Cheap wide angle lenses?
Discussion
Hello
I'm starting to get into mountain biking photography and looking at purchasing another lens as I only have the 18-55 kit lens and my 50mm 1.8 (camera is a 550d). Ideally want something wider than I have currently as I find a lot of my photos are quite restricted with what you can get in the frame. Example here of what I'd like to achieve, not necessarily to that extreme but you get the idea: http://www.pinkbike.com/photo/6861639/
Ideally a 10-22mm would be perfect but we are currently buying our first house so cannot by any means stretch to a budget like that.
Is there anything avaliable for a budget nearer the 100 to 200 mark? I'm guessing that I'm probably asking a lot from very little but wondered if I was missing something I hadn't spotted yet! Would obviously be looking at second hand and also maybe a wide angle prime lens if they are any good and avaliable at that price.
Many thanks
ETA: I know for cheap price I'm not gonna find a speedy lens... but it might have to be a contributing factor considering what I enjoy shooting. Could always manual focus beforehand but not always practical.
I'm starting to get into mountain biking photography and looking at purchasing another lens as I only have the 18-55 kit lens and my 50mm 1.8 (camera is a 550d). Ideally want something wider than I have currently as I find a lot of my photos are quite restricted with what you can get in the frame. Example here of what I'd like to achieve, not necessarily to that extreme but you get the idea: http://www.pinkbike.com/photo/6861639/
Ideally a 10-22mm would be perfect but we are currently buying our first house so cannot by any means stretch to a budget like that.
Is there anything avaliable for a budget nearer the 100 to 200 mark? I'm guessing that I'm probably asking a lot from very little but wondered if I was missing something I hadn't spotted yet! Would obviously be looking at second hand and also maybe a wide angle prime lens if they are any good and avaliable at that price.
Many thanks
ETA: I know for cheap price I'm not gonna find a speedy lens... but it might have to be a contributing factor considering what I enjoy shooting. Could always manual focus beforehand but not always practical.
Edited by Louisa911 on Sunday 21st August 23:18
Louisa911 said:
Hello
I'm starting to get into mountain biking photography and looking at purchasing another lens as I only have the 18-55 kit lens and my 50mm 1.8 (camera is a 550d). Ideally want something wider than I have currently as I find a lot of my photos are quite restricted with what you can get in the frame. Example here of what I'd like to achieve, not necessarily to that extreme but you get the idea: http://www.pinkbike.com/photo/6861639/
Ideally a 10-22mm would be perfect but we are currently buying our first house so cannot by any means stretch to a budget like that.
Is there anything avaliable for a budget nearer the 100 to 200 mark? I'm guessing that I'm probably asking a lot from very little but wondered if I was missing something I hadn't spotted yet! Would obviously be looking at second hand and also maybe a wide angle prime lens if they are any good and avaliable at that price.
Many thanks
Wider than your 18-55? I guess the cheapest ultra-wide will be the Sigma 10-20 - still around £430 though. Its 'HSM' so should be pretty quick to focus.I'm starting to get into mountain biking photography and looking at purchasing another lens as I only have the 18-55 kit lens and my 50mm 1.8 (camera is a 550d). Ideally want something wider than I have currently as I find a lot of my photos are quite restricted with what you can get in the frame. Example here of what I'd like to achieve, not necessarily to that extreme but you get the idea: http://www.pinkbike.com/photo/6861639/
Ideally a 10-22mm would be perfect but we are currently buying our first house so cannot by any means stretch to a budget like that.
Is there anything avaliable for a budget nearer the 100 to 200 mark? I'm guessing that I'm probably asking a lot from very little but wondered if I was missing something I hadn't spotted yet! Would obviously be looking at second hand and also maybe a wide angle prime lens if they are any good and avaliable at that price.
Many thanks
Can't think of anything around £200 though, maybe look at buying a used lens rather than new?
Cheers.
RobDickinson said:
Cheapest will be either the sigma 10-20 or the sigma 12-24 (which isnt the best), both used.
Wont be anything else around wider/cheaper.
Samyang?Wont be anything else around wider/cheaper.
Manual only but that's no big deal with a 14mm or wider lens since just about any focus point over about 5 ft away will give a sharp image to everything that is not closer to you. If you want really close it gets a bit more interesting trying to get accurate focus in a hurry but a little experience with the lens should solve that.
To set the aperture you just take a few test shots. You are very likely to get a wide dynamic range no matter what s oit's a matter of experimenting to see what work.
I hired a Canon 14mm f2.8 L spec last year and thoroughly enjoyed discovering it but upwards of £1800 was a bit too much. £250 for a Samyang 14mm f2.8, albeit all manual, was much easier to accept. Their 8mm lens is available for just under £200.
That's new. You might find them used for less. They are sold under other brand names as well though mostly in the US.
The samyang 14mm is certainly an option, I dont think 14mm is very wide for UWA but its certainly wide enough for most applications.
Autofocus isnt that big a deal for landscapes either as you've noted.
Its downside vs the canon 14L is its ropey bokeh but then its a very small fraction of the L price!
The 8mm is a fisheye lens I think, you can correct in post but you loose width and resolution, fisheyes have limited use.
Autofocus isnt that big a deal for landscapes either as you've noted.
Its downside vs the canon 14L is its ropey bokeh but then its a very small fraction of the L price!
The 8mm is a fisheye lens I think, you can correct in post but you loose width and resolution, fisheyes have limited use.
RobDickinson said:
The samyang 14mm is certainly an option, I dont think 14mm is very wide for UWA but its certainly wide enough for most applications.
Autofocus isnt that big a deal for landscapes either as you've noted.
Its downside vs the canon 14L is its ropey bokeh but then its a very small fraction of the L price!
The 8mm is a fisheye lens I think, you can correct in post but you loose width and resolution, fisheyes have limited use.
Good points Rob and prompted me to look for some images to compare the shots I took with the Canon 14mm and the Samyang to compare the bokeh. I don't really have anything that can be considered to be directly comparable between the two - which surprised me. This may be due to very lighting conditions and circumstances for the most heavily used sets combined with my approach to using the manual Samyang compared to the automated Canon. In both cases I have tended to use the lens on my second body - a well used 400D.Autofocus isnt that big a deal for landscapes either as you've noted.
Its downside vs the canon 14L is its ropey bokeh but then its a very small fraction of the L price!
The 8mm is a fisheye lens I think, you can correct in post but you loose width and resolution, fisheyes have limited use.
The Samyang, in bright light, produces a 'look' which is really very similar to the guide sample pic linked at the top of the thread. Most of the Canon lens shots I have found seem to be taken in darker conditions or at night. I'll keep looking. I'm not yet convinced that bokeh is a major consideration for fairly wide lenses in most usage situations.
I have not used the 8mm and I can't think of many regular situations where I might have a use for one but I suspect I could find some given availability. The Photozone test points out that it has a slightly untypical "stereographic" projection and so could be rather interesting for the sort of shots envisaged by the OP.
http://www.photozone.de/canon-eos/526-samyang8f35e...
With the 14mm I can find enough resolution from the 400D to crop into the image quite deeply and still look convincing. Obviously on the 'crop' body the 14mm is notionally only the equivalent of about 23mm but it works quite well without looking extreme.
The sample linked in the first post is 14mm on a full frame (apparently) but I would think it has been cropped judging by the file size. An 8mm on an APS-C sensor and cropped to the centre would be slightly wider perhaps (13mm equivalent) but not by much. The results, given stereographic projection, might well be rather similar when cropped to the central area.
On the other hand the 14mm (23mm equivalent) shot less cropped would probably look much the same in many cases for action shots. That may not be quite so true for landscape requirements of course.
Tokina 11-16 f2.8 ATX
Amazing optics and performance.
Great build quality.
VERY reasonably priced (given the performance on offer)
I believe this is a limited production lens by Tokina in comparison to their other lenses and are made in small batches. Do not confuse with their other wide-angles which are in a class below.
I have one on a D300 and the results have been fantastic.
Amazing optics and performance.
Great build quality.
VERY reasonably priced (given the performance on offer)
I believe this is a limited production lens by Tokina in comparison to their other lenses and are made in small batches. Do not confuse with their other wide-angles which are in a class below.
I have one on a D300 and the results have been fantastic.
The Sigma 10-20 rarely leaves my D200, it's become my standard zoom as I do a lot of interior and landscape photography.
spareparts said:
Tokina 11-16 f2.8 ATX
Amazing optics and performance.
Can imagine the Tokina ATX being very good though, ATX's seem to be excellent, and the manual 24-40 I've got is brilliant. Sadly not used much now.Amazing optics and performance.
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