Looking to hire a canon 17-40 or 16-35

Bobby uk

Bobby uk

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Rob
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Looking to try out some new lens's for maybe my next purchase. Mainly looking at landscape but not sure what sort of lens to try. I know the 17-40 is cheaper but the 16-35 looks tempting? Some personal experience advice would be good. And of course any other recommendations.
Also im looking at using 'lens for hire' should I stick with them or look else where.
 
Would recommend Lenses for hire. Hired a 300 f2.8 off them and found them excellent.
 
It is far cheaper to buy from ebay, then off-load when you no longer need it. 17-40 wont be much used, around 300-350 if you look around. Only hire stupidly expensive glass like 400mm f/2.8 if you absolutely need it.

I'd much preferably buy 16-35 f/4 as it is in theory much sharper than either of the older alternatives. I don't know whether Canon quality control can be trusted but at least you have 14d to return a new lens if it is made by a blind and shaky optical engineer.
 
pingu666 said:
theres really good and possibly wider lenses made by tokina and sigma too
Click to expand...

On full frame? No not really unless you refer to tokina 16-28 that is incompatible with filters. Everything else really is subpar
 
Just remember that the 16/17 -> 24 section of your lens will probably be too wide for most landscapes. Too much space to fill.

Excellent idea to hire a lens first unless you enjoy the buying and selling side of things.

The 17-40 is said to be the worst L lens canon makes. I've certainly got a soft area on mine and it's not in a corner. It has no IS either although that would be less crucial on a wide-angle.

There are several versions of the 16-35 around. The f4 is the latest.
 
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The 17-40 isn't as bad as people make out. It struggles at especially in the corners and needs stopping down to f11 to get something worthwhile. From 20mm onwards it's a decent lens but does benefit from being used at f8-11.
 
.....or alternatively you could just take my personal experience of this lens as an example of how bad it can be. I forgot to mention the barrel distortion at the wide end but the 24-105 has that as well.

I make do with it when occasionally I need a lens in the 17 - 24 mm region.
 
That doesn't mean it's a bad lens generically though. Photozones test on it has it as a decent enough lens. It's like the 100-400. So many people say you take a chance of getting a good copy. I've used 4 of them and they've been fine. Slightly worse at the long end which is generally down to a slight decentered front element. The downside is there is nowhere in the uk that you can send it to to get it adjusted properly. A properly adjusted one is consistent through its focal range.
 
Im using a cropped sensor at the moment so could possibly look at the 17-55 is ?
 
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