I agree with this 100%. I mean, if you look at Nikon's "vintage" lenses (not the latest S or G lenses), theoretically the "best" lens is the 35mm/F1.4. But really, that's only because it can shoot at 1.4, and in shooting it at, say, F2.0, you're stopping the lens down a bit so it "should" be better than an F2 lens being shot wide open. And at 1.4, its results are not, let's say, pin-sharp, and possess a lot of "character" (which some people quite like).
If you're shooting landscapes and using hyperfocal focusing, you're likely stopping down (and you are focusing at a range) where *any* 35mm Nikkor will produce excellent results.
That being the case, you might look at the
35mm/F2.8 PC lens. If you're wanting to, especially, emphasize foregrounds, or you want to
stitch together panoramas or
high-resolution stitched composite images, you'd find that lens
extremely useful. It can be a bit slow working--but with landscapes that of course doesn't matter. I own one, and while I don't use it terribly often--I use mine mostly for panoramas, it's quite convenient for that and eliminates the optical distortions caused by panning the camera--it produces very high quality images. And
they're not terribly expensive--grab one and try it out, if it doesn't do what you want you can always sell it again for what you paid for it, or more.
