Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II Interchangeable Lens Review

Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II Performance

Despite the low price tag and basic features, this simple lens is capable of producing outstanding results.

Shooting wide open, sharpness in the centre of the image area is already good, and the quality towards the edges of the frame is fairly good. As with most lenses, stopping down improves sharpness across the frame. Sharpness in the centre of the frame peaks at f/4, and the clarity is outstanding here. Peak sharpness across the frame is achieved between f/5.6 and f/8 where the clarity exceeds excellent levels across the frame.

MTF at 50mm

How to read our charts The blue column represents readings from the centre of the picture frame at the various apertures and the green is from the edges. Averaging them out gives the red weighted column. The scale on the left side is an indication of actual image resolution. The taller the column, the better the lens performance. Simple. For this review, the lens was tested on a Canon EOS 5D Mark II using Imatest.

A simple lens design like this needs no exotic glass elements to keep chromatic aberrations under control. Even when shooting wide open, fringing barely exceeds 0.4 pixel widths. This level is low enough to cause few issues, even in very large print sizes, or with harsh crops from the edges of the frame.

Chromatic Aberration at 50mm

How to read our charts Chromatic aberration is the lens' inability to focus on the sensor or film all colours of visible light at the same point. Severe chromatic aberration gives a noticeable fringing or a halo effect around sharp edges within the picture. It can be cured in software. Apochromatic lenses have special lens elements (aspheric, extra-low dispersion etc) to minimize the problem, hence they usually cost more. For this review, the lens was tested on a Canon EOS 5D Mark II using Imatest.

Falloff of illumination towards the corners is noticeable, but not overly intrusive. At f/1.8 the corners of the image area are 1.65 stops darker than the image centre and stopping down to f/4 results in visually uniform illumination.

Barrel distortion is quite high for a prime lens. Imatest detected 2.22% barrel distortion, which may pose issues with critical applications such as copy stand work. The distortion pattern is uniform across the frame, so it should be relatively straightforward to correct in image editing software afterwards.
Although this lens does not come supplied with a hood to protect the lens from extraneous light that may cause flare, the front element is recessed and is reasonably well shaded as a result. Shooting into strong light sources, such as the sun, may result in a noticeable loss of contrast under certain circumstances. Strong light sources outside the frame may also cause a flare, but only in very harsh conditions.

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