New Canon 17mm & 24mm Tilt & Shift Lenses

Harold Gough · Post by **Harold Gough** » Sat Mar 07, 2009 6:50 am

These are due to be available in May at around £2,750 and £2,400.

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0902/09021 ... lenses.asp

Harold

mgoodm3 · Post by **mgoodm3** » Sat Mar 07, 2009 1:49 pm

I love T&S lenses. I use my Nikon 85 PC micro a lot.

gabedamien · Post by **gabedamien** » Sat Mar 07, 2009 4:39 pm

Can't wait to see what kinds of crazy photos people make with a 17mm tilt-shift. The objective looks like a snowglobe!

As a very budget-conscious amateur, there is virtually zero chance I will ever own that particular lens. Having a moderately wide TS one day is a long-term goal though.

Harold Gough · Post by **Harold Gough** » Sun Mar 08, 2009 9:51 am

I have just obtained this one (awaiting delivery), after many years of waiting:

http://zuserver2.star.ucl.ac.uk/~rwesso ... 4mmf35.htm

http://www.mir.com.my/rb/photography/ha ... mSHIFT.htm

It is shift only but some say it is the best film lens of any model made for performance. I want it for architectural use i.e. travel, buildings. I already have the 35mm version.

Harold

Cyberspider · Post by **Cyberspider** » Sun Mar 08, 2009 10:41 am

I don't know much about T&S lenses but 3070 EUR (3875 USD) is very much money

...It is to correct perspective, right?

gabedamien · Post by **gabedamien** » Sun Mar 08, 2009 11:38 am

Markus,

The "shift" can correct (or distort) perspective without angling the lens - good for photographing tall buildings, for example.

The "tilt" is also very special though... like the movements on a view camera, it allows you to change the focal plane. Instead of focus being defined by how far or close to the sensor/film plane the subject is, you can define it by how high or low in altitude it is, or how far to the left and right of center.

For example, in landscape photography, you can use a moderate aperture, tilt the lens, and EVERYTHING front-to-back will be in super-sharp focus with no diffraction problems. Or for special effect, I saw an example photo where in a field of flowers, all the blossoms were in focus but the grass beneath them was out of focus.

Another funny possibility is to simulate very narrow depth of field on a large scene - this makes real life look amazingly like a tiny fake model photographed with a macro lens.

Combining tilt and shift with independent rotation makes for a very versatile lens with many applications. This kind of thing is second nature in view cameras, but generally limited to specialized lenses on 35mm format.

rjlittlefield · Post by **rjlittlefield** » Sun Mar 08, 2009 11:42 am

I see this overlaps with gabedamien's post, but I think it is different enough to be worth posting.

Cyberspider wrote:It is to correct perspective, right?

They have two major functions: 1) correct perspective, and 2) tilt the plane of focus (Scheimpflug principle).

These lenses are critical for architectural photography on film.

In digital, the perspective correction of a tilt-shift lens can be exactly duplicated by image warping. Perspective correction is usually integrated into the same image processing framework that also corrects for barrel or pincushion distortion, vignetting, and chromatic aberration, while stitching multiple frames for increased resolution.

Tilting the plane of focus can not be duplicated by digital processing. Some of its uses can be done by stacking to increase depth of field, or by filtering to imitate reducing depth of field. But for other uses there is no substitute for tilt/shift. For example suppose you want to shoot a video of ants moving around on a tabletop, shot from the side but with the whole tabletop in focus. For that, you need a tilt/shift lens using Scheimpflug.

--Rik

lauriek · Post by **lauriek** » Sun Mar 08, 2009 12:13 pm

An interesting modern take I've seen to using tilt lenses is to use the tilt in the opposite way to normal to reduce apparent dof and so make the subject look smaller. I've seen several videos using this technique, of city scenes, beach scenes etc where the people appear to be tiny models moving around!

mgoodm3 · Post by **mgoodm3** » Sun Mar 08, 2009 2:38 pm

I use tilt for almost all of my coin photos. It allows me to tilt the coin into the light (improves the look) while keeping everything in focus. No stacking needed.

elf · Post by **elf** » Sun Mar 08, 2009 9:10 pm

mgoodm3 wrote:I use tilt for almost all of my coin photos. It allows me to tilt the coin into the light (improves the look) while keeping everything in focus. No stacking needed.

How much lens tilt do you normally need? How far is the camera (sensor plane) tilted in relation to the coin?

Harold Gough · Post by **Harold Gough** » Mon Mar 09, 2009 12:31 am

Here is a link to a thread on the subject:

http://www.photomacrography.net/forum/v ... tilt+shift

Harold

Cyclops · Post by **Cyclops** » Mon Mar 09, 2009 2:56 am

I'd quite like that 17mm(equivalent to about 28mm on the Canon) but I'd have to win the lottery first.

Harold Gough · Post by **Harold Gough** » Mon Mar 09, 2009 3:49 am

Cyclops wrote:I'd quite like that 17mm(equivalent to about 28mm on the Canon) but I'd have to win the lottery first.

As you're a mate, I'll let you have my tickets for last Saturday at half price.

Harold

Cyclops · Post by **Cyclops** » Mon Mar 09, 2009 4:15 am

Harold Gough wrote:
Cyclops wrote:I'd quite like that 17mm(equivalent to about 28mm on the Canon) but I'd have to win the lottery first.
As you're a mate, I'll let you have my tickets for last Saturday at half price.

Harold

Ha,with the news we've just had we could do with a lottery win!

Harold Gough · Post by **Harold Gough** » Mon Mar 09, 2009 4:38 am

Cyclops wrote: Ha,with the news we've just had we could do with a lottery win!

Is that 'we' personal, national or international?

Harold