Today we have announcements of two brand new Canon lenses. The Canon 16-35mm F4.0L IS lens and the Canon 10-18mm F4.5-5.6 IS STM lens. At first I felt very meh about the news. But after looking closer I think both these lenses are going to be killer tools for filmmakers. Let take a look at each and discuss their uses.
Canon 16-35mm F4.0L IS – $1,199
At first glance this looks like a cheaper version of the Canon 16-35mm F2.8L lens that is already available. But this sucker has IS which is HUGE for video use. I know so many shooters who are in love with this lens and use it all the time, so to have a similar model but with IS is pretty sick. Not to mention this lens is about $500 cheaper than the F2.8 version which gives you more than enough savings to pick up the other new Canon lens…
Canon 10-18mm F4.5-5.6 IS STM – $299
The first thing I noticed about this lens was the off putting wide open aperture. 4.5 isn’t terribly good, especially when it falls back to 5.6 on the long end of the lens. But it is a wide lens and we probably wouldn’t be filming and zooming with this sucker. While this lens has one weird ass focal length, I think this would be PERFECT for jib shooters looking for a cheap wide lens to fly. Oh, and did I mention the lens has IS AND is an STM lens? Great news for video shooters!
Who Should Buy These Lenses?
If you do any jib work, that 10-18mm is going to be a great tool and it will only cost you $299!
And if you shoot weddings or any wide angle footage the new 16-35mm is going to work great, as long as you can make F4 work. If your shooting on a C100, 5D Mark III or a 6D, you shouldn’t have any issues with F4 since the ISO range on those cameras is crazy talk.