Canon TS-E 45mm f/2.8 Tilt and Shift Manual Focus Lens - USA

2016-12-18T19:00:00

I've owned this lens for about 4 years now, and I will occasionally use it for architecture photography, when I have the time to get the shot right (and the results are stunning but 95% of the time I use it during weddings for interesting atmosphere and unexpected portraits results. The blur it can create is not for everyone, but I love it, and so do many clients. It does take some practice getting used to, but I find it relatively easy to handle with a little patience.

nystedtphoto

Originally posted at

2016-04-06T20:00:00

It's not that sharp. The maximum aperture is just okay. There's some notable chromatic aberration, and it's hard to fix in post. Of course, there's no autofocus. For all its foibles, though, I like shooting with it. The movements are simply not available on many lenses, and they open up a bunch of creative options. The 45mm focal length is practical for general-purpose photography, and if you pair it with an APS-C sensor and/or extenders, you get a really neat portrait lens. My advice is to think of this lens like the lens on a technical camera. You focus and compose wide-open, but the lens really wants to be used around f/8 to f/11. Once it's stopped down, the optical performance is really pretty good. My main complaint is CA. There's some lateral CA and it can be hard to fix since it won't be in the center after you shift. More irritating is the longitudinal CA, which gives green and magenta bokeh. It's really hard to fix and means you have to be really careful of your backgrounds when you tilt with gusto. Also, when I'm shooting un-tilted and un-shifted, I really do miss autofocus. I'd like to see an autofocus system in the next version for people (like me!) who mostly shoot the lens as a regular old prime and only use movements occasionally. The autofocus points on my cameras still work, so the only thing preventing autofocus is the lack of an autofocus system. It's not advertised as such, but you can use Canon extenders with this lens. It doesn't correctly record the aperture, but the image quality is fine at f/8. Would I recommend it to a friend? Well, I don't think any of my friends would really want a tilt-shift! But if someone knows they want a tilt-shift, this lens certainly comes recommended.

Charles M.

Originally posted at

2011-03-10T19:00:00

I have a lot of canon lenes this one was not up to snuff the 90 mm T's is far better not crisp for macro w

Arnold

Originally posted at

2011-03-03T19:00:00

I've owned a 45mm TS-E for 7 years and find it fun and an enjoyable experience to use. However, it needs improvement in several areas. It needs a circular aperture, rotatable tilting, and Canon's SSC lens coating. With these improvements the lens will be world-class. Focus across the image plane is adequate but could be sharper. At large apertures there is significant color fringing. An updated version of this lens would be welcome.

cb_photo

Originally posted at

2009-02-14T19:00:00

I bought the 45mm TS-E lens for one use and ended up using it most of the time for completely different purposes. WIth film cameras, I mostly used it as an urban landscape or architectural lens. But now with 1.6X crop sensor digital cameras I find it an excellent macro or near macro lens! The shift and tilt capabilities are a real bonus, to give even greater control over the plane of focus. It's become my main "table top" small product lens. I also use the 24mm TS-E. Now that lens is more of an architectural lens for me. If I were shooting with full frame digital cameras, I'd want the 90mm, too, for macro and near macro work. These lenses are extremely well made. They are manual focus only, but that's not an issue for the types of shooting their designed to do. Besides, every EOS camera I've ever used TS-E lenses on gives a focus confirmation, making it easy to use the lenses manually. The only thing I'd like to see done differently if the TS-E lenses were ever revised would be to build in another rotation, that allows the user to set the tilt and shift planes ligned with each other, or set 90 degrees out of phase. As it is now, the lens comes with the two adjustments at 90 degrees, but you can send them in to Canon Service Department to have them aligned, if you wish. Build quality and the "feel" of all three TS-E lenses are the same, excellent, although only the 24mm gets an L designation. The TS-E lenses are about as close as you will come to view camera movements on a full frame or crop sensor digital camera. A full featured 4x5, for example, will have more types of movements possible, as well as a bit more range of movement. Still, it's a lot more practical to use the TS-E lenses and EOS cameras out in the field! If you've used a view camera in the past, these lenses will be easy to use. If not, there will be a bit of a learning curve using them. Read the manual and, if still scratching your head, pick up a book on using view cameras.

amfoto1

Originally posted at

2007-12-29T19:00:00

For the unitiated: this is really a unique lens; you can just grab it and go, shooting normally, as manual focus-only, and it will render quite sharp, contrastive images. However, the real fun behind this type of lens is the tilt/shift mechanism, it allows you to place your depth of field in a way that's independent of the usual f/stop method. It also allows the user to rotate the whole assemblage about the camera axis, so your T/S features can be angled at nearly any plane you see fit (it features 30° detentes on the rotate as well), so you're not merely limited to focus plane alteration in the horizontal. It's a rewarding lens to use, very versatile, but you really must shoot a lot with it to get the hand of the T/S concepts and be able to effectively use them to capture what you've envisioned. The T/S effects are most notable on a full-frame body, this is both good and bad (Chrom. Ab., vignetting, etc (no free lunch!)....however I'd recommend that one pairs it with a a FF sensor body so as to further your potential for unique perspectives with this lens.

GREGORY K.

2007-05-07T21:00:00

good quality lens. Tilt/shift effects work well however, not as dramatic as a large format bellows tilt effect. Great lens nonetheless.

jar p.

2007-02-04T19:00:00

Hard to use the lens but the photos come really NICE!

TaeLimSeeYa