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The “nifty-fifty” (as lenses like this are often called) is typically the first (and often the only) prime lens that many photographers will own. A prime lens is one with a fixed focal length (50mm in this case), và typically people start off with a zoom lens of some kind (essentially all kit lenses are zooms). Often people want to experiment with a prime lens because of the faster maximum aperture (F1.8) và better image chất lượng one provides (which is typically, but not always the case as many modern zooms are very good). An inexpensive lens like the Canon RF 50mm F1.8 ($199 USD) allows them to vày so without tremendous expense, and the images you can get from a prime lens like this are definitely different in kind from what you can get from your kit zoom.
Canon’s 50mm F1.8 lenses have traditionally been a pretty safe bet optically. They punch far above their weight class, and, while the images don’t have the “wow!” factor that some very expensive glass can produce, I’m often surprised by how great of images can be produced with an inexpensive lens lượt thích this. Canon’s latest iteration is the best yet, with a slightly nicer build quality, slightly better autofocus performance, & slightly better image quality. The RF 50mm F1.8 instantly becomes the least expensive RF mount lens from Canon, và as such it’s easy simply from a value perspective. But you expect more from than that, so let’s dive in a little deeper and determine if the RF 50mm F1.8 STM can stand on its own two feet. You can read on or watch either my definitive (long format) or standard length clip reviews by clicking the respective đoạn clip below.
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Thanks khổng lồ Camera Canada for getting me a loaner of the RF 50mm F1.8 STM. If you’re in Canada, kiểm tra them out for a reliable online retailer.
Canon RF 50mm F1.8 STM Build và Handling
My first impression of the RF 50mm F1.8 is that it is much less of a “plastic fantastic” than Canon’s last two 50mm F1.8 lenses. The first EF 50mm F1.8 was better made than the MK II, which was the low water mark for the series. That lens was made of extremely cheap feeling plastics, had a plastic mount, và featured a buzzy autofocus motor that was decidedly NOT premium. The EF 50mm F1.8 STM was improved, with a slightly less plasticky feel và a STM motor, that, while not particularly fast, was smoother & quieter than the old micro-motors in the first two lenses. Khổng lồ this point, however, the 50mm F1.8 lenses have felt noticeably inferior khổng lồ most other lenses in the Canon ecosystem, but that trend ends here. The RF 50mm F1.8 is smaller and lighter than other lenses in the RF lineup, but the build chất lượng feels roughly similar to other non-L series lenses. This feels like a real lens, and it no longer feels lượt thích you are putting a toy on your expensive camera.
I have khổng lồ confess lớn a certain degree of frustration every time I nhận xét a non-L series lens from Canon, though I’m far more sanguine when reviewing the $200 RF 50mm F1.8 than I was when reviewing the $600 RF 85mm F2 Macro. Canon persists in the pettiest forms of “nickel and diming” with their consumer grade lenses. They never include a lens hood. The ES-65B lens hood will mix you back an additional $40 (20% of lens costs), so I suspect that 90% of purchasers will never bother with a lens hood. As is the case with all non-L Canon lenses, there is no weather sealing of any kind on the lens. While these things are disappointing from a use perspective, I’m far more accepting of these limitations on a lens with a genuinely low price tag, particularly when you consider how many other improvements have been made khổng lồ the lens from previous iterations.
The appearance of the new lens is much classier, with several accent rings and the kim cương pattern texture of the multi-purpose ring adding some variety khổng lồ the look of the lens. The outer shell is durable, resistant lớn marking or scratching. The new Canon RF lightly flocked, matte finish is also resistant to lớn finger prints, so I find that the look of the lens stays consistent (it doesn’t look one way when cleaned và unused and another if you actually take it out of the box and use it!) The new RF lens definitely has a much more stylish look to it than previous lenses:
One minor negative that I noticed is that there there are several visible seams in the outer shell. You can see one in the second photo in this section above, và another in this photo that shows the lens from a different angle.
Not a big thing, but a reminder of the budget origins even if the lens itself feels bit more upscale.
You can also notice from the photo above that we have a metal lens mount, which further contributes to the lens feeling more substantial. In truth there is little to lớn complain about here in the basic build. The lens itself is much nicer than any previous Canon 50mm F1.8 lens. You can also see the 12 communication pins that the RF lens mount has which enable Canon to have more flexibility in lens design.
One advantage of those pins is the control ring, a new addition to RF lenses. The control ring can be programmed to lớn several different functions in the camera body. Popular applications are for aperture control and exposure compensation.
In the case of the RF 50mm F1.8, Canon has a much smaller lens to work with, so they adopted a creative solution that utilizes the one switch on the lens. Instead of a simple AF/MF switch, Canon elected to go with a switch that changes the function of the control ring between whatever function you have mix for the control ring (I have exposure compensation, myself) and focus. In theory this is good, but in practice the execution could be better. I would prefer that if you switched to the focus setting, the lens would automatically engage manual focus. As it stands, you have to lớn switch over lớn manual focus in the camera body, and, since most lenses have an AF/MF switch, there is little reason lớn program one of your valuable programmable buttons to that function. That means jumping into the menus khổng lồ make the switch, a more time consuming process. It seems lớn me that having the “focus” setting always be manual focus would be the more elegant solution. You could then simply engage “control” if you want normal autofocus function.
The nice diamond pattern texture on the ring makes for nice grip & feel, however, và unlike most control rings, there is no feeling of “detents” here, so đoạn clip shooters might enjoy setting the control to aperture và having a reasonable “declicked” aperture experience. Manual focus is far less frustrating than it is on the RF 85mm F2 Macro IS, with focus throw kích hoạt being much faster. If you make a major focus change, you will experience a feeling a bit like “drag” as the focus motor provides a little resistance as it makes the focus change. The sensation isn’t there with minor focus tweaks. No one is going khổng lồ confuse the focus kích hoạt with a Zeiss lens, but I also think this probably represents a high water mark for manual focus in the series thus far. So, while I think the execution of the multi-purpose ring & switch could be a little better, this is definitely an improvement over anything we’ve seen on a Canon 50mm F1.8 lens before.
The RF 50mm F1.8 is wonderfully compact. It really transforms even a larger camera like the EOS R5 into a highly portable platform. Canon has managed khổng lồ make the lens almost the same length as the EF version despite the greater flange distance of mirrorless cameras. The new RF version is 69mm (2.7″) in diameter and only 40mm (1.6″) in length, comparing lớn 69.2 x 39xmm for the EF version of the lens. The weight of both lenses is identical at 160g (5.6 oz), which is impressive when you consider how much nicer the build feels on the RF version. The other RF 50mm lens is the RF 50mm F1.2L (my đánh giá here), and it essentially 500% heavier (950g) và nearly three times the length.Here’s a look at how the specifications break down.
These bởi vì a good but not great job of retaining a circular shape when stopped down. This sequence shows wide open, F2.8, & then F4.
F2.8 looks great, with very good circular geometry across the frame, but even by F4 you can see the aperture shape a bit, though the shape is much nicer than the old 50mm F1.8 lenses & their five straight blades.
Up front we have a very small 43mm filter threading, a figure (surprisingly) smaller than the more common 49mm filter thread kích cỡ on the EF version of the lens.
One of the most significant specification changes to the RF 50mm F1.8 is that Canon has managed lớn significantly improve minimum focus distance (MFD) down to 30 centimet (11.8″), which enables an unusually high 0.25x maximum magnification figure. Most 50mm lenses are more in the 0.15x range. But I also see a generalized trend that I saw with the EF STM lens, và that was that while the magnification increased (to 0.21x on the EF STM lens), the close up performance is not really improved. The images below show that while magnification is fairly high, close up performance isn’t great. The plane of focus is not very flat, contrast is low, and aberrations are exaggerated. Stopping down to lớn F2.8 helps (second image), but not considerably.
So, ironically, I find that performance improves if you move back a bit và lose out on some of that magnification. This shot is slightly further away, but you can see that contrast is improved.
The lens doesn’t have image stabilization, obviously, but Canon does state that you can get up to lớn 7 stops of stabilization if you are using it on one of the new bodies with IBIS. The 7 stop rating is on a camera lượt thích my EOS R5, và I felt that things were nice & steady there.
Bottom line is that the RF 50mm F1.8 STM definitely moves this particular lens into much nicer territory than the old “plastic fantastic” toy lens used to lớn occupy. This “nifty-fifty” is much more nifty, & the price tag of $199 USD feels like a bargain for the chất lượng of the lens.
Autofocus and đoạn phim Performance
Canon has given the RF 50mm F1.8 an STM motor, but frankly that doesn’t mean a whole lot anymore. I have found that the performance of STM motors varies widely in almost every facet, but most obviously in focus speed & sound. Some STM lenses are very quick và quiet và have a fairly sophisticated performance, while others feel somewhat slow & crude. The previous EF 50mm F1.8 had an STM that was fairly smooth, but quite slow to focus. The recent 85mm F2 Macro IS that I just reviewed also had an STM motor, but it was pretty noisy and fairly slow in focus. The good news is that the behavior of the STM motor in the 50mm F1.8 is much, much better.
The RF 50mm F1.8 is a front focusing lens (the front group of elements moves forward và back). It is not internally focusing & will extend about 1 centimet when focused to it’s minimum (macro) limit. You will probably want to lớn enable the setting on your camera that will retract the lens when powering down the camera, as the extended barrel feels a bit vulnerable.
Focus tốc độ is actually nice và snappy here, with even major focus changes happening very quickly và with no drama in focus. The lens is not completely silent in focus, but sound is minimal. The focus behavior is that of a more expensive lens và was noticeably smoother & quieter than the RF 85mm F2 that I reviewed at the same time.
Eye AF worked effectively, locking onto eyes và tracking them in real time. This really enables pretty much anyone lớn get accurately focused results when people are in the frame. One of my kids took this shot in rather dim lighting conditions (ISO 3200), but focus was accurate.
I was able to have a pretty successful hit rate on narrow depth of field shots even when the subject was slender, lượt thích these bare branches during a snowstorm.
Video AF also seems khổng lồ be pretty reliable. I’m grabbing one of these lenses primarily lớn give me a 50mm angle of view for filming on my YouTube channel. Real time face/Eye tracking seems to lớn work reliably, without pulsing or hunting during my “talking head” segments.
I was shooting a promotional spot for one of my YouTube sponsors, & I needed a simple shot where the focus was on a foreground object (in this case an iPhone display showing a certain app), which would then be moved out of the way khổng lồ reveal a background object (a wallet being “paged” by the ứng dụng in the phone). In theory it was a perfect application for the RF 85mm F2 Macro, so I tried to use it on my EOS R5 for the shot…but to no avail. It just wouldn’t focus on the foreground object consistently despite my best efforts (choosing different focus modes on the camera). It also took forever to lớn transition from close focus to the object a meter beyond, which completely defeated the purpose on a clip that could only be about 4 second long. I used the RF 50mm F1.8 STM instead, and, despite that being a much cheaper lens and less well suited to lớn the task on paper, the little nifty fifty performed the job much better…and I got the video clip I wanted. Bad news for the RF 85mm F2; good news for the RF 50mm F1.8.
In my focus pull test, the lens made a minimal amount of noise (almost undetectable by the built in microphones) and focus pulls were mostly smooth. Bigger pulls had tiny amount of detectable stepping, but performance here was mostly good. There is some focus breathing, however, so expect objects lớn change size somewhat during major focus pulls. It’s not bad for small pulls, but more noticeable in larger focus changes.
All in all, this is easily the best 50mm F1.8 from Canon ever in terms of autofocus. The STM motor seems more sophisticated, và the EOS R5 camera I tested it on has an amazingly good focus system, so getting quick, accurate results from an inexpensive lens has never been easier. Focus here is actually a little nicer than what you’ll find on the 11x more expensive RF 50mm F1.2L.Canon RF 50mm F1.8 STM Image Quality
The Canon RF 50mm F1.8 STM doesn’t necessarily have a lot to lớn prove as the cheapest lens in the RF lineup (a distinction it may hold for a long time), but Canon’s 50mm F1.8 lenses have always provided an outsized optical performance relative to their low cost. That continues to lớn be true here, as, while the lens can’t compete with its big brother at wide apertures, it is actually remarkably sharp at smaller apertures. Even at large apertures, however, it has good enough sharpness, contrast, & bokeh lớn create visually interesting images like this one (wide open, F1.8):
But we will take a little deeper look than that! All of these tests are done on the 45 MP Canon EOS R5 body.
First of all, a look at vignette và distortion.
There is the tiniest amount of barrel distortion, but probably not enough to register in just about any situation. I corrected it with only a +2 in Lightroom (the manual correction is on the right above). Vignette is a whole other story, though. I’ve seen a trend on Canon RF mount lenses, & that is that vignette is the key area where Canon’s engineers are leaving somewhat uncorrected (much like Zeiss often did). Perhaps they think that vignette is the easiest aberration lớn correct for. In this case, however, there is a radical amount of additional vignette when compared to lớn the EF version of the lens. The EF version had well under 2 stops of vignette in the extreme corners; the RF version has over 4 stops of vignette in those corners! Correction required me to lớn max out the vignette slider (+100) & move the midpoint over to lớn 13. There is no standard profile for RAW images yet (the lens is too new), but JPEGs and video are corrected for in camera.
You will definitely see this in certain scenes. This wide mở cửa shot has been left uncorrected, và you can see a lot of vignette towards the edges.
This F2 shot also has a lot of vignette, but it works better here due to the subject & environment.
This isn’t a giảm giá breaker, but it is surprising to lớn see so much more vignette compared to the previous generation lens. I’m not quite what lớn make of that!
In our next test, we can see that there is a moderate amount of longitudinal chromatic aberration (LoCA), that manifests as purple fringing before the plane of focus and green fringing after the plane of focus. I found the green fringing more pronounced, but that has a lot to bởi with the way I use the lens.
The spherical aberrations of the lens vì chưng reduce contrast somewhat, but I didn’t find real world fringing terrible. You can see some purple fringing in this wide open, high contrast shot (at distance, which a lens like this will struggle with more), but the fringing isn’t extreme.
There’s a tiny amount of lateral CA visible at a pixel level in highly demanding applications, but not enough to lớn mar an image. You can barely find it even if you go looking for it.
Outside of the vignette, there is no gross offense here.
Canon has utilized a classic optical design here that looks similar but not identical lớn previous versions of the lens.
There is still six elements in five groups, but the placement of those elements has been “optimized” (Canon’s words) and you’ll see in the RF thiết kế (on the right) that there is a new special element in the formula (the light green element in the diagram). An aspherical lens element is often utilized to reduce certain kinds of aberrations. It is evidence at the least that Canon worked here to lớn improve the optics & give us a slightly higher level of performance. Did they succeed?
Here’s a look at my test chart.
What we find is that resolution in the center & mid-frame & even into the corners is fairly good (outside of the extreme corner), but contrast is not exceptional. There’s a slight haze over all the textures, like a thin layer of Vaseline has been applied.
That bears out in real world samples, too, as detail is fairly good but contrast is not exceptional.
Essentially I find that there is enough contrast for images to look crisp when viewed globally, but if you zoom in lớn a px level there isn’t an exceptional amount of acuity (rendering of fine details) due to lớn those spherical aberrations. Here’s another example that illustrates that point:
It is here that the much more expensive RF 50mm F1.2L distinguishes itself, as it has exceptional acuity and micro-contrast. Fine details are exquisitely rendered by it even at wide apertures. The RF 50mm F1.8 is more pedestrian in this regard, though, as noted, the images from it look quite good if you don’t pixel-peep.
A minor stop-down to F2 sometimes does wonders for lenses, but that’s not really the case here.
There’s a bit of a boost to contrast & overall image brightness, but the “haze” persists.
It is the stepdown khổng lồ F2.8 that brings a more significant jump forward.
We can see that the corner performance is significantly improved save that last 1% at the extreme edge. The haze is gone, và the textures “pop”. This is not unusual for a lens lượt thích this, as while Canon’s 50mm F1.8 lenses have always been okay at wide apertures, they have been universally excellent at smaller apertures. I think the RF version is a little better at wide apertures, but it is great from F2.8 on.
Here’s a real world landscape shot at F5.6:
Nice detail there in the needles. Here’s another shot at F4, & the crop shows that there is a lot of great detail rendered at the px level.
I would say that the RF 50mm F1.8 is surviving the demands of the high resolution EOS R5.
The advantage of the newest RF version of the lens, though, is that it does better with delivering decent real world resolution & contrast at wider apertures. There were some images where I was pleasantly surprised with the overall punch of the image. This is a wide xuất hiện example where I feel lượt thích the the resolution và contrast looks pretty great at a pixel level.
If you look critically, you can see a bit of that haze, but the overall impression is of good contrast. You can see that the contrast along the edge of the frame is reduced somewhat, though. There’s no question that we are getting fairly good performance here out of a very inexpensive lens.
How about the bokeh? I’ll first make it clear that this budget lens is NOT in the class of the very expensive L series lens. The RF 50mm F1.2L has actually been my favorite RF lens optically thus far. The RF 85mm F1.2L is actually a little better corrected, but I feel like the RF 50mm F1.2L has better character and rendering. It is both extremely sharp while also retaining a certain magic to the rendering. The “nifty fifty” isn’t in that same class, but it’s pretty good for the money. First of all, bokeh circles when bright highlights are in the frame are actually quite nice and soft.
There’s no busyness in the circles or harsh outlining. That can result in a fairly creamy background when shooting a closer distances.
Where the “magical” lenses are often separated from the merely mortal performers is when you are working at medium distances & with revised ratios where you aren’t as close to your subject and thus the background is a bit closer in the ratio. You can see some busy outlining in the background under these conditions.
Here’s a few more “bokeh shots” to lớn help you get a sensor of the rendering from the lens:
If you are a serious portrait photographer, you will find that up close the 50mm F1.8 STM isn’t wildly different from the more expensive 50mm F1.2L (at least globally), but if you switch khổng lồ shooting full body portraits, you will probably see a fairly pronounced difference. But if you are making money from being a portrait photographer, you are probably more likely lớn be able to afford the more expensive L series lens (which is exceptional!) & probably also more willing to khuyến mãi with its bulk and and weight. Portrait photographer Irene Rudnyck has a good video illustrating this point.
Canon claims that the lens has received improved coatings that improve the resistance lớn flare. I think this is mostly true, though the performance against bright lights really varies on the position of the sun in the frame. I tried a variety of positions và got differing results. Some were quite good, others not so much. I saw more flare artifacts when panning across the sun and shooting video. Here’s a few samples that illustrate the varying results that I saw.
All in all, I would say that the flare resistance is improved but not quite at a màn chơi I would hotline good. I think it is manageable & that you can get good results if you are careful on how you position your subject (and the sun) in the frame.
I would recommend that you kiểm tra out the image galleries lớn see a greater variety of photos & get a sense of the lens performance for yourself. My analysis is that while the performance of the lens isn’t đứng top shelf, it is certainly is very good relative khổng lồ the cost of the lens. This has always been the position that Canon’s 50mm F1.8 lenses have occupied, but the RF 50mm F1.8 STM just does it a bit better than any previous Canon nifty fifty.
Conclusion
As I noted in the introduction, it is easy lớn recommend the Canon RF 50mm F1.8 STM simply from a value proposition. It is (by far) the least expensive lens in the Canon RF lineup at right under $200 USD, which makes it a full 11x cheaper than the admittedly amazing Canon RF 50mm F1.2L. For those of you who have recently bought into the Canon RF system & are desperate for a native mount lens or two, the RF 50mm F1.8 is an obvious choice, as it unlocks some of the goodness that a prime lens can bring with a large maximum aperture and often superior image quality.
But, after spending time with the RF 50mm F1.8, I can also say with confidence that Canon didn’t just “mail it in” by throwing an RF mount on the EF lens. The RF lens is improved in almost every way. The build unique is noticeably improved and is far from feeling lượt thích a toy lượt thích the EF 50mm F1.8 II did. This feels like a real lens, a finished product. The same is true of the autofocus performance, where the STM motor in the newest lens is smoother và snappier in performance than the older EF STM lens. When I reviewed the EF 50mm F1.8 STM, I had to make major micro-adjustments to get accurate focus on my DSLRs, so it is such a liberating thing to lớn not have lớn worry about focus accuracy on mirrorless. I just threw the lens on my camera and started shooting…and got great results.
I also threw the RF 50mm F1.8 into the EOS R5 gauntlet with its 45 MP of resolution, và the lens emerged largely unscathed. Wide xuất hiện contrast isn’t amazing, and there is a surprising amount of vignette that is now part of the equation, but the lens is capable of producing very nice images with good detail and great bokeh even at wide apertures, & if you stop the lens down, it becomes very sharp.
So, in conclusion, the Canon RF 50mm F1.8 STM is not only worth buying because it is cheap, but also worth buying because it is competent. No, it’s anywhere near the class of the RF 50mm F1.2L, but that’s lớn be expected. But, because of its affordability, there will be more great photos taken with the cheap F1.8 version than the expensive F1.2 lens. The RF 50mm F1.8 will not be a credible impediment khổng lồ producing vị trí cao nhất notch photographs. It’s the photographer, after all, who makes the images. The lens is just a tool…and, in this case, it’s a pretty good tool, và one most anyone can afford. More of this, please, Canon!
Pros:
Significantly improved build chất lượng over previous EF 50mm F1.8 lensesSTM motor is much more refined & faster than EF STM versionFocus accuracy is very highStable AF tracking during video clip captureImproved close focus performanceGood center sharpness even wide openBokeh quality quite good in most conditionsOutstanding price point relative khổng lồ performanceCons:
Very heavy vignetteNo lens hood includedWide mở cửa contrast not exceptionalCorners aren’t sharp at wide aperturesGear Used:
Purchase a Canon RF 50mm F1.8 STMB&H Photo | Camera Canada | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | EbayPurchase a Canon RF 85mm F2 Macro IS STM
B&H Photo | Camera Canada | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | EbayPurchase a Canon EOS R5
B&H Photo | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | EbayPurchase a Canon EOS R6
B&H Photo | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | EbayPeak thiết kế Slide Lite: Peak kiến thiết Store |B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UKPeak kiến thiết Leash Strap: Peak kiến thiết Store |B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UKBenQ SW271 4K Photo Editing Monitor – B&H Photo| Amazon| Amazon.ca | Amazon UKAdobe Photoshop Creative Cloud 1-Year SubscriptionExposure Software X6 (Use Code “hsnovini.com” khổng lồ get 10% anything and everything)Visit Dustin’s Amazon Storefront & see his favorite gear
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