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trevilla
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Registered: Jan 8, 2007
Location: United States
Posts: 403
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Review Date: Apr 28, 2007
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Recommend? |
Price paid: $80.00
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Pros:
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f/1.8, light, small
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Cons:
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AF fairly slow, plastic
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This was my first lens after the kit 18-55. I really enjoyed the fast f-stop and the clarity of a prime lens compared to the low quality of the kit lens.
Paired with my 350D and 430EX, it makes a great lens for courtside basketball.
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 Apr 28, 2007
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wildestdreams
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Registered: Jul 26, 2005
Location: United States
Posts: 798
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Review Date: Apr 28, 2007
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Recommend? yes |
Price paid: $79.00
| Rating: 9
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Pros:
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My copy is extremely sharp throughout aperture range, AF/MF switch is smooth and relatively quiet, light-weight, color and contrast very good, bokeh is superb, focusing is not bad at all as far as speed (it's not like I'm going to be shooting sports with it), and who can beat the price for what you're getting? It needs careful handling but is easily replaceable at this price. My first test shots were of my husband, standing in the shade, no flash & wide open. Very impressive performance as noted above.
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Cons:
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When I picked up the delivery box, I wondered if anything was in it! It does look and feel like a toy. Very deceiving for what lies inside. My 10D feels unbalanced with it on...probably just not used to the lightness after my other lenses.
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The good outweighs the bad by a mile with this lens.
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Apr 28, 2007
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Daniel Hwang
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Registered: Mar 18, 2007
Location: United States
Posts: 68
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Review Date: Apr 18, 2007
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Recommend? yes |
Price paid: $70.00
| Rating: 10
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Pros:
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Only $70, Very sharp images, Creamy bokeh
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Cons:
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AF/MF switch
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This was my 2nd lense after 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 kit lense.
@50mm the image quality difference is HUGE.
This little lense is extemely sharp even @ 1.8.
It looks like a toy with its cheap plastic body but with hood added on, it looks quite nice.
Only thing I don't like about this lense is its AF/MF switch.
It is really hard to switch as it gets stuck and won't let me switch smoothly.
Other than that, it is a great lense for its price.
$70 is nothing compared to the satisfaction you get from this lense.
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Apr 18, 2007
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Amar Dewri
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Registered: Jan 24, 2007
Location: India
Posts: 0
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Review Date: Apr 14, 2007
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Recommend? yes |
Price paid: Not Indicated
| Rating: 8
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Pros:
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Light weight, sharp, dirt cheap
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Cons:
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Gets confused for very close ranges, delicate, build quality.
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Apr 14, 2007
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BrandonRussell
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Registered: Jan 6, 2007
Location: United States
Posts: 581
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Review Date: Apr 3, 2007
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Recommend? yes |
Price paid: Not Indicated
| Rating: 10
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Pros:
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Great light gathering ability, super-light weight, price, sharp...
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Cons:
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None, everyone should probably own this lens
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This lens is just great. The IQ is amazing, the 1.8 changes how you look at low light, and it's so light and inexpensive.
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Apr 3, 2007
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riversen
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Registered: Apr 7, 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 6
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Review Date: Mar 28, 2007
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Recommend? no |
Price paid: $80.00
| Rating: 2
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Pros:
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Decent lens for what is paid, but that is about it.
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Cons:
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Cheap construction, loud, slow to focus, not so good bokeh, viginetting.
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Mar 28, 2007
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Harry Jadwani
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Registered: Apr 21, 2006
Location: Canada
Posts: 81
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Review Date: Mar 27, 2007
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Recommend? yes |
Price paid: $85.00
| Rating: 9
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Pros:
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"L" glass quality images for a next-to-nothing price. Weight almost non-existent. Prome
'L' glass quality images. ultra-lite weight. Prime lens quality. Nice background blur.
UV filter also cheap due to small size.
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Cons:
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Zero 'snob" value. Too cheap to be considered a'pro' lens. Fragile build.
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I've used a number of expensive lenses - 24-105 f4
IS, 300mm f4 IS, 135mm f2 L, 70-200 f2.8 IS, Sigma 120-300 f 2.8.
With 5D and 1DMKIIN.
This cheap lens holds its own - especially in walk-around, non-tripod situations.
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Mar 27, 2007
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Bjorn Beheydt
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Registered: Mar 22, 2007
Location: Belgium
Posts: 0
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Review Date: Mar 23, 2007
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Recommend? yes |
Price paid: Not Indicated
| Rating: 9
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Pros:
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light, cheap, sharp, small, L quality images, all rounder
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Cons:
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plastic build
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I bought this lens 3 years ago, and have been using it non-stop ever since. If I can take one lense anywhere, this is the one I take. It is light, small, versatile, and takes great pictures.
I used this lens on my 10D, and now on my 5D, results are always great.
I did some whole modelshoots with this lens only, and use it extensively as a macro with a tube inbetween body and lens.
I don't only recommend this lens, I think it is a must have lens!
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Mar 23, 2007
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alpha_1976
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Registered: Feb 28, 2007
Location: United States
Posts: 778
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Review Date: Mar 15, 2007
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Recommend? yes |
Price paid: $70.00
| Rating: 9
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Pros:
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Sharp, Light weight and short
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Cons:
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Terrible build
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I bought this lens a few weeks ago. It's reasonable sharp wide open but really shines above 2.8 or 3.5 to be very precise. It's really light; once you put it on your camera what you feel is only camera weight which might be awkward sometimes. With f1.8, I think this might be the chepest lens one would want to use inside museums and so on so forth to have reasonable IQ. The thing I don't like about this lens is the build quality of this lens. I mean, I have some you know so-called cheapo from Canon, but man, this is the worst of all. If you shake it a little you hear some rattling noise like something is already broken inside! But the price you pay for this lens is really a tiny fraction of what you'd pay on other lenses to get the same image quality; so can't complain.
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Mar 15, 2007
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Jordan Diaz
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Registered: Sep 24, 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 108
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Review Date: Feb 18, 2007
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Recommend? yes |
Price paid: Not Indicated
| Rating: 9
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Pros:
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Small. Light. Sharp.
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Cons:
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Slow Focus. Rotating front. Openings for dust to get inside lens easily. Ugly.
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This is one of my FAVORITE lens. I shoot this with my 1D mkll all the time. I get funny looks from other photog's, but I really don't care. This lens is sharp. Just as sharp as the 1.4. Will be using this guy for a long time.
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Feb 18, 2007
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purelthium
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Registered: Feb 1, 2007
Location: Canada
Posts: 0
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Review Date: Feb 1, 2007
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Recommend? yes |
Price paid: $70.00
| Rating: 10
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Pros:
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Cheap, sharp, small, light.
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Cons:
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Slow focus
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This lens is FANTASTIC. I did a sharpness test against my lenses at 50mm and f/5.6. This lens was the sharpest by far, I was amazed by its ability to show the detail on the $5 dollar bill that I used.
The test was compared against the Canon Kit lens and the EF 28-105mm f/4-5.6. These lenses are not great performers by any means, but they are around the same pricepoint.
That into account, this lens is the BEST value in Canon's lineup.
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Feb 1, 2007
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froggynaan
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Registered: Jun 30, 2005
Location: United States
Posts: 35
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Review Date: Jan 21, 2007
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Recommend? yes |
Price paid: $90.00
| Rating: 9
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Pros:
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Don't worry about breaking: Just buy a new one!, sharp at all apertures (see text), good for reversing on the front of my macro lens
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Cons:
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slow autofocus, only F/1.8, 50mm is a bit long on a DSLR.
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I like most aspects about this lens: the wide aperture for the low cost, the sharpness of the images, and the background blur. It's not a lens i can use all the time, since it's too long for most walk-around applications.
Sharpness: I was surprised to find that this lens sharpens up faster than the F/1.4. I tested the F/1.4: it gets extremely sharp at F/4 and begins to degrade around F/8. I also tested the F/1.8 in similar conditions: it reaches peak sharpness around F/2.2, and all other subsequent apertures are about as sharp (at least up to F/8). I cannot be totally sure, but I believe this lens does not get to be as sharp as the F/1.4 lens. This is probably because the 1.8 has a 5 element design, while the 1.4 has a 6 element design. Also, this lens has a 5 blade diaphragm while the 1.4 has 6 blades.
This lens is good for reversing and placing in front of a macro lens. I was able to get magnification of better than 2:1 using this in combination with my 1:1 macro lens.
The bokeh is very nice, especially compared to my sigma 105 macro lens. It's soft and flatter, as opposed to sharp and crunchy.
This lens is a good value over all.
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Jan 21, 2007
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trevilla
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Registered: Jan 8, 2007
Location: United States
Posts: 403
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Review Date: Jan 9, 2007
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Recommend? yes |
Price paid: $80.00
| Rating: 8
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Pros:
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tiny, very lightweight, great depth of field, good for dim conditions
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Cons:
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minimum focusing distance too far away, f/1.8 is good, but f/1.4 is better, loud AF
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This is a GREAT beginners' lens. With its standard fixed focal length, the photographer is really challenged to get the shot. It taught me to get on my belly or get on top of that building.
It is very lightweight and compact. Almost plastic.
It's depth of field is great, and it works well in dim lighting conditions, but, if any darker, you're pushin' it. I shot a concert that had pretty crappy lighting with this, and my average shutter was around 1/30.
The depth of field, though, is very nice.
The AF is fairly slow and pretty loud. Loud enough to turn a few heads during English class.
I would definately recommend this lens to any beginner.
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Jan 9, 2007
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Andrew Lin
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Registered: Jan 3, 2007
Location: United States
Posts: 0
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Review Date: Jan 3, 2007
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Recommend? yes |
Price paid: $84.00
| Rating: 8
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Pros:
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inexpensive, lightweight, short dof (for portraits)
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Cons:
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cheap build quality, slow & noisy af
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This was my second lens after the EF-S 17-55mm that came with my XTi. I wanted a portrait lens with a short dof, a wide aperture, and something that was relatively inexpensive. A friend recommend this lens and when I saw the price, it wasn't even a question. The short dof makes shooting bokeh incredibly easy and the edges in focus come out incredibly sharp for such an inexpensive (dare I say "cheap") lens. I would certainly recommend this lens to anyone looking for a beginner's portrait lens. Next for me will more than likely be a 70-200mm F4L. Enough of the hard plastic, I want glass lol.
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Jan 3, 2007
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Bombino
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Registered: Mar 31, 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 18
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Review Date: Jan 2, 2007
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Recommend? yes |
Price paid: $50.00
| Rating: 9
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Pros:
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Very sharp, great color, best bang-for-buck non-L glass out there, hands down. Cheapo.
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Cons:
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AF is slow, loud and often inaccurate even when it does lock.
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Jan 2, 2007
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Dave Picklyk
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Registered: Dec 13, 2006
Location: Canada
Posts: 10
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Review Date: Jan 1, 2007
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Recommend? |
Price paid: Not Indicated
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Pros:
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Pleasing bokeh (out-of-focus blur), extremely low priced, great color and clarity at f/2.5+, excellent for close-proximity portraits!
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Cons:
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Loud "clunking" sounding AF, cheap plastic mount and design, AF hunts in extreme low lighting conditions.
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First thing, everyone needs a good fast 50mm prime in their bag...whether it be a f/1.2, f/1.4, or f/1.8. Affordability will decide for you. At $100 CAN, this lens beats anything hands-down and for me price made me choose this lens.
The bokeh is extremely pleasing and this lens takes some great portrait pics! Outdoor portraits I've used this lens at f/2.5 and produced very crystal clear results that rival most zoom lenses. The colors are well saturated and bright.
I have found the "clunking" noise of the focus a bit weird but tolerable considering the cost of this unit. In extremely low light the AF does hunt a bit and I have to switch to manual focus. The manual focus ring is too small and a bit awkward to use but I manage fine.
If you are just starting out in photography and want a lens that will produce easy, breezy, beautiful results with low-light situations than this is a great first lens to play with.
I know some people recommend going with the MK I metal-mount version for an extra $100 or so...and I debated with that myself at length before buying this. The thing about the MK I is that even though it's better built, you will still have to buy it USED (which means no warranty really), there is still no USM, and the AF is a bit slower. Here's my thinking: if you can afford to spend a $100 more for what the older MKI is going for then just buy the better f/1.4 for $309US at B & H Photo.
All in all, the f/1.8 is a steal.
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Jan 1, 2007
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Reviews
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Views
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Date of last review
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351
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588802
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Dec 21, 2016
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Recommended By
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Average Price
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94% of reviewers
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$128.42
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Build Quality Rating
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Price Rating
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Overall Rating
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5.88
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9.56
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8.6
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