Sharpest lenses?

The 35mm, both f/2.0 and f/1.4L are some of the sharpest lenses Canon makes, believe it or not. Better than the 50mm, 85mm and 135mm lenses, even.

My Tamron 90mm Macro is by far the sharpest lens I have, followed by my Sigma 28-70 2.8DF which is closely followed equally by my Canon 70-200 2.8, 17-40 F4, and Canon 10-22. My Canon 17- 85 is my weakest lens and yet the most often used as its so versatile.
Interestingly my two oldest lenses the Tammy and the Sigma suffer from no purple fringing whatsoever wheras all my other lenses suffer to some extent.
How do I know this? Just tested them all on my new 30D one rainy night.

Mark

I don't own and haven't tried that much but so far my 200 f2.8L is winning.

The sharpest in my arsenal are:

35 f2L
50 f1.4
85 f1.2L
85 f.18
135 f2L
200 f2.8L

Note these are primes. My sharpest zoom is the 24-105 f4L

Mark

Mark_Cohran wrote in post #2053998
35 f2L

IQ wise maybe, but it's not an L.

Sigma 30mm 1.4 EX, Sigma 70-200mm 2.8 EX, Sigma 10-20mm EX, Tamron 28-75 2.8, Canon 70-200mm 2.8 and 4, Canon 300mm 2.8 and 4, Canon 100mm MACRO, and many more... Basically any prime and especially prime MACROs...

EF 100 f/2.8 Macro is pretty darned sharp. EF 135 f/2L is amazing.

my 300 2.8 is definitly my sharpest lens, followed by the 400 5.6, 24-105, 70-200, 17-40, and 50 1.4. all of these are super sharp IMO.

i only own 2 lenses , and my tokina 100mm is far sharper then my canon.

Another one that's really sharp is the Canon 60mm f/2.8 macro. Great little lens that's also one of my favorites.

Here's a graph from my booklet about buying glass:

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I ought to attach a knife to a Canon EF to Nikon F mount adapter or something and call it the sharpest thing ever to be mounted on my camera.
It would still be a tough call though. All of my primes amaze me, and even the zooms hold their own.

Double Negative wrote in post #2053638
The 35mm, both f/2.0 and f/1.4L are some of the sharpest lenses Canon makes, believe it or not. Better than the 50mm, 85mm and 135mm lenses, even.

arh darn, you just made me itch so much to get a 35mm. and i just got the 135L last week..

frankly, is that ef 35mm f/2 worth getting considering it only has an af-d motor and has that buzzing hornet nick.

I haven't had too much experience personally with the truly amazingly sharp lenses here. I've tried the 135 f/2L, and it was incredible, but even the 400 f/5.6L was tack sharp wide open when I tried it.

Of my small lens kit, my 80-200L is my sharpest lens. It's sharper than my 50 f/1.8, which is also quite sharp, just not quite as sharp as the 80-200L. In fact, my 80-200L at f/2.8 matches the 50 f/1.8 at f/2.8.

In my bag the 100 F/2.8 Macro. The other two lenses are no slouches either.