"L" vs "Non-L" comparison.

I agree that a lot of people look for L lenses simply to show off and be a super duper photog. Maybe they think that just cause they have $6,000 worth of glass, they are now great photographers! There are A LOT of lenses our there that are reasonably priced and will make wonderful photos for you. I think buying lenses is all about comprimise. If you get a cheap lens, you have to comprimise build quality, and possibly some facet of optical quality. With L lenses, you probably comprimise less optical and build quality, but your wallet suffers

but hey, if you got the money!

Wilt wrote in post #2126562
What happened to the idea in photography of simply enjoying one's avocation and taking pictures? Seems everyone is out to win Sharpness Awards on a chronic basis, with all this attention given to L lenses! Does no one simply buy lenses to have certain focal lengths available?

As I have said numerous times, for DECADES photographers made award winning photos with whatever lenses a manufacturer built, and the L designation was nothing more than a marketer's dream. Now there are thousands of photographers wanting to spend $1000 more per lens simply to have a red stripe and L designation...the marketer's dream has come true because they have succeeding in getting the lemmings to come to them!

My point is not to condemn L lenses as a waste of money. My point is to draw question into the motivation of photographers' obsession with L...the red L in the signatures as a 'badge' seems to be a bit like the M badge obsession where ordinary BMW owners pried off the 318i badges and replaced them with M badges they purchased over the counter. My point is to try to get photographers to BE photographers and enjoy the equipment they own. You drive Hondas and Lexus' and VWs and you do not try to find the absolute highest performance racing tires and brake pads, yet you enjoy the car none the less. This L lens thing seems an obsession, and the enjoyment of photography seems to have been LOST in this obsession.

sirsloop wrote in post #2126881
I agree that a lot of people look for L lenses simply to show off and be a super duper photog. Maybe they think that just cause they have $6,000 worth of glass, they are now great photographers! There are A LOT of lenses our there that are reasonably priced and will make wonderful photos for you. I think buying lenses is all about comprimise. If you get a cheap lens, you have to comprimise build quality, and possibly some facet of optical quality. With L lenses, you probably comprimise less optical and build quality, but your wallet suffers

but hey, if you got the money!

I hear what you're saying...

But this is way off topic. All i'm looking for are photographic comparisons. My spending value is mine to worry about. haha

Agreed... I could care less what you spend your money on. If you want to buy a 50mm F/1.0L lens, by all means.

If you want hard numbers, then you should look at a scientific approach to the glass. I've seen GREAT photos come out of cell phones (no joke). Most of it is the nut workin the controls. http://www.photozone.d​e/8Reviews/index.html

I think you'll find that there are A LOT of non-L/EX lenses out there that are very resonably priced and peg the resolution graphs out. Perfect example, the 50mm f/1.8 (the cheapest EF lens canon offers). At $80 dollars, Its by far the biggest bang for the buck lens optically speaking. Only thing that would make this lens a knock out would be a 8 blade aperture and metal mount, which is available in the 50mm f/1.4 flavor (at four times the cost).

Photography isn't about the body or the lens. It's about the image.

1D bodies and L lenses might be the way to get a particular image, but it's not an entrance requirement.

L optics! Cant be beaten!
L quality Cant be beaten!
L price Cant be beaten! (but the price second hand stays close to the price you pay new)!
So Lis a good investment!!!

price, quality, and build all can certianly be beaten. The used market is very strong though...

I have a nice blend of both and enjoy the benefits equally. I'm not going to get into the sour grapes thing and condemn L lenses because I can't afford them. They are very, very good in terms of image quality. And so are my beloved primes. I don't really care about the red ring as long as I continue to sell my images at a profit, and I'll use whatever tool I need to do so.

I am sure there will be many comparing the 1.4 and the 1.2 once the 1.2 is out. Should be very soon!

Yella Fella wrote in post #2126586
why are the L lenses slower at wider apertures? Any reason for that?

Slower at the wider apertures? What do you mean by that?

Mark

liza wrote in post #2128646
I'm not going to get into the sour grapes thing and condemn L lenses because I can't afford them.

I think there is far to much of this on these forums and on many others. It's really irritating, frankly, to see people angrily bash gear solely because it's more expensive. If it's legitimatly not as good as another, ok, but "this is nearly as good as that, therefore, you are a snob" is really dumb.

Back to the topic. I have this 28-80 mm 1:3.5~5.6 II collecting dust from the old film days, I wanted to see how good it was when stop down to f8, compared to the 24-70 L. Same camera, lighting, and PP setting, at around 50mm:

28-80

Byte size: ZERO | Content warning: NOT AN IMAGE

Byte size: ZERO | Content warning: NOT AN IMAGE

The difference is crystal clear in those shots. There's so much more detail in the shot with the L

Wilt wrote in post #2126562
What happened to the idea in photography of simply enjoying one's avocation and taking pictures? Seems everyone is out to win Sharpness Awards on a chronic basis, with all this attention given to L lenses! Does no one simply buy lenses to have certain focal lengths available?

As I have said numerous times, for DECADES photographers made award winning photos with whatever lenses a manufacturer built, and the L designation was nothing more than a marketer's dream. Now there are thousands of photographers wanting to spend $1000 more per lens simply to have a red stripe and L designation...the marketer's dream has come true because they have succeeding in getting the lemmings to come to them!

To be honest, I both agree with this and disagree with it.
L glass is sharp, no doubt about it... but you can get as many duds as you can from the consumer glass market. Just check around these forums for people stating their Ls aren't as good as they should be.
But barring image quality, which can be better, as good as, or even worse than consumer lenses (I know this is true as my 17-85IS beats my 24-105L in certain tests), Ls are perfect for build quality, focusing and weather sealing. Consumer lenses just don't match them in these areas generally.

To Canon: I'd buy more Ls if you made more of your bodies weather sealed!
Landscape photographers with a 5D also takes pictures in the rain you know!