06-04-2010, 06:06 PM
I have been an off and on photographer for twenty-five years and in that time I have associated a certain "look" to my photographs; an image identity that reassured me that I had a unique view of the world. In that time I have used Nikon, Mamiya, Pentax, Rolleiflex, Canon, Polaroid, and other brands as well in my quest for that magic, but mostly relying on film type and printing to achieve that final 'look'.
I am still very amateurish in my technique in the digital era, but have found a digital process that gives me prints I like, and some prospect for good things to come with consistent results across my group of lenses and filters; and then I bought the Canon 24 TS-E II. I am so befuddled by this lens and the data it produces that I have nearly given up. Even without using any tilt or shift, using the same cameras, same software (I only use digital now), it looks like I have gone from using Kodachrome to a hybrid emulsion something between Velvia and Tech-Pan! I am only a few thousand images in using the lens, but the post-process is so different from my other lenses that I treat the lens something like an alien now, and I am afraid to use it for fear of how much further its rendition of the world is going to deviate from what I envisioned. It is everything we are supposed to expect these days in terms of contrast, sharpness, handling... but why does it look so different from my TS-E 90 or 200L?
I'll search for a process that can tame this lens, but in the interim I suspect I will be its foster parent; too bad since I placed so much faith in it that I bought a whole Singh-Ray and Cokin filter system for it too!
I am still very amateurish in my technique in the digital era, but have found a digital process that gives me prints I like, and some prospect for good things to come with consistent results across my group of lenses and filters; and then I bought the Canon 24 TS-E II. I am so befuddled by this lens and the data it produces that I have nearly given up. Even without using any tilt or shift, using the same cameras, same software (I only use digital now), it looks like I have gone from using Kodachrome to a hybrid emulsion something between Velvia and Tech-Pan! I am only a few thousand images in using the lens, but the post-process is so different from my other lenses that I treat the lens something like an alien now, and I am afraid to use it for fear of how much further its rendition of the world is going to deviate from what I envisioned. It is everything we are supposed to expect these days in terms of contrast, sharpness, handling... but why does it look so different from my TS-E 90 or 200L?
I'll search for a process that can tame this lens, but in the interim I suspect I will be its foster parent; too bad since I placed so much faith in it that I bought a whole Singh-Ray and Cokin filter system for it too!