My friend who I shot a wedding with this weekend had a 50L loner from CPS. She wasn't impressed with it either on her 5d3. I was playing around with it on my 5d2 though a few days earlier and it was as sharp as could be and the bokeh was just downright sexy.
Why do you love it? What does it do for you that other lenses can't? How often is it on your camera? What do you like to use it for?
character, texture, color, & vivid twilight blues. Can shoot any light source, including dingy gym. Always on my camera for shooting infants or garish nightscapes. I like to use it in flea market-still life /street & upscale tourist joints, travelers & revelers & totems generally common to, or nearby, local monuments and sculpture. Wide Open IS NOT ALWAYS the best aperture to shoot it (too artsy fartsy half the time) & you need patience to learn to like it.
I owned the 50L for about a week and liked its character but not enough to put up with the spastic AF on my 5D2 and to a lesser extent 1d3. From what I have gathered, you really need a 5D3 or 1Dx to take advantage of this lens.
I am sorry to say that in this topic of very enthusiast of 50L, but after owning one Canon 1.2 and comparing with Sigma 50 1.4 at the same time, I sold de Canon and I keep the Sigma. Only the AF was little better with the Canon, but for the rest the Sigma was clearly better, specially wide open. My Canon was too soft at 1.2 for me. The bokeh was very good, but the focus zone of the picture was not sharp enought in order to keep the picture into the best shoots. With Sigma the bokeh is only little inferior but it is really sharper.
CoLmes wrote:
Why do you love it? What does it do for you that other lenses can't? How often is it on your camera? What do you like to use it for?
I'm just wondering to see what the positive side of the tricky lens is to people who love it and use it often.
Besides the obvious great performance at f1.2-f2 the 50L has a very nice rendering even at smaller apertures like f8. I love the look it has when Im using strobes on location or in the studio at f8-f11. This is rarely mentioned but it is there. Its something in the color and the way highlights are rendered, brighter but softer curve into the lighter tones. Its a nice look.
I had good focus results with the non-MA 1Ds2 body with a good percent of keepers. Slightly more imprecise results with the 5D2. The 1D3 was very good, better than the 1Ds2 and 5D2. The best has been the 1Ds3, so I imagine the 5D3 and 1DX are even better, especially from all the user comments. I find any of those cameras compatible and useful with this lens, even the 5D2. All using the center AF point.
Side note: I haven't sorted through my whole collection, but I'm finding some lenses work better on some bodies than others. And it's not always the more expensive bodies that do better all the time. For example, a few months ago, I got a 24-105L and a 100-400L at about the same time, and took them out together to sort out MA on outdoor location subjects, rotating them between the 5D2 and 1Ds3. After fully torture testing the MA to the best result, I found the 24-105 perform far better on the 5D2 than the 1Ds3 -- much higher fine detail at any given aperture, especially wide open. In contrast, the 100-400 (and 1.4X II) excelled on the 1Ds3, and was only decent on the 5D2. So, I've made mental note of this and only use those lenses on the respective bodies. I'm sure this holds true with other lens/body combinations too, including such shallow DOF lenses as the 50L. It takes a lot of time to do these comparisons, but the results seem very worthwhile. I know I haven't discovered the principle -- I've read references to the minute tolerance differences lumped together as "sample variation". It's educational to see it in real life.
I don't own it, but it's at the top of my list for the next prime I want to get. Maybe by the end of the year unless Sigma comes out with a new 50 that's outstanding and reasonably priced.
I traded my Sigma 50 for it a few weeks back. I have 2 5DMKIII and on one camera, it's not consisten. Shooting around f1.2-1.8 could result in inconsistent focus even with good light when the subject is a bit far out. I had to dial in +2 MA. But on the other body it seems good.
I like the color it renders better than the Sigma.
I owned it and sold it - for a Fuji X-Pro1 and 35/1.4. Whilst I had it, it was one of my favourite lenses for taking pictures of my family. Very nice colour and out of focus rendering are what made it special to me. I still miss it. If I ever upgrade to a 5D3 I may purchase it again.....
Great examples of what the 50L can do. It has definitely different characteristics than an 85L and a 35L. The full body shot has "quiet" bokeh compared to the 50 1.4 and 1.8. The sigma 50 comes close. However none of the 50s I have used can give that glowing dreamy transitions in the close up. Any example of a wider framed head shot?
Amazing piece of glass. Do not listen to the detractors, Mine has been glued to my 5d, 5d2 and will likely stay on the 5D3 90% of the time. The only other lens I really use is the 40mm Pancake for traveling light, no excuse not to have that one in your bag for the price.
Nice shots, Jim Cramer! Really demonstrates the value of the lens in simple available light settings.
dc -- The 50L just makes people (and places) look better!
Why?
Well, the #1 reason is the lens has intentional (not fully corrected) spherical aberration, and at wider apertures, that softens the image and the edges in it -- think of it as airbrushing in the camera.
Reason #2 is related to how it is often used: wide open, or nearly so. This causes photographers to enter into "twilight lighting" even during midday, outside of the magic hours before dawn and after dusk. But a good many shots are made at those mellow times, and they look gorgeous -- even landscapes take a romantic look.
I usually go for sharp and ultra-realistic (TS-E and macro are favorite lenses). But the 50L gives me an outlet to the fantastic, without being goofy and overly contrived.
Gunzorro wrote:
Side note: I haven't sorted through my whole collection, but I'm finding some lenses work better on some bodies than others. And it's not always the more expensive bodies that do better all the time.
This is so interesting. I can MA my 70-200/2.8mkII on my 5D2 all I want, but I get more consistent AF results when this lens is on my 5Dclassic. This has always been my most reliable lens before I got the 5D2. Now, when it really counts, I find I keep using my 5Dclassic with this lens. My 16-35mkII on the other hand performs quite remarkably on my 5D2. That said, any of my lenses perform quite adequately on both bodies.
I think the 50L is similar to the 35L in that some copies are more quirky than others. I got my 50L as a Canon refurb and it was probably tested and recalibrated after passing through the refurb department. I use it often wide open on a 5DII. It is actually quite easy to use and gets consistent great results even at f1.2. My 35L had to go back to Canon service a couple of times before it was right.
I love the look of the images from the 50L. I shot a High School Senior session yesterday with natural light inside a historic covered bridge. There was an opening in the side of the bridge where soft rays entered from the overcast day. The 50L's light sensitivity really helped make for a nice, natural subject illumination.
