Canon EF-S 10-18mm f/4.5 - 5.6 Review

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• published: 22 Jul 2014
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Check out my website at http://www.DarrenMiles.com - Southwest Florida wedding, portrait and Real Estate Photographer BUY The Canon EF-S 10-18mm f/4.5 - 5.6 HERE: http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1051476-USA/canon_9519b002_ef_s_10_18mm_f_4_5_5_6_is.html/BI/19363/KBID/11419 Take advantage of B&H; Photo's daily deals HERE: http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/search?setView=GRID&BI;=19363&ci;=18560&N;=4144359020&view;=GRID&KBID;=11419 CONCLUSION Time to recap this review and draw some conclusions about the canon ef-s 10-18 - so here goes; The BUILD QUALITY: it's clearly not professional grade, nor was it ever intended to be, but canon had to cut costs somewhere to produce a lens like this for just $299. And where canon really cut corners was in the housing, it's made out of a thin - lightweight plastic - which lends itself well to the lenses paltry weight of just under 9 ozs - nice if you're going to walk around with it all day, not so nice for long term durability, even the filter thread and lens mount are made out of plastic. There's no weather sealing but surprisingly canon did include image stabilization. And remember, because it's plastic, you have to wonder if it cold survive the day to day rigors of a working professional. The focus and zoom rings are - but truth be told, it's about what you'd expect from a $299 lens, for build we gave it a 7.5/10 AF SPEED AND ACCURACY: the stm motor that's included is very quiet and reasonably quick, the stm works exceptionally well in video mode, specifically with the dual pixel technology in the 70D, it has a full time manual focus override, even in AF mode. It's no where near as fast as a canon ultra sonic, but it's also not as buzzy as some of the other lower end models from canon, like the highly regarded 50mm f/1.8 e.g.. Fortunately, when you're considering a wide angle lens, focus speed isn't usually on the top of the list of priorities, all in its an adequate and accurate performance, format speed and accuracy, we gave it an 9.5/10 OPTICAL QUALITY / QUALITY OF RESULTS: Downright excellent, especially relative to the price. I'm getting sharp results straight from f/4.5 and things stay great until about f/11 where diffraction really sets in and starts to degrade the sharpness. With a couple of tweaks in lightroom, getting to the promised land is a snap. Overall, it's a much better performance than the price point would indicate. Optical quality 9.5/10, Quality of the results 10/10 VALUE: At $299 in my opinion, the 10-18 sets a benchmark for price to image quality ratio. When you consider that the majority of wide angle lenses - specifically from canon start at prices much higher than this, then the 10-18 is nothing short of an amazing value! Major pros include a low price, excellent optics, a silent and reasonably fast and accurate focus motor, and decent build for the money. On the downside is a relatively narrow - and variable - aperture, there's no weather sealing, and even though the quality of the plastics is a notch above the average kit lens, they're still plastic down to the mount and the filter threads, Canon had to cut costs somewhere, so they sacrificed on the build quality. But all in at the price point, the 10-18 represents an outstanding value from the folks over at Canon. So for value, Canon just knocks it out of the park and it easily earns a 10/10 Overall 45.5/50 - HIGHLY RECOMMENDED THE FINAL WORD: If you're thinking about getting into landscape, real estate or architectural photography and you're just starting out, then I think you have to consider the 10 - 18 from Canon, it's a low cost, high quality lens with only a few compromises, I wish it were built a little bit better, but image quality like this is a bit of a shock at only $299. It's nice to see Canon diving into the value game head first, and the 10-18 is a winner. Congrats Canon, it's a job well done!This is Darren Miles with Darren Miles Photography based here in beautiful, sunny Naples, FL, if you like these reviews, please don't forget to "SUBSCRIBE!" Thank you so much for watching, and until the next time... Happy Shooting!