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Canon EF 200mm f/2.8 L USM II - APS-C Review / Test Report |
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Lens Reviews -
Canon EOS (APS-C)
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Page 1 of 3
Review by Klaus Schroiff, published August 2005
Special thanks to Jaroslaw Komasinski (1st lens) and Markus Stamm (2nd lens) for providing this lens for testing!
Introduction
The Canon EF 200mm f/2.8 L USM II was introduced back in march 1996.
The differences compared to the initial version are marginal - Canon decided to replace
the build-in hood of the mk I for a snap-on variant. Whether this is a progress or a
step back is debatable (personally I would prefer the build-in hood actually). Other
than that both lenses are basically identical down to the optical design.
On APS-C DSLRs the field-of-view is equivalent to 320mm on full-format cameras.
The lens features a ring-type USM AF drive allowing very fast and silent AF operations.
Full-time manual focusing (FTM) remains possible in one-shot AF mode.
Manual focusing is very smooth and the broad, rubberized focus control rings adds to the
positive impression here. The minimal focus distance is 1.5m resulting in a max. magnification of 1:5.
The outer shell is mostly made of metal. The size of the lens remains constant thanks
to an IF design. Consequently the front element does not rotate so using a polarizer remains
easily possible. All-in-all a typical Canon L lens.
The optical construction is made of 9 elements in 7 groups with 2 UD elements.
The lens features 8 aperture blades. The filter size is 72mm.
With a weight of 765g and a size of 83x136mm it is fairly compact and light weight for
such a large aperture lens. The EF 200mm f/2.8 L is capable to accept
both Canon tele-converters resulting either in a 280mm f/4 (w/1.4x) or 400mm f/5.6 (w/2x)
combination.
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