2 new Canon tilt/shift lenses

Canon launched two new tilt/shift lenses today:

TS-E 24mm f/3.5L II

A superb refinement to a true Canon classic, the new TS-E 24mm f/3.5L II offers enhanced functionality and image quality in its most popular tilt-shift focal length. Designed with UD glass to minimize and compensate for chromatic aberrations and specially coated aspherical elements for the highest possible glare-free image quality, this tilt-shift lens features an angle of view of 74°. New TS revolving lets users freely combine tilting and shifting within the range of +/- 90° in the direction of movement. It has an enhanced range of movement of up to +/- 8.5°, a revolving construction for both portrait and landscape shooting modes, locking, ergonomically designed and easily operated tilt and shift knobs, uses a circular aperture for beautiful out-of-focus areas, and is constructed using only lead-free glass and has an SWC lens coating that controls ghosting and flare to a far greater degree than earlier coating technologies.

TS-E 17mm f/4L

The widest tilt-shift lens in Canon’s lineup, the new TS-E 17mm f/4L lens expands shooting possibilities exponentially on EOS Digital cameras. Designed with UD glass to minimize and compensate for chromatic aberrations, with specially coated aspherical elements for the highest possible glare-free image quality, this tilt-shift lens offers an angle of view of 93°. New TS revolving lets users freely combine tilting and shifting within the range of +/- 90° in the direction of movement. The lens also has an improved tilt & shift knob with an enhanced range of movement of up to +/- 6.5° and revolving lenses for better operability, it uses a circular aperture for beautiful out-of-focus areas and has an SWC lens coating to control ghosting and flare to a far greater degree than with earlier coating technologies.

Horseman LD bellows/movement system for DSLRs

Horseman have just introduced their LD bellows system for Canon and Nikon digital SLRs.

"Whether you are using a Canon® or Nikon® digital single lens reflex, Horseman now gives you an opportunity to add full bellows functions—like in a medium or large format view camera. The Horseman LD comes in two models that accept Nikon or Canon DSLR bodies, maintaining all their normal functions. Up front, you can attach any standard medium or large format camera lens…"

This isn’t my ultimate fantasy ideal, which is movements controlled by a thumb pad on the back of the camera with one-touch zeroing of any plane, but still: HELL YEAH!

Coming soon are a conversion kit that will allow you to shoot 4×5 film and a slide adapter for pro digital backs.

It’s available now for about US $2,500.

Check it out at the Horseman product page or read the press release.

Via PhotographyBLOG

Canon TS-E 24mm lens – a review and discussion

Northlight Images have posted a comprehensive review of Canon’s 24mm tilt/shift lens, which allows a limited set of view camera-like movements for perspective and focus manipulation:

Keith recently obtained a Canon TS-E 24mm 3.5L lens primarily for interior and exterior photography of buildings. There are quite a few reviews of the TS-E 24mm on the web, but we wanted to give a bit more of a feel for what it is actually like to use a shift lens for real (on a Canon EOS 1Ds). Given the very wide angle pictures you can get with a 16mm lens and the ease of correcting perspective in Photoshop, why bother with this manual focus lens and all the extra effort involved in using it? This review/article is intended to give an overview of some of the effects, and has links to more detailed technical info at the end.

Read review at Northlight Images

Via Photography Blog