EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM

[tecboy]

I thinking about getting this lens, EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM. I notice my EF-S 55-250mm f/4-5.6 IS II is lagging in autofocus. It takes me a while to focus on a far away subject.

My my question is should I stay with my old lens and deal with it, or I should go ahead and buy a new lens just to make me happy?

 

[Gavjenks]

70-300 is a fantastic lens. Just fantastic period, but especially fantastic for the money. For only $300 used (!), you get a super useful range for portraits or wildlife, image stabilization, ultrasonic autofocus that will definitely address your concerns above, and great optical quality.

Time and again, I've lusted over a 70-200 f/2.8 "pro" lens, and ended up unable to justify its cost at all, based on how little of a practical increment in usefulness it would gain me over my 70-300 IS USM, especially given the image stabilization (70-200 IS is almost 10x as expensive as the 70-300 IS, for maybe 15% more utility if you're not a pro sports or wedding photographer). When small apertures are needed, I have a 85mm and a 135mm prime that can go as low or lower than the 70-200 2.8.

In short, I think it is the absolute best choice (possibly in conjunction with a fast prime within the same range) for a tele zoom that Canon offers, for anybody who doesn't make significant profits off of their photography.

 

[lambertpix]

I upgraded from the 55-250 (earlier version) to the 70-300, and I found it a worthwhile upgrade. If you find yourself using all the reach of the 55-250, you'll like the little extra reach in the 70-300.

If you don't need all that reach, however, give a little thought to something like the 70-200 f/4. You'll give up some reach and IS, but it's razor-sharp and a little faster, too. There's no free lunch in lens selection, so you'll definitely have to evaluate these tradeoffs, but I think you'd be happy with either of those choices.

 

[Gavjenks]

The 70-200 f/4 is a reasonable alternative option. I wouldn't say it is better or worse. per se, but the 70-300 is probably more often a better choice for an amateur (and that's pretty much the only market, as most pros would get a 2.8)

* It is a tiny bit wider aperture, yes, but the 70-300 is f/5 max aperture at 200mm, so it is at most 2/3 stop slower, and rapidly becomes only 1/3 stop slower and then 0 compared to the 70-200 f/4 as you go down in the zoom range. In msot cases this will be trivial.
* It has no IS. This means that for still subjects, the 70-300 is effectively quite a bit faster in terms of shutter speed. Although IS doesn't replace slight differences in background blur, nor does it apply for moving subjects.
* It has less reach, and the reach on the 70-300 is still sharp enough to be superior at 300mm to a crop from the 70-200, so that is a real difference.
* The 70-300 has a max magnification of 1:4, the 70-200 f/4 does 1:5, somewhat better macro ability from the 70-300 (it is actually a useful macro lens
* The 70-200 is of course much better build quality, weather sealed and internally focusing and zooming, etc.
* The 70-200 used is still about twice as expensive though than the 70-300 used

As for sharpness, unfortunately Canon doesn't publish MTF charts for both at 200mm for a fair comparison, and DxO Mark hasn't tested the non-IS 70-200 f/4, which is the comparably priced lens to the 70-300 IS USM. But here is a comparison with the 70-200 f/4 IS. Reviews suggest that they are similar in sharpness (IS and non IS):


Acutance is maybe 5% better for the 70-200 @200 in the center and 25% better at the edge at a fair comparison of f/8 for each.
In my experience, when you are shooting still subjects, though in normal lighting? The lack of image stabilization will often cause more pixel-level blur than the sharpness will give back! This is just from me using the 70-300 with and without IS, but the principle obviously applies to any other comparable lens. These charts are tested on a rock solid tripod, not hand held, remember.
If you're shooting a still subject at 1/2000th of a second? That's a non issue. But how often do you do that? More often you shoot at 1/400th or similar, and this becomes very much true.





So I would buy the 70-300 if:
* You want to do macro stuff
* You want to shoot handheld still subjects
* You need all the reach you can get like for small wildlife
* $250 matters to you.

I would get the 70-200 f/4 if:
* You will be in adverse environmental conditions a lot like rock climbing with it or lots of rain
* You will be shooting on a tripod OR shooting fast moving subjects.
* You will be shooting video with it (parfocal / constant aperture is important)
* You don't have a strong need for 300mm.

In most cases, I think the typical person would fit the 70-300 better. People doing extreme sports with DSLRs on their hip are not very common, nor are casual videographers using 200mm lenses.
The most common situation where the 70-200 is a better choice is for people shooting moving subjects like sports.

 

[DarkShadow]

Most definitely the 70 -200 is razor sharp. In regards to the 70-300 IS everything i have read confirms what Gavjenks said.From what I understand you get the L Glass like IQ with out the L Price Tag.I say go for it,for the more reach and better glass then the 55-250.

 

[Lumens]

I have a "EF-S 15-85mm" and a "EF 70-300mm f4-5.6 IS USM" I have been using on my 7D and they make a good combination. The 70-300 has been my Wildlife lens and has performed well, although I do have a 100-400L on its way right now (Looking forward to playing with it soon). The 70-300 has provided me with some great Birds in Flight photos and some good distance photos as well when needed. Not to mention some super Wild Horse photos as well. It is a great lens, I have done some good Macro shots as well, I don't like getting too close to bees.

This conversation may have saved me some bucks (Thanks Gavjenks) - been looking at the 70-200's L glass as I see some great reviews. The price tag has been holding me back and maybe that is good now that I see how happy others are with the 70-300 compared to the 70-200's.

 

[lambertpix]

Gavjenks, I'm not entirely sure which lens you're leaning toward with respect to macro shooting (I think there are two parts of your post that contradict one another), but having owned the 70-300 for quite a while, I'm not a big fan of that lens for macro shooting. It's marginally acceptable with extension tubes, but I'd honestly not get too excited about it for macro shooting even with tubes. You'll fill the frame with something the size of a large butterfly, for instance, but that's about it.

Beyond that, I've been fairly happy with it. Mine is a bit soft wide-open, so I typically stop down a bit at 300mm -- this, unfortunately, makes a not-too-fast lens even slower (note your sharpness measurement at f/8). I'm still happy with it as an upgrade from the 55-250, but you should understand it's a step-improvement rather than an omg-I-just-sliced-my-finger-open-on-this-picture-cause-its-so-sharp kind of upgrade. For lots of users, the 70-300 is a lens that can live in your bag for quite a few years.

 

[Gavjenks]

The 70-300 has slightly higher magnification than the 70-200 is what I meant. About 20% more magnification.
More importantly though, if you ARE shooting butterflies (not in mid-flap), you're probably doing it handheld at 300mm, and the image stabilization will help you tremendously.
Together, those two issues make it a lot better for insects and such than the 70-200 I think.

No, it's not an ideal, $1500 180mm f/3.5 macro lens. But it does a pretty darn good job of butterflies and dragonflies and the like, the sort of thing you said, for somebody who wants stand-off distance to not scare things and doesn't want to take out a second mortgage on the house for the occasional bug shot.

If you're shooting a dead or sedated bug or one that isn't skittish, then use a real macro lens or a 50mm 1.8 with tubes or whatever instead. I'm talking about skittish small creature candids from a distance.



Example butterfly image I shot with my 70-300 (I don't believe this is at max magnification):

 

[JacaRanda]

I have all 3 lenses. The 55-250 was nice (in the beginning) for wildlife and one I could have continued to use until I learned a little more about the camera, lenses and photography in general. The build quality on the 70-300 was noticeably better along with the extra reach as mentioned. However, when I went to the 70-200 F4 (IS) version..... I had my first wow holy cow moment in regards to build and image quality.

Note: Most of the shots with the 70-300 were on a T3I body. I may have enjoyed the lens more on the 60D because of the better viewfinder. Wifey just said she would check it out on the 70D when she gets home. Now I am curious.

 

[DarkShadow]

Me to, after taken the tamron 18-270 off and popping on the 70-200 f/4 Is,it was WOW. What a huge difference in sharpness,clarity,color and bokeh. I hate not having it on but i need the reach for birds so the sigma 150-500 stays on until I do something different then bird pics.

 

[vimwiz]

btw dont use the IS if you have a tripod, I found it was counter-productive (though excellent when handholding)

 

[Gavjenks]

Note that an 18-270mm 14x (?!?) zoom cannot be expected to be seriously comparable to a 70-300 in image quality. The difference between the tamron and the 70-200 f/4 is probably very much more dramatic (i've played with the two canons not the tamron, but I would be SHOCKED if this were not true). Especially since in the case of the tamron, you're also jumping from a DX lens to an FX lens. You're going from the worst performance of the tamron being visible (corners near the edge of its image circle) to the worst performance of the 70-200 not being close to visible on a crop frame camera.