Canon EOS 20D 8.2MP Digital SLR Camera with EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 Lens
by Canon
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Canon EOS 20D 8.2MP Digital SLR Camera with EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 Lens
Customer Review: The perfect camera allmost for me!
Summary: 5 Stars
Having owned and loved my 10D but for not very long my very honest and not to over-sale camera sales person suggested I not upgrade. He shoots wide angle a lot and I am a rapid fire person, forever and qucikly changing focal length who loves to take kids without them knowing and rarely miss or use a wide angle per se. So his counter part disagreed owning both the 10 and 20 D and I followed suit and have been very impressed but at the same time also upgraded myself to the 20D lens series with the 17-85 lens and the "L glass and Image stabiliazation" as my guy says. The lens that comes with the camera is pretty musch garbage and should be bought with body only or with the upgrade to this fine L lens series unless wanting to go into the thousands for each lens. The pictures have been fabulous so I am not sure how much due to the upgrade to the 20 or the upgrade of the lens. I am dissappointed in the focal length however as previously with an off brand but good 28-200 and I loved the fact I could be taking the whole pool at a party or the nose of a kid and they did not know. This new lens does not provide the length I like so will now purchase the 70 to 200 but consider this a crucial point in terms of focal lentgh to be switching lenses and with the time to switch out a lens and I have numb hands. I am concerned it will slow down my style. Other canon lenses are either in the thousands or lack the image stabilization or the wonderful glass quality of this new 20D series. I will keep a new Tamaron 28 - 200 for the cases in which I feel this is the best alternative as when not needing the same quality and not wanting to change. Also as a red eye hater and I do not care how manty photo editing programs you have, I would only have this or any camera with the flash attachment and find my 550 from the 10d just fine. Be careful as their are items now for just the 20D and not interchangeable with the 10D and I have seen people dissappointed receiving the wrong information. This is a fabulous camera and the sports function is a blast for making of slide shows with photos. Set the time of each photo at one second and the sliide show resembles a video and yet you have the beauty of the pictures. Buy a basic book on how to shoot what you shoot and you can not go wrong. The only way to go wrong is to not take pictures at the highest level even if you still are so excited about how wonderful it is you get more pictures at shooting at a lower level. You must buy a good and I mean a good gig compact flash disk. ( at least one) Why brag about the price of your costco cheap gig disk with slow processing when spending the money for a camera with quick? Also then should of bought the lower level mega pixel any way. Let your email program condense but do not loose the ability to crop! Take, take, take and remember that the best pros used to say of a roll of 36 you were lucky if one picture turns out good maybe two. Do not analyse your roll in playback while shooting or you will miss the next great shot but have discovered the hard to take child can easily be brought into the process by taking their picture, checking for focus and then in playback showing them how you can magnify to their eye lashes. This gets them all the time. Then they are fun and relaxed and no more mug shots as they now want to see how you can do that. Also the joy of the garbage can. I took 450 pictures of my kids school during the halloween festivities and submit to the yearbook but my passion. Why not take so many. You should see my collectiuon of shots. 450 no way. 475 with the cropping out of individuals and garbage canning the not good. No editing, usually just the cropping and done. Then back up and remember the pictures you print today will be gone in 30 to 40 years so the back up on disk mandatory as that wonderful scrapbook that will not have pictures most likely by the time little Johnny now 3 months has kids at 35 can be redone or the pictures still here. Keep that film camera and bring it out no matter how it hurts or feels good and take some black and white four times a year on film for archival records. Set four holidays or special days you will remember and shoot 100 of your family and items of the era. Then you will have the ones here in 300 years for your decendents. Also if you have the disk space save those photos not quite yet saveable by your current abilities or editing software as in the future the technology may be here to get the horribly out of focus one you took of Julie at her first day of kindergarten as she moved too fast focused and looking good or you may learn more. Problems in future include use of compact flash cards instead of smaller disks for memory and the fact of the pins wearing down so try and use a memory card reader vs the camera when downloading. In two years the pins on my 10 d need replacing based on there being prone to damage and bending even when careful, so the camera with extended warranty is needing to go back to Cannon for fixing and now OK but hard to give up camera for 6 to 8 weeeks. Also when push comes to shove if you know your cannon product, no matter the level of customer the support will stand behind you, Technically if you buy from them or another rep whether online or real store and the product deficient from the start the rule of Cannon is you send it back to Cannon and even if it never worked, you are to take for repair or send in for a refurbrished replacement. After buying a i1990 printer for $500 with a rebate of $100 and it never even printed a picture I thought I deserved a new replacement. There is no such thing with Cannon as a "lemon" with a new replacement. They eventually agreed and were very quick about sticking behind their product but then I own the eos elan II e, the 10 d, the 20 d, bought the printer, was talking about a new video so who knows. At least they knew not to make mad a loyal customer but had to go to supervisor and believe nice carries more weight. The use of pictbridge color vs. Print image matching is also a concern as Canon is one of the few to stick with their own system making it a necessity to buy their printers in many cases. Make sure to have a pict bridge printer or you will be disappointed and editing everything as with my set up the 20 d talks to my mac, the mac to my epson with print image matching but since it does not have the pict bridge functioning as well the compact flash can not "speak" to the printer carrt with it the inportant color or exposure information. Without a pict bridge printer to read the quality poor unless editing constantly and with this camera this is not necessary unless you want to change in some graphical sense and not help. This makes it impossible to easily acheive the same colors you see on your screen of your computre and also the matchiung LCD on the camera when printing. For fun and speed the epson 4 x 6 priinter with the LCD display even though more than some counter parts is great for those occassions as it is pictbridge and my kids love for me to take pictures at playdates or sleep overs and then i get them going on a non messy project of a scrapbook with a three hole punch into 12 by 12 paper and markers with a yarn tie or the decorating of foam frames. This keeps the kids busy and they love going home with a framed picture or a few pages of a scrapbook and then I put my kids in a book and the kids are busy and happy for two hours. Worth the 29 cents per print. Make sure you have a pict bridge printer as my new i1990 great and my my brother the 800 something he loves despite using a non cannon camera of lower quality and he needs to edit too much. Looks fake but not due to printer. Good luck. Not a good customer of the 5d for me as not wide angle, you should be sold a camera for how you shoot, not just the camera. My girlfriend bought an olympus, a fine camera, SLR, for $3000, but portrait with slow processor and no sports mode and yet 3 sons out there stealing first all the time. Good camera, wrong fit. Tell the person who you are and how you shoot, go to a good store and then buy here if you want. Anyone ever try to use the amazon extra warranty? I have not had the occasion to use it and now knowing Cannons policy would wonder about exchanges as I know if I buy from the toys r us link the store easily takes something back whether they carry it or not. amazon you are great in every way. i come to you instead of consumer reports or the magazines to get product information thru customer reviews. All is well. Do not go anywhere. Why is my sons math book $70 however. Not you I am sure. Horrible. I know so much about the printers as had to trouble shoot on my own. No cannon, apple or epson person knew about it but the reviews on amazon had others commenting so I knew not just me. So then i get it and then the release of the info in the trades. Any one can recomend a high quality and a midrange Cannon Video?Customer Review: Best Digital camera for under $2000
Summary: 5 Stars
This is my second digital camera. Previously I had used the Fuji Finepix s5000, but wanted to move up to an SLR system so that I could eventually use a variety of lenses.
I was very concerned at the beginning of my DSLR buying process- it seems to me that once a person buys a body and a few lenses, they are committed to that camera maker's "system" pretty much for life, so I wanted to be very certain that this was the right choice. If you purchase a 20d, you are not just buying a 20d, you are making (often) a pretty serious financial commitment to Canon technology.
I chose a canon 20d for a few reasons; I had decided early on in the process to stick to Nikon or Canon, as they are the clear leaders not only of Digital SLRs, but of Camera technology in general. Thus, though certain other SLRs like the Olympus E-Volt or the Pentax *istD are attractive, they simply do not have the range of accessories or the support community of either Canon or Nikon.
I ended up seriously considering three cameras; the Canon 350d (Digital Rebel), The Canon 20d, and the Nikon D70. From talking to other folks who were in the same situation as me, This seems to be a common range of choices people face
I ended up choosing Canon because it seems to me that they have a slightly better line of lenses than Nikon, particularly those available on the used market. This is important, because the more you use your DSLR, the more you will want that lens that is just a slightly wider angle, or just a slightly faster aperture, etc.
Once I decided to go for Canon, I chose the 20d over the 350d primarily due to size and toughness. The 350d is a great Camera, and its sensor is very similar to the 20d. However, the 20d's magnesium alloy chassis is much heavier than the 350d. It can certainly take a lot more abuse than the plastic 350d body- and I tend to take my camera on a lot of long trips. The 350d is a lot lighter, which is nice- but I frankly found its body too small to grip easily. As I have very large hands, this was a serious disadvantage to me. For someone with smaller hands the 350d probably feels fine. You will have to pick one up and judge this for yourself.
The layout of the camera itself is a lot easier to use than the 350d as well. The camera requires far less attention when shifting settings than the 350d, and thus frees up your "focus" for the subject you are shooting. I cannot stress how ergonomic and intuitive I find this camera to be.
Since I have purchased the 20d, I have not regretted it for a minute. This camera is a real joy to work with. The viewfinder is nice and bright (looking through glass again instead of an EVF is a pleasure, believe me). The range of ISO settings from 100-1600 is wonderful, particularly nice are long twilight/night shots at ISO 100 that give you some lovely colors. Shooting night and low light with the 20d will blow your mind. The CMOS sensor of the 20d produces almost noiseless images at high ISO settings.
The best feature of the camera is the quick start up time. It can go from dormant to actively autofocusing in 0.2 seconds. My previous camera took 2 seconds to "turn on." That may not sound like a great deal, but I lost countless shots due to that fact, and it is what pushed me most to upgrade my camera.
I tend to shoot on aperture priority or A-DEP (like auto, but with no flash), but there are a variety of "pre-set" modes for portraiture, sports, night shooting, and so on that are easy to use.
The megapixel count is nice, but not really that important. Comparing images made from the 6 megapixel Nikon D70 and 8 megapixel Canon 20d, one can't really notice any difference until you blow them up to ridiculous sizes. At this level of the MP game, the quality of the lens you use is far more important to final resolution than the sensors pixel count. If you compare the kit lens (18-55mm f3.5-5.6) at its wide focal lengths and lower apertures with the canon 50mm f1.8 prime lens at f8, It looks like you are shooting with 2 different cameras. The same holds for Nikon as well, so don't decide for the 20d simply because it has more megapixels than the D70. Of course, even the worst canon lens beats the hell out of my old digicam on its best day.
I have had a few problems with some older third party manufacturer lenses made for the Canon mount, Like Sigma and Tamron, not working with the new 20d body; but I have been told that if you ship off the lens to the manufacturer they will rechip it for free. All currently manufactured 3rd party lenses ought to work with this body. Keep in mind that the Canon digital sensor is smaller than 35mm film, so there is a "focal length multiplier" that makes your lenses "longer" than they would be on a regular film SLR. The focal length multiplier for the 20d is 1.6 . That means a 100mm lens on a film camera acts like a 160mm lens on a 20d. For those who like to focus close up with telephoto, that's great, because you can buy a relatively inexpensive 300mm lens, and it will shoot almost like a 500mm telephoto. I, however, usually shoot wide (more "peripheral vision") and prefer shorter lenses, so this is a pain. Of course, I would love to have a "full frame" camera like the Canon 5d, but the price is simply to much.
It has a number of strengths and weaknesses, which I will detail below:
Strengths:
The variety of lenses is excellent.
Lenses on second hand market are reasonably priced
Introductory high speed lens (less than f2) is inexpensive (canon 50mm f1.8)
Autofocus aquires targets quickly
Continuous shooting mode is quick- autofocus recalibrates for each shot.
Extremely high ISO capability (1600) for low light situations
Body is physically tough.
Very fast top shutter speed (1/8000) allows open apertures in well lit situations.
Manual focus easy to use
Pop up flash is very high above camera, and thus avoids casting shadows
Flash recycles quickly
CF card memory system is versatile and inexpensive
User interface is the best I have ever seen
Can be used as a blunt weapon if you are mugged
Weaknesses:
It ain't cheap
Very heavy, particularly with long lenses
You may end up spending money on glass that rivals a serious crack addiction
Longer focal length multiplier (1.6) than film, or than Nikon (1.5).
Doesn't work well with older 3rd party lenses without rechipping.
Mirror is very loud, particularly if you are used to a point and shoot.
Comparison with Nikon:
20d is better at telephoto (lenses have internal motors)
D70 is better at wide angle shots (focal length multiplier is lower)
20d is better at low light (lower noise, lower ISO setting).
Nikon fans believe that all Canon users are heretics, and vice versa, so why compare them you dirty heathen.
Customer Review: The right camera for impassioned amateurs!
Summary: 5 Stars
Just a little over a year ago, I became fascinated with digital photography, but not for the reasons most amateur photographers cite. I was in the market for a new home and, as I was looking at one with my realtor one day, I ran across a home filled with pictures. These were all pictures taken by the owners with SLR and D-SLR cameras. The pictures were diverse, but they simply made the home quite warm and interesting (disclosure: I didn't buy the house, but I did take away a new passion!). As a result of this "warm, fuzzy" feeling of seeing a large volume of pictures embellishing the flavor of this home, I decided to jump into digital photography with both feet. I knew I wasn't ready for the "big cameras," so I bought the Canon A80 4MP digital. Since that time, I've taken hundreds of photos, some which I've blown up to 8 x 10s and are hanging in my office (the Continental Divide on a snowy day and Puerto Vallarta sunsets). This particular camera, which I reviewed previously, was a great starter camera, and one which I'll hang on to for future "snapshots." That said, this warm fuzzy feeling I had when looking at this home described above has turned into a heated passion. As a result, the "heat" quickly pushed me toward a more serious D-SLR.
When looking for a newer D-SLR, one with greater diversity, features, and higher-quality output, I did my due diligence like I do on most purchases. I did however, read one review that pretty much summed up the camera buying experience. This reviewer said there are three types of camera buyers: 1) those who only buy Nikon, 2) those who only buy Canon, and 3) those who can't decide between Nikon and Canon. Very astute and very true. After much consternation (and not wanting to get caught in #3), I decided on Canon, and purchased the 20D. I must tell you that I look looked at the camera superstores and boutiques, but found that Amazon had a very competitive price and besides, I'm an Amazon junkie. In any event, I purchased the 20D with the 18mm-55mm kit. That said, let me take a quick detour on to lens purchases.
Since my 20D purchase, I've quickly learned that, while the camera is the foundation for high quality pictures, and imagination is the fuel for creating beautiful shots, the lens is the bridge between the two. Honestly, if I had to do it over again, I would not have purchased the 18-55mm lens with the camera; rather, I would have made a body purchase only. This lens is good for "everyday" shooting, but I was looking for the greatest breadth of exposure in the least number of lenses. The 18mm-55mm lens fits the middle of the road in terms of macro/zoom parameters however, it did not fit the boundries I set for the lenses I wanted. Using Amazon customer reviews and several photography-based web sites, I began my search for lenses that would give me the broad range I sought. Although expensive, I believe I've found an excellent, albeit heavy duo: the Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM Standard Zoom Lens and the Canon EF 70mm-200mm f/2.8L IS USM Telephoto Zoom Lens. Add a 2x telephoto extender, and I effectively have from 24mm exposure to 400mm exposure (the 2x extender fits the 70mm-200mm lens and doubles its zoom capabilities). Yes, these two lenses (and the 2x extender) have run around $3K, but both are "L" lenses (top of Canon's line) and both should easily provide me with the depth and breadth of pictures I wish to take. (Warning: if you decide to purchase the extender, make sure you check the lens compatibility. The extender only fits certain lenses.) Back to the camera...
As an impassioned amateur, the 20D was easily the best purchase for me given its volume of features and photo quality. I doubt seriously I'll need to upgrade for years. I've taken a few hundred shots since the purchase, and the quality of the photos can only be described as smooth as butter. The color is brilliant, and exposure is top notch. There is no noticeable resolution distress (I believe the pros call it "noise") regardless my focal point. The camera has an instant startup, which is important to anyone needing a quick shot. And, the time differential between shots is immediate. Although this camera allows manual settings for specific shots, I find myself in automatic mode in most cases, both from an ease of use standpoint and allowances for my inexperience. I've read many reviews redressing the built-in flash and its inadequacies however; I've not yet had that problem. All shots I've taken, which have needed additional light, have been more than adequately handled with the built-in flash.
At this point, the absolute only downside I have found is the weight factor in terms of my combination of camera and chosen lenses. The camera body itself is not a weight factor however, add either one of the lenses I purchased and it becomes something of a different story (particularly with the 70mm-200mm lens). Now, this is not to say that I have any regrets relative to these purchases; rather, it is the only downside I've found. The camera body weighs only a 1.5 lbs however, the 70mm-200mm lens adds 2.9 lbs, which makes the total unit weight something over 4 lbs...not inconsequential when taking numerous photos.
All-in-all, this jazzed amateur gives the 20D two thumbs up for ease of use and incredible quality, particularly in the $2,000 and under D-SLR category. VERY highly recommended.
Customer Review: Almost perfect -but not quite
Summary: 5 Stars
If you want the full hard core review of this camera you need to be looking somewhere like [...] because there's far more to this camera than a normal user will ever meet.
Having said that we are left with just the little bits and pieces a normal user would use.
The camera is actually a little smaller than optimal for a person with average sized hands, the little finger of the right hand has nowhere to sit and the EOS10D actually feels better. But in normal use you won't notice this. The viewfinder is small, in many cases you just have to trust that it really has done a good job of focus because there isn't enough image for you to see for yourself. I find it quite difficult to be certain that I even have the camera level. It's also not the brightest viewfinder you ever saw.
Battery life is very good, even powering an image stabilized lens, I just filled a 1Gb card on a single battery, that's a few hundred images and the battery still isn't showing low.
Dust has been a small issue, there are cameras now that will clean their own sensor but this isn't one. I eventually found a good hand air blower. You can not use canned air or a brush to clean the sensor, either can damage the camera badly. Once I got the dust off, it was there from new, it has remained clean. So maybe it's not that much of an issue. I use Tokina 24-200, Canon 50mm and Sigma 80-400 OS EX lenses, so I do change the lens fairly often, so perhaps dust isn't that big an issue.
Switch on is unbelievably fast, slow switch on times have cost me numerous shots with other cameras, with the 20D the camera is on by the time you realize the switch has clicked into place. Speaking of which, on a camera with excellent ergonomics the on-off switch is about the only thing that doesn't come to hand well, but it's not a factor in normal use. Just not perfect.
Low light performance has been excellent, the camera will shoot at 800 or even 1600 ASA with no apparent noise. You can even configure it to use 3200ASA, but you get significant noise effects with some faint horizontal lines and grain like effects, though I was shooting under sodium light. Even at 3200ASA the pictures are better than with fast print film under similar conditions.
You do need to be mindful that the exposure controls on this camera really do do what they say, you need to keep your eye on the shutter speed and aperture to get the shot you think you want, this isn't an instant camera that will just make the most of it. Most of the time the idiot modes, sport or scenic or whatever, will actually do a good job of picking the right settings. If you are in a hurry then use the built in functions. For example, in sports mode it switches to predictive autofocus, shutter priority and continuous shooting, which are all good choices.
The autofocus is excellent, however in programmed modes you need to pay attention to which of the focus zones it has actually selected. If there is something closer to you than the subject you may need to select the correct focus point, fortunately this is very easy to do, you can hit the control and then select the focus point using the joystick, both with your right thumb.
Another minor irritation to me is that if you are using the fully auto mode, which does a very good job of most things, it will sometimes select the flash even though the autofocus should tell it that the subject is way out of range. Perhaps I expect too much?
Picture quality? Well, unless you have an absolutely perfect lens and need to make 36" wide posters you are unlikely to find that the camera is a limiting factor. I'm actually waiting to see an Epson R1800 because the current generation of printers can't reproduce the quality I have available with this camera and my lenses.
The built in flash is inadequate and the flash metering is soometimes poor, I was taking pictures near a road recently and whenever a reflective sign was in shot the picture was under exposed. Recharge times are pretty poor too, but I think the built in flash should be regarded as an emergency or backup method only, if you are serious then you need a serious flash. I'll be adding either the Speedlite 580EX or a Metz 54 flash in the near future.
I'll also be adding an L-series lens in place of the Tokina, the Tokina is OK, but not good enough for my brothers wedding.
Would I buy it again? Sure. Will I trade for the next great EOS digital to come on the scene? Unlikely. Maybe if it has a larger viewfinder and a 35mm sensor, but this camera already does way more than I need.
Customer Review: Very nicely designed camera - fun to use.
Summary: 5 Stars
I purchased the Canon 20D package with the stock 18-55mm zoom lens about three weeks ago. Since then, I have taken several hundred pictures and am very happy with the camera - highly recommended if you can justify the price. I've broken this review up into sections due to its length.
1. Lens
a. 18-55 mm stock lens
The lens isn't great, but on the other hand, it's not bad. On the pro side, it's lightweight, cheap, small, and seems to focus fairly quickly. The only bad thing about the lens is that it produces slightly soft pictures, but if you won't be blowing the pictures up too large, you probably won't notice.
b. 17-85 mm USM IS lens
Being obsessed with quality, after having the camera for about a week, I purchased (also on Amazon) the Canon 17-85 mm USM IS (Image Stabilized) zoom lens. I've been very happy with this lens and would recommend it if you can afford it. The IS is quite impressive - it really works. This lens isn't perfect either, but it seems noticeably better than the 18-55 (and only six times as expensive!!).
2. Compact Flash
I'd recommend that you purchase a SanDisk Ultra II 1 GB compact flash card with it - these are sold here on Amazon. This card provides about 5 MB per second write speed which is significantly better than many of the cheaper cards - there are some websites on the net which review cards (and even one which has tested them all in a Canon 20D) - it's worth looking into.
3. Battery
The battery life has been very good for me so far - the specs say that you can take about 1000 pictures with flash on half of them, and I don't doubt that (although I haven't pushed it that far yet). The charger is also nice and compact (easy to travel with) and charges the batteries in about an hour and a half (fast!).
4. Design
This camera is fun to take pictures with! Through the lens composing allows precise control of depth of field, focus, and cropping - it's also much easier to use in full sunlight as compared to a point and shoot digicam. It operates much like a film SLR in that you set most of the settings on the top LCD panel, compose through the viewfinder, etc., but it also adds the color LCD screen to view the pictures you've just taken. The other thing I really like about this over a film SLR is the ability to set the ISO and white balance on the fly. With film, you'd have to load a different roll of film for different lighting conditions or ISO - now it's the simple twist of a dial. While these features are available on most consumer point and shoot digital cameras, they're generally much harder to get to through the menu system. One great advantage of this camera is that it has so *many* buttons and dials - it's very easy to get to most frequently used functions without wading through extensive menus. They're also very ergonomically placed so I can switch most settings I care about while looking through the viewfinder just by feel.
Another nice pro is the backlit top LCD panel which makes night shooting easy.
5. Bad Points
Hmm.. Not much I can think of that I don't like about it. My camera came with a 'starter quantity of dust' (quoted from some other website) on the imaging chip - but I was able to blast it off with a rubber bulb. Be aware that digital SLR's tend to gather dust on the chip - especially if you change lenses a lot - but this is nothing against Canon - it happens on them all.
It's a shame that it doesn't show you the current ISO setting in the viewfinder (or on the top panel unless you hit a button). Several times I've left it at ISO 1600 by accident when I didn't really need that speed.
It's a little heavy, but I find that I actually like the weight - makes it feel more solid.
I wish it had an IR receiver so you could use an infra-red remote with it - but alas - it doesn't (even though the Digital Rebel does!). I had to buy the Canon RS-80N3 wired remote (which works well).
7. Conclusion
An awesome camera overall - definitely go for it if you can afford it! I still kept my old compact digicam as a backup for cases when I don't want to carry an SLR, but in general, I'll use it 95% of the time. Much more enjoyable to take pictures with than a standard digicam - try it - you'll like it.