This is a sharp, contrasty pancake lens with good control of flare. At 2.8, there's not much bokeh to talk about though, and so this might be the reason why the images randered do not have the 3d pop. The drawing style is rather boring.
weekh wrote:
This is a sharp, contrasty pancake lens with good control of flare. At 2.8, there's not much bokeh to talk about though, and so this might be the reason why the images randered do not have the 3d pop. The drawing style is rather boring.
Oh well, it's a "video" lens for their primary customers and the poor still photographers get the scraps that fall off the table..
Back to photographic reality, the f/2.8 is "slowish" which many people have already registered as a negative, but I ordered it for street shooting. I'm not close to home and don't have a 35mm or 50mm prime with me, so when I heard about the 40mm pancake, I thought it might fit the bill and ordered it instead of another 50mm.
Have you tried shooting to maximize bokeh? I noticed some nice circular sunlight blobs in the pigeon shot which I'm assuming were aided by the 7 blades, but none of the other shots looked like they were good bokeh or OOF background opportunities.
Size aside, what is your over all impression of it, and if possibly how would you rate it versus a 50mm f/1.8?
Generally it looks good (especially the flare control) but the bokeh is way to nervous for my liking. If you have 50/1.8 and/or 35/2 I'd love to see some comparison shots.
i can't comment on the IQ yet, but regarding build and AF:
build is good, not L but definitely feels way better than the 50 1.8 and even the 50 1.4. the MF ring is easy to turn but is very smooth and doesn't have any of that plastic on plastic feel of the non-L 50's. you have to put the lens on MF to manual focus. the lens telescopes a little bit when close-focusing - about 1/4". the focus ring seems to control the focus electronically - it's not physically connected at all. so you can't MF with the camera off. there's no infinity stop or MFD stop, the ring can just turn endlessly.
the STM drive is very quiet. kind of sounds like listening to an old dot matrix printer that's inside a cardboard box 200 meters away. like this faint, kind of muffled whir/buzz. i can see how the video people will dig it. also, the AF is very smooth... the movement isn't jerky at all, it's very fluid. again, something i'm sure video folks really care about. the focus definitely *seems* slower than my other lenses... but i'm not sure how much of it is that the smoothness of the AF just feels so controlled and slow. i think if you need *REALLY* fast AF you won't like it. but it certainly seems quick enough to lock on for street type use. i haven't tried servo focusing with it yet, so that's completely up in the air.
mounted on a 5d mk. iii, the front element of the lens only sticks out about 1/4" further than the hand grip.
matejphoto wrote:
I think thanks to this the lens is available quickly after announcement.
It seems to me that everything made outside of Japan is quickly available.
Rebels, 60D?, kit lenses
And everything (maybe with the exception of 5Dm3) made in Japan is a 6 month - 12 month delay.
Examples: 24-70II, 200-400 f4IS, 1Dx
I own a 60D and XTi and both were made in Japan. Not sure if Canon makes these models offshore too but the T3i I just saw at Costco was Japan made as well. I think quickly available has more to do with potential sales and inexpensive cameras and lens sell millions of units whereas high-end is low volume.
I'm still waiting for mine to ship. My excitement has definitely waned though with every post.
Perhaps, and I hope, I'm wrong, but it's just seeming like it's an average lens for photographers and I had hoped for something better. Oh well, that's Canon for ya.....
I'll wait to try the lens before I decide, but I couldn't care less about video if I tried, so whatever features they built into this for video people are completely lost on me.
Gochugogi wrote:
I own a 60D and XTi and both were made in Japan. Not sure if Canon makes these models offshore too but the T3i I just saw at Costco was Japan made as well. I think quickly available has more to do with potential sales and inexpensive cameras and lens sell millions of units whereas high-end is low volume.
Interesting, my T3i was made in Taiwan. And all of my EF-s lenses (18-55 IS II, 55-250IS and 60mm) were made NOT in Japan. I have no problem with that, all of those lenses are great considering the price. For general family photos I almost always take the T3i kit and leave the 5Dm2 with bag of Ls at home.
My 15-85 IS and Elan 7NE were made in Taiwan. However, my Elan 7E was made in Japan. So, some models are made both offshore and domestically. The 15-85 is amazingly well made--better than my 17-55 2.8--and sharp as a whip. I haven't played with any of the newest Rebels but my sister's SX has "Made in Japan" stamped on the bottom and was the lowest of the Rebel line a couple years back.
