Bloody L

Jul 31 2009

I am now the proud owner of a Canon 24-70 f/2.8 USM L lens-

I tried it for the first time with TOADS Theatre Co. last night, shooting stills for their production of Hi-De-Hi. This lens, aptly dubbed ‘the brick’ by professionals around the world, weighs nearly 1kg! All that extra ballast will take some getting used to, but it’s worth it for the image quality.

Having said all that, I’m honestly not as blown away with last night’s results as I thought I’d be. Why? Because of this baby-

I’ve been using a Canon EF-S 60mm f/2.8 Macro lens for all my low light shots over the last year or so, and it has totally spoiled me. It’s been called Canon’s sharpest lens by many photographers, with good reason too! Here is an example daytime shot of Kingswear in South Devon. Just take a look at the detail on these houses (zoomed in to 100% with no processing)-

To put that into perspective, look at the photo that the crop came from-

So for all its critical acclaim (and huge price tag), I find my shiny new 24-70 f/2.8 being blown out the water at f/2.8 by a non-L-series EF-S lens which costs much much less and was already in my camera bag.

Of course, prime lenses will nearly always be sharper than zooms, but I was hoping for the difference to be less noticeable in this case. There’s a little voice in the back of my mind saying that I’ll end up going back to the 60 for live music and theatre work. *sigh* Ah well, naturally the 24-70 is far more versatile in its focal length range than something fixed at 60mm, which is why I needed it. I’ve been wondering around with only a 10-22 and a 60 prime for far too long. Besides, this one has a sexy red ring on the end, which is the mark of a true pro, right?