jcmellen

Alan, You aren't making this easy on me! The fixed F4 of the Tokina really is an added bonus for me.

 

I just worry about the CA of the Tokina, and is it usable at F4? I'd like to confidantly pull a 11x14 print at F4 if need be. Am I hearing correctly that the Tokina can be used on FF bodies and film bodies?

 

I am now leaning towards the ultra-wide zooms...thinking that the 20mm fixed just isn't as wide as I want.

As much as I like that solution, its not an option at the moment.

William:

 

Gear list: 20D, 24-70 2.8L, 70-200 2.8L, 50mm 1.8.

 

I should state that landscape would most likely be primary use, followed by portraits (different perspectives with wide angles) and studio work. Reason i'm in such a rush now is i'm planning a photo excursion to Death Valley the first week of February...this is making me lean towards probably the sigma 10-20mm. But, I'm booked for a wedding in October (was volunteered), and am getting pressure from my wife and other clients to do weddings.

 

The stubborn part of me cringes at buying a lens that can't be used on a FF or film body. I still have my film bodies, and even though i haven't put a single roll of film through them for 2 years, having them to use if i want them is still there, and the thought of having a lens that can't be used on them kills me for some reason.

Thanks Matthias

 

How did you do that? i spent 20 minutes trying to fix that format and it kept reverting back to the state above....I got tired of messing with it and said screw it and posted it as is.

 

The photo.net forums are too tempermental.

 

I keep going back and forth. Just a matter of two weeks ago, weddings were completely out of the picture - was just going to be used for landscapes and studio work. But now i'm being pressured to do weddings, and the slower lenses kind of scare me when used in dark settings such as a church.

 

I just wonder if there is enough of a difference between 20mm and 24mm to bother buying a 20mm by itself.

Ok....I have a decision to make and i'm stumped on it. Lookin' for others

takes, thoughts, and experiences with these lenses.

 

I'm in need (and want) of a wide angle. If I were only using said wide angle

for landscape or studio stuff, this would be an easier decision - but I like

the thought of having a faster lens for potential low light situations for

things that might pop up such as a wedding or what have you. My goal is to

have this by February - but i'm thinking that is probably a pipe dream - but

its not gonna stop me from trying.

 

Options:

Sigma 20mm 1.8

Pros: Fast lens, good perspective, lens gets great reviews, $400ish, can be

used on any Canon EF body.

 

Cons: Fixed lens - potentially a weak point for shooting weddings or the like,

Front filter = 82mm while other lenses in my arsenal are 77mm meaning that i

have to have new filters just for one lens

 

 

Canon 17-40 F4L

Pros: Fixed F4, wider than 20mm - good for cropped sensor bodies, 77mm filter

size - same as other lenses, good lens with good reviews (but there are known

bad copies on the market). Can be used on any Canon EF body.

 

Cons: Expensive option - $250ish more expensive than fixed 20mm. Most of range

of lens is already covered with my 24-70mm. Not as fast as fixed 20mm

 

 

Sigma 10-20 F4-5.6

Pros: Super wide option. Good range. Good lens with good reviews. 77mm filter

size

 

Cons: Fairly slow, not bad for landscape or studio work, but not good for low

light situations. $100 more than fixed 20mm. Can only be used on cropped

sensor bodies - becomes expensive paperweight if I upgrade to a 1 series Canon

body, and cannot be used on film body.

 

 

Canon 10-22 F3.5-4.5

Pros: Little bit faster than Sigma 10-20mm. Super wide option. Good Range.

Good lens with good reviews.

 

Cons: Most epensive lens of the bunch. Does not come with lenshood - thats

another $35. Still not as fast as prime lens. Can also only be used on

cropped sensor bodies - useless on 1 series or full frame cameras.

 

 

Any thoughts or experiences with any of these lens? Any pros or cons you'd

like to add? I'm leaning towards the Sigma 20mm or the Canon 17-40. I'd like

to have a wider throw that the 10-20mm lenses have, but I'm being pushed to

grow a pair, and start shooting weddings, and don't want to be stuck in a

church like setting and be stuck with a slower lens. Also not being able to

use them on my film body, or on another camera in the future when I upgrade is

a massive turnoff to me.

Be very very thankful that you have overcast skies! That just made your job soooo much easier.

 

Broad daylight = metering nightmare. Highschool stadium lights at night = poor lighting nightmare. Overcast daytime game = heaven.

 

I'd keep it on iso800. Might even stop down a half a stop or so, as lenses tend to be their least sharp wide open....even the Canon 70-200 2.8L. I'd keep it on 3.5 or so. You should easily be able to pull 1/500 shutter speed. If your pulling faster than that, I'd even drop your ISO down to 400 if you can get away with it.

 

When shooting HS football, i'm usually happy if I can pull 1/350...and am extatic if i can get 1/500. 1/250 is usually typical for most stadiums in my area.

 

If you look at the photos in this section - http://www.photo.net/photodb/folder?folder_id=554946 - the first 16 were all taken during an afternoon football game in overcast lighting. If i remember correctly, I was shooting with a 20D, 400mm 2.8L, iso800, and 1/500ish at probably f3.5. The next 8 photos were taken at a night game (with unusually good lights for the area) with a 20D, a 300mm 2.8L (think), and were probably at iso1600 at 1/250 or 1/350 @ 2.8.

Well, I pull 28 inch prints off my 20D without problem. In fact, I have two 28x16 prints (matted and framed to 36x24) hanging in my house from my 20D.

 

I seem to recall you saying at one point that you don't like to crop to try to keep the highest image quality possible - although I could be imagining that. I seriously don't think it'd be a problem to pull 30" prints off a MKIII.

I eventually got it. I held it horizontally which isn't easy with a 6 foot wide reflector.

Ok...this is embarrassing. I purchased a 42 inch 5 in 1 reflector. I was able

to consistantly fold it up after a few tries. But I decided that it was too

small for my needs, so I traded it in for a 72x42...and i'll be damned if i

can't fold this thing back up. i'm to the point where i'm afraid i'm gonna

damage it.

 

I know its a stupid question, thats damn near impossible to describe, but i'm

running out of ideas. How in the hell do I fold a 72x42 oval reflector?

Hit submit too fast....

 

what kind of budget are you looking at? I think you'd be better off buying a used 300mm 2.8. Even a Sigma 300 2.8 would be a descent option.

I don't know anything about the Tamron, so I can't comment on that...but my instincts tell me that quality won't be excellent on that. The big problem that I see is that its terribly slow. Are these sports that you are shooting daytime or nighttime? If nighttime...don't waist your money. WAY too slow for that.

I also don't believe the lenses focus the same speed on different bodies. I had an oportunity to play with the 20D and a EOS 3 side by side with two 70-200 2.8L non-IS versions. The EOS 3 was quite noticably faster than the 20D...which disappointed me since the 20D was mine, and i just bought it at the time. When pushing the shutter button down half way on each camera at the same time...the lens on the EOS 3 kicked in and started focusing immediately, while there seemed to be about 1/4 of a second delay before it started on the 20D. Also...with lens caps on, focusing to infinity and back....the EOS 3 was able to focus to infinity and back faster than the 20D. I even switched lenses around on the cameras thinking that maybe one lens was a newer generation (mine being about 6 or 7 years old at the time, while the other was fairly new). Still didnt make a difference.

 

Makes me want to purchase a 1D MKII so much more now...since sports is a big part of what I do...it disappoints me to be missing that extra AF speed.

David...i agree with what you say, and I have been making a point to comment and critique on more photo's recently. I'm afraid that I send the wrong message with this thread...that it looks like i'm seeking the holy grail as E Walker mentions. I want to make a point that its not about getting high ratings to get an elusive spot on TRP, its about recieving critiques and pointers as I'm still deep into a learning stage at this point. Getting ideas and pointers from other photographers is quite important.

 

I also agree with posting multiple pictures for ratings up at the same time...as it pushes other photos off the main pages quickly...even though I may have been guilty of posting a couple at the same time in the past.

 

I will say that the new (semi) layout leaving many many more photo's on the page before dropping off is a very welcomed addition in my eyes.

Ok thanks all...that is good to know.

 

Walker...i read through your thread about why TRP are the holy grail of PN.

 

For me...I could care less about ratings. I've learned that ratings don't mean much, especailly with the anonymous rating system...where I see some work that I consider brilliant getting 3's and 4's and see other work of which would and should be considered snapshots and throw-aways getting 6's. For me, TRP gives more exposure, which often translates to more critiques. That is what I'm really after. I'd put pictures of for critique only, but most of the time they drop off the page with 2 comments if i'm lucky.

So if I have a photo in my gallery for a while, and eventually put it up for critiques and ratings, it will not hit the top rated galleries?

Out of curiosity...why do my photos never seem to appear in the top rated

photo gallery? I'm not concerned out of ego, but i'm interested in getting

more views and more comments, and having photos floating in top rated helps

get this done since pictures tend to drop off the main page so fast these

days. I see pictures that were posted at the same time, or even after me with

sometimes less ratings and lower ratings and make it to top rated photo's, but

mine don't (they use too, but not anymore).

 

Can anybody shed some light on this?

I laughed at this....only because it sounds exactly like something that I would do.

 

Reminds of my days working newspapers. Was covering a baseball game one night. Wanted to play with multiple exposures.

 

Finished playing with it....but forgot to turn off feature on camera and continued to shoot the game...after a while, i thought somethign was wrong with my camera, because i started to notice that i couldn't hear the film being advanced between frames. Took me a minute to remember what was wrong when i finally noticed the "problem".

Canons 100mm 2.8 macro is pretty much the standard. Also tips itself into the legendary optics catagory.

Were the photographs that you took underexposed? Even at 100iso, if you underexpose a photograph, and try to pull it out in photoshop, the image will be noisy. As a test, take a picture of something outside, in broad daylight. Make sure it is properly exposed...use histogram. Then blow up at 100% and check out noise. If its still noisy...then yeah, I'd say that you may have a problem.

 

With the photographs shown...i wonder how much editing was done, or if the exposure was pulled up in photoshop.

Pro-ball is lighted for TV, so lighting should be more or less ample. I don't really think you'll be able to squeeze out 1/500 @ 3.5 with iso1600...but you may. I'm thinking you'll have better luck at 1/250@3.5...but you'll have to see what your meter says.

I think your going to be really really disappointed at your focal length when you get there. Especially from the stands. Might be able to get some pretty wide angle shots of stadium of lens is fast enough.

 

If you want any action, you won't be happy with anything less than a 300mm...and thats if your on the field. I've never shot pro-baseball, but have shot countless HS baseball games...200mm is short even for that.

 

Good luck though.

I understand it this way...although I could be wrong. Hot shoe flashes at full power generally have a flash duration of 1/1000. Every time you half the power, the flash duratoin shortens the same.

Example:

1/1 power = 1/1000

1/2 power = 1/2000

1/4 power = 1/4000

1/8 power = 1/8000

1/16 power = 1/16000

and so on.

 

I recently went through this myself with water droplets and trying to catch objects being dropped in water...i kept getting motion blur with my novatrons, and started researching...posting in the lighting and technique forum in PN started my research. Using hotshoe flash fixed my motion blur problem.

 

Thread can be seen here

http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=00GP5G

Only problem I have is when I first got it, and tried it out using AA's, it would only take 2 pictures before giving me a dead battery signal on the camera. I had a hard time believing that 2 pictures drained the batteries...so I contacted Canon.

 

Their response? "Don't use AA's, use the BP511A"...and that was their only response. Well then, why give me a freaking option to use AA's then...that pissed me off. I later find out that its been recalled to fix that problem. Canon really needs to work on their customer service.

 

But other than that...I've had no problems with the vertical grip. I don't think I could live without it.

Kinda same problem with my 20D. Manual says 9 shots...but it bogs down after 6 shots. Wondered if something was wrong with my camera.

Its worth it, its worth it, 100,000 times, its worth it. I started with my first VG on my first A2, and will never own a camera without one. Increased weight is insignificant in my eyes. Increased bulk is a good thing in my eyes...and extra battery capacity obviously has its benefits.

 

The only thing about the BG-E2, is that its made kinda chinsy...that kinda bugs me....but even knowing that now, I'd still buy it. I shoot alot of verticles so having the controls there is unbelievably handy.

 

Some of the earlier models (mine included) got recalled, and I can't bring myself to send it in to Canon, cause I don't want to take it off and shoot without it. I'm going to have to break down and do so soon I guess.