Canon EF-S 10 mm-22 mm F/3.5-4.5 USM Lens

I'm a technical type, with a photographic background using film. My spouse wanted to get into digital photography, so I got drafted into this new territory. My spouse's favorite word is "medium", so that was our goal: to buy a digital SLR camera and accessories, which wouldn't limit our creativity, while not draining our savings. Initially, we bought a small sensor (APS-C) camera with a standard (medium) zoom and telephoto (longer) zoom lenses, all OEM. The medium zoom lower focal lengths dipped down into the wide angle range, but it wasn't wide enough to get entire large objects in short distances. So I went Online to gather specifications, options, and reviews. There are the people who backpack, so weight is a factor. There are the people that are most concerned with price, so third party lenses are a consideration. There are the people that want to use a lens, for both APS-C and full frame 35mm applications. Then, there are the people who want more focal lengths built into the same zoom lens. To me, the latter is most important. I want a lens to do more; to pick up where my other lenses left off, but it has to do it with quality! I did not care if the lens could be used, for both APS-C and full frame 35mm applications. Being "medium", my spouse wanted it all, except being able to use the same lens, for both APS-C and full frame 35mm applications. According to my research of ultra-wide zoom lenses, which would fit our camera, the Canon EF-S 10-22MM F/3.5-4.5 USM Lens seemed to meet most of what we wanted. After using the lens, for a while, we found that if there is any problem, it is with us and our inexperience. Because it is an ultra-wide and if a lens protecting UV filter is used, the filter should be thin or some vignetting may occur. A lens hood should be used, especially outdoors to limit reflections and other stray light, from entering the lens. The built-in camera flash coverage is not wide enough. Flash fall-off appears around the edges, and a shadow of the lens appears at the bottom of the photo. This can be overcome by zooming out and later cropping out the flash fall-off and shadow, or buying a separate automatic flash, made for ultra-wide lenses. Overall, the lens has been great; a joy to use, a wonder to learn, and has not disappointed us yet!

PRO’s :
Surprisingly very sharp lens, excellent color rendition and contrast resulting in punchy images without excessive photo shopping needed.. excellent super wide angle lens for 1.6 crop sensors.

Con’s :
No “L” denomination but optically it is “L” quality glass, reversed focus/zoom position, no lens hood included for the price charged.

I had my copy of my Canon 10-22 now for about 6 months, I have been very surprised by the image quality of this lens.

Optically the image quality is very good wide open, but absolutely shines stopped down to f5.6- 8.0. Wide open (10 mm) there is some softness in the corners visible, which is really inherent with wide angle lenses, but again gets quite better stopped down to f5.6. The saturation/colors, contrast in the images are just splendid and have a 3D feel to it, creating the pop and punch what makes the images so beautiful.

The distortions (barrel and pin cushion) is so well controlled with this marvelous optic, I only need to change perspective, and everything will straighten-up, if desired of course! This “fisheye-effect” this super wide angle lens provides can be both good and bad, depending on your personal style and creativity…The flare with this lens is very well controlled, to the point that a hood is in 95% of the shots taken really not necessary. Vignetting or light falloff of in the corners of the image is visible wide open at 10mm (taken picture of blue sky for example) but still very well controlled and quite less vignetting is present when stopped down to f8.0. Just be careful to use thin-filters, standard ones make matters quite worse. Chromatic aberrations (purple fringing) are present with this lens, nevertheless the use of the super UD glass element. I found that -all by all- it is not super bad at 10 mm and gets actually pretty good at 22 mm; but I would have hoped it was better since Canon has some lenses where it is quite better…
Regarding the built and handling of this lens it is for sure not the same feel as the “L” Lenses; nevertheless the zoom ring has been a joy to use, silky smooth since it came out of the box. The reversed focus/zoom position does take some getting used to, but one learns…Note that this lens is not weather sealed, but currently no canon crop-sensor body is neither….thus what is the point? The canon auto focus (AF) motor design per USM, is super fast, accurate and basically noise free. Nothing more can be anticipated really from the AF, as good as it gets in my opinion…

In conclusion:

Very sharp super wide angle lens even wide open but absolutely shines at f5.6 to f8.0, definitely the “sweet spot range for optimal optical quality (sharpness, minimize vignetting, and CA ” . The images have a 3D quality to them, without excessive distortion, creating bold and punchy images straight out of the box. Basically best super wide angle lens in my books, making it an enormous fun and creative lens. Optically, it is awesome. It's definitely an “L” version for us 1.6 crop sensors.

However, for a “non-L” lens, it isn't cheap. On top of that there is no hood included for the price since this is not an “L”….

I have these 2 wide-angle lenses that I'd like to discuss:

1. Canon wide-angle zoom 10-22mm
2. Canon wide-angle Tilt/Shift 24mm

It's hard to compare these 2 lenses since they are different in function. The Tilt/Shift 24mm is a moderate wide-angle lens. I say this because I have a new Canon T1i. Since it has a smaller sensor, the multiplication factor is 1.6, leaving me with a lens of 1.6 x 24mm = 38.4mm, which is not as much of a "wide-angle" anymore.

The main advantages (if Photoshop distortion corrections are not considered) of this lens is to correct for distortions due to wide angle lenses when they are aimed up or down. Aiming a wide-angle lens up or down (for buildings let's say) increases perspective
(size distortion) from the bottom to the top. A tapering effect occurs, with the bottom broadened, and the top minimized. A second major advantage is to allow the lens to angle left or right, or top to bottom) which allows for enhanced focus. Canon has incorporated the tilt/shift components from the large-format cameras into their 35mm lenses. If you Google the words "Scheimpflug Rule", you'll find explanations on how the view camera was used to minimize distortion, and maximize focus. That's what Canon (and I'm sure Nikon) have done with these tilt/shift lenses.

However, with the added advantages of the tilt/shift come some disadvantages. I haven't had enough time to verify what I am about to write, but this is what I've read: The more you tilt and shift the lens, the more you will decrease even illumination across the image-capture sensor. If you enlarged an image captured with tilt/shift movements, you'd noticedarkened corners form the lens movements. Of course, with "Photoshop", it's easy to dodge to balance the exposure in the 4 corners.

Shift means to slide the lens to the left/right or top/bottom. To avoid building distortion (top/bottom), you need to keep your lens and camera parallel to the building. Of course, with most buildings, and their locations (confined downtown areas), it's now at easy as it seems. If you do keep the lens parallel, with the building, you might chop off the top. Therefore, you can slide the lens to centre the building in the viewfinder and capture it all. This is one of the other advantages of this lens over other "normal" or zoom lenses.

Now the 10-22mm lens is a great lens for "sucking in the scene". What I mean by that is the lenses ability to take a small space and fit it into the small sensor of the T1i. The sensor size is 22.3mm x 14.9mm (smaller than the full-frame Mark III which is 24mm x 36mm - former 35mm film camera).

However, even on the T1i, the 10-22mm translates by the 1.6 factor into 26mm-35.2mm as a zoom. I tried the 24mm TS on my living room after I had shot the living room with the 10-22mm set at 10mm. There's no comparison when it comes to capturing a small-sized area with a wide-angle lens.
The 10-22mm easily wins for image area capture! However, if you had more space to work with ,then you easily use the 24mm TS to max the depth-of-field, and minimize distortion. However, distortion can be corrected easily (with some loss of image area) through the use of Photoshop (Select All, then Image>>Edit>>Trans​form or Image Transform).

Another interesting feature of the tilt/shift lens 24mm is it's ability to distort more,and to decrease the focus. WIth the change in photography "styles" to selective focus, this lens can be used with its' movements to this advantage.

SB

Very pleased with this lens. Versetile, crisp, clear, fast, light weight, it could nicely complete your lens collection. I would buy it again.
This is really an amazing lens for a canon crop camera.
I purchased to fill out my wide angle options on my 7D, as I also have the Canon 24-70mm. Great image quality, auto focus, and construction, just as all the reviews say. It does take some practice to use the ultra wide range of this lens effectively, but the longer range gives great results right away.

really made for beginners! good battery life, Nice features/settings, Quick Start-up time, excellent image quality, Superior build quality, Bright LCD, Solid Operation, Lightweight/Portable, Simple controls/menu, easy to use
Having had a canon sure shot for years i decided to go a step up and purchased the Rebel XS. So far i am very impressed with the quality and ease of operation of this camera. Canon has come through with this camera fpr people that want a great entry level digital SLR