The Great 24-70 vs 24-105 Debate

Hey guys,


So just wanted to say sorry that my first post will be opening up pandora's box. I know this particular comparison is probably the most difficult one to answer, and that's exactly why I'm looking for more opinions.


And here we go!


I'm in the market for a new wide angle lens because my current EF 24-85 f/3.5-4.5 isn't cutting it. The IQ isn't where I need it to be as well as the limits on non-constant aperture. So my options are between the 24-70L f/2.8 and the 24-105L f/4 IS. My current photographic disciplines include wildlife, BIF, photojournalism, and a lot of indoor event photography and my other lens is a 100-400L f/4.5-5.6 IS. Most of the indoor events allow me to use a flash, but I still want the extra shutter speed offered from the f/2.8 of the 24-70 incase I encounter and event where flash is prohibited. However, due to the wildlife portion of my interests, the extra reach and IS of the 24-105 is awesome too. I can only afford one of these lenses otherwise I'd use the 24-105 outdoors and the 24-70 indoors all the time. So I need to pick the lens that will satisfy my needs as best as possible. Any ideas?


Thanks,


Mike

For me the 24-70 is better. I do a fair share of journalistic type shooting and the 24-70 is the lens I use most. I had the 24-105 and liked it but for PJ work the 24-70's extra stop is nice. Usually your subjects are moving and IS can't help that. I also like the shallower DOF.


As far as wildlife, not to sure you'll find 105 is going to get you all that close.

Thanks Keith.


The 24-105 is more for outdoor photography where the fewer times I need to expose my sensor to the elements, the better. The wider angle is good for landscape stuff, but the extra 35mm is useful in my mind to get away with changing lenses as often. Or maybe I'm just lazy and should just swap the lens haha

I'd probably go with the 24-105 then. You can also get great deals on this lens used. It's resale doesn't hold as well as other L lenses, I think mainly because the market is flooded from people selling it from kits.

http://www.juzaphoto.com/eng/articles/canon_24-70_f2-8_vs_24-105_is.htm

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by crosbyharbison

http://www.juzaphoto.com/eng/articles/canon_24-70_f2-8_vs_24-105_is.htm

---

"From the results of this test, it would seem obvious to go for the 24-105 IS. That said, I have some doubts about the 24-70 I have tested - can it be actually that bad? Or is it a bad copy? The bad copy option would seem the most likely, but some months ago I did another 24-105 vs 24-70 test with another copy of the 24-70, and the results are the same. At that time, I did not publish the test because I thought that it was for sure a bad copy or there was some error in the test, but the results of this new test confirm my previous findings. So, either I got two bad copies, of the 24-70 has so-so image quality...personally, I'd say two bad copies. I have read many opinions about this lens and the majority say that it is very sharp, while some others (about 10%) complain about the lack of sharpness: essentially, I think that Canon has a lot of sample variation on the 24-70 and poor quality control"


I think this was a bad copy of the 24-70. In my own experience I have found the 24-70 better in the corners than the 24-105, especially at 24mm. At 24 I found the CA of the 24-105 unacceptable from the mid frame to the corners. That was the main I sold it.


I found my results very similar to Bryan's


24-70 v. 24-105 @ 24mm

I always try to go with the widest aperture I can afford. The 24-70 was my first lens and it's just an amazing piece of glass. As you mentioned, you'd be doing a lot of indoor photography; the f2.8 aperture can definitely be used without a flash. The same cannot be said of the f4. For wildlife you're already covered with the 100-400, so if you went with the 24-70, you'd be missing a small range of focal lengths between 70-100 which to me is just fine. Another option for that little extra reach you're looking for with the 24-105 could be made up with a 1.4 extender.


B&H cost analysis:


$1309 for the 24-70 through July 7th (to me this is the by far better choice)


$1059 for the 24-105 + $309 for the Canon 1.4 extender





Good luck with your choice and like many others have said, I haven't met a piece of L-glass that I haven't liked. Take care, erno.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by crosbyharbison

http://www.juzaphoto.com/eng/articles/canon_24-70_f2-8_vs_24-105_is.htm

---

Crosby, hi!





I found "Juza" a bit biased towards 24-105: 24-70 shown dirty (which may mean he used it more, in fact), while 24-105 shown clean.

MikeG2012, hi!





I would go, along with the camera, to the nearest shop selling photo gear and try both lenses for shooting sellers (PJ, as you said). If your particular camera body (1D ?) doesn't show any advantages when using 24-70, then buy 24-105 and save cash.


I have 7D + 24-70. The lens is amazing, IMO.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by erno james

Another option for that little extra reach you're looking for with the 24-105 could be made up with a 1.4 extender.


$1059 for the 24-105 + $309 for the Canon 1.4 extender

---

Nice suggestion. Or, it would be except for the small but critical fact that the Canon 1.4x extender does not work with the 24-105mm f/4L lens.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by alex_sb

I found "Juza" a bit biased...

---

Yeah, that sums it up, except for mentioning the frequent factual errors in his reviews, too.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MikeG2012

My current photographic disciplines include wildlife, BIF, photojournalism, and a lot of indoor event photography and my other lens is a 100-400L f/4.5-5.6 IS.


The 24-105 is more for outdoor photography where the fewer times I need to expose my sensor to the elements, the better.The wider angle is good for landscape stuff...

---

Given your interests, I'm not sure you'd benefit too much from the 35mm on the long end. If you're out in nature, 105mm is not going to be any better for wildlife or BIF than 70mm - you're still looking at a lens change to go from wildlife to wide landscapes. For photojournalism and indoor event photography, I think the 24-70mm is the better choice (better subject isolation when needed, better low light performance with moving subjects).

24-105 is great if it's your only lens, 24-70 is the better lens once you have a telephoto (because it's a better lens, period).


(I started with 24-105, and it was the right choice then but isn't now.)

Thanks for the responses guys!


It definately sounds like the 24-70 is the way to go. I'm gonna head over to my local pro shop and try out both lenses sometime this week. Hopefully that will help make my decision.


Mike

Good luck with the 24-70 L, I think its a great start. When I was first putting together mylenskit I was really trying to figure out where I wanted to go too, 24-105 or the 24-70. I purchased my 40D a few years back and along with it I purchased the 24-70 because I liked lower light side of the 24-70 and the out of focus background the 24-70 can give. I dont think you can go wrong with the 24-70, its a beautiful lens

I cast my vote for the 24-105.


When I go on vacation and can only take two lenses I take the 24-105 and the 100-400 and the 24-105 is my everyday walk around lens. I find that most of my shots are around f8 and I and only occasionally get down to f4 so going down to f2.8 is not a huge deal for me. Much of my photography is of wildlife, aircraft & boats where I rarely get the chance to carefully do anything so the IS is a major bonus for me. I get a clear picture and more depth of field which is what I want.


My father-in-law is a very different photographer than I. He does a lot of wedding, portrait and carefully planned landscapes. He is big on primes and big aperture and often uses the 24-70 for his walk around flexible lens.

I just want to ask about image quality between the two lenses. Which one is sharper? According to the charts, it seems that the 24-105 is a bit sharper than the 24-70 but how about on real life images? f4 is f4 and f2.8 can be stopped down to f4, is the 24-70 sharp wide open or do you need to stop down to f4 atleast to get a sharp image?

In the "real world" I've got no issues with the sharpness/ image quality of my 24-70mm f/2.8 wide open. There's a photo I took at f/2.8 blown up to A2 size hanging in the main office of my work and the detail is delicious. Sure, it's even sharper at f/4 but it's still excellent wide open.


Ben

If stopping a subject is out of the picture, is it worth the move to 24-70 than having an IS and extra reach?

Hmmmm... that's a question only you can answer I reckon. Depends on what YOU want out of your lens. I love having f/2.8 but more for the narrow depth of field than the low light capabilities. I haven't found much of a need for IS anyway, I've got a pretty steady hand and I guessI'm just a little more conscious ofmy techniqueto eliminate camera shake when using it.

IS isn't that big a deal to me either with such a short focal zoom range. I also have pretty steady hands and good shooting technique, so I'm confident in my abilities to get that sharp shot handheld. The f/2.8 just helps because it allows more light into the lens thus allowing better focusing in low light conditions when I do photojournalism type stuff. Depending on what you shoot mostly will help you decide which features are more important and not so needed.

I love my 24-70 on my 5DmkII. I think it's a better lens than 24-105mm especially indoors and low light. I found the images sharper and extra stop very helpful. I picked up the 24-105mm for 800 bucks during a Midwest Photo twitter special and didn't like it as much. I felt the extra reach wasn't that significant and IS didn't help much at all. I ended up selling it to a friend.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by cxr

I just want to ask about image quality between the two lenses. Which one is sharper? According to the charts, it seems that the 24-105 is a bit sharper than the 24-70

---

At a 1 or 2 focal lengths the 24-105 is a LITTLE BIT sharper, but overal the 24-70 is better. And by a significant amount at wider apertures, like f/4 and f/5.6. Remember, Bryan's crops are not all the way to the extreme corner. So differances at certain focal lengths arenot visible in the charts, so ifyou see a significant differance inhischarts in the corners then the corners will beeven worse when you look at the full rez picture in the extremecorners.I think the most obvious differance between the two is at 24mm, the 24-70 is a little worse in the center but significantly better in the corners with about half of the distortion.


At atypical landscape aperture of f/11 they are about the same.


Hope this helps,


John.

Mike, the 24-105mm suffers from significant distortion at the wide end, much more than the 24-70mm. If you plan to use it a lot in the 24-35mm range (you called this a wide angle choice in your first post) and shoot buildings or indoor shots (both may give you straight features at the edges of your frame), you might want to take that into account.

Oh, I almost forgot. Although you can correct for distortion in DPP, it will soften it and make the image less wide. The less distortion the better, even with digital magic....[:)]


John.

Well I only read the very first response you got (since I don't want to read all 20-something responses) but I dend to agree. 70mm vs 105mm isn't really a "dilemma" with wildlife. Neither is close enough. Plus, you have the 100-400 for that. f/4 is of course slower, but the IS helps to balance out some of that. Still, though, I'd go with the EF 24-70mm f/2.8 L USM. Have you purchased it yet though, because I hear they may come out with an IS version of that soon! I used to own the 24-105 f/4 IS and liked it, but eventually ended up getting rid of it and purchasing the EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM. I have a 7D and 50D so that's why. That's my two cents!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Jordan

I hear they may come out with an IS version of that soon!

---

Iheld out forwhat seemed like an eternity when I first read those rumours, 12 months passed until I bought it (didn't need it until then anyway). My point is, there'll always be something better/ updated on the horizon, who knows how distant that horizon might be though.