Canon EOS 600D EF-S 18-55 IS II Kit review

The Canon EOS 600D is getting on in age, having initially been released back in 2011 and has since been superseded by newer models in Canon’s entry-level Digital SLR range including the EOS 700D and EOS 750D/760D. As such, it’s now quite hard to find the EOS 600D apart from on the used camera market. As a used body only, it’s often available for less than £200, meaning it’s potentially still an interesting prospect.

Its predecessor, the 550D, introduced an 18-megapixel sensor, an improved metering system and significant improvements to video capture. At first glance, the 600D seems like a much more conservative update. The 3in screen is now articulated, the handgrip is chunkier than before and the camera can control Canon Speedlite flashguns wirelessly. Automatic exposures are more sophisticated and there’s some on-screen assistance for less experienced photographers. Continuous performance remains at a relatively pedestrian 3.6fps, with a buffer that lasts for just six RAW exposures. It’s not a list that’s likely to see many 550D owners rushing to upgrade.

Then again, an articulated screen is one of those features that quickly becomes impossible to imagine living without. It allows the camera to be used at elbow height, above the head, for self-portraits and on a tripod without having to contort yourself to see the screen. It helps that this 3in, 1-megapixel screen is extremely high quality. The drawback is that – in keeping with other EOS cameras – autofocus in live view mode is hopelessly slow. When shooting handheld it’s pretty much essential to use the optical viewfinder. The articulated screen is still welcome for tripod use, though, and it really comes into its own for video capture where it’s useful to be able to move the camera freely while recording.

The ability to control external flashguns wirelessly is another feature that’s easy to underestimate. Off-camera flash is a fantastic way to improve the quality of indoor photography, unlocking an array of advanced studio lighting techniques. It’s also extremely effective for capturing casual portraits by bouncing the flash off a wall or ceiling – doing so simulates natural ambient light while allowing low ISO speeds and eliminating the risk of motion blur. Our two example shots below show what we managed with and without the help of a Canon Speedlite 430EX II off-camera flash (click to enlarge).

Shot with ambient sunlight, the high ISO setting adds lots of fine noise While here off camera flash produces a natural looking light, but at low ISO settings

The 600D can remotely control various Speedlite models from the 270EX II (£150) up to the 580EX II (£350). Unlike other affordable wireless flash systems we’ve seen, this one is fully compatible with Canon’s E-TTL automatic flash metering and exposure, which is much more practical than manual settings for casual portraits. It’s also possible to control multiple flashguns in two groups and set their relative power, with or without the camera’s integrated flash. Configuring these advanced settings is a little fiddly because the relevant menu page must be navigated to after each test shot. However, the creative potential of this feature can’t be stressed enough.

The old 550D’s video mode was extremely impressive, with sumptuous picture quality and full manual control, but it had a few flaws. 1080p clips were limited to a 12-minute maximum running time. Continuous autofocus while recording was nothing short of disastrous, with clumsy toing and froing that spoiled both the video and soundtrack. This made the camera impractical for casual video duties, but more ambitious videographers will prefer to focus manually anyway. However, these users might be put off by the moiré problems – swirling bands of interference that appear on repeating textures such as bricks and fabric. It’s caused by the resizing of the 18-megapixel sensor’s output to 1080p resolution without adequate anti-aliasing. The problem was subtle but still a major irritation for anyone working on a serious video project.

The 600D doesn’t address any of these problems directly, but it does sidestep the moiré issue through the introduction of a digital zoom function, which ranges from 3x to 10x. Setting it to 3x means that the 1920×1080 video frame is captured by a similar number of photosites in the centre of the sensor. A representative from Canon informs us that it’s not a perfect 1:1 pixel match, but the maths suggests that it’s close. Because this feature makes substantial picture resizing unnecessary, using it eliminated moiré in our tests. The video clip below shows a clip at the 55mm zoom position without digital zoom followed by another at 18mm with 3x digital zoom – view it full-screen at 1080p to see the moiré interference in the first clip, which disappears in the second.

This digital crop function also raised noise levels a little, but they were still extremely low at ISO 800. The heavily cropped field of view is more of an issue, giving the 18-55mm lens an effective 87-264mm zoom range that may prove restrictive. Even so, it’s a welcome stop-gap until such time as Canon tackles the issue of moiré interference directly.

Another welcome improvement for videographers is a manual volume control, which captures audio more faithfully than the automatic mode. The level meter is only visible in a sub-menu page, though, so there’s no way to ensure that the microphone isn’t distorting – or that an external microphone hasn’t run out of batteries – while recording.

Our photo quality tests revealed no discernable differences compared to the excellent 550D. The new-and-improved automatic mode, called Scene Intelligent Auto, may be more sophisticated than before but it’s impossible to draw conclusions without testing the two side by side. We had no qualms with the 550D’s automatic exposures, and none here too. JPEG colour processing struck an excellent balance between honesty and flattery, and the highlight- and shadow-recovery functions proved their worth in high-contrast scenes. Noise levels were extremely low, producing attractive shots at ISO 1600 and presentable snaps at ISO 6400. The 12-megapixel Canon EOS 1100D was a little cleaner at high ISO speeds, though.

One area where EOS cameras fall behind their rivals over at Nikon is for chromatic aberrations, where the red, green and blue elements of the picture become increasingly misaligned towards the edges of the frame. The problem was reasonably subtle with the 18-55mm kit lens (see the example below – click to enlarge), but Nikon’s SLRs remove it digitally, giving notably sharper details towards the edges of frames.

Chromatic aberrations are still an issue for Canon

We also noticed a problem with autofocus using the kit lens, where focus was often slightly less than pin-sharp. Testing with a tripod and static subject, and using the normal phase-detect autofocus followed by live view’s slow but extremely accurate contrast-detect autofocus, the second shot was often a little sharper, particularly at the telephoto end of the zoom.

We’ve seen this issue before on the 550D, 500D and 450D, and only when using the 18-55mm kit lens. This lens now bears a Mk II suffix but apparently the redesign is purely cosmetic; it’s disappointing that this problem persists. Confusingly, it didn’t appear in our tests of the EOS 1100D, which uses the same lens. We won’t second guess the root of the problem, but as with the 550D and its predecessors, we recommend against buying the 600D with the 18-55mm kit lens.

The 600D sits in an odd space in the consumer SLR market. It’s more expensive than the entry-level models but lacks the larger viewfinder and superior controls of the Canon EOS 60D and its ilk. Its main rival is the Nikon D5100, announced earlier this week, but we’re yet to get our hands on that model.

Most people needn’t spend this much when the Nikon D3100 offers arguably superior quality (with no autofocus issues or chromatic aberrations) for just £420. However, for those who are interested in video as much as photography, the 600D is a serious contender despite the various flaws of its video mode.

Ultimately, the 600D was, without a doubt, an excellent camera for its time. But, nowadays, you’re much better off looking at a newer camera such as the Canon EOS 700D that has introduced considerable improvements, not least the slow autofocus in live view mode. So unless you’re getting a considerable bargain price for the EOS 600D, we would advise looking at something newer in the EOS range.