What's the learning curve for a tilt-shift lens?

Question

I'm considering renting a tilt-shift (TS-E 24mm f/3.5L) lens for about a week when I travel abroad to do some photography in the middle east. What's the learning curve like on those lenses? Can I get anything accomplished if I'm completely new to tilt-shift and only have a week to use it?

What creative/interesting things can you do with them? I'm probably looking to do architectural and those fun miniature faking stuff if I do end up taking one.

My other option is renting a standard ultra-wide zoom (EF 16-35mm f/2.8) for landscape shots, so I'm trying to find the best artistic value for money.

I guess I should add that I'm not very skilled at manual focusing.

Answer

Shift is quick and easy to pick up; tilt (or swing, if the lens is set to pivot horizontally) a little less so. It helps a lot to know the theory behind what you're doing rather than reinventing the Scheimpflug rule every time you want to take a picture.

I'd suggest downloading Harold Merklinger's Focusing the View Camera (it's free) and getting familiar with the territory first. Yes, the book is written to deal with the movements as they're implemented on view camera, but everything translates easily to a tilt/shift lens once you account for the fact that you've only got one (variable) axis of freedom for each of the movements. A day or two of familiarizing yourself with the lens (how to set/break the locks and orient the axes of tilt and shift) should be all that you need if you understand what the movements do.

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