70-200 or 100-400

[simon_t1]

<p>I was asked my use.<br />For closeup subjects that fly away as soon as I try to approach with a 100mm macro lens such as butterflies, distant portraits that are too distant to use my 24-70, throwing bg out of focus obtaining clean soft out of focus bg, in order to bring out the subject. Rarely sea gulls that are not so distant away (above me) and indoor sports.</p>

[DickArnold]

I shoot a lot of swimming meets indoors in badly lit venues. That includes some big time Natatoriums. I use the 70-200 2.8 and I have recently bought (take note WW) an 85 1.8 to do the really dark corners and the egregious back light you get in Boston University's great modern facility (huge north facing banks of windows in direct line with finishing swimmers). BTW "wildlife weddings" are a specialty. I used the 70-200 2.8 for night time high school football. The 100-400 just does not work for these uses IMO. However, on a tripod (shut off the IS on this particular lens) or in good light I handhold it a lot and it works well. It weighs about the same as the 70-200 sans extenders. I am just about to submit a large print for a local show show at 400mm. I do not see any softness as that is one of the reasons I am submitting this picture is that it is quite sharp showing great feather detail on an Oriole.

[mark_ethridge]

<p>Simon, it does sound like you'd be better served with a 70-200 f/2.8. As others have stated, unless your main purpose for buying the lens is to use it in the 200-400 range, then the 100-400 is probably not what you want. However, don't think that the 100-400 isn't capable of incredible sharpness--it is! In a laboratory under exacting conditions you may be able to see minute gains in sharpness of one lens over the other but out in the field, given conditions that play to the strengths of each lens they are both very sharp. </p>

[John Crowe]

<p>There are better ways to get to 400mm and the 300/4 with 1.4x was mentioned above. Personally for the price of the 70-200/2.8 IS II and 2x III you have quite a few options. Even greater options if you drop the IS requirement. IS is severely overhyped for general photography. IS is great for lowlight non-moving subjects with no flash, and not significantly useful for sports or birds in flight.</p>

<p>I suggest a used 300/4 non-IS and a 1.4x II, but even if you go for the new IS version and new 1.4x III there is still plenty of budget left for your shorter focal lengths.</p>

<p>I suggest either a 200/2.8 L to go with your 100mm macro, or the 70-200/4 L non-IS. There is still room in your budget for the 70-200/2.8 non-IS if you get the 1.4x II instead of the III. </p>

<p>To summarize, at the top end of the budget, you could get the 70-200/2.8 non-IS, 300/4 IS, and 1.4x II, for the same price as the 70-200/2.8 IS II and 2x III. You can get well under budget by buying used. I have bought used lenses (and cameras for that matter) and have been able to buy the best possible equipment for a much more appropriate budget.</p>

[g dan mitchell]

<blockquote>

<p><em>"What I am trying to decide is, should I sacrifice the convinience of having the extra focal length of the 100-400 and concentrate on having less focal length but with increadable sharpness."</em></p>

</blockquote>

<p>"Sharpness" is a fine thing, but it isn't the only thing - and choosing a lens primarily because it is "the sharpest" among a group of excellent lenses is letting yourself get distracted by a single aspect of lens performance that may well not be the most important. "The sharpest" lens is not necessarily "the best lens" for your purposes.</p>

<p>First, what are you doing with the photographs? Are you regularly printing "gallery quality" (for lack of a better term) prints at very large sizes? Or not? If not, the differences in sharpness among a group of good lenses are often completely insignificant and/or invisible. It is quite possible that any of a number of lenses would produce your particular final output with excellent results - in which case small sharpness differences that might be visible at 100% magnification in side-by-side comparisons on the screen won't make any difference at all.</p>

<p>Second, are you shooting in ways that potentially let you take advantage of the maximum resolution of your lenses? If you shoot from a tripod, carefully (and most likely manually) focus, use a remote release and MLU or live view, choose aperture carefully, and all the rest of it... perhaps. If you shoot handheld or most often shoot active subjects, other factors will affect resolution and make the super sharpness margin from the "sharpest" lens superfluous.</p>

<p>Third, how important are the functional differences among the lenses. In this case, a most basic question is how often do you shoot in the 100-400mm range vs. how often do you need f/2.8 in the sub-200mm range? If you primarily shoot in the 70-200mm range and really need f/2.8 and IS, then a f/2.8 IS 70-200mm lens seems like a necessary choice. If you imagine that you'll more likely frequently find yourself shooting in the full 100-400mm range and in situations where flexibility and quick response are more important than getting f/2.8 at the sub-200mm focal lengths, the 100-400mm zoom is going to be the far better choice.</p>

<p>And, are these the only or best options for the sort of shooting that you do? (Notice the obsession with "the sort of shooting that you do..." - this is the fundamental criterion for lens selection, not "what is the best lens out there.") Perhaps a 70-200mm f/4 IS plus a longer prime would be a good choice. (Do you do a lot of landscape photography and wildlife photography?) And so forth...</p>

<p>Dan</p>

[DickArnold]

Dan. You say it better than I do. I was just an hour ago trying to decide with a gallery proprieter what print I was going to display; He never once talked about sharpness or talked about what lens I used; or what body. He does not care nor do the majority of viewers and buyers of pictures. He decided his selection on his gut. It was the Oriole. It's in my PN gallery. He is a long time artist and when talking what I liked about the Oriole picture I had to explain to him what the word "bokeh" meant. He is not a photographer and gets it with his brush without second thought... He wants stuff that will sell. As Dan has said it all depends on what one is into.<div></div>

[DickArnold]

For some reasond my jpeg conversion got a little over saturated

[DickArnold]

Anyway it was a 100-400 at 400mm on a tripod (makes a big difference in sharpness) at a normal sunny 16 exposure.

[William Michael]

<p>Simon, to cover the tasks you outline this statememt makes incredible sense to me:<br>

<em> </em><br>

<em>"To summarize, at the top end of the budget, you could get the 70-200/2.8 non-IS, 300/4 IS, and 1.4x II" (John Crowe)</em></p>

<p>WW</p>

<p>Dick - you'll use that 85 a lot - I bet. Best to you.</p>

[simon_t1]

<p>Thanks very much for all your valuable help.<br>

I was checking the links I placed at the start of this thread, and noticed that the <strong>70-200mm f/4 L IS</strong> performance results resemble the ones from the new <strong>70-200mm f/2.8 mark II</strong>.</p>

[simon_t1]

<p>Thanks very much for all your valuable help.<br>

I was checking the links I placed at the start of this thread, and noticed that the <strong>70-200mm f/4 L IS</strong> performance results resemble the ones from the new <strong>70-200mm f/2.8 mark II</strong>.</p>

[savas_kyprianides]

<p>You can say that again!</p>