I know most photography enthusiasts like to stick to lenses from their respective manufacturers be it Canon or Nikon ( though my personal observation is that Olympus & Sony users are much more flexible in their lens choices!). But really, third-party lenses aren’t all bad and neither are all Camera manufacturer lenses fantastic. If you look at the lower end of the lens market where all the non-professional lenses come in, meaning non-L lenses in the case of Canon and its counterpart in Nikon – some lenses don’t perform better than third-party lenses and yet they cost more!

I have shot with Tamron lenses before, though I don’t own any yet (borrowed from friends 😉 and I’m impressed with some of their lenses. It should be also noted that Tamron does have a higher incidence of bad quality control from time to time – though not completely. So if you buy a Tamron lens and somehow feel that it’s not performing as well as it should, just have it replaced – in most cases the replacement will work as expected and it’s just that the one that you got initially had some problems.

I’ll recommend a couple of Tamron lenses for Canon shooters here which I believe offer the best value for money! cause if you’re after image quality go after the Pro series lenses (look for the “red” line & L designation).

• Tamron 90mm F/2.8
• Tamron 18-270mm F/3.5 – 6.3 Di LD VC
• Tamron 17-50mm F/2.8 XR Di II – also the new VC (Image Stabilized) version
• Tamron 28-75 F/2.8 XR Di

You can read the complete article to learn more about the details of my recommendations and decide for yourself. Looking for similar advise on Sigma lenses? I’ve not shot with enough of them to get an impression, but when I do I’ll have a list up for them as well.