raw conversion process, the potential gains can be much better than post-processing of an already rendered RGB file. For example, correcting Lateral Chromatic Aberration, can sometimes be done
before demosaicing, which will allow higher resolution and more accurate color conversions.
Cheers,
Bart