Wide Angle Lens Needs at WDW

[Jalva22]

Hi! I am looking at purchasing the Canon 40D with the 28-135 lens. I am also going to add the 50 1.4 for family portraits. The 10-22 is a little pricey for me at the moment, but I was curious as to how often veteran parks shooters need wider than the 28 on a crop body? Interests are more along the lines of building exteriors than trying to shoot while on attractions.

Thanks!
Jim

 

[Roger]

Hi! I am looking at purchasing the Canon 40D with the 28-135 lens.

Nice choice in a body. Lens? I take it Canon is still shipping a kit with that lens. That lens is the oldest IS lens left in their lineup, and hasn't been updated in some time. With a crop body, lenses like the new 18-55 IS are options; but only if you don't plan on upgrading to a full frame camera anytime soon.

http://www.usa.canon.com/consumer/contr ... elid=15704

They were supposed to come out with a 55-200 IS for the EF-S mount but it's not listed yet.

I am also going to add the 50 1.4 for family portraits. The 10-22 is a little pricey for me at the moment, but I was curious as to how often veteran parks shooters need wider than the 28 on a crop body? Interests are more along the lines of building exteriors than trying to shoot while on attractions.

Thanks!
Jim

Well for building exteriors, you can't beat tilt-shift:

http://www.usa.canon.com/consumer/contr ... delid=7328

But others will say you can fix it in photoshop; me, I'm old school. Photoshop can't fix a physical slide.

Surprisingly I would say yes you do need to go wider than 28 on a crop body. 28 = 45mm full frame - almost the old 'standard' lens. Not wide at all. I loved 28mm on 35mm (the old 28-105), and just to get to 28mm roughly on a APS-C crop (darn I have to mention that since I too have a crop body) would be 17/18mm - which is why Canon has those EF-S lenses.

Save up for a 17-40/4L. You'll have the upgrade path, and get the general focal lengths you're missing with the 28-135.


But to answer your question completely: You can manage. I had a D30 for years, and that was well before EF-S, so I was stuck, so I learned to work around it. But once you see what wide angle can do....you'll probably never go back.

 

[gary]

i'll throw my .02 in here, yes getting wider than 28mm is really important, esp at wdw, i took some of the same pics from the same places for years, finally got the 10-22 and can't believe the changes in perspective, what's now in the shot etc. really opens up whole new areas of creativity

and i would explore other options besides the 28-135, it was a good lens back in the day, but it hasn't been upgraded since issue, the IS is the first gen, oldest IS canon has, how old, why i won grand prize in a photo contest with a pic taken with that lens, mounted on a d60, those familiar with canon history will know that's 3 models prior to the 40d

if you think you'll go full frame some day, go with the 17-40, it's a little wider than the 28 end, if you see staying crop for awhile, by all means try to finance the 10-22, i took mine on the med cruise back in may. it really shined in the narrow streets of europe, and allowed some real good almost pano stuff in plazas, much as you would get shooting wide in the open areas of the parks

 

[Jalva22]

Hi all! Thanks for the responses! I've made my purchase! Now the happy owner of a Canon 40D! I went ahead and bought the 28-135 as I got a great deal on the kit. Circuit City had it for $100 off and then I added a 10% AAA discount (which took care of sales tax and a little more). So I got the kit for $1,375. The way I figure it, the 28-135 was basically had for under $100. Well worth that price, I figured, and should tide me over until I can afford a nicer lens. Still leaves me weak on the wide end, so upgrading will still be a priority.

I also bought the 50 1.4. I'm enjoying playing around with it already (but doing more manual reading than shooting so far).

Next purchase will be the 580EX II sometime next spring, then will begin saving for something along the lines of the 17-40L or the 17-55.

Now, I've just got to figure out how to get back down to WDW!

Thanks again for the replies! And thanks to you, Tim! Your original 20D shots were the things that originally piqued my interest in the Canon xxD line!

 

[Roger]

Enjoy the Mk3 mini-me! I'm glad they came out with the customized shooting modes, plus your auto-ISO options are a little more available.

But you might want to consider a used 580 EX (I) - the II really only had a weathersealing upgrade and a studio lighting plug added, which I doubt you'll need. The weathersealing isn't going to matter as much since I don't think Canon aggressively sealed the flash mount on the 40D. But the flash itself, the power, etc. wasn't changed.

 

[gary]

actually consider the promaster line for flash, i picked one up in syracuse as a backup for my neices wedding for karen to use on the xti, seems to do real well esp since i'm not a studio shooter, and price new was around $200 with tax, which as everyone knows is high in new york

 

[Dan]

I'm currently really not seeing the price drop in a used 580 EX versus a new EX II to be worth it. You can get a new II from B&H for $360 with a rebate. An instant rebate, so apparently no mail-in monkey business to deal with. Or.. you can get a used mark one from Adorama for $330.

I looked on Ebay and found a used Mark one going for more than a new Mark II. Maybe I'm looking in the wrong places.

I've taken the point, in any case, if I do find a cheap 580 EX I'll go for it, I've been thinking I should invest in a good flash and I was unclear if there were any changes made to the mark II that would be relevant to me.