New Mark III - Need recommendations

[chuck27p]

Hey everyone,

I have a new 5D Mark III on the way and this is my first full frame sensor camera. I shot with a 50D for many years. I have 4 lenses and only 1 is an EF-S, so I'll be getting rid of that. The others are EF, so they should be good for the 5D as far as I've read. 

I'm looking for a few recommendations here.

1. What compact flash card should I use? I am currently looking at these:

- SanDisk Extreme Pro CompactFlash Memory Card UDMA 7 Upto 160 MB/s by SanDisk

- Lexar Professional 1000x 128GB CompactFlash Card LCF128CTBNA1000 by LEXAR

- KOMPUTERBAY 128GB Professional COMPACT FLASH CARD CF 1000X 150MB/s Extreme Speed UDMA 7 RAW 128 GB by Komputerbay

2. The EF-S lens I have is my 10-22mm wide angle. I use it quite a bit. I'll be looking for a replacement. Any suggestions? I was looking at this one:

Canon EF 17-40mm f/4L USM Ultra Wide Angle Zoom Lens for Canon SLR Cameras

3. Any other lens recommendations? What I have is below and I mainly shoot portraits / headshots in the studio, landscapes, and do a bit of long exposure work. I know it's based on what you shoot, but if anyone has any lens they use all the time that they love on the full frame, I'd love to do some research on it. 

My lenses:

Canon 50mm prime

Sigma 70-200mm Zoom

Canon 24-70 2.8 (my workhorse)

- Need to replace my wide angle

Thanks guys! 

[amfoto1]

I agree with the other recommendations about the memory cards.... Lexar and Sandisk are very reliable. Your camera is UDMA 7 capable, so might as well get that. I doubt the camera can take advantage of much faster than 400X or 45MB/sec write speed, but most are selling 800X and 1000X now, so that's probably what you'll find. All the cards I'm currently using are either Lexar or Sandisk. Most are UDMA. Some of the older are 300X, others are 400X and the newest I have are 800X. I really don't notice any difference in performance out shooting with them.

The larger cards I use are 16GB. Those each hold more than 500 RAW files from either my 5D Mark II or 7Ds. It takes mere seconds to swap cards and, as noted previously, I don't like putting all my eggs in one basket. Lose that one huge card full of images any you'll really be crying the blues!  I took nearly 9000 images last weekend, using 17 or 18 memory cards ranging in 8GB and 16GB sizes. If I lost one of those (or it failed or whatever), it would be a tragedy, but only a small percentage of the overall shoot.

You do have to watch out for fake memory cards. I don't know if it's still the case, but there used to be a lot of Sandisk fakes, in particular. So long as you buy from a reputible dealer, there shouldn't be a problem.

Shooting portraits, if you used your 50mm a lot, I'd recommend the Canon 85/1.8 or the Sigma 85/1.4. But you also might want to consider the 135/2L... it's a wonderful portrait lens on a full frame camera.

For your wide angle replacement, any of the Canon full frame (EF) ultrawides would do nicely. Personally I just use an 20/2.8 a lot. It's a nice lens. If I wanteda zoom, I would consider the 17-40 and new 16-35/4 for their slightly smaller size and weight, as well as its use of smaller filters (77mm, as opposed to 82mm on the f2.8 lens). I really don't need IS on an ultrawide, but it doesn't hurt having it either. I also don't really need f2.8.... I'm usually using an ultrawide stopped down for increased depth of field, not wide open looking for some small amount of background blur.

I haven't used it, but have heard really good things about the Tokina AT-X 16-28mm, too. The only problem I see is that it has a strongly protruding front element, that prevents mounting standard filters (it's probably possible to use larger rectangular filters with a jerry-rigged mount, or just handheld in front of the lens).  

***********
Alan Myers

San Jose, Calif., USA
"Walk softly and carry a big lens."
GEAR: 5DII, 7D(x2), 50D(x3), some other cameras, various lenses & accessories
FLICKR & PRINTROOM 

[cale_kat]

It is my personal opinion that the main difference between Komputerbay cards and name brand cards is that name brand manufacturers spend millions of dollars on marketing to support the higher prices they charge. This is Marketing 101 and should be more commonly acknowledged than it is. The main reason people recommend name brand cards, and buy them, is because of scare tactics like those that caution that any lost shot will leave you devastated.

Manufacturers have been making unbranded products on the same equipment as branded products since the dawn of marketing. But if you're the sort of person that spends extra to put "Tier 1" gas in your car, I can see how spending multiple times the amount necessary to buy a name brand card appeals to your sense of caution.

[ebiggs1]

"...  that any lost shot will leave you devastated."

An therein lies the difference between an amateur and a pro.  He puts groceries on the table with his camera.

Amateur, says there is always another shot.

[cale_kat]

Again, the ramping up of analogies makes the "scare" worse. No where do the responses offer anything substantial in the way of evidence.

If there were any doubt in the effectiveness of marketing, one has only to read the collection of responses from people (being a "pro" makes you no more cautious than an "amateur", you just think you are) recommending branded cards.

[ebiggs1]

"... you just think you are ..."

They don't pay for the shot you almost got.  No matter how great you say it was.

[cale_kat]

Boo! Did I scare you? Probably not. So why are you scaring others? Or do you have any evidence to support that more shots are lost to unbranded cards (like the Komputerbay card in question) than branded cards?

[Skirball]

---

@cale_kat wrote:

It is my personal opinion that the main difference between Komputerbay cards and name brand cards is that name brand manufacturers spend millions of dollars on marketing to support the higher prices they charge. This is Marketing 101 and should be more commonly acknowledged than it is. The main reason people recommend name brand cards, and buy them, is because of scare tactics like those that caution that any lost shot will leave you devastated.

---

I agree with parts of your post, however there is truth in those that are aprehensive of generics as well.

I'm a big supporter of third party gear and use it regularly, but I research the gear that I get, because not all generic is created equal. There are plenty of companies out there that try to cut in on a market with low quality product because they cut corners on materials, quality control, warranty, customer service, etc.  The generic battery market is a great example.  I use third party batteries because Canon charges an outrageous amount for theirs.  And because th risk of a third party battery is relatively low.  But I research who I buy from, because there are plenty of crappy batteries being sold that won't hold a charge after a few cycles.  Batteries aren't difficult to make, but it's easy for someone to sell complete junk, make a few bucks, then change the company name when the reputation sours too much.  For some it's just not worth the risk and they buy Canon, other's like me, research the brand and the reviews they get and buy a decent third party battery and save some cash.  If the battery doesn't last quite as long as a Canon I'm not out much, and I saved some cash for another.

For me it all comes down to a risk vs. benefit ratio.  It's worth it for me for a battery, the cost difference is relatively large and the risk is small - the camera simply dies and I have to put a new battery in.  SD cards are cheap, even the name brand ones.  The little bit of money I save with a generic just isn't worth it for me compared to the perceived risk of having a card fail and losing my photos.  Yes, name brand cards can fail too, and Komputerbay could be just as reliable.  I don't know.  If I saw data showing that then I would switch.  But for the tiny bit of difference it's just not worth my time.

[cale_kat]

Skirball, thanks for the thoughtful reply.

I'm not immune to risk, but I'm aware that percieved risk and actual risk can be two different things. You mentioned the batteries as another place to "cut corners" where it comes to budgeting for photograhy. You wrote that your perceived risk  of doing so was low. Yet there is little evidence to support that the battery you have choosen to use is less, or just as, reliable as the Canon battery. (IMHO, the failure of a battery is just as bad as a failed memory card because it can also cause you to "miss the shot".)

I could be completely wrong, but my interpretation of what you wrote is that as you move from the battery to the memory card, your perception of the consequences of a failure (or increase in perceived risk) grows greater. But there is no evidence that the risk is any greater than that taken with the third-party battery.

I shoot with the 5D Mark II and have compared prices for CF cards. I agree that the market for SD cards is a lot more competitive leaving less room for the manufacturers of branded cards to mark-up their products. What is lost to this diminished profit margin, is made up in the higher sales volume. So, the manufacturer still wins.

Just my $.02.

[TCampbell]

Let me turn this around on you.  You're making a claim that the Komputerbay card is just as good, that we have no evidence otherwise, and that the well-known brands with solid reputations are engaging in scare tactics.  

What evidence do you have of that claim?  What do you really know about how Komputerbay manufactures and tests their chips?

I do not know what Lexar and SanDisk actually do -- nor can I contrast that against what Komputerbay does.  But what I do know is that we get a lot of people who compalin of memory card failure and a substantial percentage of the time it's due to a bad card... and typically a lesser brand.  Those who buy good cards don't seem to have nearly so many problems.  

Given that the cost of memory cards is pretty cheap EVEN when it's a top-name card, how much sense does it really make to take a risk in exchange for saving a few pennies per gigabyte?

I consider that if someone buys a DSLR camera, they expect a better experience and a higher quality product -- after all a person could have purcahsed a point & shoot or just use the phone built into the camera if saving money is the primary motivation for product choice.  

When someone comes to this forum and they ask for advice based on the best practices of experienced users and experienced users tell them that one of their best practices is to use quality component with a proven track record, the person is getting the advice that they asked to receieve.  

You can argue that it's bad advice, but you'd being arguing against a lot of well-established photographers -- this is hardly the only online photography website that would have given a similar answer.  Most serious photographers (not just pros... passionate amateurs fall into the same category) give similar advice when I've seen questions such as this one arise elsewhere.

The process of "writing" to flash memory is a physically destructive process.  A "read" is non-destructive, but you get a limited number of "writes" before the memory location fails. It's sort of like the tires on your car.  After a few trips around the block on brand new tires, you can hardly notice any wear has occurred at all... but technically we know that some wear has occurred and after enough mileage those tires will need to be replaced.  Flash memory works the same way and, like tires, some are actually better than others.  

[chuck27p]

Thanks everyone for the suggestions, I appreciate it. I went with a couple SanDisk cards. B&H has them on sale right now, $30 cheaper than Amazon. For under $100 for a quality brand, you can't go wrong: http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1000362-REG/sandisk_sdcfxps_032g_a46_32gb_extreme_pro_compact....

As for all the lens recommendations, I appreciate it. There are some great suggestions in there and a couple I'm going to rent and try out. 

Thanks everyone!