Re: Pickup a Canon 18-135mm?
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MrWasabi wrote:
Thanks Michael,
That's excellent input and I agree the SL1's versatility has given me the photography bug again after many years. I'm actually looking for a SL2 as well and I'll probably keep the SL1 as a backup or for another family member to use.
The big appeal of the SL2 is the move to a full dual-pixel sensor for super-fast Live
View AF. In practical terms, it means a big step up in video AF performance. For travel, the SL1 is fine with us, but it's not my first camera of choice when capturing video of our three 2-6 year old grandchildren!
Another question for the group. Should I be targeting the 18-135 STM or the USM relative to the deal I can find? I just missed a STM for $185 and it looks like I can find either in the low $200s range most of the time.
The STM version is extremely fast and very good, optically, where the original version was largely ho-hum. The USM version is supposed to improve still photography speed. I haven't use it. However, there's LOTS of reviews and comparisons on Youtube. My takeaway was that it might be helpful for action photography, but most found of the reviews I saw said that the improvements are minimal. My wife came back from 2 weeks in Europe with nearly 1500 photographs, and focus was not an issue. Given how inexpensive (and still good) the STM model is, it would probably remain my first choice for travel. Her copy was the one EFS lens we didn't buy refurbished, instead part of a local kit that included a 70D, 50/STM, and 2 128GB SD cards for $600 total, making it difficult to itemize for just the zoom, but about $200 is not only consistent with what I've seen regularly, but also a pretty good price for such a capable general zoom.