Canon 20mm wide angle lens

parallactic-pictures

parallactic-pictures

Active member
Hi guys,

So I think I'm ready to buy my first wide angle lens. I'm still very new to the Canon 7D, but I've already done a ton of shooting with it, and I've found myself wanting wider shots. On Christmas day, the rooms sometimes didn't even seem big enough to get good landscape photos of my family, posing side by side.

This is the lens I'm thinking about buying:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=470938631&pf_rd_i=507846

Does anyone recommend something different, or have any red flags they'd like to raise about this specific lens?

Thanks!
 
Two things, firstly w/the 7d 1.6x crop it becomes a 32mm, so that in itself isn't super wide although is decent.

But more importantly I'd ask yourself for what purpose do you want the lens. If it's to take wide angle shots specifically, check out the Tokina 11-16mm f2.8 lens. That's highly rated on here as a great wide for the 7d.

However, and I have a 5d here, when I wanted a wide angle I picked up the 28 1.8 as I wanted to be able to have control over depth of field, basically I wanted to have a nice blur, the wider you get the more difficult this is to achieve, so check out what you want to do with the lens first. If it's wide angle love, check out the Tokina before making your mind up. If it's for dof control the 20 prob won't give you enough I'd imagine.

/2cents.
 
What would the advantage be of a 20mm 2.8 vs. a zoom at 20mm and 2.8? I'm thinking about the Tamron 17-50mm 2.8. It costs about the same as this prime your looking at (and has the same min aperture), but has a greater range.

EDIT: I guess the Tamron would have to be at 32mm for the comparison to work actually?
 
Primes are generally a lot sharper than zooms can be, due to the amount of glass needed in a zoom.

I have a Tamron 17-50 2.8, the lens is phenominal!
 
Andrew, that Tokina 11-16 2.8 would be great, but it's about $650, which is, currently, out of my price range. I really can't afford to spend anymore than $500 right now on a wide angle lens.

Jester and Nox, I've heard nothing but great things about that Tamron 17-50 2.8. In fact I've even come close to just getting that one myself. But from only spending 2 weeks already, shooting with the Canon 50mm 1.8, I've really fallen in love with it as a prime. You simply can't beat the sharpness of a prime.

So I think I'd still opt to get the Canon 20mm 2.8, over a zoom wide angle lens. I'd lose the options of the focal lengths, but I'd be gaining it with more sharpness.

Can anyone else comment on the Canon 20mm 2.8? Anyone that has it?
 
I would think pretty much any half-way decent lens would be more than sharp enough for 1920 x 1080 when they're designed for full-res (~18 mp) stills?
 
andrew00 said:
Two things, firstly w/the 7d 1.6x crop it becomes a 32mm, so that in itself isn't super wide although is decent.

But more importantly I'd ask yourself for what purpose do you want the lens. If it's to take wide angle shots specifically, check out the Tokina 11-16mm f2.8 lens. That's highly rated on here as a great wide for the 7d.

However, and I have a 5d here, when I wanted a wide angle I picked up the 28 1.8 as I wanted to be able to have control over depth of field, basically I wanted to have a nice blur, the wider you get the more difficult this is to achieve, so check out what you want to do with the lens first. If it's wide angle love, check out the Tokina before making your mind up. If it's for dof control the 20 prob won't give you enough I'd imagine.

/2cents.
Click to expand...

I've been reading a lot of bad reviews recently about the Canon 20mm lens. Issues with vignetting and blur. A couple of people have mentioned the Sigma 15-30mm in those same reviews as a better alternative. It's also a lot cheaper in some places. Here it is on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/Sigma-15-30mm...=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=photo&qid=1262551173&sr=1-1

Do you have any thoughts on this lens? This has become my top choice for a wide angle now. I don't like losing too much DoF, but right now, my main priority is just having something wider to shoot with than my current 50mm.
 
Yeah, I've heard some good things about that Tokina lens, but it's out of my price range.

I'm trying to keep it under $400. I'm not totally bent bent on needing Image Stabilization, so the Sigma 15-30mm seems like a good purchase.
 
parallactic-pictures said:
You simply can't beat the sharpness of a prime.
Click to expand...

How do you know that you'd only be satisfied with a prime lens' supposed superior sharpness unless you try a zoom? It really does depend on the specific lens in my experience.

Personally, I don't see a lot of point with you purchasing a 20mm f2.8 unless it has some other feature you really want such as fish-eye, macro (on a 20mm?, hah!) or some other such thing. I see the purpose of a prime lens being one of three or so things:

1) Faster aperture - which is not present here
2) Sharper/better optics - not always true and not always ideal for a 7D's video, see extensive articles written by Barry Green on aliasing for reasons why.
3) You want to use it to train yourself to use only a certain focal length, perhaps for compositional training?

Just... know what you're trying to accomplish, I guess is what I'm saying. I'm not saying.

Last thing, the Sigma 15-30 you're also looking at is unfortunately inflicted with the "slow and variable aperture" disease. Having used both variable and constant aperture lenses, I can tell you that a fast constant aperture is something that I can't live without anymore. It will literally save your butt in certain shooting scenarios, stills or video.
 
Get an older manual Tokina 17mm. F3.5. REAL good ones go for ~$300.


Or a Vivitar/Spiratone/Soligor etc 18mm ~$200 or less.
 
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