Canon 300 f4 L vs 70-300 L

popmonkey69

popmonkey69

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Jody
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Hi all..

Ive not long had decent Canon gear and I bought a 70-300 L for karting and small circuit motorsport photography

Dont get me wrong its a great lens but Im spending most of my time at around 300mm so I thought about a prime...

Is the f4 IQ that much better than the 70-300, I wondered if anyone had a real world comparison or experience

Cheers
 
I saw your sale/wanted ad on dpreview and started wondering about this myself. I have the 300 f4 IS but have never used the 70-300L so can't compare unfortunately. All the web reviews of the zoom seem to think it's very good, but I'd be surprised if it's as good at 300mm as the prime plus you get a stop more light with the prime which has the added benefit of making it work with the 1.4 TC.
 
Cheers for the input...

Its just difficult as all websites say the 300 f4 has very good/excellent image quality

And the same ones will say the 70-300 has great/very sharp/ image quality

Which is all well and good in a lab test but what will be better for me with all the skills to about manage a Box Brownie....

After reading a bit more I definitely want the Ef300.......Id love a 400 but my wallet doesnt
 
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Ive had both lenses and there isn't a lot in it with regards to image quality. The prime is marginally sharper I'd say.
As said above the benefit of the prime is when using a tc. The benefit of 70-300L is of course the ability to zoom out if needed.
The 300 F4 is nice and light to use though and I've considered buying another one.
 
Hi,

I have Both and the TC 1.4 MkIII for the 300mm, both equally as good, but the Latter having a Clunkier IS system with it being an Older lens.
 
Thanks for the info..

Much appreciated :D
 
I've got the 300 F4 IS and it's a belter of a lens, I've also the 1.4 TC which it takes very well and I've not really noticed any loss of IQ or AF performance when using it.

But, it's not as flexible as it's not a zoom...really depends if you do zoom about a lot when you use the 70-300 ?
 
No.....I normally stick it out around 300 and leave it as its for motorsport shots
 
Hi Jody. I see you have a 7D, so both lenses will give great results, but the zoom will give more flexibility. One thing to note is that while I got great sharpness from the 300mm f4 on my old 7D, it is a little too soft for me on my 7D2, the extra pixels seem just a little too much. The 300mm f4 is an older lens pre 2000, so isn't really designed for modern DSLRs, whereas the 70-300mm is.
 
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