Reviewed by Ben Lee, http://dslrlensesonline.com editor.

canon 10-22mm

The Canon EF-S 10-22mm  is one of the highest quality lenses to not wear the coveted L series designation.

Rating: ★★★★☆

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It is of course an ultra wide-angle lens and if you have done any amount of research at all up until the point of arriving on this page you will know that they tend to suffer from distortion and corner sharpness falloff.

The good news is that the distortion levels in the 10-22 far exceed its competitors in the wide angle market and what little distortion does pop up is easily corrected in Photoshop.

Shoot with a Canon 1.6x body? Get a Canon 10-22!

Chances are that if you are looking at buying this lens, then you have a vested interest in either landscapes, architecture or street life or something which commands a wide field of view.

If that sounds like you, then you absolutely have to own this lens. Aside from fitting everything into the shot, you will get tack sharp, colorful and well contrasted images every time.

The Good
  • value for money
  • fast, silent and efficient auto focus system
  • accurate color and contrast reproduction
  • little distortion
  • 16-35mm full frame equivalent – this lens fills a gaping void in the APS-C sensor wide angle lens market
  • lightweight
  • flare resistant even without the high priced Canon hood (you should still buy a hood anyway, just to be on the safe side)
The Bad
  • not a general purpose walk around lens – there will be many situations where the 10-22 simply won’t be practical
  • slight corner softness at 10mm and equally minimal chromatic aberration at this focal length
  • not compatible with full frame bodies
  • be careful not to use as a dedicated portraiture lens because it can distort faces (use from a distance!)

Canon 10-22mm reviews

The 10-22 has a very high approval rating amongst its current users – just about the highest rate of satisfaction I have seen for any lens that I have reviewed thus far.

M. A. Filippelli from Rosedale, CA. shared a glowing review of this lens, and you can really see his passion for photography and the lens in general shine through which is really inspiring to read:

I have had this lens for several months now and let me start out by saying WOW. I looked at the lens in the store along with the Sigma 12-24 and I was in total awe of what I saw though the view finder with the Canon 10-22…

…. The 10-22mm is equivalent to 16-35mm field of view using a canon 20D which is not a full frame sensor. With a minimum focal distance of .24m (about 9.5 inches) you can get very close to objects and still get alot of focal width in the photo. There is incredible clarity in the lens.

The photos I have taken are very clear with only a slight hint of softening at the corners at 10mm; everything else is sharp after that. There is a little barrel distortion at 10mm but everything else up to 22mm is nice. I have not gotten any light flare in my photos. The Ultrasonic motor is very quiet. The depth of field is outstanding.

Conclusion

The Canon 10-22 is a simple but highly effective lens and apart from being optically brilliant, it also feels “right” in your hands. It is decently constructed and doesn’t feel cheap, but I use the term cheap loosely here.

What do I mean by this? The lens is under $1000 but has the performance specifications that are more suited to L series glass that is 3 or 4 times the price. Value for money may be the more correct term here, because you are getting truckloads of it.

Image quality (sharpness, corner softness, flare, etc.) – Rating: ★★★★☆
Build quality (dust and moisture resistance, plastic or metal?) Rating: ★★★★☆
Ease of use (weight, size, controls, popular filter size?) – Rating: ★★★★☆
Lens features (auto-focus, IS, full time manual focus?) – Rating: ★★★★☆
Value for money (all of the above measured against price) – Rating: ★★★★½

The auto-focus system in this lens is not the fastest in the world, but the reasonably low maximum aperture and wide field of view ensure that most hand held images will require a fast shutter speed and hence be very sharp indeed.

The only real problems you are going to have with this lens are accidentally including your feet, your shadow or your tripod legs in the bottom area of the photo because of the extremely wide field of view.

Of course, being able to fit so much into the frame is both a blessing and a curse. On one hand it can make your photos look cluttered and busy but on the other, it can force you to carefully compose your shot and use the wide angle view to your ultimate advantage.

This is only even minutely negative aspect of this lens though – and you will get used to not including foreign objects in your shots over time. To me that says that this lens is pretty good.

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Filed under: Canon DSLR Lenses

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