EF28-300mm F3.5-5.6L-IS USM

[darrenb]

Just picked up the latest ed. of Practical Photography and seen and advert for the new Canon 28-300L.

Not seen any posts re: this lens - Has anyone managed to have a look at this lens yet or seen any images produced by it?

[toglenn]

Check this link for cover photo;

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/

[ShootTechPan]

Looks like MR posted the review today. He raises some good non-measurebator points, as always.

He doesn't sound too fond of it, and the DxO results don't look too fabulous wide open, either. It would be nice if he could have posted some comparison shots versus the 70-200mm 2.8L IS and some wide angle shots compared to the 24-70mm 2.8L since those are often more telling than a graph. Maybe if someone out there owns this lens they could do that? I'm not expecting a miracle compared to these two all-stars, but it would be good to know what one is giving up with this besides the obvious technical things (speed, portability, etc.)

Though it is a big, heavy and expensive lens, I have missed a nontrivial number of paid shots from changing lenses or not having the right focal length on me. For that reason, I often carry two bodies on me with two different lenses, but that's literally a pain in the neck. I know some people will think this lens is ridiculous, and I'd agree for some applications, but if versatility didn't matter then we'd all be using a single prime lens. Having IS at 28mm would also be nice; Canon claims a 1.5 stop gain at 28mm even for the older 28-135mm IS, so maybe this guy could pull out two stops at 28mm.

Unfortunately, while versatility looks good on this monster, quality is not a very good place to compromise. Hopefully it's better than MR makes it sound. Does anyone own this lens yet?

[MarkH]

It occurs to me that this lens is priced a little high. For the money this baby costs you could get a 24-70 f2.8L and a 70-200 f2.8L and still have change left over, add a 1.4x teleconverter and you can cover the same range. From what I understand the 24-70 f2.8L and the 70-200 f2.8L would be the best 2 zooms made by Canon, so I think that I would rather give up the convenience of one lens to do it all, rather than give up so much quality.

Of course if the price for the 28-300L was the same as the older 35-350 then it would be looking good for those situations where you need a big range of zoom, and the addition of IS would make it that little bit more attractive.

Does anyone else think that an expected street price of $2400 is a little high for a above average quality but slow zoom, even if it does have over 10x zoom range?

[ron chappel]

Yes the price is just silly

But if one NEEDS a wide zoom ratio like that PLUS a decent minimum image quality ,then there is nothing else that comes close
I seriously doubt they'll sell many at all.
No doubt canon want to have one available for those that need it.So long as my purchaces don't end up subsidizing it i'm not worried

[ShootTechPan]

Thanks to a friend I got to use this lens and the 70-300 DO today. Unfortunately, it was on a film body (EOS 1V HS) so I won't be able to post any test shots.

It's actually a bit smaller than I expected. Heft will feel familiar to users of the 70-200mm 2.8L IS and the 35-350mm L. That said, the "my 28-135mm IS is a bit heavy" crowd will think this lens is monsterous. It goes without saying that it has a solid, quality feel to it.

The push-pull zooming is okay. It definitely is intuitive, but the friction adjustment collar isn't. At the loosest setting, the zooming is still easy to control. The EOS-1V HS (similar autofocus system to the EOS-1Ds) sometimes had trouble getting a focus lock indoors at 300mm. It was a bit trippy to go from 28mm (full-frame) to 300mm in less than a second.

I agree that the price is too high. *This next statement is an oversimplication, but just humor me*:

Even just looking at glass, it's got 22 elements in 16 groups, with 3 UD elements and 2 aspherical elements. Of course, this is oversimplified, but it's awfully close to the 70-200mm 2.8L IS in terms of sheer glass (4 UD elements, 23 total elements in 18 groups), and both have second-gen IS systems, "pro" construction and 77mm front elements. One has a high zoom ratio and the other has high speed and close to ultimate quality. So why does the 28-300mm cost almost $900 more than the 70-200mm? Of course, we gotta pay for the development costs of this stuff, but I doubt Canon is losing money with retailers selling the 70-200mm at $1600.

That said, I would consider the lens at around $1300-1600. Give it a few months, and hopefully the price will drop a bit. As for me, I'm going to wait for the measurebators and comparators to get their hands on it, and see what kind of quality they find. If it sucks, I won't use it for nary any price.