Tilt Shift Lens...

[dnpayne]

Quick question. Hopefully it's not stupid. I'm thinking of getting a tilt shift lens and I was looking at the Canon 45mm Tilt Shift. Does it always shoot in "tilt shift" mode, for lack of a better term, or can you use it as a standard lens as well?

Im trying to justify the $1200. :\

[OsmosisStudios]

You can use it as a 45mm lens, just straight, but wheres the fun? For literally 1/10th the price you could get a 50mm f/1.8 instead.

What do you feel you need a TS lens for?

[Doug Pardee]

Yes, you could use it as a normal lens. But remember that it's strictly manual-focus. It's also not going to give quite as good an image as a conventional lens, although by reputation it's fairly close (unlike, say, the TS-E 24mm).

[dnpayne]

Originally Posted by OsmosisStudios

You can use it as a 45mm lens, just straight, but wheres the fun? For literally 1/10th the price you could get a 50mm f/1.8 instead.

What do you feel you need a TS lens for?

I'm trying to add a unique and creative effect on my photos. Personally, I would just carry two different lens if I could. I want the 50mm 1.8 and the 45mm tilt shift. I was hoping I could use the tilt shift as a normal lens to justify the cost.

Anyone know if there are any Tamron or other brands available besides Canon?

[its_tim]

You could take a look at the lensbaby options which are designed to be more creative tilt-shift lenses rather than breaking the bank for a proper one.

Lenses for SLR, Mirrorless and PL Cameras | Lensbaby Creative Effects Lenses

[dnpayne]

Originally Posted by its_tim

You could take a look at the lensbaby options which are designed to be more creative tilt-shift lenses rather than breaking the bank for a proper one.

Lenses for SLR, Mirrorless and PL Cameras | Lensbaby Creative Effects Lenses

The Tilt Transformer lens is pretty close. Why in the world does it only come on Nikons???

[Niresangwa]

Originally Posted by dnpayne

The Tilt Transformer lens is pretty close. Why in the world does it only come on Nikons???

The tilt-transformer is not for DSLRs.

You want the Composer, which comes in all mounts.

You won't use this as much as you think you will.

[inkista]

If this is just a "fun" lens, and not one for work that require serious image quality, I'd actually recommend hitting eBay and looking for an Arsat/Arax tilt-shift. These are Russian medium format lenses with a tilt-shift mount slapped on the back for dSLR use. They do the full tilt/shift thing, so you can play with that. The glass won't be as nice as a Canon, though. But the price is substantially lower.

I will also say that if you're just going to a tilt-shift for the toy-model effect, you'd probably be better off learning to do depth maps in post-processing instead. Tilt-shift lenses have a lot less freedom of movement than the bellows on a technical/view camera, and (of course), you can only affect the lens plane and not the image plane.

Get a tilt-shift if you actually plan to use tilt for increasing/extending the DoF, and the shift for perspective change/correction. Otherwise, I'd say it's probably not worth it for you.

[dnpayne]

Originally Posted by inkista

If this is just a "fun" lens, and not one for work that require serious image quality, I'd actually recommend hitting eBay and looking for an Arsat/Arax tilt-shift. These are Russian medium format lenses with a tilt-shift mount slapped on the back for dSLR use. They do the full tilt/shift thing, so you can play with that. The glass won't be as nice as a Canon, though. But the price is substantially lower.

I will also say that if you're just going to a tilt-shift for the toy-model effect, you'd probably be better off learning to do depth maps in post-processing instead. Tilt-shift lenses have a lot less freedom of movement than the bellows on a technical/view camera, and (of course), you can only affect the lens plane and not the image plane.

Get a tilt-shift if you actually plan to use tilt for increasing/extending the DoF, and the shift for perspective change/correction. Otherwise, I'd say it's probably not worth it for you.

I don't want this soley for the tiny model effect, although a couple shots here and there would be neat. I mainly want the DOF shifting, etc... I've seen some really interesting portraits and wedding photos taken with a tilt shift and I want to mess around with it.

The Arax ones look interesting. I'm trying to find photo samples from them.

[dnpayne]

Originally Posted by Niresangwa

The tilt-transformer is not for DSLRs.

You want the Composer, which comes in all mounts.

You won't use this as much as you think you will.

I've been looking at this one. It's not exactly like the higher end tilt shifts obviously. I'm trying to hunt down more example photos of the one for the Canon DSLR to form a better option.