Customer Reviews

Canon EF 50mm f/2.5 Compact Macro Lens

5 star:		(26)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I never thought a $250 lens could be so good. I have been trying to buy lenses that are light-weight for my 20D, due to a neck injury problem, and this 50mm fits the bill.

Great in low light, and agree also, the bokeh is sweet. I do alot of bee chasing and manage some great macros with bees in flight with this one. All hand held. Can also take great indoor shots without flash, with a steady hand.I chose it also because it was one of the least expensive high rated canon 50mm's.

It goes well with another inexpensive canon lens, the 55-200mm ef f4.5-5.6 II, which also does well outdoors, including macro.

I am very pleased with both, and wouldn't part with them!

I bought this lens to go with my Canon Digital Rebel XT. I absolutely love this lens. I got it to try some insect and other macro shots and it has served this purpose very well. With some practice this lens will produce fantastic macros with some great bokeh to boot.

I read the other reviews and must say that I have never scared an insect away with the noise as mentioned before. And I have taken countless insect shots with this lens. It is a bit louder than the other lenses I have but I don't see it to be a problem. The one problem I do encounter is when using the autofocus in a busy closeup scene it often will focus on the background instead of say a closer insect on a flower. When this happens I just flip it to manual and focus that way. No big deal.

Overall, great lens for an even greater price. Definitely worth it. (I submitted a photo of a bee that I took a couple of days ago with this lens as an example.)

I purchased this lens back in March of 2005 to shoot static "Warhammer models" with my 10D. I found that longer lenses such as the Sigma 105mm, the Canon EF 100mm, and the Tamron SP Autofocus 90mm all were "too long" with the 10D's 1.6 focal crop and would result in requiring me to use a lot more physical space that what I had room for to get the shot.

The Canon EF 50mm f/2.5 is nearly a perfect match with the 10D for this purpose. Its small, its compact, and its short focal length do not require that I be standing three feet away from the model I'm shooting.

As far as shooting at non-static objects, such as insects, the lens is slow to focus and loud, in both noise and vibration, which results in "startled" subjects and missed shots.

The same also applies for non-macro shots as well. Its slow focus makes it a poor choice for action photography, and its loud enough to draw attention to you when you are attempting other shots as well.

I bought this lens around three months ago for use with my Rebel XTI/400D. It has produced some nice shots and has great clarity and bokeh for portraits and the like. However, in this area it is really only as good as the "nifty fifty" 50mm f/1.8, which you can get on here for about $90.

For me, I like to take shots of insects and other animals that tend to be skittish. For that type of work, this lens is loud and finds it tough to focus quickly, so you need to work in manual mode. By the time you get the shot, the subject has moved out of the position you were after. Also, you don't get true 1:1 macro, so the details are not as good as if you fork out the extra for the 60mm Canon f2.8 Macro USM, which has the ultra quiet focus.

A recent review I read in a prestigious magazine put this lens a distant second to the Sigma Macro 50mm f2.8 EX DG, which costs about the same as this one and offers true 1:1 macro. If I could go back and buy that one I would.

I purchased this lens to take photographs of vintage wristwatches. I use an original Canon Digital Rebel and the shots are really very detailed. It is easy to use in fact, I can hand hold the camera and capture the details in the hand-made craftsmanship of the watches. Its F2.5 opening is a welcome change when you are use to shooting with a zoom lens and it is quite sharp edge to edge. If you own a Canon digital SLR and want to pocket some extra coin then this is the lens for you.

I bought the Cannon Digital EOS to leverage my existing Canon lenses and the Canon EF 50mm f/2.5 Compact Macro is one of my favorites. It's great for nature, non-moving nature in particular.

Focus range is small, however the images are very sharp. Physically the lens is not as sturdy as some but good for the price. The bokeh is great!

If you search around you can find some great photos on web taken with this lens.

For less than $300, this is a pretty decent 50mm lens, but it's not the best choice unless you do simple, straight-macro work. Why? In my experience, for 1:10 or smaller magnification (focusing distance of about 0.6m or 2 ft), Canon EF 50mm f1.4 USM Standard & Medium Telephoto Lens for Canon SLR Cameras provides better contrast and image sharpness than this lens at any aperture value. So, the only time this lens is the better choice is close distance macro work.

Now, when I use this lens at 1:2 to 1:5 magnification range, the resolution and contrast are good, but I noticed a bit too much chromatic aberration (CA) with shiny objects such as jewelries and silverware. The color is magenta and green, depending on the distance of the object in relation to the focusing distance. The CA decreased to some extent by stopping down. A significant drop of CA was seen at f/8 for 1:5 and f/11 for 1:2 magnification, although CA was still noticeable at those f-stops. Sure, at such magnifications, you would stop down to about that range anyway, due to very thin depth of field, but I would be happier of CA was lower from wider apertures for a bit more creative flexibility. Meanwhile, it's not impossible to correct for CA in professional image editing softwares, but that just means more editing work.

The lens is excellent for non-shiny small product shoots, such as hair accessories, cosmetic products, food, etc., although tilt shift would be useful whenever the image uses creative styling. Therefore, for creative macro work, TS-E90mm, possibly with extension tubes, would be more useful, although there is a price to pay in terms of dollars, pounds, and more demanding manual work. Whether 100mm macro is better or worse is not so much of an issue as other people say. EF100mm f/2.8 macro provides more working distance and flattens perspective (which may or may not be good for product photography), but not as different as what you can do with TS-E 90mm as a macro lens. The 90mm TS-E is a truly excellent lens, even if you combine with an extension tube for 1:2 magnification.

About the only thing this lens is superior to Canon EF 50mm f1.4 USM Standard & Medium Telephoto Lens for Canon SLR Cameras at non-macro work is that this macro gives more pleasing bokeh than f/1.4. But for that matter 85mm f/1.8 or TS-E90mm is better, and so this isn't a good reason to buy this lens.

In short, EF50mm f/2.5 macro lens is good for simple, straight-forward macro work. If you don't do macro, buy Canon EF 50mm f1.4 USM Standard & Medium Telephoto Lens for Canon SLR Cameras or Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II Camera Lens. If you use more elaborate styling or creative work, buy Canon TS-E 45mm f/2.8 Tilt Shift Lens for Canon SLR Cameras or Canon TS-E 90mm f/2.8 Tilt Shift Lens for Canon SLR Cameras. If you do macro work of jewelry or any other shiny or high contrast objects, be careful about chromatic aberration and stop down as needed.

I have been using this lens for about 2.5 years and it is an exceptional piece of equipment, especially for the price!

I very rarely feel the need to get a closer image than I can achieve with this lens.

It's very solidly built and I am sure it will continue to be a primary piece in my kit for years to come!

I am THRILLED with this lens's capabilities and the pictures it does. I test shot a corner of a window to determine if it would be good for my insect shots that I like so well.

Well, it did great as it came but I found that I wanted to have the 1/1 capability so I bought the add-on converter and am thrilled to have added both of these necessary items for my set-up. I like nature photography the best and like to use my off summer days for hiking and finding photographs to take in perhaps well-known places but finding unique angles and subjects is what I like to specialize in. This lens will greatly enhance your experience in that 'little world' we commonly trod over or weed-ate away. I built a diffuser using a ping-pong ball over the flash so the lighting would work better. (Works great, btw).

As usual, it's great Canon glass that does the trick.

Some of reservations people have in their reviews are right--the lens is slightly noisy, it does sometimes hunt a little for focus, and it is only 1:2 magnification, not 1:1. But despite that, I love it. I have found that it is a great lens, particularly for the price. It has good optics, it is a nice length for a lot of macro work (yes, you have to get closer with a relatively short lens, but depth of field in macro shots is hard enough with a lens this long, let along a longer one), and it generally focuses plenty fast enough. Some people have complained that the noise of the focus would scare off insects, etc., but I have not had that experience at all. I have gotten up close to lots of bugs, like bees and wasps, and they don't respond to the focusing at all. [...] If you are concerned about skittish critters, the issue is not the slight noise of the lens; it's how close you have to get to them with any 50mm or 60mm lens. So unless you decide you need a long macro lens or want to spend a lot more money, this may be a very good choice for you. And keep in mind that if you have a consumer-level SLR, the effective length of this lens (compared to the old 35mm standard) is about 90 mm.