Last Updated: February 15th, 2020

The Canon EF 24mm f/1.4L II lens was our first prime lens.

For most of our life growing up and enjoying photography, we rarely experimented with lenses outside of standard kits lenses such as the a 50mm. As kids and poor teenagers, it’s easy to just work with what you have – and kind of forget anything else exists.

As we began getting into wedding photography, and well, photography as more than just a hobby in general – expanding our bag of lenses became essential. With a good 50mm lens already on hand, we wanted something that could give us a wider angle of the things we were photographing. The 24mm turned out to be an excellent choice for this.

Now that we have been using the Canon EF 24mm f/1.4 II lens ourselves for several years now (you can actually read an earlier review we wrote about it on our other website here), we feel our thoughts on this lens, it’s performance, and what kind of value you can get out of it can be useful!

What to expect from the Canon EF 24mm f/1.4 II lens

When we purchased this lens, we did so more like kids on a sugar high just wanting to buy more candy. We saw it was well reviewed on Amazon, and general user feedback told us that the images were “crisp” and had “good quality.” We’ve heard a lot of people harp on about how excellent Canon red-ring prime lenses are. Certainly now, we can agree with these sentiments – but at the time – our purchasing decision was less about logic, and more about getting our first really nice lens that could capture more of a scene.

Like we mentioned in the introduction to this review, coming off a life of shooting with a 50mm lens, the first time we took out the 24mm – we came away with an entirely different perspective. As photographers, it’s a pretty intoxicating feeling to be able to see your art form in a distinctly different way.

While the 50mm focal length is closer to what the human eye sees, the 24mm provides a warped view. It’s not quite as staggering as the widest angle lenses like an 8mm or 16m.

As a result of this, 3 of the biggest practical uses of the Canon 24mm camera lens are as follows:

1. Landscape photography. Immediately, the first reason for buying a 24mm (or any wide angle lens) is if you are looking to capture more of the environment in your shots. For landscape artists, it is easy to see the value in being able to capture more of a location in the frame. While in Iceland, we were able to use this lens in particular to capture some stunning views of the fjords and mountains there.
2. Unique portraits. While the 24mm focal length is not a “portrait lens” (and we wouldn’t suggest buying it solely for this reason), it has actually turned out to be one of our favorites for creating portraits that are different than you might be used too. In fact, some of our favorite portrait shots were photographed with this lens! You do need to be weary as the warping of this lens can elongate some features if used incorrectly – but fortunately, and sometimes with the help of post-processing in Lightroom through lens profile correction, you can minimize the impact of this.
3. Dancing shots. As wedding and event photographers, the dance floor is one of our favorite places to get candid photos. When we think of a dance floor (and experience them on location), they tend to have these features: relatively small location, fairly self-contained, a lot of people, a lot of movement and action. With this in mind, we know longer focal lengths are really challenging to effectively capture the small location with a sense of scale and intrigue. The warping of the 24mm lens benefits the dance floor because the elongation of legs and arms gives off a sense of movement, and this contortion can also be used to shape the different people in the scene together.

Put simply – the Canon 24mm f/1.4 II lens is an excellent lens with a range of uses in our toolkit. There really are no downsides for us to mention. Assuming you know the purpose of a 24mm, and the situations where it can benefit your photography, this is a great choice.

Comparing the Canon 24mm f/1.4 II lens vs. the Canon 16-35mm f/2.8 III

Now, if you are either budget sensitive or just wanting the best bang for your buck, it’s worth looking at another Canon lens as a point of direct comparison. While the 24mm was our first prime lens, our most recent lens purchase is actually the Canon 16-35mm f/2.8 III.

In our current situation as professional wedding photographers, we value and use both of these lenses quite heavily. Given that we work together, it’s easy to see how one of us could use the 24mm while the other shoots with the 16-35mm (such as during reception dancing). In fact, we do this!

However – if we just wanted to purchase one of these lenses, we would choose the Canon 16-35mm f/2.8 III.

The Canon 24mm f/1.4 II lens is great because it can stop down to f/1.4, which enables us to get more light into the camera and increase the depth of field to the extent that it can be on a wide angle lens. The image quality and that “crispness” we mentioned earlier is also better. But, for the cost and need to only pack one lens in your camera bag, the Canon 16-35mm f/2.8 III is still an excellent lens that provides even more possibilities due to the zoomable focal length. While not as low as a prime lens, f/2.8 is still great for taking beautiful images – and the image quality itself is very good as well.

In our experience, Canon lenses in general, and especially their wide angle lenses, are consistently high in quality and high performing. We have been putting both of these lenses to use, and both have their purpose in our camera bag – with the 16-35mm being just a little more usable on a day-to-day basis due to the flexibility it provides.

Conclusion

The Canon 24mm f/1.4 II lens is great to have in your kit if you need the capabilities of a wider angle lens that can also be used for some unique portrait shots. If you’re on a tighter budget and just want to purchase a single lens right now, the Canon 16-35mm f/2.8 III will actually be a better choice for you – but otherwise, the quality and performance of the 24mm prime lens is enough that we can recommend it again and again.

If you are looking to buy the Canon 24mm f/1.4 II lens yourself, consider doing so through our links provided throughout this post. We earn a small commission from each purchase, and as a result, can be enabled to produce more content like what you find here on FFL.

About us: We are wedding photographers (Hand and Arrow Photography) based in Eastern Pennsylvania, but always running off on adventures all over the world. Come say hello on Instagram and Facebook.