This post is a compilation of links to Canon EF-S 10-22mm f/3.5-4.5 USM tips and techniques.
Attribution is given by linking to the source. My comments are prefixed with “DLC:”.
“Imqqmi” wrote the following list of Canon 10-22 tips in a DPReview post:
It’s an excellent lens for landscapes and creative stuff, even for portraits it can be great.I’ve spend some time reading about it before I bought the 10-22. Here are my findings I’ve found most useful:
- The lens vignettes a bit at 10mm, and there’s some chromatic aberration, most of it can be corrected but not all. LR 3 (DLC: LR 3 = Adobe Lightroom 3. Read How to reduce chromatic aberration using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom) has a preset and works but doesn’t remove CA as much as could be and you’ll always need to adjust it manually.
- 10mm on a crop-sensor camera (DLC: Crop factor on Canon DSLR cameras with an APS-C sensor is 1.6x) is a focal length for compositions of lines and shapes. Try to see the lines in the scene and look around you. The lens is much wider that what you see by eye or at 18mm. It’s hard at first to pick a scene that lends itself to ultra-wide perspective shooting. So try to minimize distractions, the lens includes a huge part of the scene
- I’ve also read some posts that claim a CP (DLC: CP = circular polarizer. Note that the filter thread size on the Canon 10-22mm is 77mm, so you should limit your purchase research to 77mm circular polarizers) is completely useless, I don’t agree, it’s been very useful to me. It is correct however that a CP at such a wide focal length will darken a part of the sky (you can rotate the CP element to choose which part) and the rest will be much brighter. When there’s say 15-50% clouds in the sky, much of the difference in brightness is hidden and make the clouds stand out much more. The normal B+W doesn’t hard-vignette so save some money by getting the standard MRC version. Stacking it with an ND filter (DLC: ND = Neutral Density) does hard and soft vignette though. (DLC: Imqqmi adds a couple of sample photos illustrating the use of CP filters in this post, and advises against buying Hoya and B+W Kaesemann CP filters)
- Vertical lines will lean inward when tilting down or lean out when tilting up. However often you don’t want the horizon bang in the middle for landscape shots. So pick the scene carefully and plan some extra space around vertical objects so that you can compensate it in post later on.
- Set focus manually, this can help you in many cases. I often set it just after the 1m mark, f/8 and everything from 50cm to infinity is in focus. Easy and quick.
- Portraits, yes it can be done. You can go for the extremely distorted sort of portraits (select your subject and angle carefully, you’re not making any friends!) or you can do more natural ones by not placing the subject in the extreme corners or edges and don’t get too close. It takes some practice to get it right but it can be very rewarding in tight spaces if you manage to learn this relatively difficult to master this kind of portrait look.
- If you shoot landscapes always look up into the sky for nice cloud formations. Since a very large part of the image will contain clouds, those formations far off will be very small, so look for large detail closer by and above you.
- Get an off-brand lens hood. I’ve found it useful to increase contrast and remove flare at angles that doesn’t include the sun in the frame. And it also kind of protects the front element from you touching it a bit more. It’s a huge hood though so make sure you’ve got a bag that can fit it properly. (DLC: Canon makes the EW-83E hood for this purpose, and there are a variety of third-party, compatible options which are at least half the price of the EW83E.)
- Always try to find some subject that can go in the foreground, you can make good use of the fact that things closer by will seem very large compared to stuff farther off.
So if you get it, get a CP and lens hood as well and enjoy the new lens!