about reviews

One thing to note about these reviews is this: I only put reviews on this site of products I use on a regular basis. I may try out a new product from time to time, but I won’t put a review up unless it makes it to my camera bag. I’m also never paid to do these reviews. They are only products that I genuinely love and recommend to you. So you know I’m not just saying something because someone asked me to.

Where to buy or try

B&H Photo Video – Canon EF 15mm f/2.8 Fisheye
Borrow Lenses - Canon EF 15mm f/2.8 Fisheye

Canon EF 15mm f/2.8 Fisheye Review

Have you ever hit a creative wall? Or just gotten bored of photographing with the same lens every time? If you’re looking to freshen up your photographic perspective, and open up possibilities that don’t exist with any other lens out there, then you may want to consider a fisheye lens. The Canon 15mm Fisheye Lens has a 180 degrees field of view, an incredible amount of distortion that you can use to your advantage, and to top it all off it’s a very affordable lens at around $630. With some lenses you don’t want distortion, with a fisheye you embrace it. This is a really fun lens to use and there are so many ways to get creative with it! The lens can focus on subjects as close as 0.7 feet so you can get really close and still get tack sharp images. The build and performance of the lens is easily “L” glass quality. It’s also incredibly light. The only unfortunate thing with a lens like this is that the lens sticks out like a bubble, or erm, a fisheye. This means the lens can’t except any kind of filter to protect the outer glass. I just means that you have to be extra careful with it and make sure you keep the cap on it when you’re not using it.

Using a fisheye lens definitely brings in some challenges in composing a scene. When you use a lens like a 70-200mm lens, composition is a lot easier. Framing your subject is simple. With a fisheye, everything changes. If you move your subject anywhere out the middle of the frame, you will visibly see it begin to rapidly distort. But because this is a fisheye, you simply use this to your advantage. Another problem that you run into is just how much of a scene you can fit into the frame with this thing. I can hold my hand out by my shoulder and see it when I look through the view finder. I love using this lens at weddings during receptions, it allows you to get shots of the entire group of people dancing, and in low light you can spin the camera during the shutter release to create a radial blur around the frame while leaving the middle of the frame clear. However, every now and then you’ll be looking through your images later and see a pair of shoes that look very similar to yours at the bottom of the frame .

Here are some examples of shots I’ve taken with this fun little lens, enjoy!