Posted by Paul DeCesare on February 18, 2009 at 12:33 PM
Canon just announced two new TS-Es, one is the new 24mm version 2, and a new 17mm. I HOPE the 17mm has better edges than what we get from the 17-40mm (any of the Canon ultrawide zooms actually). I don't think anyone's made a 17mm tilt-shift lens before. If this turns out to be a good design, the landscape world may have a new gem on their hands (a $2,499 gem... yikes!).
Posted by David Bostedo on February 18, 2009 at 1:59 PM
Paul - From what I understand, since a tilt-shift lens has to cover a much larger image circle than a standard lens, there's almost no way the corners would be soft. If you take a simple straight on shot, you're really only using the center portion of the lens. Sort of like using a 35mm lens on a crop camera.
Posted by Buck Ward on February 18, 2009 at 8:29 PM
Before I got the 24mm TS, everybody told me it would be my favorite lens. Well, sometimes it's just not wide enough on my 1.3 crop body. I welcomed the announcement of the 17mm TS lens, but the price is off-putting. It makes the 5D MkII all that much more attractive.
Posted by Darwin Wiggett on February 18, 2009 at 9:51 PM
Yeah but... you can not filter this puppy, not even a polarizer, let alone grads.. that sucks! And the 24mm now has an 82mm filter thread rather than 77mm so you need to move up to bigger filters. And the price?? Yikes!! Gotta sell my house first! The current 24mm TSE is pretty decent, the new 24mm TSE had better blow the doors off the old one for the asking price! The new TS revloving feature looks amazing though! Darwin
Posted by Buck Ward on February 18, 2009 at 10:24 PM
I saw an article - instructions on how to reset the tilt shift features of the older lens so that the tilt and shift are both on the same axis. Or you can have Canon do it. I've been thinkng about that. Yes the revolving feature would be nice.
Posted by Bill Pelzmann on February 18, 2009 at 11:53 PM
Darwin, given the suggested retail price, I agree upgrading to the new 24 TS-E is far from a "no-brainer".
One of the significant factors to consider is the much larger image circle - now 67.2mm compared to the old 58.6 mm. That should allow use of the entire 12mm shift, instead of only 8mm of the 11mm previously available. But it remains to be seen how well the shifted image quality holds up to the unshifted MTF curves.
I may not be able to justify either of the 2 new lenses, but I'm sure glad to see Canon doing more than just tweaking the design and adding a new lens coating.
Posted by David Taylor on February 19, 2009 at 2:52 AM
Now if they'd just announce a new 100-400 IS f4...
Posted by Tom Nevesely on February 19, 2009 at 10:20 AM
I agree that it's too bad that the 17mm won't accept filters and that the new 24mm would probably need the larger 4x6 filters. That would mean a whole lot more money (on top of the already insane price) for the larger filters.
The original 24mm TS-E is working just fine for me and is my overall favorite lens. I think I'll be sticking with it for now.
Posted by Wim Reyns on February 19, 2009 at 2:10 PM
I could live with hand holding grad filters, but having to polarizer is the killer for me on the 17mm,
the price is also pretty steep.
Wim
Posted by Paul DeCesare on February 19, 2009 at 8:47 PM
The price is way out there for my budget, but if RentGlass.com gets a 17mm in stock and I have a good photo opportunity, it might be interesting to rent one for a week. If so, I might send out a "what do I need to know about TS-Es" post in the future.
One thing I DO know about my 5D Mark II regarding TS-Es... you have to set Silent Shooting to Disabled in the LiveView menu or your images will be hugely over exposed (same goes when using Macro tubes). The default setting is Mode1, so you have to disable it out of the box. It's even in the Canon manual about that, so it's probably not going to be in a firmware fix.
David B, thanks for the explanation, "since a tilt-shift lens has to cover a much larger image circle than a standard lens, there's almost no way the corners would be soft". That's encouraging, even if the lens isn't filter-friendly!
Posted by Bill Pelzmann on February 19, 2009 at 10:52 PM
"since a tilt-shift lens has to cover a much larger image circle than a standard lens, there's almost no way the corners would be soft".
Yes, until you shift it and have to use the edges of the image circle.
Posted by David Bostedo on February 20, 2009 at 9:24 AM
Yes, until you shift it and have to use the edges of the image circle.
True, but since Paul compared it to a non-T/S lens, I assumed he was talking about corners without shifting. I wonder how good the corners will be fully shifted....
Posted by Paul DeCesare on February 20, 2009 at 2:01 PM
David, that's true, I haven't worked with a TS before, so I was thinking simply a 17mm with great edges. But now that Bill mentioned it, I'm aware of that now. See? Discussion on this site is always informative.
Discussion
12 repliesOne of the significant factors to consider is the much larger image circle - now 67.2mm compared to the old 58.6 mm. That should allow use of the entire 12mm shift, instead of only 8mm of the 11mm previously available. But it remains to be seen how well the shifted image quality holds up to the unshifted MTF curves.
I may not be able to justify either of the 2 new lenses, but I'm sure glad to see Canon doing more than just tweaking the design and adding a new lens coating.
The original 24mm TS-E is working just fine for me and is my overall favorite lens. I think I'll be sticking with it for now.
the price is also pretty steep.
Wim
One thing I DO know about my 5D Mark II regarding TS-Es... you have to set Silent Shooting to Disabled in the LiveView menu or your images will be hugely over exposed (same goes when using Macro tubes). The default setting is Mode1, so you have to disable it out of the box. It's even in the Canon manual about that, so it's probably not going to be in a firmware fix.
David B, thanks for the explanation, "since a tilt-shift lens has to cover a much larger image circle than a standard lens, there's almost no way the corners would be soft". That's encouraging, even if the lens isn't filter-friendly!
Yes, until you shift it and have to use the edges of the image circle.