Canon EF 24-70 mm f/4L IS USM review - Introduction

Have you rated your lenses yet?

Canon EF 24-70 mm f/4L IS USM

22 May 2015

Arkadiusz Olech

1. Introduction

Say what you might, the launch of the Canon EF 24–70 mm f/4L IS USM was a huge surprise. The EF 24-105 f/4L IS USM model has been available on the market for some years at that time and it enjoyed a very favourable opinion so presenting an instrument with a narrower focal range and a significantly higher price tag seemed rather counterproductive.

Currently the price of the Canon EF 24–70 mm f/4L IS USM, a bit more stabilized, is oscillating near 3,000 PLN; still it remains about 400 PLN higher than that of the 24-105L model. Perhaps it is caused by the fact that its constructors tried to reach the height of their performance and the 24-70 mm lens, despite featuring a narrower focal range than that of the 24-105 model, is optically outstanding. Of course we had to check it.

We would like to thank the ProClub shop for lending us one specimen of the lens for testing purposes.

Please Support Us

If you enjoy our reviews and articles, and you want us to continue our work please, support our website by donating through PayPal. The funds are going to be used for paying our editorial team, renting servers, and equipping our testing studio; only that way we will be able to continue providing you interesting content for free.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - advertisement - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Still I suppose our Readers deserve some explanation concerning the publication date of this test. Once in a while, after performing several hundred lens tests, you have to deal with a situation when a certain device somehow has been left behind for different reasons. A lens is sent to us, we conduct the whole testing procedure, we return it duly and then, e.g. because of a failure of the data carrier, we lose a part of its test. Sometimes we simply lack time for conducting the whole test and the lens has to be returned anyway because other editorial offices are waiting for it in a queue. There are not many such cases but the Canon 24-70 f/4L is one of them. It had been left on our shelf for over a year and finally was given a second chance when the new Canon EF 24-105 f/3.5-5.6 STM model was released. I decided that, before presenting my test of the newest instrument of that class, it’s high time we caught up.

You are also invited to get acquainted with our test procedure, described in the article "How do we test lenses?" If you feel it’s still not enough, please go to our FAQ section where you can find some further explanation.