Canon EF-S 18-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IS

[barrett14]

I am by no means qualified to give you a legitimate review on this lens as I am pretty new to photography. That said, I took a couple of pictures with my new 18-135, and tried to replicate a few of the pictures with the 18-55 IS T1i kit lens for comparison. I will post them side by side with the settings and am eager to hear your opinion.

Picture One:
18-55 lens
ISO - 200
1/250 sec.
F/11
18mm
18-55 lens.jpg

Picture Two:
18-135 lens
Settings same as pic 1
18-135 lens.jpg

I didn't realize there is a two picture limit so let me reply with more pictures.

[barrett14]

ok Picture three

Lens: 18-55
F/11
1/160
ISO 200
length 55mm
18-55 lens-2.jpg

Lens 18-135
Same settings as above
18-135 lens-2.jpg

[barrett14]

18-55mm
F/6.3
1/20
ISO 400
18mm
18-55 lens-3.jpg

18-135
same as above
18-135 lens-7.jpg

[barrett14]

18-55
F/6.3
ISO 400
1/15 sec
55mm
18-55 lens-4.jpg

18-135
same
18-135 lens-8.jpg

[barrett14]

And these are all the 18-135. Both of these are at 135mm
18-135 lens-3.jpg

18-135 lens-4.jpg

[barrett14]

both of these are also 135mm

18-135 lens-5.jpg

18-135 lens-6.jpg

[barrett14]

last one at 135mm

18-135 lens-9.jpg

[barrett14]

Originally Posted by toxic

No one can tell much of anything from web-sized images, unless it's a terrible lens.

Bokeh looks promising, though.

here are the full size photos on flickr

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cbcampb...7622468264487/

Also I am going to a hockey game tomorrow so I will post some results from that...

p.s. any tips on how to make sure the ice doesn't turn out gray?

[Rubberhead]

The colors of the 18-135mm look much richer.

[amfoto1]

So, let's see... The lens just arrived, you fixed yourself a drink and are happily taking photos out the window with it, right?

Looks pretty good. I wonder if the plan is for it to replace the 28-135. Canon has been stuffing those into kits for a couple years now, like they had a huge stockpile somewhere.

Can you please look at the instructions that came with the lens and let us know if it says that IS must be shut off if the lens is used on a tripod? I suspect not, but am curious if it's like the 28-135 in that respect.

[amfoto1]

Originally Posted by barrett14

p.s. any tips on how to make sure the ice doesn't turn out gray?

Yes, don't rely on the camera's internal meter at all, or any of the camera's auto exposure modes.

Instead use M mode and a separate incidence meter to set your exposure parameters (both shutter and aperture).

Alternatively, use either Av or Tv and dial in some + exposure compensation. How much will depend upon exactly how much of the white expanse is in each image, i.e. how much it will influence (as in "fool") the camera's internal meter into underexposing everything (not just the ice). Take some test shots. Check the histogram. With snow outside the general rule of thumb is between 1 full stop and 1.66 stops + exposure will usually get you in the ball park. It's a little harder to guesstimate under artificial lighting. I'd start around +1 and see how that works.

An incidence meter is more accurate, faster and easier, IMO.

Depending upon the lights, it might be good to set a custom white balance, too... or shoot RAW and tweak white balance later in post processing.

[tkbslc]

Originally Posted by barrett14

p.s. any tips on how to make sure the ice doesn't turn out gray?

Set EC to +2/3 would probably do the trick along with manual white balance.

[tundraman]

Darn. I was really hoping this lens would have better IQ. Oh well.

[johnbachel]

I think the pictures with your new lens look good. I'm not sure if there is some barrel distortion in the first photo of the skyline, but otherwise, I don't see anything to complain about.

Remember that much of the commentary about lenses on this site involves people looking at huge blow-ups of images (much larger than they would ever print or view pictures). At these large magnifications, the relatively small differences in sharpness betweeh lenses look more important than they are in reality.

Also, other lens characteristics that are more important, such as barrel or pincushion distortion, or chromatic aberration (where different colors fail to focus at the same point), often get less attention than the maximum resolution that a lens can produce when photographing a black and white test chart.

While I don't plan to buy the new 18-135, my impression is that it will work well for those who want a single lens that can cover a large range of focal lengths.

[DreDaze]

i haven't really seen any sites with reviews on this one yet...but i think the-digital-picture.com should have one soon...they've got it in their ISO chart so you can compare it to other lenses...honestly...doesn't look good.

http://www.the-digital-picture.com/R...mp=3&APIComp=0