Which Canon EF/EF-S lens should I get for portrait and landscape shots?

Ray H

Hi All,

Canon 400D digital Rebel is my newest d-SLR. If I may ask the community, which type of lenses should go on 400D get to capture the best portrait images for indoor family photos and outdoor landscape shots?

Lens cost is targeted around $1000 USD. I have gone through technical specs and site reviews, but mixed answers are given from site reviews to user comments.

What would you recommend with the following environments to select 2 types of lens?
1. Excellent indoor portraits in,
> Low lighting environment,
> Family party gathering,
> Food presentations.
2. Good outdoor landscape pictures in,
> Summer time conditions in California,
> Minor distortions with face in landscape pictures,
> None moving subject.

I am choosing the two lenses for the following reasons:

#1
Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM â yields good shots for indoor with low lighting, $290.

#2
Canon EF 70-200mm f/4.0L USM â superb quality and results in all ranges, $550

Would you choose these two lenses? Why?

Answer
First of all be advised that the XTi has a 1.6x crop factor that make the 50mm looks like a 80mm lens in your camera and this goes to every lenses.

The 50mm f1.4 is an excellent lens that can handle low light condition very well, but it would be difficult for you to work on landscape and group portraits with this lens because of the fixed focal length. Sometimes you can work things out by walking towards/further from the object you want to shoot, but it may not always be possible.

The 70-200 f4 is excellent for portrait and wildlife photography, but again, for group photo it will be a little bit difficult to work with because it's a tele lens. If you have to shoot a large number of people in a relatively small space, you won't be able to shoot everyone in one frame because it's not wide enough.

Both lenses should be good for food photography though - and I'm sure you can use it in any condition.

So... what are the alternatives?

Wide angle lenses are perfect for group and landscape photography. And in this case, the kit lens (the 18-55mm f3.5-5.6) are in the perfect range. But of course you've heard about the quality of the lens, and if you wanted something better there are the EF-S 17-85 f4-5.6 IS which goes for about ~$500 (depending on merchant), which has perfect range and image stabilization to help you in low light condition. It's a good lens but if you wanted something better there's the EF-S 17-55 f2.8 IS - which I also use personally. It's razor sharp, it's fast and I can safely vouch for this piece of thing for its quality. The f2.8 ensure you to capture good picture in low light condition (although I would still recommend using flash, preferrably external flash) and the IS will help you even more. The only catch for this lens is the price - it goes for around ~$900. But since you're in the budget, I think this could be the perfect lens for you.

Also there's the EF 17-40 f4L lens - which is somewhat in a similar range and somewhat cheaper than the EF-S 17-55 f2.8 IS, but I would only recommend this lens if you have plan to upgrade your camera to a full frame sensor.

Last but not least... I'm only confident to shoot in low light condition with flash, unless if I'm using a fast prime (fixed focal length/non-zoom) lens, and the built in flash is less than what most people expect so I would strongly recommend get an external flash (the 430EX should suffice, although I would prefer a 580EX II myself). If you decided to get the 17-55 f2.8, you probably will have to wait and save up until you have a budget to buy external flash. But the combination of the 17-55 and an external flash would give you an edge in low light photography.

Anyway, I hope this helps.

explain mm camera lens?

tenny

i do not understand the mm specs

Answer
The "mm" spec tells you the focal length of the lens.

By itself, this doesn't mean much. But by comparing the mm spec, you get an idea what a camera with a particular lens would be good at.

Cameras with lenses below 40 mm are for "wide angle" pictures. The lower the mm number the wider the view through that lens. So a camera with a wide angle lens would be better for group portraits, or wide views of large objects (Grand Canyon), or whenever you need a wide view. The objects in these pics will look smaller, farther away than usual.

Cameras with lenses above 100 mm are for "telephoto" pictures. The higher the mm number the stronger the magnification or telescope effect. Cameras with these lenses are better for taking pictures of things farther away from you (a mountain) or for getting closeup of something you cannot get close to (a wild bird). The objects in these pics will look closer, bigger than normal.

Most digicams have "zoom" lenses where you see two numbers given for focal length, for example "35-105mm". This says the lens can change from 35mm (wide angle) all the way up to 105mm (telephoto). Since 35x3=105, this is called a "3x" zoom lens.

Using a camera with a 3x zoom lens allows you to choose between wide angle, and telephoto, and anything in between, for your pictures.

Have Fun!

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Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II Camera Lens?

Jin

Is this a good lens for everyday use? I have a canon 50D can i use it with my 500D? i mean especially at night with very low lighting situation or taking pictures of a person in a small room or taking portrait?
here is the link for the lens

Answer
If you are a portrait photographer, then yes it can be used daily.

If you are asking about using it for a variety of general shots from landscapes, group shots, single full body shots and head and shoulder shots, then no ... on your lens it can be used as a portrait lens (medium telephoto).

The best inexpensive "general every day" lens would most likely be the Canon 18-55 mm IS or if you can afford it, both the amazing 10-22 mm and 24-70 mm f/2.8 lens

What new camera lens should I purchase?

Jessica L

Hi!

I am looking into purchasing a new camera lens for my Canon 5D, and my Canon 50D. I am wanting to purchase something for portraits that will give me the most crisp & clear images possible!

Much thanks in advance!

Answer
You will notice that Freak did not mention any EF-S lenses in the group of suggested lenses. That is because using an EF-S lens on a 5D will damage it, and although a EF-S lens will work just fine on a 50D, it makes more sense to buy only EF lenses

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What specs. should a digital camera have to take decent photos of wildlife @ 100 yards away?

best camera lens for group portraits image

black_shee

I'm an amatuer at photography. I don't understand "digital zoom" or what the difference is in varying lens sizes like "18-55mm". I just want to be able to take decent photos of the deer at the back of my property....about 100 yards away....Could you recommend a camera or what lens, zoom, etc. a camera would need? Thanks in advance.

Answer
Digital zoom crops the image in the camera, resulting in lower resolution images.

18-55 mm is a medium wide angle to medium telephoto lens (good group shots to portraits) To shoot your deer, you would want an additional lens like the 55-200 mm lens.
A P&S camera (the ones that include "digital" zoom) have sensors that can be over 15 times smaller that a camera that comes with a 18-55 mm lens, a DSLR.

There are a number of camera companies that sell DSLR's in the $470 - $550 range that come with a good general lens and have many additional lenses available (even good used ones) that reach 200 mm (even longer if you want to spend the money)

Here is a list of some current ones and their ratings.

http://www.jdpower.com/electronics/ratings/digital-camera-ratings/dslr

You can look at their specs and reviews here:

http://www.dpreview.com

What is the best source or site that explains how to build a telescope with a camera?

Abeer s

I have plenty of time, so I decided to build a telescope. I want to attach a camera to it to take photos. Please tell me what is the best source or book or site to do this.
please help I really want this.

Answer
You can fit a camera to almost any telescope. If you use a standard 1 1/4" focuser you can get adapters of all sorts for fitting a camera to it directly.
They are also made for 2" focusers but are more expensive.
Put telescope ATM in the search box....ATM is Amateur Telescope Making. There are thousands of sites.
http://www.google.com/search?q=telescope+atm&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB:official&client=firefox-a . . . . . .
A very good site is this one but look at lots and see what suits you for the sort of telescope you want.
http://www.atm-workshop.com/ . . . . . .
The spiritual home for ATM is Stellafane at Springfield in lovely Vermont.
It was started by the great Russell Porter, who began the big effort of making home made telescopes popular when he started his mirror grinding classes.
http://stellafane.org/ . . . . . .
There is no problem finding parts to build telescopes with. I've built nine decent ones and several more rushed-up jobs for quick events that have come up. Some people have built over a hundred telescopes, grinding and polishing the mirrors and making the tubes and mountings.
You can get focusers, diagonal mirrors and all the other bits very easily.
http://datscope.wikispaces.com/file/view/18_inch_F5_Dobsonian.jpg/52136033/18_inch_F5_Dobsonian.jpg . . . . .
This guy made five good telescopes.
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://members.ziggo.nl/jhm.vangastel/Astronomy/30cmscope/30cm_bestanden/alle%2520vijf.jpg&imgrefurl=http://members.ziggo.nl/jhm.vangastel/Astronomy/30cmscope/5_30cm.htm&usg=__DzTxVL3S7AanlbcF4zpw_DHNHbs=&h=634&w=845&sz=186&hl=en&start=27&um=1&itbs=1&tbnid=umxySrOV9M6OfM:&tbnh=109&tbnw=145&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dfive%2Bdobsonians%26start%3D20%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26sa%3DN%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-GB:official%26ndsp%3D20%26tbs%3Disch:1 . . . . .
For refractors you can buy objective lenses and focusers and make the tubes fairly easily but it takes a bit of care to get it right.
Thousands of people make telescopes...it isn't so rare that you'll be in a lonesome land with no resources available.There are forums, Yahoo Groups, all sorts of info and help available.
Telescope making is not dying out, it is increasing. Ask the guys and girls at star parties.

A digital camera used with a telescope for taking pictures is called by the ugly sounding word digiscoping.
One way to do it is to get a filter thread adapter to fit a T2 mount, which you can find easily for standard 1 1/4 inch focusers, screw it onto the filter thread round the lens and put the adapter in the focusing tube like a normal eyepiece.
The camera then mounts directly onto the focusing tube with no worries about bits of complicated mounting adapters catching on things. It's exactly the same as having a huge telephoto lens mounted onto the camera. For mounting a heavy Nikon FM or an old-style brass-bodied Canon FTb,I use a body mount adapter straight onto the T2 adapter on the focusing tube.
All Newtonians and all normal telescopes are photo-telescopes. You can mount cameras easily on all of them.

If it's for a compact camera, what I did was to make a simple box from a scrap of thin ply with a grip to go over the outside of the focusing tube so I can use the camera with an eyepiece in place. It can be rotated easily for horizontal or vertical pictures (called landscape and portrait format in photography) because it just slides firmly over the focusing tube.
The box has some padding inside so the camera doesn't get scratched and it makes a nice firm fit.
It has to be measured up properly so the camera lens is central against the eyepiece but it's not a hard job. The back is cut out so the controls and screen are available and the top doesn't exist either, so it's more of a frame than a box. My first one was made from stiff card and worked fine for weeks till I made the wooden one.
I use it on 3-inch and 4-inch refractors and an 8-inch Maksutov for wildlife photography and occasionally on a Newtonian or the Maksutov for astro.
On a Newtonian the balance won't be affected greatly with the weight involved...4 -5 ounzes....I've got eyepieces heavier than that.. but if you want to fine tune the balance a simple solution is just to wrap something round the mirror end of the tube and fix it with string or a small bungee cord or sticky tape. Move it up and down till the balance is just right then fix it in place.
You can get balancing rods with a sliding weight for any telescope, or make one easily.
Just move the weight along a bar that's fixed to the the tube until the telescope is balanced and tighten the locking screw.
If there's a friction adjustment on the mount just increase it a bit and you'll probably find no re-balancing is necessary anyway.
A Dobsonian is OK for bright stuff like the Moon and even bright star clusters like the Pleiades or Jupiter at 80x. Take a dozen or more pics for planets and stars and stack them with Registax free software to improve the signal to noise ratio and contrast.
http://www.astronomie.be/registax/ . . . . . . .
I won a Philips Toucam Pro webcam in the raffle at Astrofest, which is the preferred webcam for astro pics. It does a good job when used with Registax.
For faint objects a motor-driven equatorial mount with manual override of the speed and a vibration-free slow motion control of declination are required for accurate guiding, using exposures of a minute or two up to over an hour.
It can be done with just manual slow motion controls but it's not fun and can be very tiring.
A separate guide scope is used, with a power a bit higher than that of the photographic scope to keep the guiding more accurate.
Otherwise you can buy an off-axis guider or an autoguider which can be expensive.

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What lens is good for large family portraits?

best camera lens for group portraits image

jennifer

I have a Canon Rebel xs and I know I will need another lens for shooting large groups of people. I've already used my kit lens for this with an wide angle lens adapter on it and it worked well but I want the pics to be sharper. I'm wanting a budget lens as I can't afford the L series lenses. So what would you recommend?

Answer
If you can't take sharp photos with your kit lens, you won't be able to take sharp photos with an expensive lens. Do NOT use wide angle adaptors on your lens if you want sharp images. They are generally rubbish.. If necessary, stand further back to get everyone in.

Assuming you have the standard 18-55mm kit lens, this is how to take tack sharp images:

1. Put your camera on a tripod. If necessary (when in low light conditions) use the camera's self timer to fire the shot, so you don't have to touch the camera to fire the shot. This will eliminate any possibility of camera shake.

2. For groups of people, set your aperture to f/8 - use aperture priority mode if you are unfamiliar with manual mode. If there isn't much light, you may also need to increase your ISO. Using f/8 will ensure you have the correct depth of field to get everyone in sharp focus, without the aperture being too narrow which could cause diffraction problems (blurring).

3. Tell everyone to stand still.

Would someone please explain to me how the Zoom on a camera lens compares to the X power of a rifle scope?

WV Prepper

For example I have 4X power rifle scope which means that what I'm looking at through the scope is magnified four times it's actual size.
How does this work with a zoom lens? Is a 200mm setting three times closer than a 50mm setting?
Is there a formula for figuring this out?

Answer
Zoom on a camera only describes the RANGE of focal lengths of the lens.
So a 4X zoom may be from 25-100mm focal length.
A 35mm film camera was the standard for comparing magnification for most photographers (and often it still is). A 50mm lens approximated the diagonal dimension of the film frame so a 50mm lens is refered to as a "normal" lens. It came the closest to what your eye saw at 1X magnification.
That means a 25-100mm zoom lens has a magnification of 1/2X at its widest setting to 2X at its highest magnification.

Power or "x" factor on a scope is MAGNIFICATION. A 4X scope sees and object as if it were 1/4 the true distance to you.

For your question, a 200mm setting is 4X more magnification than a 50mm setting.

When reading specs on a camera, you have to dig down to get the "35mm" equivalent of the particular camera focal length. An 7-28mm zoom may actually translate to 28-112mm in "35mm equivalent" because the CCD sensor on the camera may be only 12mm diagonal.

Here is your formula:

1. Make sure you find the "35mm equivalent" focal lengths of the lenses
2. Divide by 50mm to get your magnification range.
3. If the camera is 35mm film or is an expensive "full frame" sensor, simply divide by 50mm to get your magnification.

Many DSLR's tell you the "conversion factor" of lenses. Typical factors are 1.5, 1.7 and 2. That means when you stick a 100mm lens on a camera with a 1.7 conversion factor, the lens is equivalent to a 170mm lens on a 35mm camera and your magnification is 170mm/50mm = 3.4X

Here are some examples of 35mm equivalent focal lengths:
28mm = 0.56X good wide angle. You can capture nearly an entire bedroom view without "fish-eye" distortion
35mm = 0.7X mild wide angle. Easier to get group shots without backing up too much
50mm = 1X Pretty much what your eye sees in terms of magnification
85mm = 1.7X good portrait lens for face shots
200mm = 4X used to be the consumer limits for inexpensive telephoto shots
500mm = 10X used to be top of the line telephoto. These are the lenses used by those pro photographers that often get tackled on the sidelines of football games <g>.

Hope that helps

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What is the best source or site that explains how to build a telescope with a camera?

best camera lens for group portraits image

Abeer s

I have plenty of time, so I decided to build a telescope. I want to attach a camera to it to take photos. Please tell me what is the best source or book or site to do this.
please help I really want this.

Answer
You can fit a camera to almost any telescope. If you use a standard 1 1/4" focuser you can get adapters of all sorts for fitting a camera to it directly.
They are also made for 2" focusers but are more expensive.
Put telescope ATM in the search box....ATM is Amateur Telescope Making. There are thousands of sites.
http://www.google.com/search?q=telescope+atm&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB:official&client=firefox-a . . . . . .
A very good site is this one but look at lots and see what suits you for the sort of telescope you want.
http://www.atm-workshop.com/ . . . . . .
The spiritual home for ATM is Stellafane at Springfield in lovely Vermont.
It was started by the great Russell Porter, who began the big effort of making home made telescopes popular when he started his mirror grinding classes.
http://stellafane.org/ . . . . . .
There is no problem finding parts to build telescopes with. I've built nine decent ones and several more rushed-up jobs for quick events that have come up. Some people have built over a hundred telescopes, grinding and polishing the mirrors and making the tubes and mountings.
You can get focusers, diagonal mirrors and all the other bits very easily.
http://datscope.wikispaces.com/file/view/18_inch_F5_Dobsonian.jpg/52136033/18_inch_F5_Dobsonian.jpg . . . . .
This guy made five good telescopes.
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://members.ziggo.nl/jhm.vangastel/Astronomy/30cmscope/30cm_bestanden/alle%2520vijf.jpg&imgrefurl=http://members.ziggo.nl/jhm.vangastel/Astronomy/30cmscope/5_30cm.htm&usg=__DzTxVL3S7AanlbcF4zpw_DHNHbs=&h=634&w=845&sz=186&hl=en&start=27&um=1&itbs=1&tbnid=umxySrOV9M6OfM:&tbnh=109&tbnw=145&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dfive%2Bdobsonians%26start%3D20%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26sa%3DN%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-GB:official%26ndsp%3D20%26tbs%3Disch:1 . . . . .
For refractors you can buy objective lenses and focusers and make the tubes fairly easily but it takes a bit of care to get it right.
Thousands of people make telescopes...it isn't so rare that you'll be in a lonesome land with no resources available.There are forums, Yahoo Groups, all sorts of info and help available.
Telescope making is not dying out, it is increasing. Ask the guys and girls at star parties.

A digital camera used with a telescope for taking pictures is called by the ugly sounding word digiscoping.
One way to do it is to get a filter thread adapter to fit a T2 mount, which you can find easily for standard 1 1/4 inch focusers, screw it onto the filter thread round the lens and put the adapter in the focusing tube like a normal eyepiece.
The camera then mounts directly onto the focusing tube with no worries about bits of complicated mounting adapters catching on things. It's exactly the same as having a huge telephoto lens mounted onto the camera. For mounting a heavy Nikon FM or an old-style brass-bodied Canon FTb,I use a body mount adapter straight onto the T2 adapter on the focusing tube.
All Newtonians and all normal telescopes are photo-telescopes. You can mount cameras easily on all of them.

If it's for a compact camera, what I did was to make a simple box from a scrap of thin ply with a grip to go over the outside of the focusing tube so I can use the camera with an eyepiece in place. It can be rotated easily for horizontal or vertical pictures (called landscape and portrait format in photography) because it just slides firmly over the focusing tube.
The box has some padding inside so the camera doesn't get scratched and it makes a nice firm fit.
It has to be measured up properly so the camera lens is central against the eyepiece but it's not a hard job. The back is cut out so the controls and screen are available and the top doesn't exist either, so it's more of a frame than a box. My first one was made from stiff card and worked fine for weeks till I made the wooden one.
I use it on 3-inch and 4-inch refractors and an 8-inch Maksutov for wildlife photography and occasionally on a Newtonian or the Maksutov for astro.
On a Newtonian the balance won't be affected greatly with the weight involved...4 -5 ounzes....I've got eyepieces heavier than that.. but if you want to fine tune the balance a simple solution is just to wrap something round the mirror end of the tube and fix it with string or a small bungee cord or sticky tape. Move it up and down till the balance is just right then fix it in place.
You can get balancing rods with a sliding weight for any telescope, or make one easily.
Just move the weight along a bar that's fixed to the the tube until the telescope is balanced and tighten the locking screw.
If there's a friction adjustment on the mount just increase it a bit and you'll probably find no re-balancing is necessary anyway.
A Dobsonian is OK for bright stuff like the Moon and even bright star clusters like the Pleiades or Jupiter at 80x. Take a dozen or more pics for planets and stars and stack them with Registax free software to improve the signal to noise ratio and contrast.
http://www.astronomie.be/registax/ . . . . . . .
I won a Philips Toucam Pro webcam in the raffle at Astrofest, which is the preferred webcam for astro pics. It does a good job when used with Registax.
For faint objects a motor-driven equatorial mount with manual override of the speed and a vibration-free slow motion control of declination are required for accurate guiding, using exposures of a minute or two up to over an hour.
It can be done with just manual slow motion controls but it's not fun and can be very tiring.
A separate guide scope is used, with a power a bit higher than that of the photographic scope to keep the guiding more accurate.
Otherwise you can buy an off-axis guider or an autoguider which can be expensive.

What lenses should I rent for my first wedding using a canon eos 60D?

Dash Dash

Im shooting my first wedding in October! Ill be shooting indoors but I dont plan on bringing a flash seeing as ive always used natural light in my photos. Ive never shot a wedding though as I stated before, and I dont really know what lenses to use with a 60D seeing as its not a full frame camera. The lens I use daily is the 50mm 1.8 and I planned on either taking that or renting the 1.4, So other then that, what other lenses should i look to get?

Answer
Tough to say, as a fast midrange zoom is usually best for weddings but most are only full frame. A 17-55mm f/2.8 IS would probably be the best for the job, and it is an EF-S lens so it won't weigh as much as a boat anchor.

If you can't do that, you will need a normal and perhaps a wide lens... like a 35mm or a 24mm. And if I was going to be carrying around and switching primes, I would rent another body too... most likely a 5D or 6D with a 35mm for group shots and keep the 50 1.8 on the 60D for close ups and portraits..... but a zoom will make it much easier for you and less annoying for your subjects.

Also make sure you have a speedlight with a diffuser. Though natural light is great, it is often too contrasty for good photos. Even a pop up fill flash will fill in shadows wonderfully and actually make it look more natural.

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