24mm F3.5 L II TS-E Tilt Shift Lens

After years of missing large format cameras with their swings and tilts, and of course their wonderful large film size that together produce incredible images, I think I have found something that will lessen my longing. This tilt-shift lens combined with a high-pixel DSLR (like the Canon EOS 5D Mark II) enable a photographer to produce images that can rival the best from medium format cameras and even can under the right circumstances push image quality into 4 x 5 inch sheet film territory. I got this lens, snapped it onto my camera and got excellent results right away. It helped to spend some time refreshing my memory about how to use tilts and shifts but aside from that, there was nothing mysterious about this lens other than the magical quality it possesses for producing sharp, colorful images that can be free of converging lines or offer incredible field of focus control. Other's have described various technical qualities of this lens and most online reviews describe the several improvements this lens offers over it's predecessor. The big ones are better control over chromatic abberation and the ability to independently control the axes of shift and tilt. Closer focus is also a bonus. Opinion varies about sharpness in the corners but all agree this is perhaps one of the sharpest lenses in Canon's line-up. My example delivers sharp corners so perhaps my copy is better that some of the reviewers? I had to choose between this lens and more traditional ones (I was looking at the 70-200mm) and decided that this lens offered me the things I could get with no other lens - a lens great for interiors, exteriors (architecture) and new landscape dimensions. I can get the zoom later! This lens is unique. I wasn't sure how much I would like it but now that I've had some seat time with it, I could never think of being without it. Usual L quality - beefy, precise, and consistent behavior for all controls! Not a bargain price but it's the old adage - you get what you pay for!

Added this lens to my collection and it has produced some really good architectural photos. I have been using mostly the slide feature to take the tilt out of building photographs. The only complaint I would have is knobs are not easy to reach in some orientations.

Best lens I own...I shoot architecture and this is the king. Crazy sharp (as has been said many times here) and compared to the 17mm this thing is easy to focus. I own over a dozen L series lenses, all of which were purchased with a view towards their application in shooting buildings. This is the stalwart of the group; the one I'd never leave home without and the one that is used most frequently on every shoot. I'll also note that this thing has taken a beating...I use it all the time..it's been bumped and banged about a fair bit and still performs perfectly. Amazing piece of glass! I really can't recommend this lens highly enough especially for folks considering shooting architecture / real estate on a professional basis. Beyond the strict formalism of conventional architectural photography I should also note that this lens is great fun to play with in more creative applications. With a little shift and some tilt to throw focus you can make some highly compelling stills and doubly compelling video..fun times. If I had to pick 1 lens for work and fun this would be it.

Not a lot to say here. This lens is not a zoom, not fast and it has a very large image circle. So there's every reason to expect it will perform and boy, does it ever. It's true that shifting, especially if you shift all the way, lowers the image quality. But this lens is so sharp and has so little chromatic aberration there seems to be resolution to spare. Image circle, freedom from CA, vignetting, and ergonomics are all superior to the Nikon 24PC (and that lens is no slouch, either.) Good as the 24TS is, I would recommend stopping it down, even when you're not shifting. I know the test reports always say "Its fabulous wide open so stopping down just invites diffraction." This is certainly true in theory and probably in a test environment, but I find it's best at f/8 - f/11, even unshifted. Liked the 24TS so much I bought the 17TS also. While the 24TS lacks the coolness factor of the 17, the 24 is, in my opinion a much more useful focal length. (It's also a tiny bit sharper but they are both first class.)

I bought my lens copy used in mint condition as upgrade from my 24/3.5 vers. I T/S lens. Optically it is a visible improvement - shifting the lens fully up or down does not lead to any cumbersome vignetting in the corners as the old lens version did. The lens overall is very sharp and provides an excellent image quality. I also like that tilt and shift functions can now be rotated against each other easily in any angle. Compared to my old version of this lens, I only see a few drawbacks which I want to mention here. Optically it does not make a difference, but the built style of the old T/S version was a metal housing while this new version uses plastic. This is especially visible when using the interlock buttons which are now tiny plastic locks (formerly metal). As mentioned in other reviews below, the new version now uses a 82 mm filter thread. This might have been needed to create a larger image circle of the lens to shift it better and to remove vignetting issues, but it forces you to get a new polarizer and/or ND filter if needed. In comparison with the older 24 mm T/S lens, you need now to keep a close eye on the scale of the tilt/shift positions. My old lens "jumped" easier back into the zero position while the new lens doesn't do this and might easily still be one mm off center if you are not careful. But you get used to the new system easily to center back correctly. In my opinion it is the best 24 mm lens which Canon has available in regard to sharpness and for the tilt/shift performance image-quality wise.

The lens is in a good condition and works perfectly.