Canon TS-E 24mm f/3.5L Tilt Shift Lens for Canon SLR Cameras | 
 enlarge | Brand: Canon
Category: Photography
List Price: $1,900.00
Buy New: $1,129.95
You Save: $770.05 (41%)
New (5) from $1,129.95
Rating:  2 reviews
Media: Electronics
Minimum Focal Length: 24
Shipping Weight (lbs): 3
Dimensions (in): 9 x 9 x 9
MPN: 2543A004
Model: 2543A004
UPC: 082966212734
EAN: 0082966212734
ASIN: B00009XVCD
Shipping: Eligible for Super Saver Shipping
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
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| Features:
| • | EF mount; tilt shift lens | | • | Ultra-low Dispersion glass with Fluorite elements; aspherical lens | | • | 24mm focal length | | • | f/3.5 maximum aperture | | • | Manual focus only |
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Product Description
Compact, wide-angle lens which enables tilt and shift movements. The floating optical system, with an aspherical lens element, corrects distortion and other aberrations. High image quality and compactness are the result. Great for architecture, landscapes and other wide-angle shots.
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| Customer Reviews:
Very cool specialty lens May 30, 2008
16 out of 16 found this review helpful
I had this lens for close to a year now, and have had many opportunities to use it. It's a great specialty lens if you frequently shoot what it is best at, and those type of shots are worth the money you spend on the lens.
There are two separate purposes for this lens: Shifting the field or shifting the plane of focus. The shifting the field applies to architectural and landscape photography. Tilting plane of focus is among other things an interesting and unique portrait style.
I've found that I use the shift 95% of the time on both architecture and landscape. I've found the tilt to be marginally usable on this lens, mostly because at 24mm this is not a great portrait lens - you would go for the 90mm version. The facial distortions at 24mm (particularly on full frame bodies) are just plain hideous and overpower any benefit gained from the tilted depth of field.
Any time you photograph a building this lens is exceptional in allowing you to retain the proper perspective. That's what tilt-shift lenses are famous for.
However, I've also found it helpful in landscape shots where I want to the move the horizon up or down to avoid a 50/50 split without introducing curvature on the horizon due to the wide angle. That can be particularly helpful when shooting canyons from the rim in Arizona, or wide angle beach scenes, both of which have strong horizon lines.
The two challenges to master with this lens are that it is manual focus only, which many of us are not as used to anymore with today's cameras, and the fact that a significant shift plays games with the camera's exposure meter. I've found that I either have to meter the scene with a light meter, or meter in camera unshifted, then switch to manual mode and shift the lens. Both workable, but extra steps forcing this to be a lens for very deliberate shooting.
People interested in selective focus may want to check out the Lensbaby lenses, which are purely artistic, but allow a lot more play with selective focus then this lens, which will only tilt in one direction.
In summary, I enjoy having this lens, and it has served me well. But it takes some time to get used to and to know which scenes it will help and which ones it will not work with.
Excellent Lens, more manual skills needed June 21, 2007
49 out of 50 found this review helpful
I have had this lens for a few days. I ordered it since I was tired of stitching bad photos by hand, and finding everything out of alignment. I do mostly indoor and outdoor architecture, and nature scenes, so needed something with both a panoramic sweep, and to maintain parallelism in my subjects.
The lens allows 11 degrees of shift to either side of center, and it rotates, so shift is either left/right, or up/down. Out to 5 degrees of shift, I am finding the auto settings are not too perturbed. After 5 degrees, some manual setting skill is needed. I will develop more of those soon, I can tell. The lens also allows tilt capabilities, which produce a nice selective focus effect, not unlike a lensbaby. I don't use much of that, but may do some portrait work with it.
The build quality of this lens is rock solid. The optics are very nice. I got a Hoya UV filter, and there is not much light loss, although I think there is some peripheral CA.
Straight through photos (no tilt/shift) are very sharp out to the edge, but this is a manual focus lens. For my work, I set it to infinity and that is no problem. For closer subjects, this could be challenging for someone with old eyes. A focusing screen is next.
I attached a photo above of the US Capitol. This was hand stitched in PhotoShop from two images shot 5 degrees left and right off center. ON A TRIPOD, of course. Note that there is no misalignment of the vertical lines in the Capitol building. In fact, the blend line goes between the first and second bays next to center on the left side of the center section of the building. Even knowing where this line was, I couldn't see it. The alignment and metering is so good that there is a couple along the curb in the lower left, and the woman turns between shots, and there is some double exposure effect, but she is right where she is supposed to be from the previous shot 10 degrees to the other side. The original image was more than 5' wide, so I had to shrink this one down for posting.
Definitely a special purpose lens, but if you want to do good architectural shots (to preserve paralellism) this is the best you can do without going to medium format. IMHO.
Update from June 2008: I notice that someone has posted an image that seems to be taken without using the Shift effect, so that the flagpoles in the image are tilted toward the center of the frame. This happens when the plane of the image sensor is rotated out of parallel with the flagpole, and indicates the lens was not used properly for this shot. The poster there should have mounted the camera on a tripod, rotated the camera body and lens appropriately, and then shifted the lens UP. Then the flagpoles would be parallel with the edge of the frame and not be tilting inwards.
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