Image: 5D Mk III, EF 24-70 f2.8L II, 31mm, f/16, 1/50 sec, tripod.
I have been searching for the perfect landscape lens for a 35mm system since I was shooting film , ok so now that I've shown my age, what is the perfect landscape lens?
To me the perfect landscape lens would be a zoom as sharp as the best primes and with enough resolution to shoot
f/64, but oh wait thats what the Large Format segment has, so now what? well at 35mm our minimum
aperture is usually f/22, beyond that and diffraction would make our images so fuzzy you could hardly tell what you where looking at.
I never shoot beyond f/16, and with some lenses I wont go beyond f/11, with my newest lens, the EF 24-70 f/2.8L II, I have the first lens that Im not afraid to shoot at f/16, although it is sharper at f/11 I will still go to f/16 without hesitation and that is due to its resolution.
Image: 5D Mk III, EF 24-70 f2.8L II, 35mm, f/16, 1/50 sec, tripod.
Canons super wide could still use some improvement now that the 24-70 and 70-200 have been improved to the point of equaling or bettering the competition, but I still like my EF 16-35 f/2.8L II and will stick with it.
I keep getting asked, "what is a good landscape lens" my answer is always, the best lens you can afford, not every one can afford the f/2.8 zooms or want to carry them all, I know I don't want to carry all that weight, there are compromise lenses, you just need to figure out their limitations and use them at there optimum aperture. Focal length? well I use 16mm all the way up to 300mm for landscape, but typical landscape images I take are probably between 24mm and 35mm.
Ross
