Contemplating a wide-angle

[AlanBeard]

Well, the thread title kinda says it all, it's the only lens i don't have and as i'm heading off on holiday a few times this year i thought now would be a good time to invest. I've got a 50D and i've heard good things about Sigma's 10-20mm, but can anyone offer any opinions/alternatives? i can't afford to spend shedloads so i'm going to have to avoid anything from Canon.

Cheers in advance.

 

[deadprez69]

I went for the Tokina 12-24 F4. Price wise it is in between the sigma & the Canon at around £450.

The build quality & picture is excellent.

 

[Craft]

In the January issue of photoplus they did a test of the UWA lenses, might be worth seeing if you can still find it somewhere...

Summary from the article:

Canon 10-20 f3.5-4.5
+ Natural handling with familiar Canon layout. Crisp image quality
- Too expensive, no lens hood
85%

Sigma 10-20 f3.5 EX DC HSM
+ Reasonably fast constant aperture, usual Sigma refinements
- Optical quality doesn't warrant extra outlay
84%

Sigma 10-20 f4-5.6 EX DC HSM
+ Compact design, high quality finish, good optics
- Not the sharpest when wide open
88%

Tamron SP AF 10-24 f3.5-4.5 Di II
+ Enormous zoom range, great optics
- Autofocus a little slow & noisy compared with others
90%

Tokina AF 11-16 f2.8 AT-X 115 PRO DX
+ Stunning optics, battleship like build quality
- Lacking autofocus refinement, limited zoom range
92%

Tokina AF 12-24mm f4 AT-X 124 PRO DX II
+ Very well built with new optical coatings
- Sharpness and widest angle of view a little disappointing
79%

They covered a few fish eye lenses as well, but have left those out.

hope it helps.

 

[andyred]

for the Sigma 10-20mm, the others listed above are well worth a look

 

[AlanBeard]

hmm, well i guess that's food for thought, thanks for the highlights from the test results Craft, much appreciated. just have to make my mind up now! got plenty of time to do that though, fortunately.

 

[specialman]

I'd probably narrow it down to these:

Canon 10-22mm f/3.5-4.5
Expensive but IQ is very good and of course, you're buying OEM gear that is designed to work flawlessly with your camera. No constant aperture though.

Tokina 12-24mm f/4
Probably the best value zoom around I think; great IQ (best around probably) and a good zoom range. Constant aperture, which is handy.

Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8
Aside from that fast constant aperture (very useful for low-light and DoF work, this is the lens that should really get everyone's votes; it's wide, has brilliant IQ and is well built. The only downside is the very short zoom range that almost makes it a prime.

The Tamron will have good IQ if the other Tamrons I've seen are anything to go by (I use a Tammy 17-50mm for magazine work - brilliant) but is probably a bit lacking in AF speed and a bit noisey. I don't rate Sigmas; overpriced, badly made, inaccurate AF in some cases and distortion that I've seen ruin an image.

Just my two penneth (by the way, I went for a nIkon 12-24 because I got a good deal; one of the Tokinas was my choice if I bought new)....