Canon 11-24mm Lens Review

Hi. This is Ian Plant with Outdoor Photography Guide. And today I'm gonna review a lens that has changed the way I approach photography. And that's cannon superb 11 to 24 millimeter lens. That's 11 millimeters on a full frame camera.

The widest angle of view you can get without shooting with a fisheye lens. So what makes this lens so different from other lenses is the extreme wide angle view. The ultra wide perspective that this lens offers. Now on the 24 millimeter end of the zoom range this is a pretty normal focal length but you can zoom all the way out to 11 which is the widest non-fisheye angle of view that's available for a full frame camera. So prior to Canon releasing the 11 to 24 the widest angle of view that was available for the most part was about 14 millimeters.

For example, Nikon had a really great zoom lens of 14 to 24 millimeter lens. That was for many years the gold standard among wide angles zooms. But this new Canon lens goes all the way to 11. Now, 11 may not seem that much of a difference compared to 14 but it's actually a huge difference. This is much wider of an angle of view than a 14 millimeter lens offers.

So the first time I looked through my camera with this lens attached at 11 millimeters I was like, wow, this is really amazing. This is different. This is gonna completely change the way I take pictures. It's important to note that this lens is really designed for full frame cameras. If you've got a crop sensor camera this lens is more lens than you'll ever need.

So you shouldn't waste your money on this lens if you've got a crop sensor camera, because you'll be paying for full frame performance that your camera can't use. This is a specialty lens. Not all scenes are going to call for such an ultra wide perspective. I think it's best used when you're shooting landscapes. If you're out in the open and you need lots and lots of foreground, and you have a lot of big clouds that are in the sky above you.

So you need that ultra wide angle view to capture both simultaneously. It's also great if you're doing interiors like architecture or if you're deep inside a slot canyon, for example that's very narrow and confined using a really wide angle lens like this will open everything up. So even though this lens is specialized I find that I'm using it more and more. It's changed the way I approach my subjects and my scenes. So I'm now looking for ultra wide perspectives that before I owned this lens, I would never be looking for.

Now to properly use an ultra wide lens like this you need to get really, really close to your subject and close to your background if the background's important. You'll notice when you're working with an ultra wide perspective, like 11 millimeters that even really big background features such as mountains will end up being rendered very small in the final image frame when you zoom out. So you need to be really close to that background if you can if you wanna keep those background features looking big but you need to get really really low and really close to your foreground that way you can exaggerate the perspective of the foreground. You can exaggerate its size and importance in your composition. This lens delivers outstanding image quality with sharpness from edge to edge, corner to corner.

It is easily hands down one of the best wide angle lenses ever made. It's certainly better than most wide angles zooms out there. It's even better than most wide angle primes. Despite the fact that this is an ultra wide angle lens the lens is actually very well corrected for distortion. And by distortion I mean optical distortion like pin cushion or barrel distortion.

There's still gonna be a lot of perspective distortion. Whenever you're shooting with a wide angle lens if you point the lens up or you point the lens down if you have any vertical lines they're going to lean in or lean out, depending on which direction you're pointing. And you're certainly going to get a lot of that with this lens, but in terms of optical distortion this is a very well corrected lens. Another great thing about this lens is the fact that it's a zoom instead of a prime. Shooting with a zoom lens gives you great flexibility in terms of your ultimate composition and where you stand relative to your foreground subject.

So having a zoom lens that goes from this very generous range, 11 millimeters to 24 millimeters gives you a lot of options when you're shooting wide angle. Now, obviously there are a lot of things that I love about this lens. I'm a wide angle junkie so having an ultra wide angle zoom really gives me a lot more options and allows me to take the kinds of pictures that I really enjoy taking but no lens is perfect. There are some aspects of this lens that I don't love quite as much. For example, the price tag.

This lens comes in at almost $3,000. Ouch, that's really expensive but I think well worth the price. Second of all, this lens is huge. It's bulky. It's very, very heavy.

It's not a lightweight lens. So it's gonna add some weight to your camera bag. Third of all, this lens has a bulbous popeye lens design and that makes it really hard to protect the lens. It also makes it difficult to use filters because of this built-in metal hood, which sticks out to protect the lens as much as it can. It's really hard to use a filter system with them.

Now they do make these oversize filter holders that you can use with an ultra wide angle lens like the Canon 11 to 24. But these holders are very expensive. They're very big. They're very bulky. They're somewhat impractical for field use.

Now there is a rear filter slot option for this lens which allows you to use a small gelatin filter if you want to, but it's kind of impractical for use in the field. So personally, when I know that I need filters I'll leave this lens behind and bring a different wide angles zoom with me. But if I don't need filters, this is my go-to lens. Finally, one thing I wish this lens did better is flare control. I like shooting into the light, shooting into the sun itself.

And when you do that you need a lens that handles lens flare very well. This lens does an adequate job but I wouldn't say that it does a really excellent job. I've certainly worked with other wide angle zoom and prime lenses that do a better job at controlling flare. So I have to be extra careful when using this lens especially when shooting into the sun. Now, when you shoot into the sun with a wide angle lens you can create a starburst effect.

And this is another area where I think this lens isn't quite as good as it could be. I don't really like the look of the starburst of this lens compared to some other wide angle zooms that I've worked with. For example, I really liked the way that the Tamron 15 to 30 creates a starburst. I think it's got a great starburst effect and I don't think this lens is quite as good. Now, to me this isn't a huge drawback.

I still use this lens shooting into the light all the time. I just have to be extra careful. In summary, this lens is heavy, it's big, it's expensive and it's not for everyone but I guarantee once you buy it you're gonna start seeing the world in a different way. This is what happened for me. I absolutely love this lens.

You know what they say, "Once you go ultra wide, you never go back."