Looking for a lens? Going to New Zealand.

[Hyptonic]

Hey guys,
I'm going to New Zealand in January and looking for a better lens for my Canon 7D. I am going on a nature photography tour so looking for something that would work well. Possibly looking to get an L lens something high quality looking to spend between $500-$1000 obviously the lower range but am willing to spend the extra money.

If anyone has any suggestions / examples that would be much appreciated.

Thank you

[RichardTaylor]

What other lenses do you have now?

[Hyptonic]

I just have the standard 88-135mm it comes with and a telephoto 70-300mm

[ishootRAW]

What about renting something like a Bigma 50-500?

[RichardTaylor]

In that case I would be looking at an ultrawide, 10/12-22/24 zoom.

[dlambert]

"Nature" could cover a lot of ground, but if you're expecting to do any landscapes at all, I'm with Richard. Note that you can't really get a wide-angle "L" lens for a crop-sensor body (Canon won't label an EF-S lens as "L"), but the 10-22 EF-S lens might be worth a look.

[Hyptonic]

I really like some of the results online of the 10-22 going to look further into it.

[ishootRAW]

Ah, by "nature tour" I thought he ment a safari type of thing. But for landscapes, +1 for the 10-22. I have heard it called "the EF-s that should be an L along with the 17-55 2.8 IS

[NgaiHill]

I'm no lens expert but here's my 10c (smallest coin you'll find in NZ)

Where is your nature tour? If you are going into the bush, say West Coast of the the South Island make sure you lens is reasonably fast as the low light can be quite challenging.
Also its mid summer here in January so make sure you have some filters for those bright sunny days - definitely a CPL but a few NDs for all those waterfall shots.

Hope you're traveling to the South Island cos that the most scenic part of the country - the further south the better.

[CapnJack]

Originally Posted by ishootRAW

What about renting something like a Bigma 50-500?

I second this suggestion- I rented one for a Yellowstone trip in September from LensRental.com (good outfit).

A number of the shots here: Vacation 2011 - a set on Flickr were taken with the "Bigma" with a 1.4x teleconverter attached, most of the wide shots were taken with a Nikon point-n-shoot.