decide for my crop body: 24L II or 16-35L II

jxs1984 wrote in post #11667697
so the better option is to go with a full frame hmm.

going FF would mean a new set of lenses. Your 7D is more than capable. What you have to decide is which focal length is preferable to you. Do you like to shoot at the wide end of your 18-55 or the long end? Try this for few days and see your preferred focal length.

what about a full frame camera an a 50mm?

jxs1984 wrote in post #11667742
what about a full frame camera an a 50mm?

For me personally 50 on a FF camera is still too wide for head and shoulders framing. Its okay for 3/4 or full body shots. For a full frame camera you want a longer lens than you would on a crop for the same framing.

Jam.radonc wrote in post #11667735
going FF would mean a new set of lenses. Your 7D is more than capable. What you have to decide is which focal length is preferable to you. Do you like to shoot at the wide end of your 18-55 or the long end? Try this for few days and see your preferred focal length.

I rarely shoot at 55mm with the 18-55 and most of the time I use 18mm to 35mm.

jxs1984 wrote in post #11667867
I rarely shoot at 55mm with the 18-55 and most of the time I use 18mm to 35mm.

And we are tying to show you why thats a problem for portrait work.

if you want to do portrait and want to get close. most of thee time you dont want to do portrait work on the wide end of the lens.... unless youre FF and using the 35L. most of the time i use my 85L or 135L.

24-70L is great or the cheaper alternative is the tamron 28-75. you can zoom and it has a good minimum focus distance if youre in a tight situation.

i took a look at your flickr and judging by the way you shoot, you would love the 35L on a FF camera. with the setup i suggested earlier it gives you variety and a different look. you get 3 nice lenses instead of just 1 lens

I'd call the Canon 28/1.8 a viable alternative, too.... It's very compact, fast focusing, quite a nice "normal" on a crop sensor camera.

I agree though... You have to be careful working with a wider lens such as this. Get too close to your subject or position them too near the edge of the frame and you will start to see wide angle distortion effects. Too close causes exaggerated features (i.e. a big nose in relation to other facial and/or body parts). Too near the edge causes anamorphic distortion of the person... They'll look "wide" or "stretched".

jxs1984 wrote in post #11667010
I have a maternity shoot coming up in 2 weeks and I would like to add another lens to my line up. Currently I have 18-55 IS and 50 f/1.8 II. With the 50mm I always have to step back further to get a full body shot and this is when I have to switch to the 18-55. I want something sharper than my 50mm with an acceptable field of depth and the ability to take a full body shot in a tight space. Something that I will use in the long run. I would also like the lens to have weather sealing... I get frustrated with my 18-55mm when it fogs up and every shots are OOF.

24L f/1.4 II
16-35L f/2.8 II
other suggestions?

The 16-35L II is a great lens, but isn't as sharp as the 24L II at the same aperture. Both have great colors, but the 24L II has less barrel distortion. The two most important factors for you are:

Do you need something wider than 24mm?

Do you need ultra Low Light performance?

The 24L II gives you 2 extra stops of light. The 16-35L gets 8mm wider, which is considerable. Both lenses are more than useable (check out the sample threads).

Jam.radonc wrote in post #11667397
24L II is amazing on any format

I've got the mrkI version and it's awesome on both crop and FF, wish I would have gone with the II.
BTW, I have the 16-35 mkII also, probably would be the direction I would go because of versatility. 24 is going to be short on either crop of FF for non-environmental portraits IMO.

How's the decition process going?

I would rather have the 17-55 USM IS then the 16-35L II on a crop, i can't believe the 16-35 will produce better images on an APS-c sensor.

But if you can afford the 24L II go for it, i would kill for this lens. It's a new construction 2008 and is one of the best lenses canon makes. Also if you go FF 24mm is very close to how much the human eye sees.
This prime will also be sharpwer then any zoom edge to edge.