3rd party lenses

[canonbraden]

I'm looking at getting a wide angle lens for my Canon T3. What would be the best for me, Tamron, Sigma, or Tokina? (These are the only third party lens companies I know of)
Also, how do I know if the lens will fit my camera?
Thanks

 

[tirediron]

The Tokina 11-16 is generally regarded as the best UWA zoom in the third-party market, but it's not the cheapest? What's your budget? As for fitting your camera, you just need to specify 'Canon mount' when ordering.

 

[Derrel]

If it's a "Canon EF mount", or "EF-S", it will fit your T3i. The EF mount was invented in the mid-1980's, so anything in "EF mount" will be the right mount. EF-S is EF Short back focus distantance, which is Canon's smaller image-circle lens specification for crop-sensor d-slr's. Tamron, Tokina, and Sigma all make some decent lenses...going by brand name is not a good strategy...it's meaningless, actually...there are good Sigma lenses and poorish ones. Same with the other two.

 

[Gavjenks]

I don't know about the other two companies, but I own a Sigma 10-20mm, and I have absolutely no complaints about it. It is as sharp as I think one would every reasonably expect a 10-20mm lens to be, is built like a high quality tank, is compatible with full frame if I want to upgrade later, is reasonably priced (~$400 or something IIRC), was well-calibrated to infinity focus, has decent auto-focus, and has really nice grips (and you can manually override focus without switching to manual focus, a nice little touch that Canon doesn't even bother to put on any but their L lenses).

 

[ktan7]

Sigma is a better reputable brand name.