Another gear question

Another of those “what would you recommend” questions …

Given that I am only looking at Canon equipment so I don’t have to replace anything I already possess, I have the following questions:

In your opinion what is:

1. The best (and alternatively, the most cost effective quality for price) lens for landscape photography?

2. What is the best (and alternatively, the most cost effective quality for price) DSLR body for both landscape and wildlife subjects?

As the Victorian novelists used to say, “I have expectations” but also I always like to be prudent with my spending.

Thanks

Richard
Montreal

1) Canon 17-40L Camera Store

2) 30D, 40D, 50D

if one body for wildlife and landscape, you probably want a crop sensor camera for fov reach (wildlife/birds) and the 5 fps for action sequences, hence the 40D or 50D for the body. In order to get a 16mm actual field of view for lansdscapes, you will need a lense that zooms out to 10mm. The Canon EF-S 10-22mm.

c.w. moynihan wrote:In order to get a 16mm actual field of view for lansdscapes...

Not that getting a 16mm-e field of view is necessary for landscapes. I've never taken a landscape shot wider than 24 mm, but mostly take them at longer focal lengths than that. Depends on what you want to a very large extent.

1. The 17-40 is not the best or even remotely close to the "best" landscape lens for Canon. it has horrible linear distortion and is incapable of taking a shot with a straight horizon on any copy I have ever seen. Yes it can be straightened in post processing but there are lenses that don't need that. The "best" is probably a Zeiss Distagon 21mm but this is certainly not an economical lens or a versatile lens. If you are looking at zooms and ever plan to get a full frame sensor camera then I would recommend the 24-70 f/2.8L lens. It may take a couple of samples to get a really good one. If you are going crop sensor then the Canon EF-S 17-55 f/2.8 is probably the best crop sensor only wide to normal zoom made. But to give you better suggestions you have to be much ore specific in what you are looking for than simply "what's the best?" Landscape photography covers everything from about 14mm to 300mm so it would be helpful to know what focal length range you are looking for.

2. The 5D Mark II or 1Ds Mark III in the Canon system. You get the megapixels for lots of detail for landscapes and you can crop it to the 1.3x crop factor of the 1D mark III and still have more pixels left than the 1 D mark III. You do give up a little in noise performance though.

Richard - As you can see, there's going to be a wide variety of responses. To get really good feedback, specifying a budget is really important. Otherwise "most cost effective quality for price" is completely subjective. I could use that criteria to suggest just about any camera in Canon's line-up for instance.

dbostedo wrote:Richard - As you can see, there's going to be a wide variety of responses. To get really good feedback, specifying a budget is really important. Otherwise "most cost effective quality for price" is completely subjective. I could use that criteria to suggest just about any camera in Canon's line-up for instance.

I appreciate that i should have suggested a budget, and my thanks to everyone who has answered thus far - very helpful ... but it really is not terribly important to me. I have always believed in buying the best tool for the job, regardless of cost, while at the same time trying to avoid purchasing expensive glitz or features that I will never use - hence my secondary request for thoughts on value for money options if they exist. Often this means that i have to wait to get what i want, but I am old enough to be patient in these matters.

I started digital photography with a particular interest in birds although my style is the walk-about with as portable a lens as can be managed as I am also an avid "birder" and so have a huge and heavy spotting scope with me most of time as well (I used to digiscope) but i have found my interests turning more and more to landscape work because I am not ready to add the weight of a 600mm lens to everything else (I'd need a golf cart) and anyway, I often find myself sitting around in some pretty neat scenery while waiting for the right bird to show up and do its stuff so i am trying to capitalise on that opportunity. I even found myself photographing skunks and toadstools recently !! I am probably the last person on the planet using a 20D and am ready to upgrade that body and so got to thinking about lenses too. Retirement approaches and I'd better do this while I still have a good income.

Thanks again everyone - much food for thought.

baldsparrow wrote:I appreciate that i should have suggested a budget, and my thanks to everyone who has answered thus far - very helpful ... but it really is not terribly important to me.

Well that gives a much better idea at least - if you aren't very budget limited, then E.J.'s suggestions are much more in play. I'm sure others would echo his recommendations, although the 50D would still be a good option depending on what you value most.

baldsparrow wrote:I am probably the last person on the planet using a 20D and am ready to upgrade that body and so got to thinking about lenses too.

The 20D is still a capable camera, and you might want to ask yourself what you don't like about it, and your lenses. Do you really need a LOT more resolution (5DMKII and 1DsIII)? Do you mind a body that's much bigger/heavier (1DsIII)? Do you still want the option to get lots of reach without lenses quite so big and heavy (50D for cropped sensor)? How much do you feel you want zooms versus primes, and are you OK giving up a little quality to have the zoom? There are always going to be trade-offs, unfortunately.

If a "landscape" is difficult to define, a "good landscape lens" is even more difficult... Some photographers enjoy long lens landscapes while others prefer wides or extra-wide lenses. On way to solve the problem is just by having a nice zoom lens (like the 24-70, E.J. suggested), but personally I like more and more primes over zooms... Yes, today some zooms are even sharper than many primes, so this not so much of an issue like it was in the past. And yes, one of the advantages of primes over zooms was that they could be brighter (bigger maximum aperture) than zooms in the same range. But as we all know, classic landscape photography needs small apertures (for greater depth of field) and not the opposite. So why do I like primes? First because I don't have fast lenses for low light photography and slow lenses for big DOF, second because I find that creative narrow depth of field landscape photography can often be more interesting than classic landscapes, but most important, because I find that not having the zoom forces the photographer to work harder to obtain the right composition, leading to better results.
Said that, I still trust my old 16-35 many of my landscape photography (in a crop camera), but if I could I would certainly add a few more primes to my equipment...
Another thing I think you should keep in mind is that most snap shots are taken with lenses between 28 and 70mm equivalents, and many unexperienced photographers fall in the trap of becoming dazzled with extreme wide angle shots just because they look different. It´s easy to make impact images with extreme wide angle lenses, but after a while they all start looking very similar... For me, photography is about choices, and you cant chose much when everything falls in your frame... I like the ideal of leaving only the essential, so like someone already said, I would suggest a not so short landscape lens...

To answer your questions directly, regarding the lens, if money was not a big problem I would pick the Zeiss Distagon 21mm, but I could also consider Canon TS-E 24mm f/3.5L II and the EF 24mm f/1.4L II USM.
For the camera I would definitely pick the EOS 5DMkII.

If you are after the very best in wide angle, the Zeiss 21mm enjoys a great reputation. Though it will be manual focus and currently only available as an adapted lens. Zeiss has announced plans for a range of lenses in Nikon, Pentax and Canon mounts, though strangely enough the only lenses it has produced for Canon mount so far are the 50mm and 85mm, while B&H has in stock a full range for both Nikon and Pentax, including the 21mm f2.8 & 18mm f3.5. Here's a link to the lenses on B&H:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/control ... 2Cupper(ds)&sq=asc&sortDrop=Relevance&ac=&bsi=&bhs=t&shs=carl+zeiss+lens&basicSubmit=Submit+Query

They of course will suit a particular style of landscape shot, the classic being spectacular vista incorporating a close foreground interest and would really need a full frame camera to take advantage of that.

I agree with E.J., but I would also consider the 24-105 f/4 Canon lens.

ChrisRoss wrote: though strangely enough the only lenses it has produced for Canon mount so far are the 50mm and 85mm, while B&H has in stock a full range for both Nikon and Pentax, including the 21mm f2.8 & 18mm f3.5. Here's a link to the lenses on B&H:

The 50 and 85 were the first two available for Nikon, so I suspect Zeiss will be trickling the others out for Canon too.

Bob Boner wrote:I agree with E.J., but I would also consider the 24-105 f/4 Canon lens.

Except that on a full frame camera it's really a 28-105 unless you don't mind black corners. Otherwise yes, it's an excellent choice although has worse chromatic aberration than the 24-70. but it was my primary lens for about two years on a 1Ds mark II so it is definitely up to the task.