"Four-Pound Show-Down" Test (with 1755IS)

I'll leave the password requirement off for a few days so all the good folks here can view this test. The new 1755IS sets the bar for this zoom range in many facets. The main strengths of this lens are:

*Sharpness: wide open at both center and edge is the best I've seen in this lens category; by f4 it can do surgery.
*Contrast: easily L, enough said.
*Bokeh: very pleasing and smooth.

The main weaknesses of this lens are:

*Light fall-off: at f2.8 it's quite pronounced, though by f4 it's much improved.
*Build: similar to the 10-22, so it's good but not L.
*Flare: this is the big sore spot IMO of this lens.

I hope this contributes to the overall online "data points" for this tremendous lens. I welcome your comments here or at my site. I'll be putting back the password requirement after a few days or once this thread dies down. Thereafter, you can email me for the password if need be.

http://www.pbase.com/l​ightrules/fourpoundsho​wdown

jojo,
just sent you an email to borrow the Toke for a 100 macro eval.

Thanks for the tests. I'll be interested to see how many end up buying this lens. Maybe its just me, but it seems like a lot of money for an EF-S lens. Your tests do make it look pretty good though, except for the flare.

I think this lens will sell very well. In terms of both specs and actual performance, it's very impressive. I think those that Canon has targeted for this lens will not mind so much that it is EFS once they actually handhold it and use it and see how good it can be. Considering there is no lens like it, it will sell. My biggest gripe is that Canon didn't include a plastic hood with its $1200 price tag. I truly have no words to describe this omission.

Great test as usual fstop. The Sigma EX does pretty good in comparison, but the new EFS IS has a little bit of an edge.

Hi Jojo, thanks for the great test. I had a question though, and its slightly offtopic. How come your lens tests are requiring a password now? I haven't been around in a while.

Very cool, thanks for the access.

I have been searching for the perfect walkaround lans for my 20D. The 24-70L isn't it because its too heavy, and the 17-85 IS isn't as fast as I would like. I have used the 17-55 IS several times now in auditorium events, and so far it is doing the job in low light. Soon I will have a few outdoor shoots under my belt, so I will see how it does there. But this may well be the perfect walkaround lens.

I would be interested to see a comparison test of the 17-55 IS with the 24-70 L. I realize there is a skew in the ranges, but it would still be interesting to see how they compare.

In the meantime, I am waiting for the hood to arrive at B&H.

Have Fun,

Nice job, f/stop. The 17-55 has some merit, and I think it'll sell well. Especially after the introductory "Canon pricing" drops down a bit.

I'm curious to know what you are doing with a scale like that... :P I know of only three purposes. One, to measure food weight. Two, to measure packages for proper postage... and Three... lol... hmmmmmm. :P Just kidding. I've come to value your testing. Good work as always.

It is a lens with great optics. Thanks for the test. I was so skeptical looking at sample images on pbase.com... your test did justice to what it's capable of.

My biggest gripe, however, is why wouldnt Canon make it an EF mount. How much more (technically) difficult is that? It feels sorta like getting an 4Ghz CPU that's locked to run at 2. And plus, I would have thought EF-s lens are made to excel in suppressing flare and internal reflections. That seems quite the contrary to the EF.

The absence of a hood comes close second. that's really cheap too.

Incredirebelz, its easier to make a lens with a smaller diameter at the output, like the new ef-s lenses. Its easier to manufacture in terms of quality (meaning its easier to design a pro level lens thats smaller). I think it's more complicated that you think it is. It would be a completely different design if it weren't ef-s.

Incredirebelz wrote:
My biggest gripe, however, is why wouldnt Canon make it an EF mount. How much more (technically) difficult is that? It feels sorta like getting an 4Ghz CPU that's locked to run at 2. And plus, I would have thought EF-s lens are made to excel in suppressing flare and internal reflections. That seems quite the contrary to the EF.

The absence of a hood comes close second. that's really cheap too.

An EF mount lens of this focal length range would be much larger, and would likely have serious distortion and CA issues especially towards the edges and corners of the image. Look at the size of the ultrawide 16-35 and you can see that extending the range into the "normal" focal length would require more design compromises than it already incorporates. It's technically difficult to build long-range zooms that include ultrawide-angle focal lengths, because there are corrective requirements that become more critical as the angle-of-view becomes wider.

Of course, if you want an EF full-frame lens with an equivalent angle-of-view, a 28-90 f/2.8 would be comparably easy to build, but I don't see Canon making that while selling the 24-70/2.8 lens.

Given the good reviews I've seen for the Tamron 17-50 and Sigma 18-50 EX and the fact that the Tokina 16-50 is coming, I'd have a hard time buying a 17-55 IS. Since the Tamron and Sigma lenses can be had for $410-$450, jumping up to $1179 seems a bit much. IS is not worth that much to me, so I'll be interested to see comparisons with the Tamron and upcoming Tokina.

What's interesting to me, from a business standpoint, are the lack of choices from Canon for standard zooms. We have the 17-85 on one end at 500 dollars which doesn't score very well with optical performance, and we have a plastic, hoodless, 1200 dollar lens on the other end.

Yet, here comes Tamron, Sigma, and soon Tokina delivering outstanding optics for less then then optically lackluster 17-85. All 3 companies filling a niche Canon doesn't address: a well made, optically outstanding, non-IS standard zoom.

While the canon looks to be an outstanding lens in allmost every area i would allmost certainly choose something else. Not nessesarily because of cost, but more that i don't have the option of buying the canon without the expensive image stabilization.

Or to put it another way- anything that comes close in sharpness i'd consider a serious contender for my $.Currently the tamron is easily the best runner up choice to the canon.I think i can safely forget about the sigma 18-50/2.8 due to very lame performace at the long end plus too much CA.


As an interesting aside- I STILL don't like canon's ongoing choice to ignore in body image stabilization.While Minolta was a dubious option i see now that Pentax have joined in with it's new K100.It has in body stabilization **AND** a huge number of great lenses to use on it ,both old and new