Customer Reviews

Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 USM SLR Lens for Select Digital Rebel and EOS SLRs

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Despite what many of these reviews mention, this is NOT the kit lens that comes with the Rebel XT/20D. This is a higher end USM lens and costs more as well. You can read a review of the lense in the article below. The Kit lense is about a $70 lens and doesn't have the USM motor or the quality glass of this lens. This may not be the best lens on the market but make sure you're comparing apples to apples.

http://www.bobatkins.com/photography/reviews/18-55.html

If you are just starting out as a photographer and this is your first DSLR, this wide angle to medium telephoto zoom lens will do just fine. A focal length of 18 millimeters on the wide end of this zoom is the same as 28.8 mm on a full frame camera. The edge sharpness suffers when used with a wide open aperture but improves as you stop down a few f-stops. Also, this lens lacks a focus ring that has a distance scale which might make focusing tricky (for instance if you are trying to capture the aurora borealis). The lens also has a cheap plastic feel about it which is quite expectable since it is designed as a low cost lens. To this lens's credit it is very light which makes it ideal for light backpacking.

However, if you plan on becoming serious about your work, you might want to start considering the alternatives. One option is to pass this lens by completely and go with the Canon EF-S 17-85 IS USM lens. Not only is the EF 17-85 (~$500) equivalent to ~27 mm on the wide end, it has IS capability and is a much sharper lens (it should probably come with a box of bandaids!). If you plan on becoming very serious about your work, I would also strongly urge you to consider the Canon 17-40 f/4 L lens which is one of Canon's professional lenses. While it is much more expensive (~$600) and heavier, the results are very sharp and it is weather sealed. If you are after and ultra-wide angle lens, the EF-S 10-22 is the way to go although it is only useable on APS-C sized DSLR sensors which to be honest is only going to be a problem if you plan on upgrading to a full frame camera such as the Canon 5D in the near future. The EF-S 10-22 is equivalent to 16-35 mm on a full frame camera and is another very sharp lens.

It is important to remember that you just dropped $800+ on a camera body and trying to get off cheap by buying a cheap lens will lead to disappointment.

Most kit lenses are useable as paper weights and not much else. The 18-55mm is a nice exception to that trend. I recently bought a 20D to go along with my film body and got this lens because the 1.6x crop on the 20D robbed me of my nice wideangle lenses (though I've got much better telephoto now). For the price, it does a nice job with the sharpness. The color isn't the best, but with digital we can always tweak that later on.

If you can afford the 17-40mm f/4L or 17-85mm EF-S, certainly buy those instead. If your budget is tighter, this is the best way to get a wideangle lens on a 20D or Digital Rebel. The Bob Atkins website has a great technical review of this lens as well.

Let's be honest... a "kit lens" that adds approximately $70 to the overall price of a camera body is not supposed to be Canon L-series quality. Sure, you can find a better quality lens, but not for $70 you can't!

I plan to use this lens as a knock around lens that allows me to get more familiar with my camera and run off some shots. Personally (and this is a personal preference), I find that I tend to want to be closer to subjects anyway - with the 1.6x factor on the Rebel XT, I'm in great shape with some of my other lenses.

If you don't happen to already have a super wide lens in your arsenal, and you are getting a digital EOS with the 1.6x magnification factor, then buy this lens.

Please don't let some of the other "lens snobs" sway you - a few of which are actually "posers" that snap less than 500 pix per year and spend more time looking at the technical aspects of the picture instead of its true artistic value. I can hear them now.. "it isn't contrasty enough", "the barrel distortion is horrible at the wide end", "pin cushion is significant"...

I say BAH!!

Are these statements true... sure they are... to a degree. But let's remember that not everyone can afford to be as picky.

Buy the lens, load the camera with a fresh battery and a blank memory card and GET OUT THERE!!

If you find yourself shooting at the wide end often, THEN sell/give this lens to a colleague and go in search of another (higher quality) lens... very little lost.

Enjoy yourselves and take lots of pictures... good luck.

I am a portrait professional photographer for over 40 years. I needed a wide angle lens for weddings and wanted to know the quality of the kit lens. I did a test using the Rebel XT kit lens and a Canon 16-35mm lens which costs somewhere around $1,500. I set both cameras at 18mm focal length on a tripod. I took shots outdoors and indoors. The images were done exactly the same. The outdoor shots show objects at infinity as well as 10' away. I made 8x10 prints and showed them to my fellow professional photographers. Nobody could identify which lens took which. This is a real world scenario.

Many people think this is the kit lens. It is not!
The numbers do match, but the kit lens is not USM and worth about 1/2 the price. Go to the Canon web site and take a look at the Lens Chart. This lens is much faster and has better glass than the kit lens.

As mentioned before, it is important to realize that this lens is NOT the kit lens that Canon includes with its digital SLR cameras. It has an ultrasonic motor (USM), which is the reason I bought my Rebel XT's body without a lens and picked up this lens to go with it. The USM feature means the focus is very quick, accurate, and nearly silent compared to many other lenses. I have not noticed any significant amount of softness or any defects in the photos I have taken with this lens, and it works like a charm. I would definitely recommend it to the first-time SLR user who wants a lens that will serve as a good starter model but not become obsolete as their photography progresses.

As already mentioned this lens is much better than the kit lens and I would highly recommend buying only the camera body and fit it with this lens.

This is a very sharp lens (see my lens sharpness comparison test, http://www.creative-wedding-photography.com/LensTests/default.aspx
, between the following Canon lenses: EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 USM,
EF 24mm f/2.8, EF 50mm f/1.4 USM, EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM, EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM).

The lens does exhibit fringing problems, and the color and contrast are not on par with the "L" class, but for the money, it's hard to beat.

I own 3 lens. This is the worst, Feels and looks like garbage. Focus is pretty bad but Ok, Have tryed the IS version, way better than this even without IS on, Note that the IS one has a bigger front element. Also zoom is awkward, Overall.
Things to think about:
1.-This lens has a P&S quality.
2.-Try to get the IS one.
3.-If more money then get Sigma 18-50 2.8-4 OS
4.-If much more money get the tammy 2.8

I got this when I bought a 20D. I've been switching between this lens and a Sigma 17-35mm I borrowed from a friend. The difference in cost is around $150, and for what it's worth, I think that the 18-55mm is just as good. It's fast, quiet, focuses pretty well. Feels kinda cheap. The optics aren't superb, but it'll do nicely for a wide angle, even with a crop sensor.

This lens is good for something pretty basic, especially at 18mm for wide angle. This lens is a lot cheaper than most prime wide angle lenses-- if I wanted a real, wide-angle lens, there's no real reason I can think of for why I wouldn't get a prime-- the Sigma is okay, but it's also that much more expensive, and probably not worth it just for the zoom capabilities. I rarely use the 55mm, as if I want a focal length that much higher I'd much more favor my 50mm prime, which would get me a few more stops.

It's a good buy if you can get it cheap, like I did. Otherwise, it's still a solid lens, provided you really need the wide-angle zoom... it's nice to have, especially considering the price compared to higher-end wide-angles.