Canon 40mm f/2.8 vs Canon 50mm f/1.8

mrs.hankIII · Oct 2, 2018

Hi, has been a very long time since posting here and I'm seeking some advice from those in the know. I just recently got back into photography from a 5 year hiatus in the game. I cannot afford the lenses I really want right this moment and I need a better lens than the Canon kit lenses. I kick myself in the butt everyday since getting this new setup for selling my 85mm. What a silly thing to do. Anyways, I just need a general lens to carry with me. I'm wanting to experiment with street photography, and I like to shoot portraits but I do it for myself. I'm an avid equestrian, and I adored my 85mm with the horses even though it "technically" isn't a very good equine lens. I also had a 50mm f/1.8 that did well for equine portraits. So, I can't afford the 85mm quite yet so I started looking into the 40mm f/2.8.

So here I am. I'm really heavily leaning towards the 40mm and all the reviews I have read(and I think I have successfully read every single one on the interwebs!!) is telling me this 40mm is the way to go. But I'm stubborn, and I would REALLY like to hear some opinions from every day people like myself!

I'm stuck pretty firm at $200 right now, both the 50 and 40 fit right in there. I'm not opposed to used lenses, but even used I still think those are the only 2 lenses worth looking into unless someone has a suggestion? I appreciate any and all replies! Thank you!

Dave442 · Oct 2, 2018

I used to use the Pentax 40mm pancake lens when doing street and travel photography back with film. Great lens, but it was hard to manual focus. Now digital and auto-focus I would think that Canon 40mm would be an excellent little lens for street photography. I would go with that over the 50mm.

Derrel · Oct 2, 2018

If you have an APS-C d-slr, then a 40mm f/2.8 lens ought to be a pretty good choice as a general-purpose lens with a semi-selective angle of view. Mutliplying the actual focal length of 40mm by the FOV (field-of-view) factor of 1.6 for Canon APS-C yields a full-frame 35mm effective focal length of 64mm. This is an interesting length, and the most descriptive way is to call this a semi-selective angle of view. Not super-selective, like a 300mm telephoto gives, but at the very lowest end of the "telephoto" family.

The 50mm is more like an 80mm on Canon APS-C...and 80mm was the old-school bottom end of the 80-200mm zoom lens of the late 1960's and the early- to mid-1970's and later.

The difference between 40mm and 50mm is real, and noticeable. The difference between a 64mm e-view and an 80mm e-view is noticeable. The two lenses are both semi-selective in their angle of view.

In my opinion, with newer, higher-megapxel cameras, it's better to have the shorter lens with the wider angle of view, in most scenarios where you want the option to be able to shoot a bit wider, then crop-in later.

mrs.hankIII · Oct 3, 2018

My local camera shop has a 40mm for $110. They also have a 100mm f/2.8 macro non L series for $225. I'm going tonight to check them out, and tomorrow on my lunch break I'll run down and pick them up. Might as well up the budget and get 2 that I really want huh?

Derrel · Oct 3, 2018

mrs.hankIII said:
My local camera shop has a 40mm for $110. They also have a 100mm f/2.8 macro non L series for $225. I'm going tonight to check them out, and tomorrow on my lunch break I'll run down and pick them up. Might as well up the budget and get 2 that I really want huh?

I owned the Canon 100mm f/2.8 EF macro, the "second version", which as I recall had internal focusing and never changed its overall outside length even when focused pretty close....I used it mostly back in the 2004-2007 era...it's been a long time since I used it, having sold it and most all of my Canon gear back in 2015 or so. It was a good performer. Had seven-sided bokeh dots on backlighted subjects, as I recall; not the "prettiest" bokeh lens, but a decent macro lens of 100mm focal length, and the price of $225 seems reasonable to me; I payed $260 for a used copy that had been owned by the Vancouver, Washington Columbian newspaper.

A 100mm macro lens is a very useful tool to own.

mrs.hankIII · Oct 4, 2018

I'm picking up my 40mm today. Unfortunately, someone came in before I did and bought ALL of their used Canon lenses so no 100mm for me and I'm paying full price for a new 40mm. $178 is extremely cheap so I can't complain. Disappointed about that macro lens though.