Impressions of the Canon EF 20-35mm F2.8L
Another recent acquisition….I seem to be making these too often…this gem was released in 1989 with the launch of the EF mount by Canon, one of their first zoom lenses in the new series, in an impregnable metal housing to boot! Before I give you my impressions, a little history of my journey with wide angles…Many years ago, when I first stepped Canonworld, I had a 5Ds DSLR, and paired it with the 16-35mm f2.8L mark 2. Although considered then the state of art for a wide zoom, I found it big and clunky to be generally used and the images dry and unexciting. The wider end inevitably had extreme ‘stretching’ at the edges, an unavoidable optical effect, which I found rather unnerving and unnatural, especially in portraiture.
Fast forward to today, after a hiatus from all things Canon, I returned with the Canon R8, initially with the intent to use it as a travel and walk-around camera, paired with some M-mount or other small lenses. And then somehow, I started using it for my new interest in outdoor fashion portraiture. I needed a wide to medium zoom again! Having eschewed anything wider than the 20mm range, which I consider the limit of ‘stretching’ for the human body without making the subject look like a casting call for the Fantastic Four, and also for the thorny issue of funding, I settled on either the 17-40mm F4L or this 20-35mm F2.8L.
After many rounds of tea and coffee to extract other photographers’ deep dark knowledge of these zooms, the 20-35mm F2,8L seemed the ideal zoom for me. It is not a lens commonly found used, as its launch price back then was a cool USD$2000, and finding a minty copy was even harder! Nonetheless, one was eventually located and for a decent price to boot! So enough of the aside, what are my impressions?
The first thing that you notice, the first time you pick it up, even before you attempt to look ‘pro’ to examine the glass and innards in front of the shop salesman, is the lens, while rather diminutive physically in comparison to modern zooms, is actually very heavy and metallic. VERY metal feel – in a double blind test, if you were told Leica made it, your would probably imagine it to feel like so. Turning the zoom further evinces this metal-ness extends into the deep dark mechanicals of its innards. There is no ‘backlash’ – a feeling my fellow astrophotographers would wince at, so this would pass even their high standards. Turning the zoom ring to either ends further elicits a very satisfactory ‘clunk’ of the stops.
The second thing that you notice, when you finally persuade your hands to surrender the lens to the camera proper and mount it, is the look of the images that it produces. It is clearly not a modern clinical type, neither is it a vintage character look. It seems to be a well balanced lens, neither too hip nor too toff. The images have a nice slightly warm and toasty feel, with clean lines and just enough contrast to make people look especially organic, alive and might I say evocative even. It adds a light garnish of aged character, skin smoothening and an Orton effect dialled to at most a 2/10, yet it avoids the overtures of excessive flare and unruly bokeh rings or biotar swirliness. Everything is just so – perfectly balance. No wonder it commanded such a lofty price at launch!