Telephoto Zoom For Canon

[astral]

I know it's almost 30,000 Baht extra which was out of question for me when I bought my EF70-200mm F/2.8L, but go for IS if you can afford it. It's well worth the extra 30,000 Baht in my opinion, unless you think you use that lens only under bright daylight or if you are willing to carry a tripod heavy enough to support both the EF70-200mm F/2.8 and 5D (or willing to trade high resolution for high ISO). I regret I didn't buy an IS version (now contemplating trading it in for IS). I might even choose EF70-200mm F4L IS USM over EF70-200mm F/2.8L if I have to buy one now.

EF70-200mm F/2.8L comes with a nice case, but it's not padded enough so I bought a LowePro case which is also sold at Fotofile.

I apologise for starting a post with a quote, but Nordlys set me thinking.

I have the Canon 40D with 18-85mm IS

and the 10-22mm IS for wide angle.

Now what to choose for the telephoto zoom?

Occasional sport use, but I do like candid photography.

The choices seem to be

EF 70-200 L F4 IS USM Weight 750g

EF 70-200 L F2.8 IS USM Weight 1390g

EF 100-400 L F4 IS USM Weight 1350g

EF 70-300 DO F4.5-5.6 IS USM Weight 750

Sigma 70-200 F2.8 Weight 1270g (No IS)

On price the Sigma looks good, but is a heavy beast. Half the price of the EF 70-200L lens.

The 70-300mm is lighter, but more expensive, and possibly not the quality of the L lenses?

Any suggestions or advice is welcome.

Thanks

[hughden]

I had the 70-300 and the image quality was not so good. I moved up to the 70-200 F2.8L without IS and although it was much better, it was still noticeably softer than my prime 300mmL. Yes, you would expect a prime to be better than a telephoto, but this was such a difference.

Maybe I had a bad copy; but anyway I traded it in for the new 70-200 F4L IS and what an improvement! The new model F4 gives results as good as my 300mm, and the new design of IS is amazing, you can hand-hold down to very low speeds. I shoot mainly outdoor sports with it, so the lack of 2.8 is rarely a problem. You might appreciate the extra DOF with the 2.8; but it is a heavy beast and not so inconspicuous as the F4 for those candid moments.

Whatever you choose, I hope you enjoy it!

[Nordlys]

While quite handy (for the wide zoom range up to 300mm), I also haven't heard anything good about the picture quality of EF 70-300 DO F4.5-5.6 IS (and I think 40D deserves L lenses), so I'd rule this out.

I also wouldn't buy Sigma as I had a few problems with my Sigma lenses that the Sigma importer in Thailand couldn't do anything about (or more like couldn't be bothered to help to be accurate).

The weight and its bulky size (especially the length when the hood is attached) makes all other lenses except EF 70-200 F/4L IS too cumbersome to handle for candid photography (at least for me). I never keep EF70-200mm F/2.8L attached to my camera body in camera bag as the "everyday lens" and don't use it at all unless there's a specific need for telephoto. In fact, I've never taken that lens with me out of the country or even to domestic destinations unless I'm on a road trip with my own car to travel with. It's just too big and heavy for me, not the kind of a lens you want to keep attached to the camera body and keep hanging from your neck nor even shoulder for a long time (I usually pack it in my camera bag and replace it with EF24-70mm F/2.8L or EF24-105mm F/4L IS immediately after I'm done with that lens). And yes, like hughden said the size and large diameter of EF70-200mm F/2.8L hardly makes it inconspicuous.

If you don't care for nice bokeh F/2.8 produces and want to take your telephoto lens on long trip away from home then it's no-brainer for me, go for EF70-200 F4L IS.

Weight and size aside, I wonder if 1.6X crop factor of 40D makes the focal length of any of these lenses ideal for candid photography, although I understand there aren't too many telephoto zooms with focal length suitable for cropped sensor camera to choose from (why I agree with hughden I too would probably choose prime over zoom). If I have 40D I'd probably go for EF135mm F2L (which converts to 216mm on 40D) which is known to be one of the best quality prime lens ever produced (while relatively inexpensive and affordable) .

Edited December 6, 2007 by Nordlys

[Nordlys]

and the new design of IS is amazing, you can hand-hold down to very low speeds.

True. I can hand-hold and freeze shots with my EF24-105mm F4L at shutter speed as slow as 1/2 second. This isn't possible with my other lens EF24-70mm F2.8L even on the wide side of the zoom. IS of my EF24-105mm F4L outperforms EF24-70mm F2.8L zoom with two extra stops of aperture when it comes to freezing image in low speed. In fact the success rate at this shutter speed with IS turned on is almost as good as freezing image with my EF70-200mm F2.8L non-IS at 1/125 sec (on telephoto side).

Edited December 6, 2007 by Nordlys

[Firefoxx]

I use something not on the list, a Canon 70-300mm 4-5.6 IS (the recent upgraded one). It's actually overlooked by a lot of people, even though the image quality is quite good (not L but nearly there). My friend has a 70-200 2.8L, and we did comparisons, and we actually couldn't see much difference (using a tripod). The reasons I got it were: 1. It's small and light (and discrete) 2. It's inexpensive 3. It's IQ is good and 4. It has IS.

Users of L will probably scoff at it, but fortunately I don't care for the L religion, since my budget/style doesn't support it. My style of photography is spur-of-the moment street photography, and lugging around a huge white lens all the time isn't going to help me get a shot.

And my friend, the one who has the 70-200 2.8L, later got this lens too, for the same reasons.

[kash]

I also haven't heard anything good about the picture quality of EF 70-300 DO F4.5-5.6 IS (and I think 40D deserves L lenses), so I'd rule this out.

The DO lens is renowned for its excellent images, it's an excellent choice for travel.

http://www.the-digital-picture.com/Reviews...ens-Review.aspx

http://photo.net/equipment/canon/70-300do_2/

...just google the rest.

[astral]

I also haven't heard anything good about the picture quality of EF 70-300 DO F4.5-5.6 IS (and I think 40D deserves L lenses), so I'd rule this out.

The DO lens is renowned for its excellent images, it's an excellent choice for travel.

http://www.the-digital-picture.com/Reviews...ens-Review.aspx

http://photo.net/equipment/canon/70-300do_2/

...just google the rest.

There seems to be some confusion here.

These two links refer to an older model.

http://www.the-digital-picture.com/Reviews...ens-Review.aspx

seems to be the latest version.

Note the F4 at the wide end, not F4.5 and the lighter weight of 630g.

[astral]

I also haven't heard anything good about the picture quality of EF 70-300 DO F4.5-5.6 IS (and I think 40D deserves L lenses), so I'd rule this out.

The DO lens is renowned for its excellent images, it's an excellent choice for travel.

http://www.the-digital-picture.com/Reviews...ens-Review.aspx

http://photo.net/equipment/canon/70-300do_2/

...just google the rest.

There seems to be some confusion here.

These two links refer to an older model.

http://www.the-digital-picture.com/Reviews...ens-Review.aspx

seems to be the latest version.

Note the F4 at the wide end, not F4.5 and the lighter weight of 630g.

[Nordlys]

Here's another review by Luminous Landscape.

In conclusion, the author of the site speaks of this lens in cmparison to EF70-200mm f/2.8L IS as "If I didn't already own the superb Canon 70-200mm f/2.8L IS I'd be very tempted by the new DO, since I'll take the trade-off of 2 extra stops of aperture for the extra focal length any time. Nevertheless the 70 - 300mm f4.5-5.6 DO IS is a very appealing lens indeed."

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/...-70-300mm.shtml

[Firefoxx]

Astral, there's only one "DO" 70-300 lens. The other 70-300 IS is the one that I have, and it doesn't use "DO" optics (and it's newer, an upgraded version of the 75-300 IS, which also wasn't a "DO" lens). Neither are L lenses.

Edited December 10, 2007 by Firefoxx

[astral]

Thanks for all the input.

For me it seems like a toss up between the

70-200mm L F4 IS USM and the

70-300mm DO F4.5-5.6 IS USM

I will need to get my hands on both and then decide.

[Firefoxx]

If you look at the sharpness reviews of the 70-300 DO IS vs the 70-300 IS on Photozone, you'll see that the 70-300 IS actually resolves better, even though it's half the price. Of course, the 70-200 F4L IS beats both. If you're really deciding between just the DO and the F4, then by all means get the F4.

[Nordlys]

Users of L will probably scoff at it, but fortunately I don't care for the L religion, since my budget/style doesn't support it. My style of photography is spur-of-the moment street photography, and lugging around a huge white lens all the time isn't going to help me get a shot.

L lens use is no religion. I'm sure EF70-300mm 4-5.6 IS fares very good for non-L and there are few lenses like EF16-35mm F/2.8L and EF24-105mm F4L IS whose L status is questionable (former solved by new Mk2 version, latter disctinctive vignetting and distortion albeit very sharp), but if you compared your EF70-300mm F4-5.6 IS with EF70-200mm F/2.8L on bodies like 1D, 1Ds or 5D perhaps the difference was more noticeable. In fact, EOS 1Ds Mk2 is known to be very "lens limited" that resolving power of its sensor often exceeds that of the lens that there's no point having it unless you have the best of L lenses (imagine what it's like for EOS 1Ds Mk3).

Problem with EF-70-200mm F/2.8L that I have encountered that I initially thought of as sharpness issue was actually very subtle motion blur (that often occurs at shutter speed at and slower than 1/125 sec) that was hardly noticeable when I only used films but one you can detect as such with digital when you enlarge the image to 100% size. This is why I regretted I didn't buy IS version as I said in astra's quote in the opening post.

Edited December 14, 2007 by Nordlys