Canon 1Ds

8-30-07 - I've been wanting one of these for a long time and I finally got one. This camera is slow, but the image quality is easily better than anything I've owned before. Its tack sharp (just like the original 1D) and the bokeh is great. Its also nice having wider lenses. Its not a low light or a sports camera, but as a studio and general purpose camera, I'm thrilled to have this body. I have big plans with this camera.

Canon 1D

I remember telling myself when I bought my 10D that I didn't see myself upgrading anytime soon. 10 months later, I own Canon's top of the line sports camera. Some might consider it excessive, but I consider this camera worth every penny. (Note: This is the older version of the 1D that was recently discontinued. The 1D "Mark II" is the current version.)

It didn't take long to figure out that this camera is a different beast entirely from the 10D. The autofocus is much faster, much more sensitive, and deadly accurate. Every other aspect of this camera is equally fast. It gets 8.3 frames per second maximum burst speed, has between a 14 frame buffer (high ISO RAW) and a 21 frame buffer (low ISO jpeg), very low shutter lag, and fast processing/write speed. With such a large buffer, I rarely max it out, even in demanding shooting conditions. It doesn't matter how fast I need to shoot and how rapid the events take place, this camera can keep up. Its really quite amazing. With the 10D, I had to pace myself because I knew I could very easily hit the end of my buffer.

Another pleasant surprise was the quality of the pictures this camera produces. The pictures are very sharp out of the camera - considerably sharper than the 10D. This can be attributed to the weaker anti-aliasing filter, more accurate focusing, and the larger sensor. With the out of camera sharpness and more accurate focusing of the 1D, I get *far* more "keepers" with this camera than I did the 10D. This fact alone easily outweighs the fact that the 10D has a little extra resolution. As far as color goes, the 1D delivers in spades. At high ISO, it is no competition, the 1D's colors hold up *MUCH* better than either the 10D or 20D. It has a little more noise at high ISO than these cameras, but I very much prefer a noisy picture to a dull picture. Shooting RAW only helps the 10/20D marginally. Its high ISO color fidelity consistently comes up very short of the 1D. Primary colors with the 1D are very strong at any ISO. This is a good thing if you light punchy, saturated pictures. Reds look great with the 1D. They never did look that great with the 10D nor the 20D. Again, shooting RAW doesn't fix this issue for the 10/20D bodies.

My only serious gripe with this camera is its noise pattern. Noise manifests itself in a slight horizontal "banding" pattern. While this is not very noticeable in anything but dark pictures, it is still there. This pattern is most noticeable in large areas of dark, solid color. It really isn't bad enough to ruin many (if any) pictures, it can just be a little annoying under certain circumstances. The slight banding is present at all ISOs, but oddly enough it is most noticeable at lower ISOs because of the lack of traditional noise. For sports photography, this is a non issue, but for glamour or art photography it could be a problem. As for the strength of the noise, it is quite reasonable. Per pixel, the Canon 20D has slightly better noise across the board, but its images are also a lot softer across the board. A large, high quality print will make the noise difference between these two cameras the most obvious. Fine art photographers stay away. Sports, newspaper, and yearbook photographers have absolutely nothing to worry about in regards to noise.

The ergonomics very different from the 10D/D60 range of Canon camera's. The camera's main functional controls (AF mode, metering, ISO, etc.) are controlled by three buttons on the left hand side. The most common controls are accessed by only pressing one of these buttons and spinning a wheel or knob. Other controls are accessed by pressing a combination of *two* of the buttons and spinning a wheel or knob. This can be a bit awkward, as most of the time its tricky to press two buttons with one finger, plus its very easy to forget (at first anyway) which combination of buttons control which function. The menu buttons are even more bizarre. With just about every other device I've ever used, you press in a button and let it go to activate it. With the 10D, you have to press it and hold it. Pressing a button and letting it go counts as two "clicks". This again, takes a little time to get used to, but once you do it is a very fast way of navigating through menus.

The build quality of this camera is just amazing. Its very heavy and very solid - more so than any other photographic tool I've ever used. It shrugs off bumps, knocks, and scrapes that would easily damage other digital SLRs. Nothing squeaks, rattles, or makes any strange noises. Shake the camera, you hear nothing. Knock the camera, the only thing you hear is the thud of your hand against its magnesium body. Hit someone in the head with this camera, you put them in a coma. Its also weather sealed. I have shot with this camera in near-freezing rain. The camera never missed a step. It just went about its business as if it was shooting in 70 degree, sunny, dry weather. This is *not* a fragile piece of equipment that you have to baby. Rather, its a dedicated professional tool built to withstand any shooting conditions its operator can withstand - and that's saying a lot

At the end of the day, the 1D is an absolutely phenomenal picture taking machine. The spec sheets don't tell the whole story here. Everything about the 1D works together in such complete, flawless harmony to come about a common objective - to get *the* picture no matter what. You have to use it to believe it. It blows away the D30/10D/20D cameras away in both performance and pixel quality images (note the differentiation between pixel quality and number of pixels). Colors are awesome, sharpness is awesome, viewfinder is awesome, responsiveness is awesome, and build quality is second to none. This is my favorite camera, folks, no question about it. The only thing I would trade this for would be a 1D Mark II - and I cant afford one of those. :)

Canon 20D

I really like this camera. Canon fixed most of the annoying flaws of the 10D with this release. This includes the following:

1. Autofocus - Its now much faster and much more accurate than the 10D ever was. One shot AF is just as fast as the 1D, maybe even a bit more sensitive in low light. AI Servo AF is markedly slower than the 1D, though a significant improvement over the 10D. This is very good news. It means the 20D is now a viable sports camera. The 10D struggled heavily in this regard. More good news - the 20D will actually focus correctly. I'm very excited about this. Again, my 10D was a lame duck in the area of focusing accuracy. The best way I could describe it would be "good enough, most of the time". The 20D is deadly accurate all of the time (bar user error).

2. Frame rate - The 20D gets 5 FPS while the 10D gets 3 FPS. This makes a significant difference in practice and its a very welcome upgrade.

3. Buffer - A 23 frame JPEG buffer and a 6 frame RAW buffer. This is great news if you shoot JPEG and miserable news if you shoot RAW and shoot sports. You really have to pick your shots if you want to use RAW during high speed shooting because at 5FPS, the party stops real quick when you only have a 6 frame buffer.

4. Operational speed - In this regard, the 20D is almost equal to my 1D, and that's saying a *lot*. Startup is instant, review time very snappy, compact flash write speed of up to 5.5MB/s with a high speed card (some 5x faster than the 10D!), and reduced shutter lag. All of this makes the 20D much more of a pleasure to use than the 10D.

5. Resolution - For most part, 8MP vs 6MP is moot. There is very little practical difference between these two resolutions unless you consistently print very large. Megapixels to cameras is like megahertz is to computer. Both are terribly overrated. Very seldom to I yearn for more resolution than my 4MP 1D gives. But when I do, the 20D delivers very impressive detail.

Are there annoyances? Yes, a few, but nothing serious. For one, there is now a "joystick" type controller that is used to change autofocus points. In short, I hate this. The joystick has eight different positions and it is extremely frustrating trying to hit any positions not directly up, down, right, or left. This means that any AF points on the diagonal are very hard to select. The shutter is also louder than my 1D and considerably louder than the 10D. If you shoot in quiet situations, you're going to draw some attention. The 20D also has a new flash metering system - ETTL 2. Its supposed to be "new and improved", but so far I've seen nothing but inconsistent exposures from it - mostly underexposure. Lastly, the build quality, while good, is nowhere near that of a 1 series camera. The compact flash door jiggles a little bit and the battery door on the grip wiggles, flexes, and just feels very cheap and thin. It all works fine, mind you, I would just prefer that it felt a little more substantial than it does. While the 1D was made to take abuse on a regular basis, the 20D definitely needs to be babied a bit more.

Canon EOS 10D

I finally made the jump to a 10D in the fall of 2003. Previously I had a Sony DSC-F707, which was a very good point and shoot for its time. I wanted a 10D for a while but never could afford it, but upon starting work this fall and earning a little money, it was in my reach. I started shooting pictures for the Technique in the fall of 2003 and one of my favorite things to photograph was sports. This is partially because they are exciting to watch, challenging to shoot, and usually yielded some cool shots. This is where the Achilles’' heel of the Sony lied: speed. Basically, the Sony was slow. It was perfectly adequate for casual use. In fact it produced excellent results with minimal effort 90% of the time. However when it was really pushed, it fell flat on its face. Even though the Sony had ISO 100,200,400, anything above ISO 100 just looked nasty. Even ISO 100 was more than a little noisy when viewed at 100% (resizing reduced the problem). The zoom on this camera is electronic (as on nearly all point and shoots). This means that you press a button and the lens zooms in or out. Again, this is perfectly acceptable for 90% of shots, but other times you just can't zoom fast enough. Auto focus was also leisurely in low light. So if I was shooting in demanding conditions, such as low light action, I was left with soft, noisy photographs.

Enter the Canon 10D. No more slow image processing. No more noisy low ISO shots. No more slow zoom and auto focus. As of mid-October, 2003 I have had my 10D for about 6 weeks. I am not going to waste both my time and yours by drudging through a review when you could get a much better one at DPReview.com. However I will share my personal thoughts on the camera and help describe the transition from digital point and shoot to digital SLR. Below are my thoughts on certain aspects of the camera I thought would be useful to share.

Body/handling - As soon as you pick it up, you think "quality." Nothing about this camera has ever given me any doubt as to its durability in any aspect. The body is magnesium powder coated in a black finish. The big rubber grip on the right side is absolutely fantastic. It makes all other point and shoot digital cameras feel like fragile toys in comparison. Picking the thing up it feels as if you have a rubber coated piece of granite in your hand.

There are a lot of controls on this camera. This can be overwhelming at first, but once you learn how to use these tools, you will have an incredible amount of control over the images taken. Three buttons on the top, near the shutter control 6 frequently accessed functions. Upon pressing one of these three buttons, you control one function with the wheel under your index finger and the other function with the wheel by your thumb. Even after using the camera for about 6 weeks I still get confused as to what wheel controls which function (does my thumb or my index finger control shutter speed?)

One of the bad things about digital SLRs: dust. Because you can change lens, after a while dust finds its way inside the camera. When this dust (notice I don't say "if", it will happen sooner or later), the particles will show up as tiny specs on your image. I already have some very small specs on my sensor that can only be seen in the images upon very close inspection and only if the specs lie over very light colors. Dust is usually only an issue at very small apertures (F10 or higher). The only time I stop down to apertures this small is when I'm shooting with my 15-30mm in good daylight. Every other time I'm shooting below F5.0 or so. For this reason, I rarely notice dust in my pictures, even if its on the sensor in significant amounts.

Speed - One of the main things I try to get across to people is that when upgrading to a camera such as the 10D, its not about gross pixel count anymore. Standard point and shoot digicams (basically I call anything non-slr a "digicam") are sold based on their pixel rating more than anything. No one is going to buy a $300 digital camera and ask the salesperson what frame rate the camera gets, how fast the imaging processor is, or how fast the autofocus is. The question everybody asks is "how many megapixels is it?" Its become the same sort of question as people ask when buying a computer: "how many megahertz is it?" (which is equally ignorant, but that's another article).

Image quality - Very clear, very smooth. There is practically zero noise at ISO 100, while ISO 100 on the Sony looks more like ISO 400 or 800 on the 10D. Yes, its that good. The 10D's color accuracy is spot on. I hated the Sony's reds, which were almost neon-like. I have no idea what Sony was thinking, but the reds were just disgusting. The greens were also too bright, but to a lesser degree. There is none of this with the 10D.

One thing that was a big change was the fact that with the 10D's larger sensor, there was a much smaller depth of field compared to the Sony for any given aperture. For this reason alone I usually shoot the 10D at higher apertures than the Sony. Another thing that's different is that the Canon 10D will at first appear soft compared to the Sony. Canon's image processing is very conservative, sharpening very little. While the Sony pushes the image as far as it can in order to get it as sharp as possible. Canon's processing isn't bad, just different. It leaves the user with more flexibility in editing the picture and still achieving acceptable output.

UPDATE (7-6-04): I have finally decided to sell the 10D. The need for a longer, fast prime lens, nice tripod, and another 1GB compact flash card finally pushed me to do it. I might pick up a second body later on, but for now I decided it best if I sell the 10D.

Peleng 8mm F3.5 fisheye

I really like this little lens. For $250 you can get a crazy fisheye effect on even cropped cameras. On a full frame camera you get a "peephole" effect, with the image circle fitting entirely on the image sensor (the image is literally a circle). First of all, let me tell you what this lens is NOT. This lens is not a serious lens for serious people. Thiis lens flares very easily for reasons that should be obvous. This lens is not terribly sharp at wide open and the contrast isnt up to "L" standards. It doesn autofocus or have auto aperture adjustment

So whats so great about this lens and why do I own it? First of all its absolutely tons of fun. The extreme angle of view opens up a whole different area of photography not possible with normal lenses. I have really taken my most unique pictures with this lens. You get lots of practice manual focusing with this lens. At F5.6 and smaller, this lens is surprisingly sharp if properly focused. The lens is pretty small and light. Given the fact it has to be manually focused, its easy to set focus then hold your camera away from your body at unique angles to shoot with this lens.

Update: 7-23-08: I have sold this lens in favor of the Sigma F2.8 diagonal fisheye. I have just found 8mm to be too wide to be of much practical use on a full frame camera. I also found that I had been missing a lot of shots when using the 8mm due to misfocus. People who say focus doesnt matter at 8mm are wrong. It very much does matter. The sigma should be a better lens all around.

Sigma 70-200mm EX 2.8

This is the second largest in my lens collection. It holds a 2.8 aperture from 70mm all the way to 200mm and is very sharp while doing it. I have used the Canon 70-200 F2.8 and I can honestly say that the optical quality between these two lenses is a wash. The Canon might have slightly better contrast (maybe), but it is absolutely not sharper than this Sigma lens - which impresses me more and more each time I use it.

In my opinion, the only Achilles heel of this lens is its focusing. While still much better than non USM/HSM lenses, its just not as good as Canon's own Ultrasonic Motor. Its not quite as quiet (not a big deal), but its not as quick and a little jerky. USM, on the other hand, I have found to be be blazing fast (especially on primes), dead silent, and silky smooth.

Build quality, much like the Canon lens, is top notch, maybe even a little better. The physical build is very sturdy and it has a nice black 'crackle' type finish. I have found this finish preferable to Canon's white finish which is very prone to showing scratches and chips. This lens also comes with a tripod collar. I have practically never used this lens on a tripod, but the collar works well enough. One slight quirk of this lens is that the focusing ring turns in the opposite direction of Canon's lens. If you're very used to using Canon zooms, this might be an issue for you - or it might not.

Optical quality, like i said before, is just fantastic. Chromatic aberration is almost nowhere to be seen with this lens - at any aperture. Sharpness is very good wide open and absolutely fantastic at about F4.5. At F4.0, this lens is easily sharper than my 300mm F4 at the same aperture.

Update: I really had mixed feelings about selling this lens. In all truthfulness, I didn't use it much at all since I got the 135mm F2 L. The 1D Mark II was just too much money to hold onto a lens that I didn't use, therefore I decided to lighten up my bag a little bit and sell this lens.

Sigma 24-70mm F2.8 EX -

I sold both my Canon 28-105 and Sigma 2x converter to get this lens. I wanted a good midrange zoom with a large aperture. I got less than what I was hoping for, but this is still a decent lens. The Canon 24-70 F2.8L is $1350. This lens is $350. Yes, there is a reason for this price difference. I first used this lens at a basketball game and I was very disappointed. It was very soft close to wide open. At F3.5 I would subjective rate sharpness "ok", but not great. Contrast takes a big hit at large apertures as well - much more so than my other lenses. I was hoping this would be a good low light sports lens, but it definitely will not be up to this task. Autofocus slow and balky in low light. This made getting in focus pictures difficult.

On the upside, it does much better when stopped down a little. This would likely make a decent "walk around" lens for use in good light or with a flash. Also, in typical Sigma EX fashion, build quality is very good. It has a very solid feel to it with a nice powder coated finish. The Canon 28-105 felt like a cheap, thin piece of plastic in comparison. This lens is worth the extra $120 based on build quality alone.

At first I was very disappointed in the handling of this lens. The zoom ring was VERY stiff. The lens retracts at longer focal lengths and extends at shorter focal lengths. The ring is stiffer when the barrel is extending most rapidly (between 24 and 35mm), but after that, the tension lets up a little bit. It seems as if the ring has loosened up a little with use, which is a very good thing. When it was new the ring was so stiff it was almost unusable. This lens comes with a hood and a green padded case (as do all Sigma EX lenses). This lens requires 82mm filters, which are VERY expensive. A quality 82mm UV filter will run about $50. This somewhat takes away from the "value" of this lens.

After I tried the Canon 28mm F2.8 I realized just how bad this lens was optically. I sold it and have not regretted it.

Canon 100mm Macro USM

I always missed the macro shots I was able to take with my Song DSC-F707. No lens I had for my 10D could ever come close - until now. After I sold the Canon 200mm F2.8, I used the money and bought this lens, UV Filter, and hood from B&H. This lens is everything I expected it to be and more. Its build very well, its of reasonable size, and it autofocuses very quickly.

At 1:1 magnification, this lens gives about six inches of working space. When the hood is on, it can get very close to the subject. In retrospect, I'm very glad I didn't get a 50mm macro for this reason. The extra working space is very nice. Sample from this lens can be found in my macro gallery.

Macro capabilities aside, this lens makes a superb 100mm prime lens. Its extremely sharp from 6" all the way to infinity. Its autofocus speed, which is nothing short of astounding, makes it a viable sports lens while its focal length and aperture makes it a nice portrait lens. In all, this is a very useful lens that is worth every penny.

UPDATE - 12-04: I have decided to sell the Macro lens in favor of getting a few miscellaneous photographic items that were needed. I just did not use the lens enough to justify keeping it. I have found that there are not that many situations in which you can shoot effective macro with a SLR without a flash. You need plenty of light in order to get the shutter speed, and more importantly, aperture you need for sharp pictures with enough depth of field. A dedicated macro flash would have done the trick, but I did not feel like going down this road.

Sigma 15-30mm EX 3.5-4.5

This is my one ultra-wide angle lens and I love it. Whenever I have this lens on my camera I'm looking to shoot very wide. For this reason, I shoot almost exclusively at 15mm with this lens, though I do zoom in occasionally to properly frame a shot. 15mm on this lens gives me an effective 24mm on the 10D and 20mm on the 1D. After shooting at 38mm for nearly a year with the Sony, 24mm on the 20D and 20mm on the 1D is amazing. It opens up photographs that definitely were not possible with the Sony. You almost have to recalibrate your way of thinking to compensate for the coverage this lens provides. Personally, I use this lens for shooting indoors (when you cant backup any further), landscape, and buildings.

Feel:
This lens is large, though not very heavy. The lens is made out of a heavy plastic powder coated with a matte finish. The front element is a very attractive blue, boubulous dome. There is no place to mount front filters on this lens, so protecting the front element is of paramount importance. The lens ships with a pedal shaped lens hood, which is almost a necessity to reduce the amount of flare. There is also a second hood-like piece of plastic that ships on top of the lens hood to secure the lens cap on. With a full frame and 1.3x camera, picture would vignette with this additional hood on the lens, but on a 1.6x digital camera, they don’t. For this reason, its a good idea to leave this additional hood on the lens for extra flare protection.

The built in Canon 10D flash will NOT reach over the end of this lens. Attempt to use the built in flash and you will get ugly, moon shaped crescents at the bottom of your photographs. If you need a flash with this lens, pick up an external one. I personally use the Speedlite 420ex and love it.

Performance - Performance is pretty dern good, especially when price is considered. At the wide end of the focal length range it is very sharp. Past about 24mm or so, it really needs some stopping down (in aperture) to become truly sharp. Vignetting is very pronounced at wide angles and large apertures (especially on the 1D), but disappears by about F6.3 or so.

Autofocus on this lens is slow and noisy. As blunt as that sounds, I know of no other way to put it. When shooting still subjects its not an issue, but if you ever try to shoot action with this lens, it becomes annoying and frustrating very quickly.

Even though this lens has a few minor annoyances, the results are impressive - especially in good light. Sharpness is very very good when stopped down a bit and 19.5 effective millimeters (on a 1D) is *really* wide. Its not a 16-35L, but then again it only costs about one third as much. I very highly recommend this lens as a midbudget wide angle lens.

Update: 12/3/07 - I have sold this lens just because it was getting old and I needed a better focusing wide angle lens. I replaced it with the Canon 17-40L. Optically the Canon is no better, but the Canon is better in almost all areas - focusing, build quality, and fit/finish.

Tamron 28-75 F2.8

There is a lot that could be said about this lens, but i'll sum it up with "Good lens, boring focal length range". After my (horrible) Sigma 24-70 experience, I didn't think I wanted to try another fast, midrange zoom. However after I sold my 70-200 F2.8 I only had *one* zoom lens in my collection, and that was a little alarming. As much as I like primes for their image quality, there are just a lot of times where I need the flexibility of a zoom.

You'll hear lots of people in online forums claim this lens is as good as the Canon 24-70L. I don't know about that (I've never used the 24-70L), but its pretty good. Physically it feels a little cheap. Its made of plastic (quality plastic, but plastic just the same). The zoom ring, though not nearly as stiff as the Sigma 24-70, isn't as free turning as I would like. Maybe this will loosen up in time. The lens hood worries me though. It feels extremely cheap and it wouldn't surprise me if it broke within this lens' lifetime.

Optically this lens is very good, especially for a $400 zoom. Just to get one thing out of the way to begin with, this lens is markedly better in the center than in the corners (on a 1.3x crop). Though it will expose a full frame without any problem (its not a "digital specific" lens), it was "optimized" for cameras with a 1.5x or smaller sensor. This just means that at large apertures, the corners are going to be a little soft. At F2.8 this lens is sharp at 28mm (in the center of the frame) and fairly soft at 75mm. At F4 it improves quite a bit and is sharp near the center at all focal lengths. By F5.6, this lens delivers very good sharpness across the frame at all focal lengths. For the types of things I shoot at large apertures (people, subject isolation), the soft corners at F2.8 are not an issue. Overall I'm pleased with this lens' performance and would highly recommend it considering the price.

Update 12/3/07 - I have sold this lens due to its poor performance on a full frame camera. On a crop it was good, but on a full frame it was unacceptably soft (at all apertures) on the left hand side of the frame. Given the optical quality of the lens otherwise, this was a shame. I strongly suspect the softness experienced was due to manufacturing defects, and not optical design.

Canon 50mm 1.8

There isn't much to this lens. At F1.8 its very fast, at $70 its very cheap, and its also very small and light. At first I wasn't overly impressed with this lens. I was so used to zooming on my point and shoot camera that using a prime required a recalibration as to how I thought about shooting.

Basically this lens excels at two things: low light photography and producing great bokeh. When there are situations where you need an extra stop or two of light over your zooms and using a flash isn't an option, this lens is a life saver. One example of this is indoor volleyball or basketball. During these events the light is relatively low and the action is fast. An F1.8 lens is absolutely wonderful in these conditions. Think you can do just as good a job with your F3.5 zoom? Think again. Unless you fancy the idea of shooting at ISO 3200 and still (possibly) not getting enough shutter speed, then a fast prime will almost always be superior to a zoom in these light conditions. On the 10D the effective focal length is 80mm, which is just about perfect for portraits. With the large aperture you can use a low ISO for a smoother picture and you can produce great background blue to really isolate your subject.

Built quality is not that great. It is built out of a thin, smooth plastic and has a plastic lens mount. But the thing only weighs 170 grams, so it doesn't put a lot of stress on itself. The build quality scared me at times. During demanding situations where I was quick to put on or remove the lens, it just felt very flimsy. This probably will not be an issue with most people, but its something to keep in mind. Other drawbacks are a flimsy manual focus and the fact that there is no distance scale. However for $70 its an unbeatable bargain in the lens world. I very highly recommend this lens to any beginner. It will seem awkward at first, but once you come proficient in using (and knowing when to use) a fixed focal length lens, this will be one to love. Canon also makes a 50mm F1.4 that has USM, distance scale, metal lens mount, and a proper manual focus ring. If you've got some money to spare, that would definitely be a better lens to have, but it costs over 3x as much as the F1.8.

UPDATE: 2-11-05 - I finally bit the bullet and went ahead and upgraded to the 50mm F1.4 lens. The F1.8 version has treated me very well, but after using the F1.4 for basketball and very low light indoor shots, I was sold on it.

Update:  May 2008:  I sold this lens for the second time in favor of the 50L.

Canon Speedlite 420ex

I actually got this flash for the wrong reason, but it turned out to be a wonderful addition to my collection. I originally got it because I underestimated the power of the built in flash on the 10D. While I knew I was getting a much stronger flash, there were several unexpected surprises.

Low light is rough on any camera's autofocus system. To make the best of a rough situation, many cameras use an autofocus assist light of some sort. My old Sony used a laser-like beam, which worked pretty darn good. The Canon uses a white strobe which looks something like a very rapid fire flash. This assist strobe is very distracting and doesn't work all that well. If you are in a room full of people you are going to attract quite a bit of attention if this strobe goes off in a dark room. The Speedlite uses an infrared auto focus assist beam much like the Sony's. The major difference here is that this one works VERY well. With this flash perched atop my camera autofocus is nearly as fast in low light as it is in broad daylight. This speaks volumes for the effectiveness of the AF assist beam considering how fast the 10D focuses in good light.

Update: 8-24-06 - I have sold this flash in favor of the Canon 580ex. A faster recycle time was needed for events.

Canon 28-105mm 3.5-4.5 USM

I had this lens for a couple of months. It was a decent little lens, but just couldn't handle most of the things I wanted to do with it. Since then I have come to love shooting the midrange with two prime lenses (85/1.8 and 35/2). I have found that I prefer the image quality of primes to the convenience of zooms in the mid focal length range.

The lens is made of smooth, black plastic. The plastic does not feel as substantial, nor is it finished as well as either of the Sigma lenses (keep in mind this lens did cost significantly less). The zoom ring does stick ever so subtly when turned. I doubt this will actually cause anyone to miss a shot, but it is annoying just the same. When pointed straight up or straight down, the barrel of the lens will extend or retract depending on how its oriented. This isn't really an issue considering I don't take shots with the camera pointed straight up or straight down, but its something to keep in mind. The lens does not come with a lens hood, but does come with front and rear lens caps (I guess all do these days?).

This lens is reasonably sized and though substantial, I wouldn't classify it as heavy by any means. The built in Canon flash WILL reach over this lens. So, if you're looking to save a few bucks, buying an external flash is not necessary for this lens.

Performance wise, this lens does pretty well ok. Its not terribly sharp wide open, but when stopped down a little it does pretty good. However it does have a tendency to produce chromatic aberrations when shooting areas of very high contrast.

However, my biggest beef with this lens (and its a very big one) is the horizontal banding in AI Servo focus mode. This really really surprised me. The first time I shot in servo mode with this camera, I was at an intramural football game. After analyzing the pictures from the game I thought I had a defective camera. A large percentage of them had significant horizontal banding them. Upon doing some research, I found out that this problem had nothing to do with the camera, but was actually a flaw in the lens, for others with the lens have had similar issues.

From what I have seen, the banding phenomenon with this lens tends to be worse at high ISOs than at low ISOs. The banding can range anywhere from subtle to horrible. It can definitely ruin a good shot, unless of course you plan on spending a good while in Photoshop correcting it. My advice would be to never shoot in AI servo focus mode with this camera. Maybe most of these lenses work fine and I just got a bad copy. Not having access to a usable servo focus seriously holds this lens back. I can't say I would recommend this lens to anyone, just for that reason alone.

Aside from the banding, the 28-105 is really a decent lens. At $200 it wont break the bank and it offers a very useful zoom range. However if at all possible, I would recommend a lens without banding issues. The 28-135 IS would be a good alternative.

Canon 28mm 2.8

This lens is much like the 50mm F1.8 in that is very small, light, and cheap. After selling the Sigma 24-70 I picked up this lens instead to give me something sharp, fast, and wider than 50mm. I have the Sigma 15-30, but its F4.5 at 28mm.

This lens was the final blow to the Sigma 24-70. After comparing the optical quality of these two lenses, I sold the Sigma immediately. The 28mm prime absolutely destroyed the sigma wide open. It made the zoom look so bad I almost had to wonder if my copy had been damaged somehow.

This was a very nice lens for me. I was always happy with its optical performance. Eventually I wound up selling this lens in favor of the 35mm F2.

Canon 35mm F2

This lens is much like the 28mm. It is similar in size, build, and weight - all of which are good things. Like the 50mm f1.8 and the 28mm F2.8, it has a very buzzy autofocus motor, but seems a bit quicker to focus than the other two.

Wide open this lens is a tad soft and has a healthy dose of chromatic aberration, which is to be expected from a $200 F2.0 lens. By about F2.8 its very good optically, and from 2.8 down the rest is history.

I find that 35mm isn't terribly useful on a heavily cropped camera. Unless you're going to get the 35/1.4 for its fantastic optical quality, I would probably recommend just getting the 50/1.8 or the 50/1.4 over this lens. Both of them offer a lot more value for the money and don't have the awkwardness of a cropped semi-wide angle lens on a digital body. I just never could find much of a use for this lens.

Canon 50mm 1.4 USM

When I first got a DSLR I told myself I could get by just fine with the 50/1.8. After shooting with it for a year and a half I saw the value in the 50mm F1.4. The virtues of the F1.4 version over the F1.8 version are much better build quality, distance scale, metal lens mount, faster focusing, and faster aperture. For someone who uses a 50mm lens a lot, these improvements are easily worth the $160 premium over the F1.8 version.

The optical quality is as expected, which is quite good. At F1.4 its not that sharp, but fine for subjects at relatively close distances. Far subjects at F1.4 just aren't going to look that good. By F2.0 things are quite a bit sharper though, and that's good because I use this lens the most at this aperture.

As far as I'm concerned a fast 50mm prime should be a staple in anyone's lens collection. Its cheap, sharp, and is a very easy to use focal length. The other alternatives to the 50mm focal length are 35mm and 85mm. Both are a bit more specialized than the 50mm, but everyone has their own style of shooting.

One other thing to be noted about this lens is that the focusing isnt that great. Its not very smooth, and a little on the slow side. Its fine for still subjects, but makes a rather poor fast action camera. Because of this, and the fact the Tamron 28-75 is excellent, this 50mm doesnt see much action from me anymore.

Update: 12/3/07 - I have sold this lens due to lack of use and fairly poor focusing ability. Optically, it seemed better on a full frame than a crop camera, but that was not enough to keep it. I decided to sell it to help fund the 17-40 L and 24-70 L

Canon 85mm F1.8

I hate this lens, I really do. I've owned it twice and it hasn't been able to focus correctly on a 10D or a 1D. It would backfocus by a considerable amount every single time. The focusing behavior made it impossible to get any sharp pictures. For this reason, I had no reason to keep the lens. My 100mm Macro is sharper at every aperture, and it focuses correctly. I'm disappointed to say the least because I could have really used a fast 85mm prime for indoor sports this fall. I'm sure this is a very fine lens for those who can find a properly working copy, but I have had such luck.

Canon 300mm F4 L IS USM

This was my first "L" prime lens, and it certainly didn't disappoint. While many people would be tempted just to put a 1.4x converter on their 70-200 and call it a day, after using this lens one quickly realizes why that probably isn't the best solution. As an "L" USM prime, this lens focuses as fast as all-get-out and is not only usable, but very sharp at every aperture. The optical quality of a 70-200 F2.8 +1.4x teleconverter can't touch this lens - nevermind the discussion of autofocus speed or the fact that a 70-200 IS is $1600 ($500 more than this lens). This lens, without a doubt, is my favorite sports lens for its sharpness, length, and focusing speed.

The IS works very well on this lens. On my 1D I have found that I can hand hold the lens and get sharp pictures at around 1/60th of a second. That is exactly 2 1/2 stops under the recommended hand held shutter speed for that lens on my camera (effective focal length is 390mm). For that reason, it makes a fine low light lens.

For those of you who can't afford a 300mm F2.8 - which I'll assume is almost everybody - this lens makes a fine substitute. Its not as sharp as the 300/2.8, nor (obviously) as fast of an aperture, but then again it doesn't weigh over 3lbs and doesn't cost $3800. This lens makes a very fine addition to one's collection.

Update: I have finally sold this lens in favor of the 300/2.8 L. I miss the light weight, and close focusing of the F4, but the F2.8 is just too valuable for the low light sports photography that I do.

Canon 200mm F2.8 L USM

Come spring of 2004 I was getting desperate for a high quality long lens for shooting sports with. Ideally I wanted a Canon 300mm F4, however funds were a bit tight. Instead I got this lens used for a pretty good deal and bought the Tamron Teleconverters to add to it.

One would think a name brand prime would be sharper than a 3rd party zoom, especially when teleconverters were added. However this just was not the case. Every piece of me wanted to believe this lens was going to produce better images than my 70-200 F2.8, but it just couldn't do it. In fact, the images from the 70-200 as a whole were sharper (probably because a higher percentage were in focus). I did notice that the Canon prime was sharper in the corners than the Sigma 70-200, but for the events I shoot this matters little. Also, I noticed this lens was much more prone to chromatic aberration than the Sigma Zoom. It was for these reasons I sold the lens. It just didn't make any sense to keep it when I had a zoom that would do the job just as good, if not better.

However, on the upside, this lens handled flawlessly. Its much smaller and lighter than the Sigma 70-200, and it autofocuses absolutely blazing fast. I use to think Sigma HSM was pretty good until I tried this lens. This lens puts everything else I've ever put on my camera to shame in terms of AF speed. Yes, its that's good. At about $440 used, this lens is a good deal for those who don't have a 70-200 zoom, just wouldn't expect superior image quality by using this over a 70-200 zoom.

Compactdrive PD7X

With the 10D I was shooing JPEG with a 1GB card and I would maybe go through 1-1.5GB of storage per game. For that, the old X-Drive worked well enough. It wasn't terribly fast, but then again I never offloaded more than once during an event. The 1D changed all of that. 8 frames a second and RAW really plow through memory. The 20D only made the situation worse. It was at this point that the performance of the X-Drive was just unacceptable. Taking 15 minutes to offload 1GB just wasn't going to work when I would shoot up to 4GB at a football or basketball game.

The Compactdrive PD7X isn't the most featured, or the best designed portable storage device out there, but it is REALLY honking fast. I can offload a 1GB card in 3:40 - yes, three minutes and forty seconds. This is more than fast enough to handle even the most extreme shooting situations I may encounter. That is the driving feature of this device - blazing speed. There is no faster portable storage device on the market, period. It also comes in a very sturdy aluminum shell - much more substantial than the X-Drive in that respect.

That is the good. I do have two slight complaints with this device though. One is the plastic door that covers the memory slots. Its a bit fragile and the hinge will buckle and break (mine has) if you play too rough with it. Not a huge problem, just a minor annoyance. Another (slightly more serious) thing is that the device will shut off if the battery voltage gets too low. Default shutoff voltage is below 4.7v, but you can program it to shutoff below 4.5v instead (which I have). One way to alleviate this issue is to use strong NiMh batteries - 2300Mah is good. With these batteries, you can offload 7-10GB before it finally shuts off. If it shuts off in the middle of a transfer, you have to replace the batteries and restart the transfer. For this reason, once you see it hit 4.5V during a transfer, replace the batteries as soon as its done. If it drops to 4.4v, it will shut off. Again, this isn't a "deal breaker" issue in my opinion, just something you have to pay attention to.

The compact drive costs about $100 and is ideally suited for people who demand speed more than anything in a portable storage device. If this is you, I don't hesitate to recommend it.

Update: October 2005 - I have sold this drive in favor of another 2GB flash card. I finally have enough flash memory (and a laptop) that this drive is no longer necessary to me.

Canon 2x II Teleconverter

This teleconverter is quite similar to the 1.4x, except, obviously, it magnifies 2 times over instead of 1.4 times over. You lose two stop of light and a good deal of sharpness wide open. This teleconverter really only delivers acceptable results acceptable with high quality primes. With both my 135L and 300 L, I can get very good images from this teleconverter when the aperture is pushed down a stop. This means shooting at F5.6 with the 135mm+2x and F8 with the 300mm+2x. That sounds slow, but in good daylight its fine. I highly suspect this teleconverter will come in very handy once baseball season rolls around.

Sigma 2x EX APO Teleconverter

I actually owned this teleconverter twice - once in the fall of 2003 and once in the summer of 2004. I almost feel embarrassed for owning 3 different 2x teleconverters, especially when two were the same make. The truth is, I was trying to get something for nothing and I had to learn the hard way. Teleconverters work best on sharp prime lenses. This is fact. Additionally, 2x teleconverters aren't usually that useful unless you plan to stop down a bit (or have a very sharp lens to begin with). This is also fact. So when I started using this converter on my 70-200 F2.8 zoom the results were less than stellar.

I stopped down as much as I could when I used this teleconverter. For outdoor sports on a Sunny day I would usually shoot ISO 400, stop down to F8 or so, and get about 1/1250 shutter. Even at F8, the images were generally not very sharp and lacked the "pop" that comes from naturally contrasty images. On the Sigma 70-200, it makes for a (very) poor man's way to 400mm. Sigma claims autofocus speed is the same with this converter as without, but I found that to be totally untrue. I found that AF was considerably slower with the converter on the Canon 10D. All of this said, I did find this teleconverter to be of higher optical quality than the one from Tamron - which was just downright lousy.

As cheap as this converter is (~$165), it really isn't a bad addition to one's collection if you're short on cash, but just don't expect any miracles.

X-Drive II

This is a pretty basic piece of equipment. Its essentially a 20GB hard drive in a portable case that has media slots. I bought the casing and the hard drive separately and assembled the device myself. I've probably made 50 transfers or so onto this device and its been 100% reliable from the beginning. It is plug and play in Windows XP and has never given me any driver trouble. Transfer from the drive to the PC isn't terribly fast (maybe 3-5MB/s), but its faster than most compact flash cards. As for transfer from the card to the device, I can empty a 1GB compact flash card in about 15 minutes. From a full charge, I have run the battery dead in this device a few times. It has lasted on average for about 4GB of transfer with standard compact flash media, which isn't great, but is adequate for nearly everything that I do.

1GB IBM Microdrive

This was the first storage media I bought for my 10D. Originally I was looking to get the most "bang for the buck" as far as buying equipment goes, but as my hobby progressed that didn't seem like such a good idea anymore. Up front, I shot almost 30,000 with this Microdrive and I didn't lose a single one. That alone is a testament to its reliability if handled properly. However, after owning it for about 8 months, I was starting to get nervous using it in the conditions in which I shot the most - which are usually quite hectic. Changing out a Microdrive at a basketball or football game just makes me nervous. All it would take is a bump for it to fall to the floor and die. It was for this reason I sold the Microdrive. It wasn't giving me any problems, but I would rather have the safety and peace of mind of solid state storage.

1.4x and 2x Tamron SP Teleconverters

I bought these two teleconverters for the Canon 200/2.8. I had heard good things about the "SP" line of teleconverters from Tamron, so I decided to give them a shot. I paid $180 for the 2x and $160 for the 1.4x. The optical performance of these teleconverters on both my Sigma zoom and my Canon prime was just unacceptable. I found that I used the 2x a lot more than the 1.4x, so this factors into my opinion. I'm sure the 1.4x would have been a little better.

While sharpness from any 2x teleconverter on a zoom lens isn't going to be stellar, this particular teleconverter on my Sigma 70-200 F2.8 (a very sharp lens I might add) was pretty bad. Even worse, chromatic aberration (also known a "purple fringing") was absolutely horrible. If the lens + TC was anywhere near wide open (this means under F10), there would be a bright purple lining surrounding anything with lots of contrast. In my particular circumstance, this happened to be white baseball uniforms.

Overall sharpness with the 2x was certainly no better than the Sigma 2x, and might have been a little worse. However in the end it was the horrible chromatic aberration that sent these teleconverters back to the store from which they came. I went back over some football shots I took with the 70-200 + 2x last fall and I could not find one hint of chromatic aberration in ANY of the shots. This is really saying something because it was a bright day and I expected to see at least a little in the white uniforms. In retrospect, I shouldn't have gotten rid of the Sigma 2x. Considering I don't have the $1300 for a Canon 100-400L, I just might pick up the Sigma 2x to tide me over in the mean time.