One sentence only answers: best landscape lens

Ok, I've read so much on every single wide-angle prime/fish/zoom I'm seriously going in circles. One minute the 17-40 is enough, the next I'm looking at the tamron 11-18, the tokina 12-24 or the sigma 15mm fish but then I start thinking about the 10-22. I'm seriously sick of reading all these reviews and threads from last week or six months ago or whatever over and over again and getting nowhere. One thread says "I love this lense". Another says 'I traded that junk last week".

So here's what I'm asking: one sentence only. Simply, just tell me what you'd pick....

Imagine you need to shoot landscapes and architecture (95% outdoor) with your 20D. The most important thing is image quality. You can walk into any camera shop and pick out one lense for free (let's say $1500 max) ONE LENSE ONLY .

What would it be?

(BTW, the other lense in your bag is a 24-70L)

for a 20D, I would definately choose the 10-22 and I did, my favourite lens.

I got the 16-35mm/2.8 L........ Have no thoughts of another.

Learn how to stitch your images, it will give you breathtaking results.

I use an EF24mm/2.8 in portrait mode and usually take some 5 to 8 overlapping shots.
Manual exposure with an aperture between 5.6 and 8 and RAW will give you the best material to work with.
Convert them to 16-bits TIFF's and stitch them with PTGui (http://www.ptgui.com/).
With this program, and because of the enormous resolution of the stitched image, you can also correct perspective distortion etc., which is vital for architectural images.
After stitching you can then use Photoshop like you do for any other image.
Make sure you have LOTS of RAM in your PC though.

The advantages of this method are obvious:
it is the only way to get images with enough resolution for big prints,
there is enough 'room' for necessary corrections,
soft edges (inevitable with wide angle lenses) of individual shots are eliminated,
you can make the angle of view as wide as you want, using a moderate focal length lens.

The speed of the 20D is essential with this technique because of moving clouds and changing light.
For me it was the reason to buy one.

Good luck on your quest!

Don't do much landscape but if I did I have the 16-35f2.8 L to go wide.

14 2.8 L!!!!

.............cuz I already have the 17-40.

Ro1

A few people have already mentioned the 16-35L, and that is what I normally use, although I also have an EF 14mm f/2.8L, but I don't know how you've set up your budget, so the 17-40 is a very fine alternative to the 16-35L even though it isn't as fast, but since I'm limited to just one sentence, I won't dwell any deeper into the subject than this even though I could probably think of more to say, but rules are rules, and in this thread, you're setting the rules.

yikes.....are you as out of breath as I am after reading that sentence!!!

schmoelzel wrote:
yikes.....are you as out of breath as I am after reading that sentence!!!

Well, he wanted one sentence.

16-35 f2.8L or 17-40 f4L (depending on budget).

Barry

TS-E24?? Anyone?

LOL, you guys are funny. I set the rules like this because every thread everyone comes in and says "Well, you could get this...or this....or this".

I want a definitive answer. What would YOU buy if it was YOUR money. That's it! That's all I want to know.

So far the 16-35 seems to be a popular choice. However, remember I'm pretty much only using this outdoors, so I don't need the speed. How is the image quality of the 16-35 vs. the 17-40 at equal apertures? (You can write more than one sentence if you answer this one )

Technically, that's two sentences, so you'll have to practice your run-on phrasing, but I have the TS-E24, but don't use it much for landscape because it doesn't autofocus and I have better lenses for the job, but it is helpful where there's a lot of distortion, especially with vertical lines as you might find with buildings, etcetera.

There is no best landscape lens, as landscapes can be taken with many focal lengths, including long telephotos.

schmoelzel wrote:
yikes.....are you as out of breath as I am after reading that sentence!!!

Breathe at the commas!