The canon 35mm 1.4L II is leaps and bounds better than the sigma 35mm 1.4 fART lens... and you get what you pay for with that.... That being said... I shoot the canon 24-70 2.8L II and don't want either one of those lenses
I do agree with you that a lot of 3rd party accessories do the job though.
But I also use a ton of OEM stuff like the canon trigger and flash. I don't want to sound condescending to you but there's no way I could rely on a $50 3rd party flash system at a wedding. We're talking other people's memories here that they are paying me quite a bit of money to do right.
When I got started second shooting weddings I had almost everything 3rd party including my flash and my tamron glass.
And I also complained lot about recycle times and miss focusing.
When I made the switch from shooting every so often to shooting basically every weekend money, I decided it was time to just buy what i know is reliable vs. trying to find the diamond in the rough to save a buck. I honestly just dont have the time or extra money necessary to buy something i might be unhappy with then go out and buy the "better" version of.
And I sure hope my perspective clients have the same feeling about hiring me vs. someone cheaper than me who has "basically the same quality".... what goes around comes around.
The 35 L II is also like x2 as expensive as the Sigma or the original 35 L. In my PERSONAL opinion spending the extra 800 dollars is not worth it unless you are a top tier professional and are going to make that money back off your first shoot. The Sigma is better if not equal at least to the first 35mm L. The narrative that's going on in here makes it seem like you can't make money using 3rd party gear. I personally know a ton of people who shoot professionally using the art series in their wedding bag.
First of all.. i would surely hope that the sigma art which came out like 14 years after the canon 35mm L lens is up to par with it
Jesus Christ
Honestly, I dont care who shoots what glass. Im really only concerned about what I shoot. Which is why I don't even own a 35mm Prime. As a portrait photographer, 24-70 2.8 is plenty good for my needs right now in the wider department.
Like I said unless you're getting into real technical situations where you need to sync up flashes fast in more elaborate ways of course shelling out the money is worth it. I just don't get the elitist you have to buy the top tier Canon items mentality.
About the flash... I only speak from personal experience using a cheap 3rd party system vs using my current canon system. I know 3rd party lighting is actually often superior to OEM lighting. Canon doesn't even make strobes, softboxes, etc
.... my experience with 3rd party lights was on the CHEAP end of the spectrum. Canon makes a cheap flash that I also dont want.
I have a ton of Canon OEM accessories certain things you can't cut corners on. A nylon strap or a metal plate though? Yeah I'm not too concerned about it.
And I agree with that there isn't anything inherently wrong 3rd party accessories. I used to use an Altura Photo Rapid Fire that i got on amazon for sub 20.
I hope all my perspective clients don't give a rats *** about my gear and just refer to my work to let it speak for itself. Of course if you roll up with a point and shoot people are going to look at you a certain way of course but I'm not taking anyone less serious because they're using a Tamron 24-70 or a Sigma 50mm art.
You miss understood what i said when I said:
And I sure hope my perspective clients have the same feeling about hiring me vs. someone cheaper than me who has "basically the same quality".... what goes around comes around.
This is not to say anything about
you and dooming you unless you buy the expensive ish...
This is to say that if
I cheap out on something because I'm cutting a corner,
I worry that
I set up bad karma for
myself. I don't want perspective clients to say.. EH... So and so is half the price and "basically the same quality" as James.
And what about people on APSC cameras? There's so many highly decorated lenses that are 3rd party that are either better than the Canon counterpart or aren't even available. I wish daily that I could use the Sigma 18-35mm 1.8.
I've stated over and over again, i find that 3rd party lens manufacturers should be targeting lenses that dont exist in a better capacity than the OEM version.
that 18-35 1.8 is a great example of that.
the newly announced 14mm 1.8, and 135mm 1.8 are also awesome examples of that.
TBH its been WAY TOO LONG for canon to have basically zero competition as far as optics and it allows them to charge God awful amounts of money for glass. Best case scenario for me is that sigma keeps producing lenses that are way cheaper and almost as good as the canon version. It drives the price down of the canon version of things.