that this was the right lens for me, I then shopped around for the lowest price and my local cameral shop agreed to price match! I managed to get my lens for £280. That was a year ago and prices may have come down a bit since then, it?s always worth shopping around and haggling!
What you get for your money.
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In the box is an 18mm-200mmf/3.5-6.3lens.
Instruction booklet, front and rear caps and a petal type lens hood.
The lens has Sigma?s optical stabilization system to help prevent camera shake especially when you use the zoom or in low light situations. A super multi-layer coating is used on the lens to help eliminate flare and ghosting.
The lens is quite heavy weighing 405 grams but as this is a multi use lens that is to be expected! The lens has a 70mm diameter that looks quite impressive and I do ...
Advantages: Cheap, good build, good quality photos, large focal range, no front element rotation Disadvantages: A bit soft at 200mm,
I bought this lens after a massive amount of research, I wanted to find a lens that compromised of two possible lens into one big lens so it would be easier to carry around. I also was feeling very limited by the current lens I had which was Canon 18-55mm basic kit lens.
Most important thing I focussed on was the focal length; 18-200mm. It has an optical zoom of 11 times. This lens has a maximum aperture of F/3.5-6.3. One of the main issue with this lens is that when at 18mm, it has a maximum aperture of F/3.5 but move to 200mm, the max aperture increases to F/6.3. This is annoying as you have to control the lightning even more than you would have to. Also, at 200mm the picture quality tends to deteriorate whatever you're taking a picture of, the sharpness declines. This can be fixed in photoshop/ Lightroom, which is acceptable ...
Advantages: An almost all in one. reduce lens swapping Disadvantages: not good in mid range
Having tried the 18-70mm and 75-300mm lenses this should be an excellent compromise lens. However Compromise you will definetly do.
I tried this lens from a friend and I can only say I was disappointed after the excellent 18-70 and 75-300mm lenses.
The lens operates in the same way using a middle ring to zoom in and out and a front ring to focus manually. The lens focuses fast and reliably and with less noise than the other two lenses.
Unlike the 18-70mmlens there was no darkening on the corners for the photos BUT you have to remove the lens hood! unless you like to have your photos with a round crop on the corners... this is a bit of a pain if you like to take landscapes.
It's extreme zoom at 200mm is also good for taking sports or wildlife but you will need a tripod and get closer to the action if you want to fill ...
