Canon EF 70-200 mm f/2.8L IS II USM review - Autofocus

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Canon EF 70-200 mm f/2.8L IS II USM

3 November 2010

Arkadiusz Olech

10. Autofocus

The Canon EF 70–200 mm f/2.8 IS II USM, as its name indicates, features an ultrasonic autofocus motor. Its work would be really hard to blame. During focusing you can hear only very soft whirr of moving elements and the whole process is flash-quick. On the EOS 1Ds Mark III, even in the full working range, the running though the scale, no matter from what end, takes about 0.3-0.4 of a second. Using the limited 2.5 meters to infinity range you can shorten that time by next 0.1 of a second. These are results worth of a reliable journalistic instrument. On the OES 50D the speed of work decreases slightly (by about 0.1 of a second) but still there are no reasons to complain.

It should be emphasized that these achievements are really impressive. Rival stabilized Nikkor and Sigma lenses feature narrower range of the distance scale, because their minimum focus amounts to 1.4 meters, not 1.2 meters like in the Canon. They have it easier but still they fare a bit worse. The Nikkor is about 0.2 of a second slower in the whole range and the Sigma – a bit over 0.5 of a second slower. The difference is noticeable - the Canon fares significantly better than its competitors in this category, so important from any journalist’s point of view.

What about the accuracy? No reservations either. In studio conditions the lens’s performance was excellent both on the 50D and the 1Ds MkIII – the number of misses reached 1% at the most.

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