20D Soft Focus

frederick wrote:
Randall Ainsworth wrote:

In article 1119781228.69154@ftpsrv1, frederick
wrote:


The only 18-55 lens I have ever tried (on a 350d) was soft, had a
nasty cheap feel to it, plastic mount, the front element rotated, and
it had a teensy unusable focus ring.
The only Sigma lens that I own beats the Canon 18-55 on all counts.



One man's ceiling is another man's floor.


And I am rolling on the floor laughing (at you).

Randall Ainsworth is the anti-Christ of the group Frederick. Anything
that doesn't produce massive barrel distortion and have an "L" to
describe it is just pure junk to him.

That's OK. We need people like him with money to burn on Canon lenses so
they can continue to subsidise their cameras from the obscene profits
they make selling the tale that there is no better than the fabled "L"
series lenses.

Forget the fact that their 24~70 f2.8 has so many errors in it that one
RAW decoded has a module specifically to repair the faults it creates.

Forget that the highly acclaimed 70~200 f2.8 can only just match the
Sigma variant of this class for image quality and cost's twice as much
and forget that I personally have a great deal of photographic evidence
that fools all the experts who still today, hold the belief that only
Canon lenses can make good pictures.

Randall is right to have his beliefs. After all isn't believing a pre
requisite to religion? Ha, ha.

I can just see it now. Dear Canon in heaven, please bless my day with a
halfway decent picture for I have sinned and held a Sigma lens to my
mount and (shock horror) enjoyed the feel of forbidden glass. Ha,ha,
ha. ROTFL!

Go Randall!

Douglas.

In message ,
Tony Polson wrote:

"Charles Schuler" wrote:



Here is a link that looks at the photos that I shot with the kit lens
and the 50mm 1.8 lens.

http://www.pbase.com/konascott/20tests

Kit lens at f/8 looks pretty darned good.


Most lenses look pretty darned good at f/8, even cheap junk lenses.

It takes an exceptional lens to look good wide open.

None of these images are original pixels, so they can't tell a whole lot
about lens sharpness.
--


John P Sheehy

In article , Ryadia
wrote:

Randall Ainsworth is the anti-Christ of the group Frederick. Anything
that doesn't produce massive barrel distortion and have an "L" to
describe it is just pure junk to him.

The two lenses that I own for my 10D are both consumer-grade Canons. I
will consider "L" glass in the future but regardless, they will be made
by Canon.

wrote:
In message ,
Tony Polson wrote:

"Charles Schuler" wrote:



Here is a link that looks at the photos that I shot with the kit lens
and the 50mm 1.8 lens.

http://www.pbase.com/konascott/20tests

Kit lens at f/8 looks pretty darned good.


Most lenses look pretty darned good at f/8, even cheap junk lenses.

It takes an exceptional lens to look good wide open.

None of these images are original pixels, so they can't tell a whole lot
about lens sharpness.
--
I am note sure what you mean my original pixels, these are 100% crops.
Original pixels is hard to pin down when using raw, since you can
choose the sharpening level in the raw converter. Mainly the photos
will show the OP what he should be able to get in term of a final
image, if he can't get this level of sharpness then there may be
something wrong with the camera or lens.

Scott

"Ryadia" wrote in message
...
frederick wrote:
series lenses.

Forget the fact that their 24~70 f2.8 has so many errors in it that one
RAW decoded has a module specifically to repair the faults it creates.

Douglas, I've asked you several times, including in personal email, to tell
me what those errors are. I'm planning on buying this lens, and would like
to know what problems I may face with it, specifically. I currently have
the Tokina 28-70 f2.8 ATX Pro II, and I'm not that thrilled with the images
with my 20D. The 16-35 f2.8L I just bought outperforms it, as near as I can
tell, considering the disparity of focal length.

Forget that the highly acclaimed 70~200 f2.8 can only just match the Sigma
variant of this class for image quality and cost's twice as much and
forget that I personally have a great deal of photographic evidence that
fools all the experts who still today, hold the belief that only Canon
lenses can make good pictures.

Again, since this lens is on my shopping list, I'd like to have some
specifics, here, too.

--
Skip Middleton
http://www.shadowcatcherimagery.com

Skip M wrote:
"Ryadia" wrote in message
...

frederick wrote:
series lenses.

Forget the fact that their 24~70 f2.8 has so many errors in it that one
RAW decoded has a module specifically to repair the faults it creates.


Douglas, I've asked you several times, including in personal email, to tell
me what those errors are. I'm planning on buying this lens, and would like
to know what problems I may face with it, specifically. I currently have
the Tokina 28-70 f2.8 ATX Pro II, and I'm not that thrilled with the images
with my 20D. The 16-35 f2.8L I just bought outperforms it, as near as I can
tell, considering the disparity of focal length.


Forget that the highly acclaimed 70~200 f2.8 can only just match the Sigma
variant of this class for image quality and cost's twice as much and
forget that I personally have a great deal of photographic evidence that
fools all the experts who still today, hold the belief that only Canon
lenses can make good pictures.


Again, since this lens is on my shopping list, I'd like to have some
specifics, here, too.

Yes I got your Emails Skip. I thought you were trolling me.

Let me ask you a simple question:
If both those lenses were all they're cracked up to be, why would DxO
(www.dxo.com) so successfully sell a module to correct their optical
flaws whilst decoding a 20D's RAW files and not offer any for the Sigma
rivals when they do in fact offer Sigma modules for their lenses with
optical errors?

Get yourself a decent chart - God, just a box drawn on a card will do
and go shoot some frames with the lenses you are interested in. Then
make up your mind if you can live with the distortions and colour
irregularities.

Better still. Download the free demo of their program and the 24~70
module. Trot on down to the local camera store and shoot a few rounds
off in the store with your camera and their lens. Go home and decode the
RAW (or JPG) file with DxO and whatever else you use and you will see
just how much difference the correction makes.

I didn't believe it myself until I shot a family where one guy had a
small symbol on his shirt that was so distorted, I couldn't make out if
it was just some lines or a drawing. DxO showed it was a drawing.

The single sharpest lens I ever owned was a Sigma 28~70 f2.8 APO HSM.
Ask me and I'll dig up some examples. Plenty of Pro wedding
photographers come through my shop every week and none of 'em believe
the 24"x36" picture of a steam powered traction engine on my wall was
shot with a 10D. Tell 'em it was a Sigma lens and the general attitude
is "yeah, right, now tell us the truth". But I already had.

Eyes open.
Mind clear.
Test the gear.

Douglas

In message .com,
"Scott W" wrote:

I am note sure what you mean my original pixels, these are 100% crops.
Original pixels is hard to pin down when using raw, since you can
choose the sharpening level in the raw converter. Mainly the photos
will show the OP what he should be able to get in term of a final
image, if he can't get this level of sharpness then there may be
something wrong with the camera or lens.

Original pixels is another way of saying "100% crop", which makes no
sense, because it sounds like a crop with no cropping.

You have serious aliasing, without haloing, which suggests downsizing
with the nearest neighbor algorithm. If not, then some kind of
ultra-sharpening has been applied, and is optically unattainable.
--


John P Sheehy

wrote:
In message .com,
"Scott W" wrote:

I am note sure what you mean my original pixels, these are 100% crops.
Original pixels is hard to pin down when using raw, since you can
choose the sharpening level in the raw converter. Mainly the photos
will show the OP what he should be able to get in term of a final
image, if he can't get this level of sharpness then there may be
something wrong with the camera or lens.

Original pixels is another way of saying "100% crop", which makes no
sense, because it sounds like a crop with no cropping.

You have serious aliasing, without haloing, which suggests downsizing
with the nearest neighbor algorithm. If not, then some kind of
ultra-sharpening has been applied, and is optically unattainable.

The photo titled "kit lens crop" is a 100% crop, you can see where it
is taken from in "kit lens resized" I put these up some time ago, they
were converted from raw using Photoshop elements 3, I don't recall the
settings but the sharpening was probably set pretty high.

You can look at 20D with 50mm lens to see an entire photo at full size.

There is aliasing, but whether it is serious is another issue, in a 8 x
12 print you would never see it.

Scott

Skip M wrote:
"Ryadia" wrote in message
...
frederick wrote:
series lenses.

Forget the fact that their 24~70 f2.8 has so many errors in it that one
RAW decoded has a module specifically to repair the faults it creates.

Douglas, I've asked you several times, including in personal email, to tell
me what those errors are. I'm planning on buying this lens, and would like
to know what problems I may face with it, specifically. I currently have
the Tokina 28-70 f2.8 ATX Pro II, and I'm not that thrilled with the images
with my 20D. The 16-35 f2.8L I just bought outperforms it, as near as I can
tell, considering the disparity of focal length.

Forget that the highly acclaimed 70~200 f2.8 can only just match the Sigma
variant of this class for image quality and cost's twice as much and
forget that I personally have a great deal of photographic evidence that
fools all the experts who still today, hold the belief that only Canon
lenses can make good pictures.

Again, since this lens is on my shopping list, I'd like to have some
specifics, here, too.

--
you can see a lot of photos taken with this lens here
http://www.pbase.com/cameras/canon/ef_2470_28u
People seem to want to trash those lenses that they don't use, from
what I can see this lens does a pretty good job, but I don't have one
so I can only judge by what other are getting.

Scott

Scott W wrote:


--

you can see a lot of photos taken with this lens here
http://www.pbase.com/cameras/canon/ef_2470_28u
People seem to want to trash those lenses that they don't use, from
what I can see this lens does a pretty good job, but I don't have one
so I can only judge by what other are getting.

Scott


I gather your inference is that I don't use or own the lenses I pass
comment on? This is my camera and my lens :
http://www.technoaussie.com/gallery/FZ20-Pics/P1010002

The picture below and about 25,000 others were taken with a Sigma 28~70,
f2.8 and a Canon 10D. I still sell 24"x36" posters of this and others
trucks at every vintage truck show in my state.
http://www.technoaussie.com/gallery/..._truck_show_88

Like Skip intends to do, I use my DSLR and 24~70 f2.8 lenses primarily
for weddings and general portraiture.
http://www.ryadia.com/child-studies.htm was shot with the Canon lens.

I also own a 70~200 f2.8 Sigma and a Canon 70~200 f2.8 "L" series Canon
lens. http://www.ryadia.com/pets.htm was shot hand held at 1/60th, f2.8
with the Canon lens - no image stabliser.

I've had several Sigma and Canon lenses over the past 3 years.
http://www.tecphoto.com.au/pelican.htm is an example of the resolution
of Sigma's better quality lenses.

Unfortunately a "pretty good job" is simply not good enough when your
livelihood depends on it. Although I sold the original 28~70 Sigma I had
with the 10D, I recently re purchased one and I prefer to use it than
the three times more expensive Canon 24~70 for no other reason than it
is sharper, does not produce as much barrel distortion and it gets up
Randall Ainsworth's nose that I make a living using Sigma gear. (Not
really but he ****es me off with his uninformed bull**** about Sigma
being crap).

Douglas