Canon EF 85mm f1.2L II USM Lens for Canon DSLR Cameras - Fixed

This lens produces the most beautiful portrait quality outside medium and large format photography I have seen. It is bright, clean, crisp and vibrant wide open, and the beautiful creamy shallow depth of field (sorry, not a fan of the word "bokeh", LOL) at 1.2 is poetry to my eyes. Unlike many other people, the weight does not bother me. I hand held it the other day for 5 hours with no problems whatsoever. Also, I have heard many complaints about chromatic aberration with this lens, but from my experience with this particular lens it is actually axial color (longitudinal chromatic aberration) which occurs when the subject is just slightly out of focus in certain lighting conditions. I notice it shooting a "wide" scene directly lit by sun at 1.2, especially on a slightly out of focus pattern such as a striped black and white tie. I see no cons with this lens outside of expense.

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85mm - F1.2 - need I say more? If your serious about buying this lens chances are you read reviews from lens review sites so I will tough on what most of them talk about. Focus speed is slow for a lens in this price range but for portraits and pre-focusing to about where the image will be shot it is not a problem at all. This is not for sports, works great for weddings or dimly lit areas. Pros: images come out super creamy, super dreamy.

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Id give ten stars if I could. This lens is the holy grail for portrait photography. The sharpness of the images are immaculate. Best purchase ever! Im in love with it.

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This is not a beginner lens. In fact, even experienced shooters will take some time to get used to this lens. But if you know what youre doing, it can produce some amazing shots. The key feature of this lens is of course its very wide aperture creating a very narrow DoF. Which means your focus needs to be spot on. I found that this is one of those lenses where your results are best if you shoot with a single, selected focus point. Its also one of the lenses where the 1DM3/1DsM3 microadjustments for focus may be worth undertaking. The challenge with this lens is the slow AF, because its front focusing. It wont track a moving person very well. Its also a heavy lens - even though its a prime lens, it weighs more than most zooms. But chances are if youre considering this lens, you also have one of the bigger and heavier full frame bodies. As such if you hope to use this lens as a everyday multi-purpose lens you will be disappointed. But if you use it for a narrow range: portraits or other objects which dont move much, and benefit from a very narrow DoF, this is a fabolous lens.

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Ive had this lens for 6 months and now it is the lens that is most often on my camera. The creamy smooth background blur this lens achieves is stunning. I was amazed at how big a difference I get with bokeh from this 1.2 lens versus a 2.8L lens. I use this lens on a T2i and the results are incredible. I mostly use this lens for portraits, but I have also had amazing images of products. My best images from this lens are when I am taking portraits outside during the "Golden Hour." I do love that with this lens, the background doesnt matter because when you focus on your subject, everything else magically disappears in the background. Backgrounds become nothing but creamy bokeh when you shoot with this lens wide open. When the lens arrived, I was shocked at the massive size and weight, but when I consider the 1.2 aperture and all the glass, it makes sense that its so big.

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Most amazing lens I have ever owned. Its a little heavy but I like that. This lens is a beast. My images are so sharp now. Im very pleased with my purchase!

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Incredible lens. I’ve only had it for a few hours and I’ve already gotten some seriously good photos.

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Anyone who says "f/1.2 is too shallow for portraits" just doesnt have the skill to use it... Anyone who says "5x the price of the f/1.8 for basically the same picture" is jealous they cant afford it. Anyone who says "focuses too slow for sports"... Well ok yes that one I agree with. But if you buy this lens you should NOT be buying it for sports and high speed shooting, this is a portrait lens and the best one on the market at that. The focus speed is definitelly the slowest of all my L lenses, but when you shoot portraits your not focusing all the way from infinity to close up... your range of focus is very small and for this purpose it is more than fast enough. The bokeh this produces can only be described as magical, it transforms the background and makes it look like a dream world while subjects are in as crisp of focus as my 70-200 f/2.8L II IS. Colors are vivid and accurate, contrast is phenominal... and did I mention the bokeh?? WOW!!! PROS: - Bokeh - Extremely sharp even at f/1.2. According to FoCal f/1.2 is as sharp as the 70-200 f/2.8L IS II at f/2.8. - Colors and contrast CONS: - Im not going to put focus speed here because you should not be buying this for sports - Rear element is flush with the mount so you have to be very careful when changing lenses - You have to have the camera on to manual focus, because the manual focus relies on the AF motor, not a big deal but Im struggling to find another con - *** Edit 12/18/2013 *** One more con, Chromatic aberration is pretty bad at times. I shoot weddings, and it shows up a lot on the edge of brides dresses. Most software today has lens corrections available to fix this. But, many times doing this adversaly affects the image too (lips can sometimes have the same color, so half of the lip becomes grey which looks very odd) Overall a great lens, expensive as all hell but you do get what you pay for.

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