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Canon EF 70-300 4-5.6 IS USM

Started Aug 5, 2015 | Questions thread
tatslau Regular Member • Posts: 298
Re: Canon EF 70-300 4-5.6 IS USM

alan e jones wrote:

Hi the 70-300 USM is an extremely poor lens as it zooms out and gets soft after 200mm

i have used 6 copies and do not rate the lens that well at all

the tamron 70-300 Sp is better But by far the best is the canon 70-300L

regards

Alan

I had the Canon non L, got rid of it and bought the Tamron, my brother has the L lens. So I have some experience with all of them.

Totally agree on your rating of the 3 lenses, but I'd like to add some points:

The Tamron is sharpest @ 70mm, seems even sharper than the L lens by a hair (Color maybe not as good). The Canon L lens is tack sharp over the whole zoom range, especially @ 300mm.  The Tamron beats the crap out of the Canon non L over the whole zoom range.

But as soon as you zoom it in, the Tamron's IQ gets worst but is still good to around 200mm, then it's almost on par with the Canon non L lens, that is, BAD, all the way to 300mm. However, stepping down to f11 - f16 gives very decent IQ.

Canon L lens puts the priority on the long end of 300mm while Tamron has the priority on the wide end of 70mm.  Seems like Tamron has their priority backwards since most people use it for the long end.  Consider the Tamron as a very good 70-200mm with 300mm f11 (at least f8) as a bonus, and you'd be happier.

If your budget allows, get the L lens, but be warned, it's $1000 more and one lb. heavier.

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Tat S Lau

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