TS-E 17 mm f.4,0L or ef 14mm 2,8 L mk II

[Heidrun]

Maybe a stupid question. But im planning to buy a widangel lens in the near future. And since its really wide. Then everything should be in focus. But if you forget about the manuel focus vs autofocus. which one of these two are the best lens for landscape photography

 

[LuCoOc]

which one of these two are the best lens for landscape photography

if you don't need autofocus then it comes down to how wide you want to go. i don't have hands on experience with any of the two lenses but they both seem to be pretty impressive. check out some reviews e.g. the-digital-picture.com
i think the ts-e is superior in IQ, you have the possibility to tilt for more DoF and you can stitch some pictures together for a panorama wich takes you close to the 14mm
i recommend the ts-e

 

[akiskev]

About TS-E 17mm: It is difficult to master a tilt-shift lens, but when you do, the images will be impressive.
With shifting you can correct the perspective - or make it more dramatic, and with tilting you can increase (or decrease) the depth of field. This lens surely gives you a lot of things to experiment with!

The EF 14 2.8L II is an EXCELLENT ultra wide angle lens. Nothing more - nothing less!

If you don't care about tilt-shift, take a look at the Zeiss Distagon T* 18mm f/3.5 ZE too.. I'd definitely give it a shot, as autofocus is not an issue in landscape photography!

Cheers!

 

[epsiloneri]

I've used the TS-E 17/4L, and found it quite challenging. Because it's so wide and f/4, it's actually not so easy to get a nice tilt-effect - everything tends to be in focus. It works best for close-ups. I guess the shift function is useful for architecture, but I don't find it as exciting (because the effect is easy to replicate in software - albeit at some resolution loss). If you don't absolutely know that you need the TS-E 17/4L lens, then I think the EF 14/2.8L II is the better option. It's quite a lot wider and brighter at the same time [f/2.8]. I use it for night photography, i.e. starry skies, aurorae, meteors, lightning. For those applications the f/2.8 comes in handy. Indoors photography also benefits from the ultra-wide focal length and large aperture.

 

[t.linn]

Folks have made some good points about the pros and cons of these two lenses. As an owner of a TS-E17, there are a couple additional things I would add as considerations.

First, the TS-E17 is heavy and more vulnerable to the environment than the 14. I don't take mine near any location where it might be exposed to sand or heavy moisture. Then there is the front element. It is scary as heck the way it sticks out with no protection. And if you use GND filters, they'll have to be handheld Art Wolfe-style since the 17 takes no filters.

Having said that, the 17's IQ is outstanding and it allows you to do things you just can't do with a standard lens. First and foremost, you can reduce or eliminate the keystoning effect that otherwise plagues ultra wide angle lenses. If you happen to follow Trey Ratcliff's Stuck in Customs blog, you know what I mean. I love Trey's images but he often shoots with the Nikon 14-24 and the keystoning sometimes drives me nuts. With the TS-E17, you can shift rather than pointing your camera up or down and you can do so handheld. If you were shooting architecture, the shift function alone would make the TS-E17 an obvious choice for me.

Someone said that using a TS-E can be tricky and if you're tilting to achieve an infinite depth of field then I concur. You need a tripod to really be precise and focusing can be torture if your body doesn't have live view. But for all other purposes, using a TS-E isn't hard. Shifting to eliminate keystoning is straight forward. You will likely need to employ exposure compensation because the exposure meter isn't always right on when you're shifting but that's not complicated to understand or to do.

The TS-E also accepts Canon's teleconverters so you can inexpensively use the lens as a TS-E24 f/5.6 for significantly less than the cost of an actual TS-E24. I use the Extender 1.4x II on my TS-E24 as much as I use the 24 by itself. (Of course, I don't need to use it on the 17 since I already have the 24 but it does work.)

If you tend to take your time and shoot deliberately, the TS-E could be a great choice for you. If you like to run and gun and tend to be hard on your gear or shoot in extreme conditions the 14 may be your best choice. Good luck!

 

[DJL329]

If, as your post states, you're planning on shooting landscapes, then I would say neither of these lenses.

The TS-E is great for architecture, since you can use it to eliminate the "keystone" effect. If you're not shooting buildings, then why pay more for the Tilt/Shift and manual focus? And, as others have mentioned, you do need to use a tripod.

The 14mm is rectilinear (I have the original version), which makes it great for exaggerating/distorting perspective. The best use for this lens is to get up close to something, not for landscapes. The angle is so wide, things in the distance end up being very small.

Also, since both have a convex front lens, neither will take screw-on filters, which can come in very handy when shooting landscapes (especially ND and polarizers).

Therefore, IMO, the best choice for shooting landscapes would be the 16-35mm f/2.8L II. Check out other sites (fredmiranda, flickr, etc.) to see examples by other photographers. You could also rent (or at least try it out in the store) before buying.

 

[Mt Spokane Photography]

I'm assuming that you have a FF camera, 17mm is not particularly wide on a APS-c. I'm not much of a landscape photographer, but for a 5D MK II and manual focus, the Zeiss 21mmm is pretty much the reference that others are compared to, and its plenty wide for FF.

 

[neuroanatomist]

You will likely need to employ exposure compensation because the exposure meter isn't always right on when you're shifting but that's not complicated to understand or to do.

Live View takes care of that as well, since the metering is based on the imaging sensor (and not the separete metering sensor, which isn't able to properly sample the scene with shift or tilt applied).

 

[ronderick]

I owe the TS-E 17mm, and I have a co-worker who uses the 14mm for works.

The one darn thing about both of these lenses is that neither take filters, so either way you'll have a great time trying to protect the elements.

The 14mm is definitely wide, and could easily fit into your camera pack so in terms of ease-of-use, its much better.

The 17mm, on the other hand, is a lens that takes time to set up and use. So don't expect that you can take it out of your bag, mount it quickly, take a few shot, and move on in matters of minutes. Coming to think of it, I don't recall a time I've used it w/o a tripod.

That aside, there are a lot of effects you can play with - thanks to the tilt/shift feature.

So it really depends what you are going for: for fast-use, wide angle capture you can go with the 14mm; if you don't mind carrying a fragile lens (yes - especially those knobs for adjusting the tilt/shift... they can get in the way), go for the TS-E.

 

[Canon 14-24]

definitely 17mm tse for the sharper corners

 

[hendrik-sg]

If you want extremely wide the TS-e is even wider, you can stitch shifted shots and get a wider pic with even more resolution than with 14mm. You can see this in the review at TDP.

 

[Flake]

Sorry Heidrun, but it is a bit of an odd question! The T-Se is normally a lens for architectural work keeping the lines vertical using the 'Scheimpflug principle'. To use it focussed on a landscape at or close to infinity would just be a waste.

If you have this kind of money to throw around, then consider a Sinar type monorail view camera, that many of the landscape photography notables use. It's big & heavy, complex, but completely controllable, and uses large format film which you would need to develop & scan to work on in digital. The best pay off of all though is that it would teach you loads about both the science & art of photography. If you really do have to have digital then you can buy a scanning back for them which produces really great results at very high MP counts ( http://www.betterlight.com/index.html ).

I wouldn't even reccomend the 14mm f/2.8 L for landscape work, it's perhaps better for shooting interiors, but it's one biggest failing for landscape is an inability to use filters - so no polariser, no NDs and worse no grads, all of them considered essential for landscape work.

Canon alas isn't known for the quality of its wide angle lenses, but with the money you have I'd be reccomending the much more flexible 16 - 35mm f/2.8 L and a set of Hi Tech or Lee filters for it. There's only two mm at the wide end, and if you have to go wider then stitch two or more together.

For some shots I've shot at 70mm in portrait mode made several shots joined which gives a much higher MP count.

All of this of course assumes that you are using a FF body? If your not then all the advice is redundant! Go buy either a new body or a 10 - 20mm / 8 - 16mm

 

[wockawocka]

As an owner of both the TS-E 17 and 24 lens I would suggest the 17mm is too wide for architecture.
In order to fill the frame you have to be in the subjects 'face' which whilst giving interesting results means I often use the 24mm instead. Or maybe I just have to use the lens more to find it's niche.

No experience of the 14mm but to be totally honest when you go that wide your feet should end up in the frame too! I find with the 17mm I capture too much sky. The framing unless cropped will still always be 2:3 so be mindful of that when reviewing you images.

 

[neuroanatomist]

The T-Se is normally a lens for architectural work keeping the lines vertical using the 'Scheimpflug principle'. To use it focussed on a landscape at or close to infinity would just be a waste.

I'm going to disagree wtih both those statements. First off, the Scheimpflug principle applies to tilting (i.e. the tilt feature of TS-E lenses) the lens plane relative to the image plane (sensor) - that does not keep lines vertical. It's the shift feature of TS-E lenses that corrects the perspective distortion normally introduced into architectural shots by the need to angle the camera upward to frame the building.

But in landscape photography, the Scheimpflug principle does have an important use - namely, the ability to capture both the very near foreground features and the distant background features within the wedge-shaped depth of field that results from tilting the lens, and to do so at an aperture which is not so narrow that diffraction starts to reduce the sharpness of the final image.

 

[Flake]

Sorry Neuro but on this on you're not right. It is the scheimpflug principle, but not from the way around you're thinking about it. The shift part of the lens allows the film plane to remain parallel with the subject, so that there is no need to tilt the camera (and thus the film plane) relative to the subject. Tilting the camera is no different to tilting the lens as far as scheimpflug goes.

The important part to remember with the tilt is that you don't get any more depth of field, you just get to move it around to where you need it. 17mm does of course have quite a DoF so this might not prove as useful as it might on longer lenses or where DoF is at a premium (tilt is great for cut outs). Of course it's still possible to stack two or more images as a work around if it's really necessary.

 

[neuroanatomist]

Sorry Neuro but on this on you're not right. It is the scheimpflug principle, but not from the way around you're thinking about it. The shift part of the lens allows the film plane to remain parallel with the subject, so that there is no need to tilt the camera (and thus the film plane) relative to the subject. Tilting the camera is no different to tilting the lens as far as scheimpflug goes.

Sorry, but that's where you are incorrect. Tilting a camera back, as in a view camera where the back could be tilted relative to the lens - that's no different than tilting a lens as far as the Scheimpflug principle is concerned. But tilting an SLR, where the film/sensor plane cannot move independently of the lens mount - that's not the Scheimpflug principle.

It might be semantics, but the Scheimpflug principle applies when the lens plane and the image plane are not parallel. That's the key point - for the Scheimpflug principle to apply, the lens plane and the image plane must be tilted with respect to one another. When you angle a camera upward to shoot a tall building, the lens plane and image plane are still parallel, but your desired subject plane is not parallel to those, and keystoning results. Shift corrects that perspective distortion but maintains the parallel relationship of the lens and image planes, therefore it does not operate through the use of the Scheimpflug principle.

From the Wikipedia article on tilt/shift photography: ""Tilt-shift" actually encompasses two different types of movements: rotation of the lens plane relative to the image plane, called tilt, and movement of the lens parallel to the image plane, called shift. Tilt is used to control the orientation of the plane of focus (PoF), and hence the part of an image that appears sharp; it makes use of the Scheimpflug principle. Shift is used to adjust the position of the subject in the image area without moving the camera back; this is often helpful in avoiding the convergence of parallel lines, as when photographing tall buildings." Put more succinctly, tilt employs the Scheimpflug principle, and shift does not.

 

[t.linn]

Neuro is correct on this. Shift merely moves a different part of a tilt-shift's massive image circle over the camera's sensor. The lens and sensor plane remain parallel. Scheimpflug only becomes relevant when they are not.