Wide and standard primes needed

Amp34

Amp34

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I'm getting rid of my Sigma 24-70 and probably Tokina 12-24 as they are a little too big for a trip I'm heading off on in the next month or so. I was going to replace them with an 8mm fisheye and a Tamron 17-50 but I have this niggling feeling that I should be getting a couple of primes instead of the 17-50... The feeling is telling me they will be a little sharper (corners especially), with more contrast and colour, extra speed is always good as well...

Now the tele side of my kit is covered by a 70-200 and the extreme wide would be covered by the 8mm fisheye. That leaves me 9-69mm to possibly cover with two primes, all for around £300 max really (bear in mind i'm also restricted on size so the L primes wouldn't be any good anyway).

Now obviously you have the 50 f/1.8 to cover the top end (apparently nice and sharp...), it's also tiny and cheap. That leaves me with something to use as a nice landscape lens (a very important lens I may add, most of my work is landscape :lol:).

After a bit of looking around it seems more of a "looking for the best of a bad bunch" rather than actually seeing some stunning primes*. The 15-49mm range seems to have a lot of very poor primes with the Canon 24 f/2.8 and 35 f/2 being the picks of the bunch. The 35mm in particular looks pretty good, but I'm thinking a bit too long to really be that useful as a general landscape lens on an crop camera. I guess the 24 f/2.8 would be not too bad length wise but I do wonder (looking at the reviews) if it is actually any better than a Tamron 17-50. It's not even faster and with the added expense of having to get something for 50mm's it's over £100 more expensive.

Am I missing something?
 
Bump. Nobody uses standard primes?
 
Amp34 said:
and 35 f/2 being the picks of the bunch. The 35mm in particular looks pretty good, but I'm thinking a bit too long to really be that useful
Click to expand...

I ahve the 35mm F2 and although a great lens I wouldnt class it as wide on a crop.. I ahve had it on too many times and wishing I had wider .. hence why i recently got the canon 17-40L
 
Are they actually any better than the Tamron 17-50 though? From the reviews I've read of them they aren't, which is contrary to what we are supposed to believe is it not?
 
I have the Tamron 17-50mm f2.8 and the Siggy 30mm f1.4.

The first obvious advantage the Siggy has is that no matter how hard it tries and no matter how good a copy you have the Tamron can't do f1.4.

Having said that the Tamron is a sharp lens and the only optical nit picking I can do is to say that it distorts a bit at the widest end. It's nowhere near as bad as some other lenses in this range though. I rate the Tamron 17-50mm f2.8 highly but I too like my primes and the Siggy 30mm is good. IMVHO. Sharp too.

Maybe the flexibility of the zoom would be a good thing to have with a fast prime in your pocket if needed? Or you could go for a 20mm f1.8 (Sigma again, a lovely lens and sharp) and something else like a fast 30 or 50mm.
 
28/1.8 is one of my faveroute lenses

on crop its just wide of standard (like 45mm 35mm equiv)

on ff and 1.3 crop I use 28/1.8 50/1.4 and 85/1.8

with 28 on 1.3 crop being perfect and 85 on ff being perfect

as focal lengths a 20mm and 50mm are close ish to that
 
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