Canon EF 20-35mm f/3.5-4.5 USM

I bought this lens second-hand off craigslist. It came with a it's dedicated Canon lens hood, a Canon EOS Rebel G 35mm body, 500 sheets of 4x6 photo paper, 400 sheets of 5x7 paper, and probably 50 rolls of various types of film. The entire bundle was $230, which I think is quite a deal.

On a 35mm (or full frame digital for that matter,) this lens is fantastic. 20mm gets a lot of picture in the frame. I can stand just a few feet away from a 15-story building and get the entire picture in the frame. The only hard thing with this lens on a full frame body is that it can be quite difficult composing the right picture- many distractions can come in the frame since the lens is so wide.

On a 1.6 crop body, this lens is quite wide as well. Testing out that 15-story building again, I simply had to take maybe 4 or 5 steps back to get the entire building in the frame. Personally, I like this lens on a 1.6 crop body better because I'd rather take a few steps back and get the entire building perfectly composed, rather than having to later edit out distractions and unwanted things that get into the frame in Photoshop due to a fullframe body.

Definitely get the lens hood for this lens (or any lens, really.)
I tried some test shots at f/8 without the lens hood where some of the sun was in the frame and there was very little, but noticeable upon further inspection flare. Throw the lens hood on and it's gone. The lens hood makes the difference of "almost perfect" and "perfect."

The USM focusing on the 20-35mm is SILENT. I put my ear up to it while it would autofocus and all I could hear was the peice from the distance scale moving back and forth. That's all.

I won't comment on distortion since I don't consider it to be a problem.

For your wide needs within a budget, definitely get this lens. I would get this lens over the 14mm and 15mm fisheye.

VERY lightweight, silent USM, 20-35mm, sharp

Limiting on 1.6 crop bodies, but once you learn how to combine the two- it's perfect.

Canon EF 15mm fisheye
Canon EF 14mm

Not used

I another Great lens from Canon. With Digital a tends to be a bit Consevative, However the image quality is very good. I recommend using dedicated Hood at all times.

- Sharp and Contrasty - USM motor with FTM - Good construction

- Large filter size

Sigma 20 f1.8 EX Tamron 17 f3.5 SP

noon needed

I believe this lens is too often overlooked as a serious consideration for a wide-angle zoom for the advanced amateur to semi-pro photographer. I have gotten very sharp prints at 9 X 13.5 inches. This lens has the inherent drawbacks of a consumer zoom (flare, distortion, etc) but it can be a very useful tool for general photography. There is surprising little light fall-off at its widest focal length on a film camera. The compact size and light weight are welcome attributes. This lens is a very good performer and an excellent value.

Very Sharp Decent Build Quality Excellent Value

Flare Distortion of Straight Lines These are limitations and should be expected of any consumer level zoom. These issues are able to be compensated, and for general, non-architectural photography this lens is more than worth its listed price.

Canon EF 28-105/3.5-4.5 USM The 20-35 is noticably sharper. size and weight of these two lenses are similar, though this lens has a very large front element (and accessories).

Not needed for this lens. Generally honest timely and fair customer service from Canon.

Reasonably sharp at 35mm, too soft at 20 and 25. Barrel distortion strong at 20 and 25, significant but ok at 35. Reasonable flare resistance with the expensive Canon hood. Good build quality, fast focussing. I would not trust this lens for critical work as sharpness leaves much to be desired. Useless for shooting straight lines (as in architecture) unless you use a Photoshop plug-in such as ImageAlign to remove the barrel distortion. OK for casual shooting.

Cheaper than the L lenses. Fast focus. Reasonably sized. Sharp enough at 35mm.

Soft at the wide end. Lots of barrel distortion. Slow.

Canon 16-35 L, 17-40 L.

Not needed.

As stated in the review below, this lens is a superb addition to your camera bag. I bought a brand new one. At the time it was a real toss up between this and the 17-40L but I found the following results - Distortion is a real issue for me and the 17-40 was rather disappointing indeed. The 20-35 had great distortion control and produced lovely colours. I scan slides, so Photoshop is the last word when it comes to contrast and sharpness but you need a start point to work with, so for half the price of the 17-40 you should really think whether the extra £300 is worth the money. The build is excellent, it feels far better than my 28-105. This lens is now my number 1 landscape workhorse. Dont follow the herd, give this a try and you will be very surprised!! A diamond lens. I own 2 other L series lenses and this is well on par (obviously not a 300 2.8L) but then again it is far more useful!

Excellent images when stopped down. Well built with good optics Excellent distortion, far better than digital brother the 17-40L (awful at 17 and 40mm with film camera)

None I can think of.

28-105 300 f2,8L 70-200 f2.8L