Canon EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM Lens for Canon EOS SLR Cameras by Canon
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Digital camera reviews of Canon EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM Lens for Canon EOS SLR Cameras
Digital camera Review: 70-300 IS USM - Great Lens
Summary: 5 Stars
Great lens for the price. Range is good, and focus is quick - although sometimes the 300 is a bit short for wildlife...but at less than half the price of the 100-400 this is certainly a good option....very sharp and fast - not quite an L but can't be beaten for the price. 70-200L would also be an option, but 200 would be a little short for wildlife.Digital camera Review: A Great Lens
Summary: 5 Stars
A Great lens that really reaches out for super closeups. very sharp, close to L quality. The IS is flawless in both modes, birds in flight are unblieveable. Pricey, but you get what you pay for.Digital camera Review: A Nice Compromise
Summary: 4 Stars
Easy to hand hold at 300mm because of the IS, less expensive than the better Canon 70-300 IS lenses and better optical quality than the less expensive Sigma. The trade offs of less durable construction and a not-fully-silent focusing motor are acceptable to me. Had I not needed this lens immediately for a trip I would have waited to compare it to the announced, but not yet available Tamron 70-300 with stabilization. All said, I am very happy with it.Digital camera Review: A Powerful, Versatile Lens for Consumer Grade Digital SLR Cameras
Summary: 4 Stars
When purchasing my new Canon EOS 40D I wanted to get an additional lens that would add an extended zoom range from the 28-135mm lens that came in the kit. I had a budget of $2,500.00 for a digital SLR camera, hot shoe flash, additional lens, memory card, and a large gadget bag. I wanted to purchase the best quality camera that I could get, so I had decided to purchase the EOS 40D by Canon (kit with 28-135mm lens), but that meant that I would have to sacrifice money spent on the other accessories. I purchased a 4GB Sandisk Extreme III CompactFlash card, and the Canon Speedlite 580EX II flash with the camera, so that meant I had roughly $675.00 for another lens and a nice camera/gadget bag. I researched the Canon EF lenses extensively and decided that I had to have a lens with image stabilization. I wanted a Canon lens and wanted it to have a large zoom range. All reviews I read pointed to the Canon EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM lens as a solid choice.
I ordered this lens from Amazon and got a great price, and with free shipping. The first thing I noticed is that this lens is lightweight and feels very well made. The light weight did concern me a little, because I typically process the thought of lightweight electronics gear with cheap build quality. Well I am convinced that this Canon lens does NOT suffer from cheap build quality. The lens feel solid, and the focus and zoom rings are not sloppy at all. The auto focus is fairly fast (although it can be a little slower in the highest zoom range), and the image stabilization works great. As others have pointed out, this lens produces a somewhat softer looking image above the 200mm range. However, the contrast and color remains sharp, even at maximum zoom. If you don't mind giving up some depth of field by adjusting the aperture, you can get very clear images at the full 300mm.
My biggest complaints with this lens are as follows:
- The end of the lens rotates when focusing, which causes the constant need to adjust my circular polarizer.
- The zoom changes the length of the lens.
- If you tip the camera at a sharp verticle angle, the zoom adjustment of the lens will retract on its own.
- Auto focus becomes slower at higher zoom setting.
- Having the lens set to AF prevents you from fine tuning the focus manually (there seems to me a mechanical, gear-type lock of the focus ring when AF is engaged)
Overall I am extremely happy with this lens, even with the few shortcomings mentioned above. The auto focus is accurate and fairly fast, the IS feature is rock solid, and the light weight of this lens makes it very good for handheld shots and does not cause balance issues when using a monopod or tripod. Although I have noticed some minor softness in photos above 200 or 250mm, my pictures always look clear and contain excellent contrast and color. I'm sure you could get better results from a Canon professional lens, which would cost you well over a grand for this kind of zoom range, but for the average hobby photographer I think this lens is about as good as you can get; and it can be had for under $600. I am confident that this Canon EF 70-300mm lens will last for many years to come, and I would definately buy it again. I hesitate to recommend this lens for a professional photographer, but for everyone else it is an excellent choice.
Digital camera Review: A Solid Lens with drawbacks
Summary: 2 Stars
This was one of my first lens purchases. I initially enjoyed it however as I became more and more serious about photography I found that this lens was not producing the quality I was looking for. For one, the chromatic abberation at the long end was terrible when the image was viewed at 100%. Secondly, when shooting wide open, the images are soft although stopping down a stop or two corrects this. I ended up trading this lens in towards the purchase of an EF 70-200 f/4L IS USM lens.
This lens, however, is not a complete loss. The 3-stop IS is fantastic and the focusing is relatively fast and accurate. I would suggest people just starting out on a tight budget purchase this lens if the higher end lenses are simply out of reach especially if you don't plan on making outlandishly huge prints from your photos. That said, if I had to relive this purchase, I would have held out for a lens with a higher resale value and higher quality.