One thing I love about Canon is their strive for greatness. They don’t just settle for making a good product. They always look for ways to improve it and one-up themselves. Well, they’ve done it again. This morning, Canon has announced two new lenses: the Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS Series III, and the Canon EF 70-200mm f/4L IS Series II.
When I heard about these new lens releases I knew I couldn’t wait to try them out for myself. A huge thanks to Canon for letting me (hi, NYC Wedding Photographer and AdoramaTV host Vanessa Joy, here) play with these new toys before the mad rush to order them.
Let’s start off with the lens whose predecessor I personally have in my arsenal: the new 70-200mm f/2.8L. The Series II was already my go-to lens for dark wedding ceremonies, studio headshots, and for getting a beautifully compressed wedding portrait. Now, Canon has gone ahead and added ASC (Air Sphere Coating) to help cut down on sun flare and ghosting, particularly in backlit situations like the ones below. Pair that with the already wildly necessary image stabilization and crystal clear image quality and this lens is sure to be a staple in your camera bag.
But now for the real right hook.
The new Canon 70-200mm f/4.0 lens is a showstopper. This lens is already a solid choice for hobbyists, prosumers, and professionals because of its beautiful compression, the light and compact size, and lower price point compared to the f/2.8. Now, it has been completely revamped. With vast improvements that Canon has made, I’m very certain that you’ll see this bad boy more often than not.
There are so many new features of the new lenses, and here are some of my favorites:
Closer focusing distance
One of the key components of photographing people is simply relating to them. How you, as a photographer, interact with your subjects can easily make or break a photo. This lens now has a one-meter focusing distance, which allowed me to take a step in and engage with my subjects more effectively while photographing them, as opposed to standing a greater distance apart.
New Image Stabilization Mode
This release features the debut of the 3rd Image Stabilization (IS) mode for this lens. You may already be familiar with modes 1 and 2 since they’re part of the Series I lens. These modes are useful for stabilizing images due to camera shake and panning, respectively.
Mode 3 will stabilize the image only during expose, which is fairly cool when you’d like to save a bit of battery life or avoid the whirl of IS pre-fire. Plus, the five stops of shake correction in this lens is a huge need for me when shooting with my not-so-sturdy hands.
9-Blade Iris Diaphragm
I was tempted to title this section “Holy Bokeh Baby,” but I figured I should stick with the formal titling. Thanks to this update, my images are even more gorgeously littered with beautiful, soft, bokeh filled backgrounds like you can see in these examples here.
Overall, I’m a huge fan of both of the lenses and I know the 70-200mm f/4L IS Series II lens will absolutely be a must-have for anyone that is currently using the Series I. For photography professionals regularly dealing with low-light situations or wanting the f/2.8 depth of field look, the 70-200mm f/2.8L is the way to go.
The Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS Series III and Canon EF 70-200mm f/4L IS Series II are available for and , respectively, at Adorama.com.
P.S. If you want some free posing inspiration while trying out these new lenses, here’s a quick (and free) guide for you!
