Best lens Canon xsi for predawn/ post sunset colors? .

Am moving from a Canon A640 to a Canon xsi. I need the best lens, low to mid range $, for shooting predawn and post sunset colors against landscape silhouettes. I always use a tripod and will have a wireless remote. Also any advice on an inexpensive light meter is appreciated. Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

You don't need anything special, you just need a camera. The camera meter will give you a good indication of exposure, but you might dial in half a stop of "over-exposure" to make sure the sky is not rendered too dark. With a digital camera this is easy - just look at the result and adjust accordingly. You don't need a light meter.

If you want to maintain the sky colour don't use AWB as this setting will try to "correct" the extreme red in the image. Use "Daylight" or "Cloudy" as you prefer and the colour will stay as it is without being watered down.

The best lens is the one that covers the area you wish to include - a standard zoom is fine, but you might want a wider angle to include lots of water reflections, or a telephoto to pick out the silhouettes of more distant objects. Don't be so overwhelmed by the colour that you forget about composition.

Hope that helps!

John

It's been a while since the initial post--so maybe this info isn't relevant... but Peter Burian just published a nice comparative review of wide aperture dslr lenses on Photocrati.

If you don't need autofocus, look at the Contax Zeiss lenses, or more cheaply, the Yashica ML wide angles. In my experience, these produce outstanding colors, contrast and saturation. You would need an adapter to use them.