Falling out of love with my nifty

swag72

swag72

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Bought a nifty fifty early on in my DSLR journey after all the hype on this and other forums - Also so cheap so I decided, worth a punt. Had a play and used it for a lot of still lifes and graveyard shots. Anyway, I tried to love it, but now find myself instead using my 17-55mm instead, even with the still life.

The sharpness on the 17-55 just is sublime, so I no longer see the point of the fifty. Also the zoom is just so versatile - Or am I just very lazy?!!

Help me!! Am I mad?!
 
Horses for courses.

I have an 18-200 which covers the entire range of ALL my primes 50, 85 and 105 BUT I would always use one of them by choice. The 18-200 is a damn fine lens but I just prefer primes IF I can use them. There are times when the versatility of a zoom wins out though.

The speed of the primes is another consideration.....
 
no, the 17-55 is a great lens and I felt sharper than the 50mm at f2.8. The 3 stop IS is one of the best.
 
funny you should say that because i was just wondering the same untill i used it the other day at 1.4 and thought "thats why i got it" , i then reconsidered it and thought i will keep it all the same.
 
i have the minolta version (50mm f/1.7) and have only used it once in the last year since buying it,and have thought if i need to keep hold of it...but as i only paid £40 for it..may as well hang on to it for the money..
 
i never use my 50mm 1.8, it's just a bit cack on a crop body for me
 
I :love: my nifty :D
 
swag72 said:
...The sharpness on the 17-55 just is sublime, so I no longer see the point of the fifty...
Help me!! Am I mad?!
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f/1.8 ... that's "the point", surely :shrug:!?

Can't you get much better bokeh with your nifty, than with your kit lens? Don't you sometimes want a very shallow DOF to pick out your subject? Isn't it invaluable in very low light shooting situations :|?

If none of those things matter to you, then you're probably right; you probably don't need it.

I have to admit, the 18-55 kit lens on my new Nikon D40 is so good in bright daylight situations that I was asking myself this same question last week :thinking:. Still, there are times when only the fast prime will give me the effect/s that I'm looking for, so I'll be keeping mine :).
 
The 17-55mm is a F/2.8 £700 lens, the kit lens is 18-55mm
 
Naboo32 said:
f/1.8 ... that's "the point", surely :shrug:!?

Can't you get much better bokeh with your nifty, than with your kit lens? Don't you sometimes want a very shallow DOF to pick out your subject? Isn't it invaluable in very low light shooting situations :|?

If none of those things matter to you, then you're probably right; you probably don't need it.

I have to admit, the 18-55 kit lens on my new Nikon D40 is so good in bright daylight situations that I was asking myself this same question last week :thinking:. Still, there are times when only the fast prime will give me the effect/s that I'm looking for, so I'll be keeping mine :).
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The 17-55 isn't the kit lenses. It is probably the most expensive EF-S lens and light years away from the 18-55mm kit lens.
 
Naboo32 said:
f/1.8 Can't you get much better bokeh with your nifty, than with your kit lens?
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The bokeh is the aspect of Canon's nifty that is particularly criticised in reviews:
The Canon 17-55mm isn't a kit lens - it's the f/2.8 £780 job and it has 7 diaphragm blades (compared to the nifty's 5).

Stroller.
 
wack61 said:
The 17-55mm is a F/2.8 £700 lens, the kit lens is 18-55mm
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jonathan_c said:
The 17-55 isn't the kit lenses. It is probably the most expensive EF-S lens and light years away from the 18-55mm kit lens.
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OK, that explains all :lol:. I'm sorry, I obviously Googled 18-55 instead of 17-55 and came up with the wrong idea :bonk:.

I wondered why nobody was "stating the obvious" :p.

Better stick to Nikon threads in the future :coat:
 
I also (L) my nifty fifty, only issue is the hunting AF and I'm considering a 1.4 to sort that out :D

But it is my day to day walkabout lens in fact almost all the time I use my nifty and my 80-200L I've used the kit twice this year
 
While I get the F1.8 bokeh on the nifty, that isn't where it is particularly sharp.

Also with the IS and F2.8 on the 17-55, I don't find it that restrictive with bokeh. F2.8 is still good in my experience. Having said that I was in a low light situation the other day and sometimes I couldn't get a focus, but the nifty would have been too restrictive in focal length for that.

Think I got caught up in the hype.
 
this isn't a troll btw, but isn't af something canons have more of a problem with anyhow?

if it's hunting at 1.8 can't see 1.4 being a great deal better tbh
 
Since getting the Tamron 17-50 F2.8 I've hardly used the nifty fifty either. I think my next prime will be the 85mm F1.8
 
not really. the 50mm f1.8 is not particulalry sharp wide open and then when you stop down you find yourself why bother when you have the 17-55 f2.8.




swag72 said:
Bought a nifty fifty early on in my DSLR journey after all the hype on this and other forums - Also so cheap so I decided, worth a punt. Had a play and used it for a lot of still lifes and graveyard shots. Anyway, I tried to love it, but now find myself instead using my 17-55mm instead, even with the still life.

The sharpness on the 17-55 just is sublime, so I no longer see the point of the fifty. Also the zoom is just so versatile - Or am I just very lazy?!!

Help me!! Am I mad?!
Click to expand...
 
I love how sharp my nifty is and the really shallow DOF is nice in some instances as is the speed.

I do find it a little long on my 400d in some cases, as i found out trying to get some family shots in a small garden on sunday. I had to resort to using my kit lens (the more crappy 18-55 ;)) to give me the flexibility i needed.

It's not the most used lens in my kit, but it certainly has it's uses. If i had the 17-55 then it would almost certainly be redundant i think.
 
In fairness to the nifty, you cant really compare it to the 17-55! (especially as there is now about a £950 difference in price!!).

I love my 50, its probably the most versatile lens I have, I wish I bought it sooner, though as above if I had the 17-55 that would be welded to my camera!
 
alexkidd said:
this isn't a troll btw, but isn't af something canons have more of a problem with anyhow?

if it's hunting at 1.8 can't see 1.4 being a great deal better tbh
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My 50/1.8 can hunt around at times,and its a noisy beast too.

I tried the 50/1.4 last week in my local dealer, near silent and no hunting. Undecided at present but will probably ay a few quid more and buy the sigma version which is supposedly better again.


The 50/1.8 is a great lens - IQ vs cost is probably one of the best there is. Comparing to a 1k zoom is a bit of a challenge, although i bet the Iq isn't that far from each other.

I have three lenses that cover 24mm - 24-105 F4 L, 24mm f2.8 and a Sigma EX DG HSM 17-35mm F2.8-4. Whilst the 24mm is over 15 years old, and the design is more like 30 years old, its probably the best of them all at most apertures and has the useful extra stop over the L glass too :D
 
jonathan_c said:
You'd have to be mental to pay that much though.
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Why? I'm sure you would happily pay that for any L lens, particularly a 24-70, so why not a 17-55, the best alternative to the 24-70 on a crop sensor?
 
swag72 said:
Bought a nifty fifty early on in my DSLR journey after all the hype on this and other forums - Also so cheap so I decided, worth a punt. Had a play and used it for a lot of still lifes and graveyard shots. Anyway, I tried to love it, but now find myself instead using my 17-55mm instead, even with the still life.

The sharpness on the 17-55 just is sublime, so I no longer see the point of the fifty. Also the zoom is just so versatile - Or am I just very lazy?!!

Help me!! Am I mad?!
Click to expand...
The nifty was my second lens. I had it for six months prior to getting a 17-55. I played around with it, using macro tubes, but only ended up with two shots I've bothered keeping, both rubbish, but from a vacation so kept for the memories rather than the IQ. Since getting the 17-55 I've never used the nifty again. I cannot abide the AF performance of the thing.

I now have a 50/1.4 and I'm still waiting for a reason to use that. Low light weddings will be the obvious opportunity, but other than that, or forcing myself to use it, I doubt that will see the light of day either. The 17-55 is a bloody good lens, with proper USM and IS, plus the flexibility of the zoom. I can see the creative value of the faster lenses, beyond just offering salvation in poor light, but the 50/anything just doesn't excite me.

My only other prime, the 85/1.8, does get used. It's lovely, sharp, fast, terrific AF, great DOF control, minimal PF on this copy (my first copy was a horror story for PF) :) It's also light and compact. When I want to shoot fast action it is a refreshing relief from lugging my 70-200/2.8 IS around.

If I did portraits maybe I could get worked up about the 50/xx a little more, but I think I'd favour the 85 for that too.
 
what is PF???

and how much was your 70-200/1.8 IS!!!??!!!
 
Was my second lens....I also have a sigma 10-20, ef-s 55-250 and 18-55 IS. It's a good starter lens to get stuck into manual mode and how a wide aperture affects the image, it's cheap as chips, and produces some great images on my 30D.

I'm probably selling my 18-55 IS as the 10-20 and nifty fifty covers that range for what I need.

I don't really see how anyone can criticise the lens, considering the price.
 
alexkidd said:
this isn't a troll btw, but isn't af something canons have more of a problem with anyhow?

if it's hunting at 1.8 can't see 1.4 being a great deal better tbh
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It's much more of a lens issue - the 1.8 (quite understandably) produces much poorer performance than the 1.4 which has a much more modern USM design.

Although I don't fully understand why, hunting seems to happen much more with non-USM lenses than USM lenses.
 
fletch5 said:
what is PF???

and how much was your 70-200/1.8 IS!!!??!!!
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PF = Purple Fringing. The 85/1.8 has quite a reputation for it when used wide open in high contrast (especially backlit) scenes.

Oops - f/2.8. Now fixed in original post.
 
Sam_G said:
Why? I'm sure you would happily pay that for any L lens, particularly a 24-70, so why not a 17-55, the best alternative to the 24-70 on a crop sensor?
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I wasn't dismissing the lens, its definately a quality bit of kit and if I was sticking with Canon, I would have bought one. I meant you'd have to be mental to pay over a grand for it when you can shop around and get it a lot cheaper (under £800 at warehouse express).
 
Crossed wires - I was talking about the NIKON 17-55mm f/2.8 - sorry for any confusion.
 
I have to say that the £600 I spent on the 17-55mm lens last year was well worth it - It's a fantastic piece of kit. Mmm, I shall be :wave: goodbye to the nifty soon. I do value what everyone has said about it, but it's horses for courses and this one's not for me.
 
Just sold my fifty.
Optically it was great, I'd go as far as to say that it was comparable to my L series zooms when used at F2.5 and it worked really well with my now sold 1D.
However, the AF was truly rubbish on my 5D unless you were shooting something static in reasonable light. Real shame as far as I'm concerned as it means that I'll have to buy an 85mm F1.8, and I know from a test I ran last year, that the 85mm whilst better, isn't night and day better than the 50mm for image quality.
 
CSB said:
Since getting the Tamron 17-50 F2.8 I've hardly used the nifty fifty either. I think my next prime will be the 85mm F1.8
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I have this lens as an walkabout and general shoot lens until I can save up and justify the 17-55 canon IS.
I have a few primes as I like gig work. for most things f2.8 is great, but for some low light scenes like gigs there is nothing to compensate for wider apertures. IS doesnt' freeze a moving guitarist!
covered a fight night with the tamron 2.8...wish I'd had the canon but the tamron did a cracking job mostly.
unless you really need the short DOF 2.8 is fine for most purposes
 
I've got the 50mm f/1.4 and whilst I do find the f/1.4 and small form factor to be great in low light, intimate settings I do wonder whether a 30mm or 35mm prime would be a better choice for a general use in low light lens.

At times, I find the 50mm to be a little too long for group shots and little too wide to avoid distortion when shooting portraits. Definitely a niche lens to me. I just don't know what that niche is! ;)
 
Funny that this has come up as I have been considering whether to keep my nifty fifty as well this week. But at the £70 I paid for it, I would hate to get rid of it and then regret it. I think I will hold on to it for a bit and see how much use it gets. I feel a 30 or 35mm would more useful on my crop body as the 50mm is a bit too long with 1.6x I find.
 
Andy FujiS7000 said:
No, unfortuately, the focusing in low light is awful as I found out recently, very good for the money in good light though.
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Hmm, I had noticed that it hunts a little, as I have one on an EOS5 (film) camera, which I bought on eBay recently. TBH though, I thought that it was the AF system on the camera that was to blame ;).

Haven't developed any shots from it yet, but I'm a bit worried now, after everything I've read here about it :(.
 
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