| Brand: | Canon | ||
| Average Rating |
|
This is considered the standard lens for use with Canon SLR cameras more info
Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II Camera Lens
Previous post: Davis Sanford TRAVLR Traveler Tripod
Next post: Transcend 16 GB SDHC Class 6 Flash Memory
{ 25 comments… read them below or add one }
Broken within Two Weeks
Rating:3 out of 5 stars
As others have stated, this lens will yield very nice, sharp images. If you buy it, make sure you also get a lens hood for outdoor shooting; otherwise, expect all of your pictures to have lens flares.
Unfortunately, I dropped my lens less than 2 weeks after receiving it. The drop was only 2 feet onto not-so-plush carpeting; but, it was enough force to crack the casing in half. It is a bit sad that the glass on this lens is stronger than the plastic casing “protecting” it. Fortunately, American Express’ insurance company is covering the damage. I definitely recommend buying this with a credit card so you too can get that 90 day coverage. More so, I recommend finding something a bit more sturdy even if it is a bit more expensive.
Nice lens for the price
Rating:4 out of 5 stars
Nice lens for the price, can’t complain, Shake is evident in low light conditions as there is no IS, tripod should take care of this issue. Surely recommend this lens.
Pretty good for low light pictures!
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
Tried this lens, and all I have to say is amazing for low light/night time scenarios! The wide aperture helps in capturing dimly lit images with such a ease that one can do away with the use of tripod! The image quality is pretty good, especially, the shallow DOF pics come out amazing!
The only thing I did not like in the lens is the amount of time it sometimes takes for auto focusing; it would make clinging noise when trying to auto focus, but once you have the focus, it will do its job!
Again, good value for the money!
Ahhh the nifty fifty
Rating:2 out of 5 stars
You get what ya pay for! This is the much-talked about “Nifty Fifty”. Out of the box it feels cheap and plastic, why because it is a cheap build and plastic!
1) AF in low light… Not good it hunts
2) Sharp Not at all
3) Build well as stated, plastic build plastic lens had it for less than a year and it is CRAP
4) Go to ebay and buy a Asahi Pentex 50mm and an adapter ring and learn to focus manually for half the price! Really I own 2 and they way out work this cheap Canon lens geared towards the hobbyist looking for a correct all “I am a pro” lens.
5)
Very Good lens, great value for money
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
I recently bought this lens after reading reviews from many people. The lens is very very good. Considering the price, it is a great buy. The sharpness of some of the potrait shots is amazing. If you are looking for a low cost, good quality lens, go for it.
for what you are paying for, you should not complain
I did wanted a fast lens.
Rating:3 out of 5 stars
I’m a graphic artist, and I just start to do photography just for fun of it, I got this lens basically so I can have not blurry pictures of my always running children.
It is a great price for sure, the lens it self feel a little cheap, but it work like a champ, now I’ been getting better result with the manual focus, the auto focus never get what I’m aiming for. may be set up of the camera not sure. I own a Canon XSI rebel and compared with the other lens 18-55mm this one make the pictures look more professional, the depth that you can get is very nice, the color contrast is great, and for indoor pictures is very very good, not to fan of flash lights so the 1.8F stop really help.
I already have taken nice Christmas pictures with this lens, and I’m sure with all the emotion of opening present I’ll catch all that craziness in a sharp way.
if you are like me this lens is great to add to your collection, portrait pictures is the strength here, now if you are a pro…well you will not be reading this for sure.
1000th review!
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
i bought this lens on a trip in taiwan a few months ago as my first lens upgrade from the 18-55mm stock lens. the image quality whether you use it wide open (at f/ 1.8) or stopped down really blows away the stock lens (of course).
since then, i’ve also bought the 24-70mm F/2.8L IS USM which is more than 10 times this price (which is a fantastic lens by the way) but this remains a favorite lens of mine when i need a fast lens for fast action or very low light.
as with all primes, you’ll be using “sneaker” zoom but i think that it’s worth it when you need top quality images.
i agree with other reviewers that this lens’ construction quality is not at all top notch. it really feels like a toy, but if all you’re looking for is great-looking pictures (with great bokeh when you open up) then this will do it for you.
yay 1000th review!
A BEAST! IF YOU DONT HAVE IT YOU DONT KNOW WHAT YOU’RE MISSING!
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
This was my first “L” lens of the series and I have Canon 50D. I have to say that the marriage of the 2 were just instant!
The minute I got this nifty fifty out I was so excited and could not beleive the quality i was getting! It put me on the map as a photographer!
I was using this little monster on photoshoots and now I am getting some good paying dollars for it! The f stops are perfect. I use this predominantly for portaits, families, events, you name it! I take this little tiger with me everywhere!
For those who are questioning L’Series Lenses by Canon just try this one and if doesn’t work for you then you can always return it!
I love this little bugga!
Great Lens for the price
Rating:4 out of 5 stars
The first time I got the lens the packaging was not proper- no air bag protection. Not sure if it was because of this the front lens was shaky.The rear lens alos had a mark which I guess was created by the lens cap being in contact with it. This I could clear by cleaning it. I soon got it on my 40D and autofocused and bloom the front lens came out.
I returned the lens back and called Amazon customer service ( their return policy works great) told them I need the reshipment, shipment method to be 2-day shipment so I can use it for Christmas. They were polite and tried to help me out but (after talking to his manager) told me that the item shipment cannot be changed for replacement once it has been placed online.
To my surprise on third working day I got the lens delivered (velocity Express). Wow just for Christmas. This new lens was properly packaged had Invoice inside the package( First one didnt) and no scuffs. Worked great out of Box and took some cool picture, just as you would expect of this 50mm.
I would add more as I take pictures through new year.
Get more than what you pay for(-:
Rating:3 out of 5 stars
OK, so this is not a $1200 lens, so don’t expect the quality of that! This is a very cheaply made lens, hence the price….but wow…it takes great pictures for the price! The first one of these I had and dropped and it immediately broke to pieces, so I bought another. Yep, its worth dropping another $100 than $1200!
Simple, Good, Better
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
I have had this lens in the past and will continue to have it in the future. It is simple in construction, good in operation and the best in its class in image quailty. Few lens have the history this lens has and continual reputation of being the best little value as this 50mm Lens. I have used it on protraits, close-ups, sports and anything I can think of that I need speed and clarity
Best bang for you buck
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
I bought a used XTi body, and wanted to pick a decent quality lens. Sure, I wanted to buy the 1.4, but this lens was so much cheaper, and has received great reviews.
After about a week, I am impressed with what I’ve seen. What really attracted me to this lens, was the low f-stop. I wanted to be able to take great low light pictures without a flash, and nothing comes close to this lens for this price, or for another couple hundred dollars.
Know what you’re getting though. This is a fixed lens, so no zooming. Also, it is not wide enough for a lot of indoor shoots, at least on a cropped sensor (equivalent to about an 80mm).
It takes incredible profile pics, great sunrise/sunset shots outside, and have found the lens great for indoor sports, as long as you’re not looking to get a tight shot.
Will have to come back after several months of use to update durability and other thoughts.
Ugly & Cheap Looking but Works Great
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
This has to be the ugliest most platicky lens I’ve seen, but it performs like a champ for its intended purpose. Though, it isn’t the sort of lens I would have attached at all times, and it’s mainly because the overreaching zoom factor is just too much when shooting indoors in average size rooms.
Yes, the low light performance indoors is phenomenal and no flash is needed, but consider also that I often find myself taking close-up portraits indoors, since there’s little room to back up far enough from the subjects. This is why I recently ordered the Canon 28mm f/1.8 USM prime. It’s a rather expensive remedy, and not really the wide angle I would like, but after a lot of research looking for fast inexpensive primes, it was the best I could find whithin my budget.
After using it for a week here are some of things I’ve noticed about the performance of this lens:
- At f/1.8 it gets rather soft, so I mostly use it at f/2 or higher.
- At f/7.1 seems to be its sharpest point but it’s very usable below that.
- In video mode, on my 500D in low light areas, subjects in the center of the frame appear very bright and sharp and manual focus is easy work with, but the depth of field is reduced to just 2 inches or so when I get closer than 7 feet (give or take).
- I was having trouble with the multiple point auto focusing, as it wasn’t always spot on, so I set the 500D’s auto focus mode to use only the center auto focus point and seems to work; otherwise the camera’s focus seems to hesitate and can’t deal with the lens’ rather shallow DOF.
- It you like dropping or banging your equipment around, the plasticky housing/mechanism on this lens is definitely not for you.
- Accidentally moving the ring in auto focus mode (yes, I know it’s not designed for this) almost feels like the gears will strip.
- Auto focus is pretty fast and accurate, so long as I set my 500D single-point-auto-focus and is aimed precisely on the an edge of something, rather that a flat/featureless surface. I always point at the eyelids when auto focusing, then I shift the camera to position the frame.
- Though the flash is not needed indoors for this lens, at a 7.1 lens aperture setting with a Canon ETTL flash, in bounce mode, adds a touch of perfection.
- Outdoors at f/7.1 colors look rich, distant trees don’t turn to green mush like some other lenses and focus is fast and accurate.
Overall, I’m pretty happy with this lens, but it almost looks like it’s made of sugar glass construction. I guess I’ll have to see about its reliability in the long run. But for the price (vs other prime lens), I can’t really complain.
Great basketball pictures
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
Novice photographer: I purchased this lens to get better indoor basketball pictures with my canon EOS40D. The f1.8 gave incredibly better pictures than the f3.5 lens I was using. Not being able to zoom has taken some getting used to, but the quality of picture is more than worth the trade-off. This lens stops the action so well. As many have noted, the construction does feel a little light, but with care, and for the price, I plan on using this lens alot.
One of the best items I bought!!
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
Wow…it’s one of the excellent stuffs I bought for my camera. The quality was really wonderful. All of my friends like it and definitely will buy one for themselves. With this price and this kind of quality….I really recommend to have one in your bag!!
A double treat
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
I bought this to go with my original EOS-1 film camera. 50mm has been the standard lens that others are judged by for decades. I had everything from 20mm to 600mm and was a photojournalist.
When I reluctantly went digital I was pleasantly surprised by the field of view change. The REAL portrait lens for 35mm was the 85mm 1.8. With the limited compression it has the same perspective as the human eye.
When put on the digital camera, the field of view is 1:6 compared to the 35mm. That bumps the lens up to 80mm on a 35mm camera. It’s the perfect portrait lens for using available light. There’s an intimacy to available light you don’t get with flash. I can go just about anywhere and it’s fast enough to shoot with ambient light. Focus is fast and sure. It’s light as a feather.
The lens is plastic but unless you plan to use it as a hockey puck, I don’t think you’ll have many problems. And you can buy 2-3 for the same price as the 1.4 version.
A Must Have for Every EOS Owner
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
I recently purchased the Canon T1i with the kit lens. I also picked up this lens because of its attractive low price tag. This 1.8 has become my standard lens as opposed to the kit lens. It is fast, takes great pictures in very low light, and the clarity is incredible. The bokeh is very impressive and distortion is nonexistent. My only complaint, and it is a small one, is with the build quality. It is all plastic and looks somewhat cheap, but then again, it is a cheap lens that takes excellent pictures. Save the extra money you would have spent on a 1.4 and buy yourself something nice; besides the price you won’t notice the difference.
Avoid this lens, flat in color, hurrible AF.
Rating:2 out of 5 stars
Good lens are expensive and when people find a nice piece of glass for cheap the buzz goes around. Many time that buzz is spread by people who have never owned or used the lens. It becomes automatic assumption that because it is a 50mm prime, it should be great. Don’t believe the hype.
The first buzz about this lens is its advantage to the Nikon equivalent because this lens will AF with all the Canon Rebels DSLR. Just be ware that the AF on this lens is horribly inaccurate so you will end up having to manual focus anyways, and that is a pain because of the design of the AF ring.
The second buzz about this lens is that it is great for low light photography because its f1.8 max aperture. Just be aware that this lens is useless at f1.8, it is soft and flat in color, and I mean it. This lens becomes useful only after f2.8 so the whole low light advantage is only a myth.
To be honest, I have gotten better and sharper results from the camera kit lens and for that I would caution you to spend your money wisely on a different lens.
Biggest Bang for the Buck or The Right Lense for the Right Camera
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
First, I would like to give a little back ground on myself ie history; My first camera was an A95 which I bought for $200. This is a small hand held camera which I would only use for its auto focuse as I had no other idea how to use a camera. Now this camera took absolutely amazing pictures in high light situations, as good as a DSLR that was supposed to be far above it. However I found myself very unhappy with not being able to capture low light photos without a flash. With a flash the image or scene is simply ruined in my opinion.
Second, What was I looking for in a camera and lens; I wanted a camera that could take photos in doors outside etc in extremely low light with no flash at all. I wanted to be able to capture moments not portriaghts that are so unatural. IMO real photography is spontaneous, it just happens and then it is gone like that ie like a shooting star. I wanted to capture those shooting stars.
Third, My references to which judege and decide what camera and lens to pick; My father is a semi-profesional photographer. He uses Nikon, which is supposed to make some of the best lenses if not the best lenses there is. I would look at his photos and I simply did not like the colors at all. Further he used a flash and I did not like that at all, it made the photos unrealistic and I simply did not want to carry around all this heavy equipement.
Fourth, My Choice; I decided that I loved the colors and abilities of my A95, for me there is no better color capture capabilities than a Canon. Next I wanted to keep my camera as small and light as possbile, further I thought of the types of photos I was taking most often. I found that 90% of them required no zoom, I did not want nore need zoom and I prefer to get into the action of my subject or scene inorder to capture these moments.
So with all this in perspective I realised I wanted something more than some reble, but I did not want to go beyond the price range of $600.00. What to do? I bought a used 20D, used? Heck it was as new as new could be for $500.00. Next I looked at lenses my two choices for this camera were the 1.8 ($89.00) and 1.4 ($350.00, with the 1.8 I was able to stay in my perfect price range. If I had the extra budget I would 100% go with the 1.4, don’t even hesitat.
Results; I use three different modes on this camera, I am no expert at all so I need this setup to do as much as the work as possible if not all the work. That is exactly what this camera and lense does, I use the auto P, portriat, and action settings. I may not be a professional on dialing the camera settings in, however what I am a professional at is choice of scene, use of natural light, etc. The result is absolutely amazing, I did not expect these results, however the photos I have produced are absolutely professional. The quality of some of the photos are 100% magazine material, everyone in my family are asking me to take photos for me and my father is out right considering ditching his Nikons for a Canon.
Conclusion; Did I make the right choice? Heck yes I did, you are not a professional if you have all this absurde equipment you have to carry with you, and how often do you even use your zoom for that matter? I have shown my work to some professionals and they didn’t even believe that I took the photos! They got really snotty with me telling me the merit of flashes, you have to have a zoom lens etc.
Listen I can caputre my family, friends, animals outside at dusk and inside the house at night time. You are missing out on real photography and real moments. Stand still portiats are lame, my christmas card was 6 kids sprinting full speed in a race towards me out side. Never seen that before, time to change the game back to what it used to be, down with the flash!
super fragile great lens
Rating:4 out of 5 stars
Like others I had one split open while in my camera bag (no bouncing). Other than that it’s great. So be extra extra careful and enjoy this cheap lens.
Cheap lens that delivers high quality photos
Rating:4 out of 5 stars
This lens is exactly as most reviewers describe it…it is very cheaply constructed, but the glass is good giving excellent images so as long as you’re not subjecting it to abuse or bad weather you should be fine. For the money, this is the best deal you are going to find on a lens that is excellent for portraits and low-light shots.
I bought this for portrait shots using my Canon Rebel XSi and it is absolutely awesome in this capacity. On a cropped-frame Digital SLR like mine it views at 80mm so if you are going to use it to shoot portraits just make sure you have at least 5 ft from camera to subject (for head/shoulder shots) and another 4-5 feet from subject to background/backdrop.
I also noticed that at its widest (f/1.8) the center is tack sharp but the edges are a bit soft, which is not neccesarily a bad thing if you want/like that look. If you want sharp edges you would just need to stop down a couple steps to say f/4 (aka “the sweet spot”).
I also shot some outside images of flowers and such and did notice that the bokeh can be a bit sloppy, especially in “busy” backgrounds (pentagon-shaped blades to blame here) so you would probably NOT want to buy this lens if your main purpose was to capture nice background blur. You would probably want to spend the extra money and get the 50mm f/1.4 lens.
That’s why I think this lens is primarily suitable for PORTRAIT SHOTS where the background is typically a nice muslin/vinyl backdrop where the bokeh really wouldn’t be distracting. People have told me that the portrait shots I took with white/black backdrops looked very professional.
Best Cheap Lens Out There
Rating:4 out of 5 stars
This lens is probably the best kept secret out there. For the price, you will not find a better lens for portraiture. Sure, the all-plastic construction makes it look like cheapy knock-off, but it’s not like the lens has to do any heavy lifting. Normal care taken in installing and removing this lens will ensure years of shooting. And no one can beat the Canon lens technology.
Great entry-level lens
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
I’m sure I have nothing new to add here. This lens is great, it’s made of plastic so pro’s probably don’t like it, but other than that, it takes great shots at great shutter speeds. Drastically out-performs the kit lens for your everyday portrait shots. I’d say if you’re new to professional-ish photography, and already have a body, I’d probably get this lens second, and then a speedlite flash. That, combined with your kit lens, should give you a very good setup for most everyday pictures.
Perfect for beginners and intermediate users
Rating:5 out of 5 stars
This is a must-have lens for any non-professional photographer, they need to go to the 1.4 or 1.2 version. But, for the rest of us, this is a perfect buy. Say goodbye to blurry shots where they once dominated, this opens up and lets in so much light compared to a kit or even a f2 lens. no its not macro, and probably not as wide as some would like, but that just makes you think a bit before just shooting, about the composition and what you want or dont want in the photo.
this lens teaches how to frame and compose very much because its not all that wide. EXCELENT for all beginners.
Cool Lens To Play With
Rating:4 out of 5 stars
I’ve had this lens for just under a year and it has been really fun to play with. It allows you to open up the aperture very wide and shoot in very low light situations. You will also be able to create a very shallow depth of field in any situation by opening up the aperture so wide. For a lens that is under $100 dollars it gives you the most fun for your $. However if you’re looking for superior image quality: sharpness and clarity then this lens is not for you. If you are just learning and playing around with low light photography and shallow depth of field it is perfect. Other than that you need to invest in something much more expensive to get something that will not have soft focus or ghosting effects.