Jeremy

I just purchased my 7D a bit ago, and its “on its way” as we speak. I am hoping to pick up a good lens and really use it to its potential, but at the moment I cannot spend 800$ on a lens after spending 1600 on a camera. :(

Any sub 800$ lens recommendations that would do this camera justice? I shoot mainly stock photography/models.

Thanks in advance.

-Dave
microstuck.blogspot.com

Elyssia What lense do I recommend . First it depends on your style of photgraphy (landscape Portrait Sports etc)

I am not a portrait photgrapher So I’ll let soemone else anwser that one.

For general walk around I highly recommend the Canon 24-70 f/2.8 great color and contrast. The 24-105 f/4 IS lens would also be a good choice and the IS will be of use when shooting hand held videos.

I dont typically use IS lenses for a couple of reasons, One is if chosing between fast and IS I usually prefer fast (f/2.8 over f/4). Also for moving subjects such as sports IS produces soft images (IMO) so I switch it off. In addition, I often shoot with a monopod or tripod (The tripod I often use to shoot my videos)

Another great lens is the CANON 70-200mm f/2.8 (either IS or non IS) an absolute wonderful lens for a Broad range of applications.

My lens collection overlaps the focal lengths all are Canon L glass. ( Canon 24-70 f/2.8 is my favorite lens)
17-40mm 24-70mm 70-200mm and 100-400mm
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NALIN: I have had no problems with the Canon 100-400mm on tthe 7D and I often use it with a 1.4x extender takes beautiful pictures. The Sigma 50-500mm is a very versatile lens with a tremendous zoom range what I lke best about it. With the SIGMA lens quality varies it seems by the copy. I sent mine back to have it serviced and it came back sharper than it went in. My Sigma produces very good quailty images and I am very happy with it. With a 1.4x telecoverter it covers 100-700mm and makes a very nice wildlife lens. However the image quailty is not as good as the CANON 100-400mm and the focus is not as fast. In addition I find the push/pull zoom of the canon preferable for zooming (Sigma you rotate a ring)

My conclusion? Buy the Canon if you are looking for best quality and IS at a higher price. Buy the SIGMA if you are looking to conserve cash and to have the widest possible zoom capability in one lens. Both are big and heavy!

thanks
Nalin

I am wondering does anyone know what system requirments i would need to be able to process the images from the Conon 7D on my laptop.

I want to buy it, but Cant Afford an upgrade.

Help please

I had originally been planning to but the 5D Mark 2 and had teh money set aside for the purchase. However when the specs became available I was interested but disappointed….

The full frame at 21 MP is wonderful for landscape photography and the inclusion of video also got mt interest up.

However, The camera kept the old autofocus system. I was very disappointed about that! Having owned a Canon 30D and then a 40D I had expeienced many issues and lost shots due too the poor autofocus of these cameras (especially when compared to thier Nikon equivalents).

Shooting sports I wanted a camera with a high FPS rate. My 40D was rated at 6.5 fps and except for the autofocus system worked wlell for my soccer photos. Well the 5D Mark 2 was backing up to 3.5 FPS again a major dissapointment. I know some foilks say that is sufficient for sports but I dont agree. In soccer when shooting a corner kick or drive in the box I open up and shoot as many shots as the camera allows. Things happen so fast at those moments that a split second can make or break a photo. The 7D at 8FPS and 15 raw burst and over 100 JPEG fit the sports shooting nicely.

Another issue with the 5D mark 2 was the balck dot and video banding problems.Although not major issues I was reluctant to shell out $2,700 for a camra body that was not as good as I had hoped and had a few technical glitches. In the end I decided to wait for the next generation body as rumors of a 60D (7D) were floating on the internet.

When the 7D was announced i was thrilled at the specs. I did feel the 18 MP was overkill and 15MP would have been suficient for this level camera. I also was hoping for a bigger sensor maybe the 1.3x used in the Canon 1d Mark 3 (a great sports camera body BTW). Except for those two issues I liked what I read about teh new body and decided to upgrade. At a $1000 less than the 5D Mark 2 body and so many new features it was an easy decision.

The 19 point new auto focus system is excellent cross type sensors with selectable 5 zones! In custom settings you can set focus tracking so that when you are focus tracking a soccer player or bird etc the camera will not adjust focus on an closer object moving into the field of view, thats a great feature for sports shooting!
There are several other cool new focus tracking options too.

The extended ISO is also nice for shooting indoor or night events Yes ISO 12,800 is grainy but at least you get a shot. Under ISO 400 the image quality at all settings are superb very sharp and clear images.

I do use the video modes. When Hiking or shooting sports I shot some short clips. Now the H.264 videos are an improvement over the 5D Mark 2 videos. However, be prepared for some surprises when you start post processing or playback from a computer (not the camera).
The H.264 videos are very compute intensive and working with these files is more demanding than most folks probably realize… You will need a video editing program that can handle MPEG 2 as a minimum and preferably H.264 (MPEG 4). A tip here is to process your videos then build you final video file with quality at 100% and use 2 pass encoding. Anyway I have produced some very nice videos with this camera but you will have to learn the ropes I assure you. Its not like shooting from a consumer camcorder most of us are use to,

In summary this camera is a technical leap in sophistication and some learning is required to use its new features effectively. Image quality is excellent and the videos are a nice feature, With the $1000 I saved on purchasing the 7D instead of the 5D mark 2 I purchased a Canon 17-40mm f/4 lens to compensate for the 1.6x crop actor when shooting landscapes and it does the Job when my Canon 24 70 f/2.8 can’t take in the entire scene I am trying to capture…

My equipment: Canon 7D with a SCANDISK 16 GB UDMA Extreme 4 memory card. Canon 17-40mm f/4, Canon 24-70mm f/2.8, Canon 70-200mm F/2.8, Canon 100-400mm f/4-5.6 and the SIGMA 50-500mm F/4-6.3 lenses. Other: 430 EX speedlite and 1.4x teleconverter plus some filters (Circular polarizer and neutral density)
Sotware: Lightroom, Corel Videostudio, Photmatix.