EF-S Lenses: 17-85IS vs 18-55 advice please!

[damian_tinsley]

I already own an EOS 50E and have a 24mm f2.8 prime, 50mm f1.4 prime

and 100-300mm zoom. I'm a little concerned as I've seen both the

50mm and the 24mm take a pasting on this site recently, but hey I

already own them so the following is a genuine thirst for

knowledge...

I am just about to dive into dSLR - mainly because I can't remember

the last time I bothered with the hassle of getting the 50E out

instead of a very restrictive but oh-so-convenient IXUS400, and then

with the expense of getting the film negatives scanned generally

with less than satisfactory results when compared to the IXUS.

Given the lenses I already have, is it worth the extra money to have

a walk-around lens as potentially useful as the image stabilisted 17-

85? Or, since the 18-55 is so cheap and I have the inbuilt quality

of the primes to fall back on for serious portrait & landscape work,

should I save the cash and get a 580EX speedlight instead?

[bobatkins]

Get both an EF-S 18-55 and a EF 28-135 IS. Cost is about the same as a EF-S 17-85 IS and you can use the EF 28-135 on your film body should you wish to.

 

Only YOU can say if a 580 speedlite will be more useful for YOU than a "walkaround" lens. Only YOU can say if switching primes will be so much of a burden to YOU that you miss shots.

[damian_tinsley]

Cheers Bob - I don't know about a burden to *me* of switching primes, my wife is generally the one who ends up on 'holding spare lens duty'! I guess I'm really asking if anyone knows whether the image quality is worth the price differential and perhaps also how people rate the IS function as I haven't toyed with it before.

[phule]

<< holding spare lens duty >>

 

Maybe what you really need is a better camera bag?

[awindsor]

That is a serious proposition ! He already married the bag :D

[phule]

Ouch!

[damian_tinsley]

Laugh - I nearly did! So nobody knows anything about the 17-85 then?

[maureen_m]

My own "bag" (traveling companion) likes to tell everyone that he spends his vacations following me around, holding my gear, while I change lenses and shoot. He conveniently leaves out the minor detail that I pay for the trips...<p>Like Bob says, the 17-85 is pricey; get the 18-55 kit lens and the 28-135 IS, and go from there. With those lenses, plus what you already have, you'll have a very useful kit. Then, you may find that you can easily let go of one or two of your current lenses (starting with the 24mm?) to pay for a flash.

[sjg]

I have the 20D and 17-85 and am happy with both.

I used a 300D with the 18-55 briefly last year, and liked the pics, but

the 18-55 just felt too flimsy for me.

 

From what I've read, the 18-55 may be as good optically - at least for

much of the range, and at 1/5 the cost its something to consider.

The 17-85 is by no means L quality (I just borrowed a 17-40/4L to

compare) but it feels much more solid than the 18-55.

FWIW my crude tests, suggest that while the 17-40 was noticably better at

the wide end, the 17-85 wasn't bad and from 35mm onwards it looked

better (actually it looked good from 24mm f8). Considering the extra

range the 17-85 gives and IS I'm satisfied with the result.

 

So for me, the 17-85 wins. I just couldn't live with the

flimsy feel of the 18-55, and I wanted a bit more range without having

to carry another lens all the time. Your needs may differ of course.

[steve_dunn2]

<cite>So nobody knows anything about the 17-85 then?</cite>

 

<p>Very few people have one yet; until the last week or two, both B&H and Adorama listed it as "coming soon", and there only seems to be one photo.netter who actually owns this lens (and he's already spoken up in this thread :-)</p>

 

<p>You asked about whether IS is useful. For some people and some applications, very; for others, not. My walkaround lens (on 35mm) is the 28-135, and while I often don't need IS, I often do. It's got me tons of shots I'd not have had without it. I also have the 300/4L IS USM, which benefits even more from IS, since its focal length magnifies shake even more than the 28-135 does. Having IS on the long lens has almost made my tripod obsolete; a monopod + IS isn't as stable as a tripod, of course, and it won't hold the camera up on its own, but I'd have to guess the monopod + IS lets me shoot at shutter speeds a couple of stops slower than IS handheld, which in turn lets me shoot at shutter speeds a couple of stops slower than non-IS handheld. Very handy (as long as I don't need a faster shutter speed to freeze <em>subject</em> motion, of course - IS does nothing to help with that). See also the standard article <a href="http://www.photo.net/equipment/canon/is_lenses/">Canon IS Lenses

- "Worth it" or not?</a>.</p>

[casey mcallister]

I bought the 17-85IS lense last Saturday and tested it for about an hour. I was pleased with the results, so I used it exclusively for a paid event (Wedding shot all PJ style...no formals, which is always prime lense turf anyway.)

 

My intial findings:

 

For environs of low light where you want increased DOF at the AV 6.5-8.0 range this lense is very useful. I say this because you can hand hold the lense at VERY slow TV's and drag the shutter to collect more light. I routinely shot at 1/25 @ in the 50-85mm range and got very clean shots! Another benefit to this approach is that autofocus performance declines as EV drops, so shooting at midrange aperatures is more forgiving in regards to AF miscalculations.

 

The zoom range is ideal for a 1.6x crop factor.

 

However, shots taken below 20mm showed signficant barrel distortion. I did not notice any chromatic abberation, but was not shooting the types of pictures where it this is prevalent.

 

Shots taken at 85mm are OK, pix taken at 135 on the film equivalent are no where near comparable. Given optics in general this makes a lot of sense.

 

The build is OK, but could be a little better considerng the price, and it does not come with a flowered lense hood...geeeez a $10 piece of plastic...again for the price it should!

 

I also use the 28-135 IS and the 17-85 seems to perform better stopped down. The autofucus seems faster and the IS kicks in almost instantly.

 

Ultimately you have a tough decision of your hands, because you shoot both formats. If your OK with the fact that your getting into a proprietary EF-S lense mount, then I would say buy it.

 

See:

 

http://www.wlcastleman.com/equip/reviews/20D/index.htm

 

for a more complete review of this lense.

 

Casey

[yakim_peled1]

I suffer from perfectitis terminalis in it's acute state. It's symptoms are that I can't buy anything but the best, even if it's more expensive (my wife hates me for this) and I can't recommend anything but the best. Now you can understand why I advise you to get the 17-40/4. Also, I think it would function as a great walkaround lens for a DSLR.

 

Happy shooting ,

Yakim.