Customer Reviews

Cosina 19-35mm f/3.5-4.5 MC AF Wide Angle Zoom Lens for Canon EOS / EF

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

When I first saw this Wide Angle Cosina Lens, I thought it had an amazing price compared to other brands. But that worried me: cheap=no good. I've never heard of the brand or even found reviews of the lens. I bought them either way (the price was too low, if they turned out to be bad I wouldn't bother as much). And if it turned out to be good, it'll be a fine addition to my Canon Digital Rebel XT.

When I finally got it, the physical appearance was nice, it didn't look as bad as I thought it would. It came with a hood which makes it look larger in diameter. The problem is when I started taking pictures with it. The zoom and angle features are nice but definitely the sharpness and quality of them weren't even as good as the kit 18-55mm lens. When you crop or zoom you can really see that most of them are blurred but not to an awful extent, if you need to make close ups or print in full resolution, then this is not the lens for you.

Save a couple of $$ or spent a $100 or so more and get a Sigma or Canon, don't waste your time with this one. I'll try it, and play with it more, and probably update this review.

I am rating this 5 for the price, but really should be a 3 or 4 if price is not considered. Just so you know, I recently sold the lens because I will be getting one of the Canon "L" wide angles.

Here's my totally unbiased review from owning this lens on my Canon 5D Full Frame for a few months.

I own several "L" lenses, so I am using those as a point of comparison (85L-II, 300mm F4L, 24-70L).

Sharpness - Excellent, I was very impressed, extremely sharp images in the area of focus.
Color - Very Good, I was very impressed. Generally I don't care too much for the color because I use RAW, and can easily manipulate the color in Photoshop.
Flare - Not that great, produces flare in outdoor images. This is not really a huge deal, but you should know about it.

Vignetting is present in this lens, but can be corrected in Photoshop.

I really almost loved this lens. Construction is good, autofocus is good, does not look 'cheap', and is very light.

The only one thing I did not like was the following:

The perspective of the images towards the outer edges (on a full frame) gets distorted, and this kind of bothered me. I think this may be a trait of most wide angle lenses, I am not sure. I believe this is also fixable in Photoshop, not sure.

On the whole, if you are looking for a cheap wide angle for your full frame, this is it..

Its made in Japan. Thanks for reading this review.

Clarity and sharpness of the pictures are not that great. Yet, if you think about the price of this lens, it's not really that bad. The material used feels and looks like a toy. If you really want a good wide angle lens, I recommend Canon 10-22mm or if you want something cheaper, a Sigma 10-20mm will give you the best result.

As a new photographer I struggled about buying a lens that was both inexpensive and a brand that was not very well known to me. I needed a wide angle lens on short notice (to take pictures of a very expensive house) so I didn't have a lot of time to research and not a lot of money either. I took a leap of faith and it has paid off. Even though I know there are much better lenses out there I am very pleased with the results. My only regret was not purchasing a filter to go with the lens but all of my indoor shots came out great. The outdoor shots came out good but would have been better with a polarized filter. I would recommend this lens to anyone like me that is struggling with money and digital knowledge. I am very pleased and not shopping for anything better at the moment. The photo's I sold the first time out more than paid the cost of the lens.

Fantastic lens for all indoor pictures and outdoor. It has a very large area of view which is really cool. Colors were excellent and there was very little distortion visible at the edges of flat objects. Zooming is very smooth and so is the autofocus. I really would like to find one for my Sony Alpha also.

For the money it's hard to go wrong with this lens. I have used it on my Rebel 35mm SLR and on my Canon Rebel XTi and have had good luck with both. Sure, it may not give 100% of the image quality of a $300 or $500 lens, but for the money you get a good lens and save a lot of money to put towards a nice zoom lens.

At such a low price you get a decent lens. It is not the sharpest but what do you expect for 80 bucks? However it is sharp enough for the work I do. The Vignetting is nice also! If you do more creative photography work and your concerns are other then the sharpest lens, you'll really enjoy this for the value! only complaint the lens cap fits a bit flimsy-definitely get a 72mm filter to go with it to protect it!

For $80, what is not to love about this lens? Yes, it has distortion and the contrast could be better, and the edge sharpness could be better, and on and on... but to get all that you have to spend $1600, and this is $80. It is a no brainer. It's built pretty good - plastic but solid. The focus and zoom are a bit clankie but again... $80. How does one complain?

I am a pro - I shoot mainly actors headshots so I am not doing a lot of critical stuff on the 19-35mm, but what I have been shooting with it has come out fine, and a few minutes in photoshop and it is dandy. I even shot it out against a canon 17-35 L or whatever the number is, and honestly, the optical difference is nowhere near the price difference. Half the time I couldn't tell which was which - and I am shooting on an 5D Mk 2 which is pretty good about showing up problems. So, if you aren't doing critical work, or you are looking to get into wider angles, this is a good way to start.

I was looking for a wide angle lens that I could take places I would be reluctant to take my more expensive lenses and at the price it was a bit of an impulse buy. I was impressed from the start the packaging surpass ed that of much pricier lenses and it has the feel of a much more expensive lens and works well with my Canon D1000. I have been using it for the last few days and am very pleasantly surprised with the quality of the pictures. I have found it to be highly responsive and no more noise then my canon lenses.
All in all a pleasant surprise and I highly recommended this "cheap" lens.

This is not a superb lens, nor its pictures will be on the front pages of a magazine. Many people misunderstand the purpose of budget lenses, they want the sleeper lens for forty bucks, no, it will not happen.

Lke most cheap lenses, they perform better in daylight at f8 to f11 or when used with flash. It may sound weird, but the flash pictures tend to come out better than even with brand lenses. Another thing I have noticed, at least on my D60, setting d-lightning and noise reduction off gives much better results. Its a tricky spontaneous lens, so expect to play a little with under-over exposure as sometimes the meter is not consistent with these kind of third party cheap lenses.

Yes, I would recommend it, just do not expect magical jaw dropping results.