T2i kit lens...is it worth the 100 bucks?

saneproductions said:
I would have at least one AF lens in the kit for shooting stills and this lens covers that function well. As others have mentioned, the front focus ring is very small and not dampened so focusing manually is a bit tough (mainly pulling focus smoothly). Supplimenting your kit with good vintage glass is a good idea as well (especially at 50mm and longer where the DOF is shortest). The trouble with vintage glass is it is tougher to shoot stills with as seeing focus in the viewfinder is a bit hit and miss. In the old days of film you used to have viewfinders with split focusing prisms. You can swap out your focusing screen with an aftermarket split prism one, but you lose the center AF point :(
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You could always pick up a Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM. That's a good lens that works well for photos and video and has a bigger nicer focus ring than a lot of the low end AF lenses. That would be my go to lens on an EOS body.
 
The 18-55mm IS f/3.5-5.6 kit lens is great for what it is.

It's not as fast as some prime lenses. It does have image stabilization.

I use it as a 24mm f/4 lens with image stabilization. For this, it's fantastic. With a steady hand and practice, some operators will be able to get by with just this and not need a dedicated handheld rig.

I've done some tests with this lens compared to a 50mm prime (the Canon f/2.5 50mm macro prime lens), the Canon 17-40mm f/4 L, and an old Canon 30-80mm f/3.5-5.6 kit lens from the film days. In those tests, the 30-80mm kit lens was noticeably softer in video mode, but the other three were pretty similar to each other. In video mode. In stills mode the differences are much more pronounced.

It is my opinion that if you use the kit lens for what it's good at (fixed at around 24mm where the barrel/pincushion distortion is zero, from f/4 - f/16), it works quite well. If you're hoping to use it at 55mm f/5.6 in low light, or get to 18mm without a little curvature in your image, or attach a follow focus unit to it, you will probably be disappointed. I personally believe that the line skipping algorithm is going to be more of an issue to worry about than the optical quality of the kit lens.

Basically, it's a great low cost general purpose walk around lens. I take it on vacations and leave the other ones at home. I use it for narrative filmmaking (but within the previously mentioned ranges to maximize what it's good at).
 
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