I've gone and done it.

Mr Jones · 5 Sep 2011 at 23:00

Ah ha, I see in your sig.
It's a shame Canon don't do a USM version of the 35mm unless 35L.

I rarely shoot wider than 28mm or felt the need to, so that prime covers the tight group shots / dance and spontaneous moments when indoors.

I adored my 85mm and the 50mm on my crop just felt great for portrait.

Really tempted by this set up and then put money towards a 5D as second body later down the line, upgrading the primes as I earn / saved from 9-5 job.

BusError · 5 Sep 2011 at 23:06

I mostly shoot primes, and all manual at that -- I only look for a zoom for when I shoot other cameras as "prime camera" so I can do snaps without carrying the prime sets..

I use at the moment a Zeiss Flektogon 20mm f2.8, a Flektogon 35mm f2.4, any of at least 20 50mm, a russian 85mm f2.0, and any one of a large number of 135mm

and yes, if you carry primes and don't shoot sports and kids, you can always zoom with your feets. I only do landscapes anyway.

An Exception · 5 Sep 2011 at 23:09

@Mr Jones

I have so far ditched the 35 as it's a DX lens and I'm picking up a D700 on sat, so I plan to use the 24 for wide angle, the 50 for small groups or single portraits where I want to show more of what is going on, and the 85 for tighter shot's where I want to turn the background into cream.

In fact I'm happy with just 3 lenses, helps keeps things simple as I don't have to think, "hmmm, which lens should I use" as it should be obvious, as before I was often torn between the 35 and the 50, and the 85 didn't really get a look in on my crop, unless I was after reach, but that wasn't that often and the 24mm wasn't really wide enough.
Might get a cheap Tamron 28-75 2.8 as backup, but I will probably just leave it in the car.

I also like how the camera is much lighter when using primes Vs zooms...

Mr Jones · 5 Sep 2011 at 23:21

@bus, I find 85mm in sports is great! I shoot a fair few kids in weddings, to be honest, it's all about waiting for the moment rather than chase.

@Ejizz, didn't realise you've gone ff too. Looking forward to mine tomorrow as I'm sure you are too

An Exception · 5 Sep 2011 at 23:23

Mr Jones said:
@bus, I find 85mm in sports is great! I shoot a fair few kids in weddings, to be honest, it's all about waiting for the moment rather than chase.

@Ejizz, didn't realise you've gone ff too. Looking forward to mine tomorrow as I'm sure you are too

The wait is agony, worse than waiting for Christmas!

Mr Jones · 5 Sep 2011 at 23:25

I will drown the postman/office clark if he/she fails to deliver mine to my work desk tomorrow.

An Exception · 5 Sep 2011 at 23:29

And you'l probably get off with 'diminished responsibility'!

bigredshark · 6 Sep 2011 at 08:58

Mr Jones said:
Instead of the 24-70L, I've been thinking of the 28mm f1.8 and 85mm f1.8 to go with the 50 f1.4 for a 3 prime set up. Any opinion on that?

I'm comfortable with switching lenses and using my feet... does make sense financially and for extra stop of light when needed.

I think you'll want a second body right from the word go for weddings if you go that route, you'll miss spontaneous shots otherwise even if you're good at changing lenses on the fly. It might not have the absolute image quality of the primes (on Canon at least) but it's a hell of a lot quicker to go from 24mm to 70mm on a zoom.

But you'll want a second body before long anyway...

Tough one, my take it primes are great but I'd always want a zoom available and I'd buy it first.

Mr Jones · 7 Sep 2011 at 07:59

Looks like I'll be sticking to a Tamron 28-75mm f2.8 (stop gap till I can afford a 24-70L or it's updated equivilent by the time I have the money!), Canon 50mm f1.4 and 85mm f1.8 USM. All of which suits me as I've worked in those range when I had my 40D and equivilent lenses.

It's nice when the EF 50mm that use to be 85mm on a crop suddenly become wider on a FF!

Rojin · 7 Sep 2011 at 09:17

I thought I'd step aside for the man with the greater need

Could you let me know how you get on with it? Especially how you find the AF speed. I did have one before but I think it was a duff copy.

adamau5 · 7 Sep 2011 at 09:21

Rojin - mine is my wedding work horse. Its sharp, nice colours, quick enough af even in bad conditions. If i were to criticise i would say the is slight focus shift through the zoom. A tendancy to slightly backfocus wide, and front focus long. not noticeable in real world shots though.

ps- mr.jones... the 50 f1.4 on the 5d2 is a superb combination, it has such a unique bokeh and colours at f1.4, creamy!

Rojin · 7 Sep 2011 at 09:38

adamau5 said:
Rojin - mine is my wedding work horse. Its sharp, nice colours, quick enough af even in bad conditions. If i were to criticise i would say the is slight focus shift through the zoom. A tendancy to slightly backfocus wide, and front focus long. not noticeable in real world shots though.

This is what I read a lot, but the lens I had before was "meh". Colours and contrast were poor and the AF was a bit slow. I'll have to keep an eye out for another one. It may be a Nikon mount though... :eek:

adamau5 · 7 Sep 2011 at 09:39

good god man... let me guess, d700

Rojin · 7 Sep 2011 at 09:45

Possibly...

How do you find the AF on the 5D2, especially the outer points? I use those a lot on the 1Ds2 and 7D. I don't have time to use the centre point and recompose when taking shots of my daughter, it works sometimes but most of the time she's off again!

Rojin · 7 Sep 2011 at 09:47

Nice

I put my camera in my wifes hand once, she looked at me... I took the camera back!

adamau5 · 7 Sep 2011 at 09:50

the 5d2 outerpoints..... not great. They are fine in daylight and you quickly learn to set them on a contrasty point (eye / edge / etc). Low light with a slowish lens they are not really usable. I have quickly got used to using centre point in low light.... and with 22mp cropping isnt an issue.

Mr Jones · 7 Sep 2011 at 10:43

adamau5 said:
Rojin - mine is my wedding work horse. Its sharp, nice colours, quick enough af even in bad conditions. If i were to criticise i would say the is slight focus shift through the zoom. A tendancy to slightly backfocus wide, and front focus long. not noticeable in real world shots though.

ps- mr.jones... the 50 f1.4 on the 5d2 is a superb combination, it has such a unique bokeh and colours at f1.4, creamy!

Good to know the Tamron reviews have the OcUK user backing too

The reviews sounds brilliant for the price I've paid.

And yea, the 50mm f1.4 just blurs it out!

Shame the 5DMKii only have 1 cross AF point in the center, but mind you, I use center and recompose 90% of my use... Will feedback how it does after the weekend acid test.

Oh and JJ, thanks for stepping aside... So to the Darkside you say...? I was tempted but to sell up completely inc flashguns was too much of a hessle, even if the D700 body is well priced.

adamau5 · 7 Sep 2011 at 10:48

Mr Jones said:
mind you, I use center and recompose 90% of my use... Will feedback how it does after the weekend acid test.

not at f1.4 you dont... razor thin dof

bigredshark · 7 Sep 2011 at 10:52

Mr Jones said:
Oh and JJ, thanks for stepping aside... So to the Darkside you say...? I was tempted but to sell up completely inc flashguns was too much of a hessle, even if the D700 body is well priced.

There are many reasons to look at the D700 but price surely isn't one of them, The D700 is a clean £200 more than a 5dII today in general and the glass is more expensive by about 20% in my experience recently (24-70/2.8, 35/1.4 for example are both a lot more from Nikon). It's part of what has caused me to look at Canon again (other factors too though).

Rojin · 7 Sep 2011 at 11:07

Mr Jones said:
Good to know the Tamron reviews have the OcUK user backing too The reviews sounds brilliant for the price I've paid.

And yea, the 50mm f1.4 just blurs it out!

Shame the 5DMKii only have 1 cross AF point in the center, but mind you, I use center and recompose 90% of my use... Will feedback how it does after the weekend acid test.

Oh and JJ, thanks for stepping aside... So to the Darkside you say...? I was tempted but to sell up completely inc flashguns was too much of a hessle, even if the D700 body is well priced.

I'm not comfortable having 2 bodies for my needs and the funds can be used elsewhere. I'd most likely keep the 1Ds2 but it is heavy and large for taking everywhere so the 5D2 or a jump to a D700 looks tempting!

I was looking at it for my brothers wedding this weekend, but I'll make do with a wide and primes

adamau5 said:
not at f1.4 you dont... razor thin dof

Yeah that's the problem I've had.

bigredshark said:
There are many reasons to look at the D700 but price surely isn't one of them, The D700 is a clean £200 more than a 5dII today in general and the glass is more expensive by about 20% in my experience recently (24-70/2.8, 35/1.4 for example are both a lot more from Nikon). It's part of what has caused me to look at Canon again (other factors too though).

Yes the glass being more expensive is one of the reasons I went with Canon originally, although I don't really have much Canon glass!

The D700 is actually cheaper second hand than the 5D2 (this was around £1200 at one stage but people are asking £1400 now!).