Home · Register · Join Upload & Sell

Moderated by: Fred Miranda
Username  

  New fredmiranda.com Mobile Site
  New Feature: SMS Notification alert
  New Feature: Buy & Sell Watchlist
  

FM Forums | Canon Forum | Join Upload & Sell

  

Archive 2012 · Canon 24 3.5L TSE

  
 
jdidomenico
Offline
• •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · Canon 24 3.5L TSE


Hi,
I am the proud new owner of a used 24mm 3.5 L TSE lens. I will be mostly photographing interior architecture and products but will also be doing some landscapes as well. After receiving the lens yesterday, I played with the lens on some landscape shots. This is my first manual focus lens. Other than occasionally manually adjusting focus during some product macro shots, I have not seriously used or developed this skill. I wonder if I should get a focus screen but have questions like; what is the best screen to use for interiors which are often dark (its hard to see the focus point i the 5D III); should they be changed out after use (only use for manual focus)?

Any thoughts or advice will be greatly appreciated.

Jim



Oct 21, 2012 at 09:37 AM
jcolwell
Offline
• • • • • • •
Upload & Sell: On
p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · Canon 24 3.5L TSE


I find a tripod and LiveView does the trick quite nicely.


Oct 21, 2012 at 09:52 AM
Roland W
Offline
• • • •
Upload & Sell: On
p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · Canon 24 3.5L TSE


If you are hand holding, and do not consider live view as practical, you have two methods to consider besides the actual viewed sharpness on the viewfinder screen. If the camera is in single shot, and you move the focus ring slowly, focus points can "light up", indicating that point is sharp at that moment. But you mentioned the 5D3, so that must not be working out for you because of the illumination issues. I can tell you that it works fine in low light on the 5D2.

The other very practical option is to estimate the subject distance, and then use the focus scale on the lens to set foucs. Unless the action is too fast, estimated distance works very well for this wide angle lens. You also have the added bonus of a very usable depth of field scale right on the lens that combines with the long throw of the focus ring to allow very practical use for determining depth of field.



Oct 21, 2012 at 10:32 AM
Lars Johnsson
Offline
• • • • • • •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · Canon 24 3.5L TSE


jcolwell wrote:
I find a tripod and LiveView does the trick quite nicely.


+1



Oct 21, 2012 at 10:45 AM
Dragonfire
Offline
• • • • •
Upload & Sell: On
p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · Canon 24 3.5L TSE


Lars Johnsson wrote:
+1


DITTO, +2



Oct 21, 2012 at 11:17 AM
Gunzorro
Offline
• • • • • •
Upload & Sell: On
p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · Canon 24 3.5L TSE


Congrats on your lens -- one of Canon's finest.

The camera provides focus confirmation and a beep to let you know proper focus has been achieved. I find it very accurate if the camera and lens are within specs (they should be). I agree with LV if you are using a tripod, but I shoot most daylight landscape and outdoor building shots hand held. You'll get used to focusing manually, jockeying the focus ring back and forth until absolutely best focus is obtained. If us other monkeys can do it, so can you!



Oct 21, 2012 at 01:21 PM
jdidomenico
Offline
• •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · Canon 24 3.5L TSE


Thank you for all of your suggestions.

I had the beep turned off before and will try that.

I found that when estimating on the distance I was not satisfied with the results but it was only a few test shots and I'm sure that with proper lighting I could stop the lens down to broaden the DOF.

My first try of live view wasn't great with such a wide lens but then I saw a thread that suggested mag in and that made a big difference.

I am still playing around with the tilt shift features and really like it. Rotating the lens makes it seem like endless possibilities. Much more fun than doing it all in post processing - for me at least.

Thanks again.

Jim
















Oct 21, 2012 at 01:46 PM
Alan321
Offline
• • • • • •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · Canon 24 3.5L TSE


In my opinion, using an estimated distance and setting the lens accordingly is not much use with a TS-E lens because lens tilt complicates things.

Using the viewfinder with the 24mm lens (or 17mm) is more difficult than with the 45mm or 90mm because the wide lenses have a relatively large depth of focus compared with the longer lenses. Again, lens tilt complicates things.

A special focus screen is not likely to help much because the focus aid is only in the centre of the screen and because when assessing lens tilt you probably need to assess focus away from the centre to know that you have maximized the DOF successfully. On top of that you would normally want to avoid changing focus screens in the field because of the risk of damaging or touching the screens or the camera mirror.

Live View is probably the best but is relatively difficult without a tripod or an IS lens.


You can make life easier for yourself by learning how to use tilt and shift: knowing where the focus plane should be, having the camera the right distance from it and the right angle to it, knowing how aperture affects the width of the DOF wedge, etc. Harold M. Merklinger has published some articles available as pdf and others available as animated web pages to explain it all for a View camera, but the principles are much the same when using a TS-E lens.

In some situations you may need to be making very tiny tilt adjustments. Anything less than half a degree gets difficult to lock in because the 0-degree detent is wide enough that the lens wants to rotate a bit further and sit at zero rather than say a 1/4 of a degree. It is common for new users to be making tilt adjustments that are actually way too big for the situation at hand and then not seeing the desired result. Further changes don't respond as expected either and sometimes it is best to just reset and start again, but knowing what sort of angles are needed will make life with a TS-E a lot easier and more satisfying.


With the first 24 TS-E the tilt and shift directions are either the same of 90 degrees apart and cannot easily be changed without undoing some fiddly screws and opening up the lens. The second generation 24 TS-E allows that 0 / 90 degree relationship to be changed without opening the lens. That plus better IQ makes it a much better lens.

- Alan



Oct 22, 2012 at 09:06 AM
Dragonfire
Offline
• • • • •
Upload & Sell: On
p.1 #9 · p.1 #9 · Canon 24 3.5L TSE


Shot on Saturday, a 9 stop ND would have prevented me from going to F22.

https://www.fredmiranda.com/forum/topic/1159527/0#11059781




Oct 22, 2012 at 10:04 AM
shmoogy
Offline

Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #10 · p.1 #10 · Canon 24 3.5L TSE


I was going to suggest Magic Lantern firmware so that you can use the focus peaking, but I'm not certain how well ML works on the 5d3 as of right now-- but definitely something to look for in the future. It makes it quite easy to see what is in focus even while tilted.


Oct 22, 2012 at 12:57 PM
Chiefdog72
Offline
• •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #11 · p.1 #11 · Canon 24 3.5L TSE


I use the ED-G focus screen with grid lines on my 5d II……I don’t think (not sure) it’s available for the 5d III. The focus confirm works well with my TS-E 17mm. I do use live view when using the tilt function.

The grid lines help confirm level when using a tripod with leveling head; and they certainly help keep things lined up when hand holding.



Oct 22, 2012 at 10:45 PM





FM Forums | Canon Forum | Join Upload & Sell

    
 

You are not logged in. Login or Register

Username       Or Reset password



This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.