Recommendation for good old 24 to 35mm manual prime lens for walk around lens?

[sapphire]

[FONT=arial, helvetica, sans-serif]Hello everyone, I am very excited to be in this forum. This is my first post as you can see. I had my t3i for 3 months now. Currently I got the 18-55, 50 1.8, 70-300, and my new love Rokinon 8mm fisheye.

I have been taking pictures everyday now and I love the 50 1.8 prime. But it's already at the point that I am very fussy about the sharpness or maybe I just read too much about the 50mm 1.4 canon and the sigma. So I am now looking for new prime lens.

I read a lot about old and cheap MF lens like the SMC super takumar 1.4 50mm. I can get it from eBay for $50.

I have been using my MF Rokinon 8mm quite a bit and I have no problem using MF lens.

Since I don't have $400 to spend on a 50mm 1.4 canon. I would hope to ask for suggestions for older MF lens, I am going to go the M42 converter .

Often 50mm is a bit too tight for me most of the time as a walk around lens. So I hope to find something in the 24-35 mm range and f/2 or smaller.

There are just too many old lens floating around so I can't really decide which one to get. I looked at the zeiss Planar T*, etc.

TIA!![/FONT]

 

[fjrabon]

just keep in mind manual focusing with an 8mm fisheye is going to be a LOT easier than manual focusing with a really fast 35mm prime.

 

[bratkinson]

Just last week, I spent a day walking around in downtown Chicago (My kind of town!) taking pictures. Last year, when I was there, I kept my camera on Av and the results were quite satisfactory. A couple of months ago, I made the transition to shooting mostly in manual. So on this years trip with my 60D and L glass, I shot all manually. The problem going from one block to the next, or simply aiming in another direction, is the settings are different for every shot. I wound up taking 2-3 pictures each time and reviewing the results on the screen for each shot I took. If I go back, I may just go to Av and let the camera figure it out.

So, before you commit to doing everything manually for a walkabout lens, are you ready for every-shot-is-different-settings shooting? AND manually focus as well?

 

[KenC]

First, you won't find much that's actually sharper than the 50/1.8, except maybe some 1.4 lenses that are a bit sharper at 1.8 than the 50. I get what you're saying about the angle of view, though, and you do need something wider. I use the Canon 28/2.8 which is within your price range new. It gets good reviews and my experience with it has been good. There is a tiny bit of barrel distortion, but that's almost certain with any wide angle, and easily correctable in software.

 

[Mike_E]

Before you shell out any money for a new lens Google "proper hand holding techniques for a camera". Read and practice everything on the first two or three pages.

Then if you still want to spend some money, start pricing tripods.

Really, even with a shorter focal length camera shake will make even the best lens look like crap. Even vibration reduction/image stabilization can only help so much.

I'm not saying that you don't know how to shoot but I am saying that it's usually the little things that trip us up.

 

[sapphire]

Thanks for all the input,

fjrabon and brat, I too know it's not a easy task to get perfect focus on the subject especially if you are on the street. I tried doing street photography in manual mode and basically 1 out of 10 photos were exposed correctly and I quickly change back to Av.

Ken, I have been doing some IQ testing with the Canon 50mm 1.8, it's a bit blurry at 1.8, and get really sharp at 3.5 (two stops down). So If all lens behave the same (at least that what people say), with 1.4 I can get sharpest pic at 2.8 (2/3 stop faster than the Canon 50mm 1.8 @ 3.5) I don't have a 5DMKII so I don't use anything over ISO400.

I assume that shooting a Canon 50mm 1.4 @ 2.8 will yields the same sharpness as shooting with a Canon 50mm 1.8 @ 3.5?

Is the MTF chart is the only data to determine the sharpness of a lens?

Mike, that's a good point, I never thought if I am hold the camera properly. I will take a look that article.