I recently swapped my go-to landscape lens (Zeiss 21) for a Canon 24 TS-e and I made it out to use it for the first time this morning. I'm not sure it was the right choice yet but I will say I had a blast with the tilt/shift movements this morning and I'm happy with the results...brrrr!!!
As always, comments (especially critiques) are always welcome:
Glad to hear that you had fun with your new toy. I just wonder why you chose to do pano's. Both of the first two have interesting foregrounds and I would have liked to have seen even more.
The panos are three shifted images stitched together (actually, 12 images - 4 each frame for HDR processing) so this is roughly the equivalent field of view (width) to a 14mm shot. So, actually, I agree with you that the foregrounds are interesting and I tried to show as much as I could...but maybe that got lost in translation?
I don't think anything got lost in translation. You have beautiful foregrounds in these and it shows. I have been trying to decide which of the 3 I like best, but really can't, all 3 each have a unique feature in their foreground for visual interest. Nice job on picking that out in each. And great job with the HDR processing. If you hadn't mentioned it, I don't think anyone could have known, which is a fantastic feat all in itself.
How did you like the TSE? I am really thinking on getting the Samyang 24mm when it is released, I am just afraid I will miss the wide 16mm view I am so used to shooting...
Jim - thank you for the fine compliments, they carry a lot of weight coming from you. I did a long stint of "HDR hating" - I had much trouble making them look natural despite many examples from other photographers being able to pull it off. And, since I don't like to tinker with GND's in the field or in post, I self righteously relegated myself to doing manual exposure blends. But, I recently got tired of luminosity masks, more layers/masks than I could count and I gave HDR a shot one more time. This little experiment showed me that with care, even I can create natural looking HDR's and I'll admit, they look as good or better than I could have done by hand in a fraction of the time.
I actually really like the TS-e, surprisingly. Like you, I thought 24mm was going to be an uncomfortable focal length for me since I've been "seeing in 21mm" for so long but shifted panos, perspective control and tilt are all simply fantastic options to have in your back pocket. I'm finding that I like stitching 24mm images into something wider better than starting with a wider focal length because I still get the FOV I want but the relationships between near and far arent as dramatic.
I'll definitely be kicking myself for bucking up on the Canon if the Samyang is comparable!
I am a sucker for the grand vistas, Sunny - maybe this will work out for me very well. Although, I need to get better at isolating the interesting details in some shots too...
