A day with the Canon T2i: My First Thoughts

I went to a cousin’s 40th birthday party the other day, and lo-and-behold, one of my aunts shows up with her new Canon T2i. Even more, she didn’t know how to use it effectively and asked me to do all the birthday shooting with it (as well as give her a few pointers). Since this was my first time using the T2i, I’ll share my thoughts:

1) The camera feels much less robust that the Canon 7D or 5D. It’s not that it feels flimsy, it just doesn’t feel as solid when compared to the others.
2) It’s much smaller than the others. It’s so much smaller that I was shocked to find out it was the Canon T2i and not some less expensive EOS. Not bad if you have to carry a camera around all day, but since many people equate “big camera” with “pro camera”, it’s not my first choice.
3) ISO speeds are standard speeds only. No options to do 1/3 or 1/2 ISO speeds – Canon has restricted this (but I’m not sure why).
4) Comes with Canon’s 18-55mm zoom lens that most of the consumer end cameras have. It’s not a horrible lens, but most beginning stage photographers don’t understand why they pay $1000 for a camera like the T2i, but their portraits still don’t look “great”, “spectacular”, and “impressive” (hint: at 18mm, the wide-angle distorts a person’s features).
5) Since it has only one window menu, it was hard to understand what the camera was doing.
6) The video functions are hard to get into and around. The Canon T2i would not be my first choice for shooting video (unlike the 7D, which is all about shooting video).

The Canon T2i is a good camera, but, all-in-all, the T2i is just not in the same league as the 5D or 7D. Where the other two are geared towards pros, the T2i is more-or-less a good entry level camera for people that really want to take photography seriously, but aren’t ready to make an actual living off of shooting photography full-time. I’d say it’s primary aim is college students (photography/art majors) that want to make it through college with a good all-round camera, beginning photographers that want to step up their game and possibly make a few dollars on weekends shooting things like pets and/or friends & family, or as a less expensive backup camera for some pro photographers (that already shoot Canon) to keep in their bag (since it’s small, it takes up less room and is less heavy to carry).

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