Canon EF 28mm f/1.8 USM

42zx wrote in post #15850869

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com/​photos/42zx/8667225959​/
Day 103 by 42zx, on Flickr

This is pretty slick. I'd buy this lens for images like this. Can you give me some specs on the shot. Sensor size, aperture, shutter speed, tracking method, etc. Thanks.

AbPho wrote in post #15855478
This is pretty slick. I'd buy this lens for images like this. Can you give me some specs on the shot. Sensor size, aperture, shutter speed, tracking method, etc. Thanks.

Thanks! No tracking, its a single exposure of 20 sec @ f2.2, ISO 1250 on a 5D Mark II. It was a really moonlit night, thats why the foreground came out so nice. The moon was high in the sky to left of camera.

Incidentally, I was looking at the 24mm 1.4 L for this kind of stuff but figured the image quality kind of sucks with these shots anyway so the differences between that and the 28mm wouldn't be that noticeable in this type of shot.

42zx wrote in post #15855516
...Incidentally, I was looking at the 24mm 1.4 L....

Thanks for the info. I can see how 22 seconds would work on a full frame. The 24L is pretty popular for night sky shots. But to expensive for me at this time. I'll keep my eye on the 28/1.8 for a possible future purchase.

AbPho wrote in post #15855917
Thanks for the info. I can see how 22 seconds would work on a full frame. The 24L is pretty popular for night sky shots. But to expensive for me at this time. I'll keep my eye on the 28/1.8 for a possible future purchase.

Exactly, I bought the 28mm 2nd hand for 1/5 of the new price of the 24mm 1.4 L, no contest. If you really want to get technical, both of these lenses suffer from coma in the corners, so the stars stretch out...it doesnt really both me but seeing as the 24mm doesnt fix these deficiencies I don't see the point of paying extra as you won't get a massive IQ improvement for night shots.

I'm also considering the 17-40mm or Samyang 14mm 2.8 in the future, rather than the 24mm.

42zx wrote in post #15857784
...28mm...24mmL...both of these lenses suffer from coma in the corners...

Coma is not something you hear abour very often. I first saw this property in my (now sold) EF-S 10-22. It took some searching to find what the cause was and what it was called.

42zx wrote in post #15857784
I'm also considering the 17-40mm or Samyang 14mm 2.8 in the future, rather than the 24mm.

At f/2.8 both of those a considerably slower. I was worried that without tracking that the shutter speed would be too long to get clean shots.

The coma doesnt really bother me, but the fact its on both lenses means paying 5 times more isnt going to get you 5 times better star shots in this case.

They are slower lenses but theyre also much wider, which means you can get much longer shutter speeds before the star trails show. Which I think will get you more light in in total...either way, I've seen amazing star shots with all of the lenses mentioned.

I understand buying the 28 1.8 over the 24Lii... and you list good reasons... but low light IQ is really a lot better with the 24. In fact, I've owned both and the 24Lii is just far better in every situation. 4x better? I tend to think not. But you have to pay to have the best.

The Nikon 28 1.8, on the other hand, is a damn peach. It comes with a higher price tag as a result (compared to the Canon 28). If I were a Nikon shooter I'd have the 28 in a heartbeat, wouldn't even think about the 24 1.4G. The Nikon 28 is so much better than the Canon wide open across the frame, and with flaring/CA. Hopefully Canon picks up their game with non-L primes, it'd be great to see some more alternatives.

Sorry I shouldn't come into this thread and talk a bunch of crap about this lens. It's definitely a good performer for the price, and a lot of fun... I just wanted to point a couple things out.

Slap this lens on a crop sensor and it becomes quite sharp corner-to-corner, and IMO, the best "normal" focal length option. If I didn't move to full-frame, I would have NEVER sold my 28 1.8..however, on full-frame the degraded corner sharpness is actually quite noticeable. Vignetting is also exaggerated, although that can be fixed easily in LR or PS.

h4ppydaze wrote in post #15863897
I understand buying the 28 1.8 over the 24Lii... and you list good reasons... but low light IQ is really a lot better with the 24. In fact, I've owned both and the 24Lii is just far better in every situation. 4x better? I tend to think not. But you have to pay to have the best.

The Nikon 28 1.8, on the other hand, is a damn peach. It comes with a higher price tag as a result (compared to the Canon 28). If I were a Nikon shooter I'd have the 28 in a heartbeat, wouldn't even think about the 24 1.4G. The Nikon 28 is so much better than the Canon wide open across the frame, and with flaring/CA. Hopefully Canon picks up their game with non-L primes, it'd be great to see some more alternatives.

I agree actually, I'm sure the 24mm 1.4 L is amazing but I don't have that kind of money currently, I almost swapped to Nikon for their cheaper primes, specifically the 28G and 50G to get around that. I wasn't even going to bother with the Canon 28mm 1.8 but I saw it going for a nice price and thought 'why not?', which has turned out ok so far . In the end I decided to play the long game as my 5D2 is still an awesome camera and overall I prefer Canon's lens lineup and not just L lenses, I think the 40mm Pancake is awesome, it can turn my full frame DSLR into a nice low profile, portable camera.

I love this lens. It's funny a year or so ago before NIkon had their inexpensive prime options I switched to canon for their 1.8 primes. haha