Help on Canon EOS 1 Lens

Royster · Jul 20, 2005

I just bought a second hand Canon EOS 1 35mm SLR body, im planning to use it as my secondary camera, i guess a lot of you guys have used this body before, can anyone tell me about its good features?. And can anyone tell me where i can get lens for this model at a reasonable price.

Thanks in advance.

Jeff Canes · Jul 20, 2005

I have two of them. Theyre built like a tank, but still well balanced despite the weight. As for lenses its an EOS so your 300x lenses should work. Not sure where to get deals in the UK or Europe.

Finger out what your budget is. If Canon medium and high-end lenses are out of your budget. Look at Sigma, Tokina, & Tamron their high-end lenses are in the same price range as Canons medium range. Think about one of their medium range lenses. Check out their web pages and them ebay

good luck

DocFrankenstein · Jul 20, 2005

1) Use it as primary, not as secondary camera. It's way better than 300X

2) What are you gonna shoot with the lenses?

Big Mike · Jul 21, 2005

The EOS 1

introduced 1989 - discontinued 1995

The first EOS designed for the professional, and the first EOS with a top shutter speed of 1/8000 sec.

This is a professional camera, so it will be built like a tank (as Jeff said) and should have great weather sealing. One thing I might be concerned about is the shutter. If this camera was used professionally for a lot of years, the shutter might need to be replaced.

You can use any of the lenses made for the EOS system. Canon EF lenses or equivalent from Sigma, Tamron etc. Lenses for this system are quite common and should be found at any photo store and many, many placed on the web.

ThatCameraThingy · Jul 21, 2005

I use a EOS 30 with a grip and Eos 1n.

the EOS 1 is an older camera , but i love it to bits. built like a tank. 100% viewfinder and bloddy fast if you shoot it with a booster grip.

use it as the primary , it's way better than the 300x.

Hanno

Royster · Jul 21, 2005

Wow, im glad i bought this camera inever thought id get my hands on a canon this good but on the other hand it might be too "advanced" for me. Ive just started 3 months ago and ive barely got my feet wet on shooting portraits of my friends and landscapes. Im now experimenting with b&w. Is there a particular lens type/size that works exceptionally with this camera?

Thankyou all for the information.

Hope to hear from you again.

DocFrankenstein · Jul 21, 2005

Royster said:
Is there a particular lens type/size that works exceptionally with this camera?

Again, this question makes no sense.

How are you limited by your current lenses?

Royster · Jul 22, 2005

thanks for your comment docfrankenstein, i understand what you meant. I mostly shoot portraits of children and landscapes can you recommend lens which are best suited for this purpose. Did you own an EOS 1 Before?

Big Mike · Jul 22, 2005

Royster,

The EOS 1 will work with any Canon EF lens....just as well as any other EOS camera will. There is no particular lenses that are made specifically for the EOS 1. All EF lenses are made to work very well with all EOS cameras.

What lenses you use...is really up to you. Some people like wide lenses for certain things that other people would use a long telephoto lens for. I like wide angle lenses for landscape. Something around 24mm or wider. For portraits I like to use my 50mm lens but the most common advice is that portraits are best shot around 100mm.

The best (& most expensive) lenses will have a bigger maximum aperture (smaller F number). This will allow the lens to let in more light, which will allow you to use faster shutter speeds. A bigger aperture will also allow you to get a shallow depth of field so you can blur out the background for portraits for example.

To decide which lenses to get...examine how you use your current lenses. Do you seem to want a wider view...or do you wish you could magnify far away objects? Would you like to be able to get better photos in lower light situations without using the flash?

Royster · Jul 22, 2005

Thanks for your very informative reply,

Big Mike said:
do you wish you could magnify far away objects? Would you like to be able to get better photos in lower light situations without using the flash?

These are exactly what i would like to do, my telephoto lens doesnt seem to produce the result i want, if i take pictures of subjects 5 meters away it looks out of focus, dark and colors are dull(even though its on auto mode). Which telephoto do you use? mine has an aperture of 4, i think. So yes, to the above, i would.

Thanks in advance.

Big Mike · Jul 22, 2005

I have a 100-300 Vivitar Telephoto with the EOS mount. It's not the sharpest lens but it gets the job done when there is enough light. The problem is that the maximum aperture is not very big...so getting good shutter speeds is hard sometimes.

Is it possible that your telephoto shots are not sharp because the shutter speed was not fast enough? The rule of thumb is that you want your shutter speed number to be about the same as your focal length (or faster) when holding the camera in your hands. So if you had your 70-200mm lens at 200mm...you would not want to have a shutter speed slower than 1/200. Of course, some people are steadier than others.

Also, most zoom lenses are not at their best when zoomed fully out.

As to what's wrong with your photos

it looks out of focus, dark and colors are dull

it could be any of a number of things...not necessarily the lens. The 70-200 F4 lens is supposed to be pretty good. An even better model is the 70-200 F2.8...but it's big, heavy and expensive.

DocFrankenstein · Jul 22, 2005

Royster said:
I mostly shoot portraits of children and landscapes can you recommend lens which are best suited for this purpose. Did you own an EOS 1 Before?

I didn't own an EOS 1 before, but an EOS 3 which is pretty damn similar.

You probably want a wide angle and a fast short telephoto.

For landscape:
17-40 f/4 L would probably be my choice. Sharp and compact, and you rarely need anything faster than f/4 for landscape. But you'll see some distortion if you're shooting aperture.

17mm tokina prime - really wide and you can also shoot architecture with it.

Stay away from 28/1.8 and 28/2.8 Both of them have some variance in the quality.

For portraits you need to pick a focal length first and know your budget.

135 f/2 L - is raved all over the net on canon forums. I'd use that one, but it may be too long for you.

Never used canon's 100mm primes. 100mm f/2 seems nice and photodo's rating of 4.2 tells me it's more than sharp enough for portraits. 100 f/2.8 macro is used often as portrait lens too. Said to have a pleasing bokeh.

In 85mm you have 1.8 which is a USM and very fast focusing. Good for sports too.

For extreme DOF separation you might get the 85/1.2. It's a specialized portrait lens with slow autofocus.

Or you can even get the 70-200 f/2.8, which is gonna give you flexibility. But the bokeh is distracting.

World of choices....

Royster · Jul 23, 2005

Big Mike said:
As to what's wrong with your photos it could be any of a number of things...not necessarily the lens. The 70-200 F4 lens is supposed to be pretty good. An even better model is the 70-200 F2.8...but it's big, heavy and expensive.

my telephoto is a 300x standard issue 90-300mm with f/4.5-5.6, i guess this will not work best in dark/dim condition. And like what you said i need to get lens with a bigger apperture number to get sharper images even in dim.dark conditions. I was browsing through ebay on lens with large max apperture and ive noticed they get more expensive as the f value goes down. I guess its time i save up for a good set.

Thank you very much Big Mike! Its guys like you that make this forum great.