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Testing 20-50 vs 18-55 right now!

Started Dec 22, 2014 | Discussions
mordor_74 Contributing Member • Posts: 622
Testing 20-50 vs 18-55 right now!
1

Hello friends,

today my 18-55  has landed home and i starded my tests to understand if its a keeper against the 20-50 that comes with my NX1100.

My reason for this is i need OIS and good performance at 50mm (i like to photograph people and pets mainly...) and i cant find a good price on a 16-50 actually...

So i picked up this almost new 18-55. Must say that is huge compared to the 20-50...

My very first impression is that the 20-50 surprised me. In the 20-24 range its absolutely a keeper. Very good colors and sharp edge to edge. From 28mm the quality start to fall a bit down but not really that bad. At 35mm i can say that the 18-55 performsalight  better at the center of the image but borders of the 20-50 still better.

Cant say the same about AF performance... the 18-55 is obviously better and i feel like AF performance of the 20-50 at the tele side are really poor both in pciture and video mode.

To my opinion the 18-55 is more a kit lens and the 20-50 is a 20-24 wide zoom (very good for street and landscapes for the money) with extra bonus range.

So far i can say the 18-55 cant beat the 20-50 @20mm on a landscape and the 20-50 cant beat the 18-55 in a video...

Just wanted to share with you my work in progress...

 mordor_74's gear list:mordor_74's gear list
Sony Cyber-shot DSC-HX5 Canon EOS Rebel SL1 Samsung NX1100 Samsung NX 30mm F2 Pancake Tamron SP AF 17-50mm F/2.8 XR Di II VC LD Aspherical (IF) +7 more
Samsung NX 18-55mm F3.5-5.6 OIS Samsung NX 20-50mm F3.5-5.6 ED Samsung NX1100
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tecnoworld
tecnoworld Veteran Member • Posts: 7,232
Re: Testing 20-50 vs 18-55 right now!

The 16-50pz is, in my experience, better than both.

 tecnoworld's gear list:tecnoworld's gear list
Samsung TL500 Samsung NX100 Samsung NX200 Samsung NX300 Samsung NX1 +15 more
OP mordor_74 Contributing Member • Posts: 622
Re: Testing 20-50 vs 18-55 right now!

I have the same feeling readying the reviews around but the 18-55 cost me near half the price, so i wanted to take a test and see how it performs.

 mordor_74's gear list:mordor_74's gear list
Sony Cyber-shot DSC-HX5 Canon EOS Rebel SL1 Samsung NX1100 Samsung NX 30mm F2 Pancake Tamron SP AF 17-50mm F/2.8 XR Di II VC LD Aspherical (IF) +7 more
OP mordor_74 Contributing Member • Posts: 622
Re: Testing 20-50 vs 18-55 right now!

I just did some OIS comparision test with my sony alpha @50mm.

The sony OIS is slight better (but i dont know if body size and the viewfinder play a role in the handling...). I can shot at 1/10 with the sony with no shake, i obtain the same results at 1/15 with the samsung. Mixed results at 1/10. The sony seems to do a better job at the wide and while the samsung has more constant results.

Anyway if you ask me i consider this results very positives!

mordor_74 wrote:

Hello friends,

today my 18-55 has landed home and i starded my tests to understand if its a keeper against the 20-50 that comes with my NX1100.

My reason for this is i need OIS and good performance at 50mm (i like to photograph people and pets mainly...) and i cant find a good price on a 16-50 actually...

So i picked up this almost new 18-55. Must say that is huge compared to the 20-50...

My very first impression is that the 20-50 surprised me. In the 20-24 range its absolutely a keeper. Very good colors and sharp edge to edge. From 28mm the quality start to fall a bit down but not really that bad. At 35mm i can say that the 18-55 performsalight better at the center of the image but borders of the 20-50 still better.

Cant say the same about AF performance... the 18-55 is obviously better and i feel like AF performance of the 20-50 at the tele side are really poor both in pciture and video mode.

To my opinion the 18-55 is more a kit lens and the 20-50 is a 20-24 wide zoom (very good for street and landscapes for the money) with extra bonus range.

So far i can say the 18-55 cant beat the 20-50 @20mm on a landscape and the 20-50 cant beat the 18-55 in a video...

Just wanted to share with you my work in progress...

 mordor_74's gear list:mordor_74's gear list
Sony Cyber-shot DSC-HX5 Canon EOS Rebel SL1 Samsung NX1100 Samsung NX 30mm F2 Pancake Tamron SP AF 17-50mm F/2.8 XR Di II VC LD Aspherical (IF) +7 more
AdamT
AdamT Forum Pro • Posts: 62,282
Re: Testing 20-50 vs 18-55 right now!

I`ve always seen the 20-50 as a superb 20mm F3.5 prime which can zoom if you`re desperate .......

what saddens me is that Samsung still haven`t made another kit lens to match it optically, what I`ve seen from the Samsung Powerzoom didn`t fill me with confidence (it reminded me of the Sony version)  - all the 18-55s I`ve tried have been poor at the edges at the wide end , they need to do something about this as Canon, Nikon, Olympus, Fuji and Panasonic all have fantastic kit lenses which wider ranging and are or can be stabilized ..

with Sammy it seems to be either the humble 20-50 or the megabux 16-50 F2-2.8 Pro lens if you want a decent zoom - all I want is a copy of the Fuji 16-50 F3.5-5.6 (XM1 kit lens) for my NX210 .

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 AdamT's gear list:AdamT's gear list
Canon PowerShot SX50 HS Nikon D3 Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH3 Nikon Z7 Nikon Z9
tecnoworld
tecnoworld Veteran Member • Posts: 7,232
Re: Testing 20-50 vs 18-55 right now!

I have two copies of the 20-50, and I prefer the 16-50 to both of them. Just my personal preference, no scientific tests.

 tecnoworld's gear list:tecnoworld's gear list
Samsung TL500 Samsung NX100 Samsung NX200 Samsung NX300 Samsung NX1 +15 more
OP mordor_74 Contributing Member • Posts: 622
Re: Testing 20-50 vs 18-55 right now!

I agree... if the 20-50 was stabilezed it would have win against the 20mm f2.8. Maybe this is the reason why the 20-50 has no OIS!!!

 mordor_74's gear list:mordor_74's gear list
Sony Cyber-shot DSC-HX5 Canon EOS Rebel SL1 Samsung NX1100 Samsung NX 30mm F2 Pancake Tamron SP AF 17-50mm F/2.8 XR Di II VC LD Aspherical (IF) +7 more
AdamT
AdamT Forum Pro • Posts: 62,282
Re: Testing 20-50 vs 18-55 right now!

I agree... if the 20-50 was stabilezed it would have win against the 20mm f2.8. Maybe this is the reason why the 20-50 has no OIS!!!

The 20-50 Probably has no OIS because it had to be as cheap as possible for the NX100 , I think the optical superiority of it was more an accident than anything else ..

I`ve had three (original NX200 Mk1, White NX1100 Mk2 and the black NX1000 Mk2 I have now on my NX210) and all of them have been better than the one 20mm prime I tried at F3.5 , none have been much good at the long end though - I analysed it and the 20-50 seems have more of a front focus issue at 50mm than actual optical design  problems ..

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 AdamT's gear list:AdamT's gear list
Canon PowerShot SX50 HS Nikon D3 Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH3 Nikon Z7 Nikon Z9
MGJA
MGJA Regular Member • Posts: 477
Re: Testing 20-50 vs 18-55 right now!

I'm a big fan of the 20-50 @20 too. But I doubt it's a front focusing problem @50. The cameras have CDAF, after all, and do not suffer the front or back focusing issues that plague PDAF systems.

AdamT
AdamT Forum Pro • Posts: 62,282
Re: Testing 20-50 vs 18-55 right now!

MGJA wrote:

I'm a big fan of the 20-50 @20 too. But I doubt it's a front focusing problem @50. The cameras have CDAF, after all, and do not suffer the front or back focusing issues that plague PDAF systems.

Technically no and I agree but I've noticed things in a scene sharper in front of the focus plane when shooting at distance at 50mm, it could be caused Spherical aberration (focus shift ?)( but that usually only affects lenses when stopped down and I Never stop the NX down beyond F5.6 unless after deep DOF for Macros

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 AdamT's gear list:AdamT's gear list
Canon PowerShot SX50 HS Nikon D3 Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH3 Nikon Z7 Nikon Z9
OP mordor_74 Contributing Member • Posts: 622
Re: Testing 20-50 vs 18-55 right now!

The sweet spot of the 20-50 is the 20mm to me. This is unusual since most of the (KIT) lenses have the sweet spot between 1/3 and the half of the focal range (i know that dxomark states that the 18-55 best performs at 18mm but i found that its best overall performance starts around 30mm and go to 40mm, indeed i started enjoyng the 29mm where you get good performance and an f4 ). It is just like they designed a good 16-32 lens and then change the design to make a more marketable focal range.

Also... if make use of the izoom @1.2x with the 18-55 you get a 22-66 sharper lens with a 14mpix sensor and nice iso performace :), still on par with performance of most of entry level mirrorless cam!

 mordor_74's gear list:mordor_74's gear list
Sony Cyber-shot DSC-HX5 Canon EOS Rebel SL1 Samsung NX1100 Samsung NX 30mm F2 Pancake Tamron SP AF 17-50mm F/2.8 XR Di II VC LD Aspherical (IF) +7 more
OP mordor_74 Contributing Member • Posts: 622
Re: Testing 20-50 vs 18-55 right now!

I still not convinced about the effectiveness of the OIS of the 18-55. I guess that the 20-50 would win hand down in a good light situation.

NX1100 16-55 @29mm f4 iZoom 1.4x (so 40mm) ISO 640 a bit of LR4 to correct exposure...

Here's a sample of my real usage testing. Light was not that good and subject was moved with a teaser to catch the right expression.

 mordor_74's gear list:mordor_74's gear list
Sony Cyber-shot DSC-HX5 Canon EOS Rebel SL1 Samsung NX1100 Samsung NX 30mm F2 Pancake Tamron SP AF 17-50mm F/2.8 XR Di II VC LD Aspherical (IF) +7 more
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