[Baines93]

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Could you not threadjack the post your picture thread again... please? You already did that once a few months ago - why not make a separate thread for your purchase decisions?

Sorry, just always seen this as the photographers hang out, but I guess it really is a pictures only thread like the portable rig thread.

 

[dfkt]

 

[Baines93]

Canon 500d here I come, at long last!

 

[Baines93]

Why is there such a huge price difference between f/1.4 and f/1.8 50mm prime AF lenses?
 
Is there a huge difference in ability and image quality brought by that small difference?

 

[shigzeo]

F 1,4 is always expensive, but considering that Zeiss and Leica lenses (even Sigma) cost much more, the Canon/Nikon/Pentax lenses are very well-priced. Speaker for the Nikon (having owned both), the 1,8 and 1,4 are very different. The 1,8 is built on the old model with different motor, rotating/extending barrel, and manual aperature ring. The new one doesn't focus as fast, but overall feels better, has better focus controls, can do a lot more at 1,4 (soft, but good), and focuses silently. 
 
Lens boffins should be able to tell you all about the glass quality differences. As a user, the 1,4 is better, but it is expensive in comparison.

 

[shigzeo]

Quote:

Great juxtaposition!
 

 

[Baines93]

I think i'm going to start with a Canon EOS 500d and the kit lens with AF and IS, which will probably get the most use?
 
The 500d does HD video, a novelty, but may get some use, and the camera seems to be very good in low light and at high ISO settings too... I just figure I can't go wrong really. It also has the AF motor in the body, so lenses are a little cheaper. Controls look very good, and I like the feel in my hands. Canon also gives me a good range of old lenses that fit, so I should be able to play with wide angle lenses, macro lenses, and fisheye lenses fairly cheaply. I could also get autofocus capable old lenses I guess too.  It'd be nice to have IS in the body, but I doubt it's worth dropping to a Pentax for!
 
I think I really want to get a 50mm prime with it to start off with, but I don't know if I can stretch to a f/1.4, I think i'll start with a 1.8 and see how much use it gets... It won't have image stabilisation, but I guess thats not biggie. I'd also like a telephoto/zoom lens, but whether I go old, or new (with AF and IS) I don't know.
 
What lens would people recommend for wedding pictures? 50mm prime, or the 18-55 kit lens with IS and AF?
 
Matt

 

[beerguy0]

Quote:

I think i'm going to start with a Canon EOS 500d and the kit lens with AF and IS, which will probably get the most use?
 
The 500d does HD video, a novelty, but may get some use, and the camera seems to be very good in low light and at high ISO settings too... I just figure I can't go wrong really. It also has the AF motor in the body, so lenses are a little cheaper. Controls look very good, and I like the feel in my hands. Canon also gives me a good range of old lenses that fit, so I should be able to play with wide angle lenses, macro lenses, and fisheye lenses fairly cheaply. I could also get autofocus capable old lenses I guess too.  It'd be nice to have IS in the body, but I doubt it's worth dropping to a Pentax for!
 
I think I really want to get a 50mm prime with it to start off with, but I don't know if I can stretch to a f/1.4, I think i'll start with a 1.8 and see how much use it gets... It won't have image stabilisation, but I guess thats not biggie. I'd also like a telephoto/zoom lens, but whether I go old, or new (with AF and IS) I don't know.
 
What lens would people recommend for wedding pictures? 50mm prime, or the 18-55 kit lens with IS and AF?
 
Matt

Why 50mm? People keep buying this lens for crop bodies, and I just don't get it. It's like buying an 85mm prime for a FF digital or film camera. If you want a 50mm equivalent for crop, look at the Canon 28/1.8 or Sigma 30/1.4.
 

 

[Baines93]

I hadn't considered that, but after some reading, I now understand that a 50mm on a non-full frame camera won't actually give me 50mm, but a 28mm or 30mm will be much closer...
 
A 50mm prime on a non-full frame would be actually about 85mm right? - so less wide angle?
 
Would the kit lens at 50mm actually be 50mm? 

 
Sorry about the newb questions! Lenses are so confusing. 

 

[beerguy0]

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I hadn't considered that, but after some reading, I now understand that a 50mm on a non-full frame camera won't actually give me 50mm, but a 28mm or 30mm will be much closer...
 
A 50mm prime on a non-full frame would be actually about 85mm right? - so less wide angle?
 
Would the kit lens at 50mm actually be 50mm? 

 
Sorry about the newb questions! Lenses are so confusing. 

Focal length is a property of the lens. FOV (Field of View) depends on the sensor size. Multiply the focal length by 1.6 to find the equivalent FOV of a given lens. A 28mm lens on a 500D is 28x1.6, or 44.8mm, which is close enough to 50mm. The 30 is 48mm. The crop factor is why wide angle is more problematical on smaller sensors. You have to go to very short focal lengths (8-10mm) to get true ultra-wide angle.
 
OTOH, because of the crop factor and higher pixel density, crop bodies have a distinct advantage for telephoto work, which is handy for birding or sports, especially if you can't afford the really long glass.
 
Since this is a photo thread, I'll post a picture.
 
Canon 7D, 10-22 EF-S
 

 

 

[Baines93]

Thankyou for the information. That is a gorgeous picture!
 
One thing I have noticed is camera equipment holds its price very well... I just looked at the 7D, and while it's a £1000 body here new, I can't find a used one under £900... Unlike iPod's and computer stuff, where you can normally get super spec top of the range stuff used for half the price! When I started looking I was hopeful about getting something with an RRP or £1000 for about £600, but there's no chance. Bad, but good in some ways, as I won't loose as much on the more entry-level gear I will have to buy.
 
Sorry for the thread jack... I promise i'll be posting alot of pictures in the near future though
 

 

[grokit]

 
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Why 50mm? People keep buying this lens for crop bodies, and I just don't get it. It's like buying an 85mm prime for a FF digital or film camera. If you want a 50mm equivalent for crop, look at the Canon 28/1.8 or Sigma 30/1.4.
 

 
A 50mm lens, perspective-wise, mimics the field of view, or perspective, of the human eye. A 35mm lens pushes the image further out by 30%, while maintaining a relatively "flat field", which keeps lens distortion minimal. Any wider and the perspective starts to curve and distort, which is not necessarily a bad thing, depending what you want to emphasize. A 100mmm lens will bring the image twice as close as a 50mm, while compressing the perspective.
 
A 1.4 lens aperture lets in more than a full f-stop, or more than twice as much light, as a 1.8 lens. This gives you a faster shutter speed, which is useful for stopping action, or minimizing camera shake. F-stops go like this: 1.2>1.4>1.7>2.0>2.8>4>5.6 etc., so at maximum aperture a 1.2 lens lets in 4 times as much light as an f 2.0 lens, which lets you have a shutter speed of 1/250th of a second, compared to 1/30th of a second on the f 2.0 lens. This is of course with the same ISO setting, and without using a flash.
 
The reason people buy the fast 50mm lens is because of the sharpness of a fixed lens, the flat field, and the speed, or maximum aperture. You can get a moderate telephoto (85mm) or wide angle (35mm) lens that has good speed, but they will not have as "normal" of perspective and are much more expensive. Zoom lenses suffer in both speed and sharpness, but are much more convenient and much less expensive, for the range that they cover.

 

[Planar_head]

Quote:

A 50mm lens, perspective-wise, mimics the field of view, or perspective, of the human eye. A 35mm lens pushes the image further out by 30%, while maintaining a relatively "flat field", which keeps lens distortion minimal. Any wider and the perspective starts to curve and distort, which is not necessarily a bad thing, depending what you want to emphasize. A 100mmm lens will bring the image twice as close as a 50mm, while compressing the perspective.

 
Not on a crop sensor. The focal length of a lens is measured based on the classic 35mm equivalent focal length, but most of the cameras today have sensors smaller than a frame of 35mm film. This means that only a fraction of the 35mm frame is being seen by a crop sensor DSLR. It is as if you had a picture from a film camera (35mm frame) and then cropped it by cutting out portions of the image, effectively zooming in on a part of the image, in the case of the crop sensor, the center of the frame. Sort of like "digital zoom" except without the quality issues.
 
So, if someone wants to shoot 50mm focal length like back in the day, it's best to set the focal length based on the crop of the sensor, which varies from sensor to sensor. For example, the Pentax K7 has a 1.5x crop, which means you take the 35mm focal length (what's usually given) and multiply it by 1.5. So, in order to get exactly 50mm on a K7, it takes...
 
50mm(crop)/1.5=33.3(35mm equivalent)
 
So something like a 32mm 35mm equivalent focal length will net you 50mm on a crop sensor. The typical 18-55mm kit zoom covers this range so if you need to see it for yourself, set your kit zoom for 32mm and then 50mm and check the results.
 

 

[Berserker]

 
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[grokit]

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Quote:
Not on a crop sensor. The focal length of a lens is measured based on the classic 35mm equivalent focal length, but most of the cameras today have sensors smaller than a frame of 35mm film. This means that only a fraction of the 35mm frame is being seen by a crop sensor DSLR. It is as if you had a picture from a film camera (35mm frame) and then cropped it by cutting out portions of the image, effectively zooming in on a part of the image, in the case of the crop sensor, the center of the frame. Sort of like "digital zoom" except without the quality issues.
 

Right you are, I am referring to the 35mm film-camera equivalent of 50mm, or whatever the "standard" focal length is on any particular DSLR.
 
But the principle is the same, some things never change