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Lens upgrade
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Im thinking of upgrading from my 18-55 lens on 500d. Just wondering has anyone had a canon 17-85 usm or 15-85 .Iwould iove to get the 15-85 but its very expensive so i would settle for the 17-85. Would appreciate any advice on this or any other upgrade.
Nice camera and lens you have there already; and yes the 17-85mm is great, too, so a good upgrade choice, if you think its warranted.
Alternatives are: going to a wider zoom, a fast 35 or 50mm prime for really low light or shallow depth of field and a standard tele-zoom.
Say, the Canon 10-22mm, (or Tokina 11-16mm if you have to save) the 50mm 1.8, and a 55-250 IS would make a great kit and you can keep your 18-55mm for travelling light.
Sorry, no s/h lens to offer. I’ve gone to the dark side….here’s a trick before thinking about upgrading… or should I say while…
sort every picture you’ve taken so far by focal length….
once you do that you’ll have an idea of where you tend to go in the wide-tele range….
I did it with my brother, who was looking to buy a 24-70L or 24-105L he checked his metadata and found nearly every shot he’d taken with teh 24-105 i’D loaned him was shot at 105, so he’s gone for a 70-200L instead and he’s happier than the proverbial pig!!
just something to think about….
I use wide commercially a lot, but never for artistic purposes, I shoot landscapes with 85mm or 135mm, next indulgence will be a 90mm ts-e to do some ansel adams mimicry!!
Thanks lads for the advice.Im not in any panic so i will take everything into consideration.
i have had the 17-85 for the last couple of years and it is a good lens for the price (particularly now) .however it is quite soft around the edges and the barrel distortion at 17 is terrible (if your shooting anything with straight lines or architecture). it is commonly prone to a problem with screws loosening inside after a couple of years which has just happened to me . i actually posted about it on this site last week.apparently canon charge bout 200 to fix it. so i’ve just ordered the 15-85 which by all accounts (bar 1 or 2 bad copies) is a significant improvement on the 17-85, particularly in the image quality around the edges and sharpness in general. i think the barrel distortion at 15 is supposed to be every bit as bad though. the 17-85 definitely has price in its favour , particularly if you get a good used one on amazon or ebay. i bought the 15-85 new on amazon for £540 which works out about e630 , which is’nt bad when alot of reviews say it as good image wise as the 17-55 which is an L lens in everything but name!
both have a great focal range and it is highly probable that whichever one you get will stay on your camera 95% of the time… the last 3 holidays i have been on i only brought the 17-85 there was no need for any other lens. ofcourse neither are particularly fast so if most of your photographs are taken inside with not much light then maybe a constant 4 or even a 2.8 lens would be better.saying that with a high iso and the i.s both of these lenses have and flash if needed really you shouldnt have a problem. money permitting get the 15-85 otherwise the 17-85 is a very good(cheap) next best thing. the best thing about either of these lenses is the very useful focal length , unless you like having to change your lens every 10 mins!Follow on to Jaybee’s comment = use ExposurePlot to graph your lens usage by focal length, aperture, shutter speed and ISO.
http://www.cpr.demon.nl/prog_plotf.html
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