Canon lenses are fantastic. They’re the ones that I use for nearly all the product images I shoot for our reviews of books, cameras, lenses, lights, etc. Indeed, the lenses and the cameras work together to have a look. I don’t care about clinical image quality, insane sharpness, vignetting, etc when I work with them. And honestly, neither should you because you’re probably going to try to fix it in post-production anyway. Instead, I just load up some of Thomas Frannson’s film profiles onto my cameras and shoot. But there’s a problem with Canon lenses: the affordable ones are missing a big thing.
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Affordable Canon Lenses Pale in Comparison
Compare the Canon 35mm f1.8 to Nikon’s or Panasonic Lumix‘s. The Canon variant has macro abilities and image stabilization while being very affordable. Nikon’s is nearly $900 and Panasonic’s is close to $700. Nikon considers the 35mm to be in its S lineup, which is the equivalent of Canon’s L lenses. But Panasonic doesn’t call their 35mm part of their Lumix S Pro lineup.
So why is the Canon lens inferior? Well, let’s look at the facts. Canon is winning without a doubt on the macro abilities. But both Nikon and Panasonic camera bodies have incredible image stabilization. The Panasonic S5 II has been lauded across the industry for its incredible abilities to be handheld at very slow shutter speeds. Nikon has it too with a camera like the Nikon Zf. By all means, those lenses don’t really need more image stabilization.
So why are Panasonic and Nikon so much more expensive? It has to do with build quality. Those lenses are going to last longer.
Read This Section Very Carefully
Some reviewers talk about build quality in terms of just weather sealing. But that’s where we also need to clear up a fact. Weather-sealing is the wrong word. You can’t fully seal against the elements; and the folks over at Lensrentals agree with us on that. However, you can make something weather resistance.
Now here’s another mind-blowing fact: you should think about the word weather as the idea of something weathering away and not about the elements. This will put it more under a durability category — which then acts as an umbrella for resistance to the elements, dust, sand, and overall longevity.
If you’re not using your cameras and lenses often, then this might not be a big problem if they’re in a bag tucked away nice and safe. But if they’re gathering dust, being left in a car on hot sunny days, or being used every day, then there could be an issue. The biggest nightmare situation I’ve seen is someone taking a camera out of their jacket pocket with no lens cap on and no back cap for their lens.
Let’s apply this now: the Nikon lens and Panasonic lens are bound to last you longer. The Canon lens probably won’t, and there’s over a decade of evidence to back this up. Just think about their nifty 50 series of lenses. Back during the DSLR days, I’ve also had problems with their 85mm f1.8 and others. By all means, they really haven’t changed that much in their philosophy as a company. The Canon EOS R8 and all the cheaper APS-C cameras that get the prices driven down greatly during the holidays is further evidence of this. Canon has a one year warranty, and so does Panasonic. But according to Ken Rockwell, Nikon’s warranty is perhaps the best. If you have to buy another Canon RF 35mm f1.8 lens, that makes Nikon’s variant seem very much worth the money.
More importantly, Canon doesn’t give any weather resistance to their non-L lenses.
Canon Can Step Up
In the long run, I think that if Canon doesn’t start giving more love to their non-L lenses, then they’re probably going to fall behind Sony, Nikon, and Panasonic in some ways. Canon hasn’t really lost the #1 sales position really; but they’ve surely lost market share over the years.
And here’s the biggest part of it all: everyone is getting smarter about cameras. The most common camera around is still the iPhone and there are fewer and fewer reasons to get a real camera.