I was just wondering what the problem with the canon 75-300mm lens is? What do you think is the best and most affordable canon telephoto lens?

-- Brent Wheelehon (bww18_inc@hotmail.com), January 30, 2002

Answers

Is this the non-USM model with the rotating front lens element and no distance scale or IS? If so, that's all that is wrong with it. It's not bad optically, according to a lot of things I've read. None of the "consumer" zoom lenses from Canon or anybody else are that great at the long end at full aperture. The better Canon telephotos and zooms are the L-series lenses. They cost a lot more than the 75-300 and 100-300 zooms simply because they are better built and use exotic glass to correct for lens aberrations. At 300mm and above, lenses need good correction of these problems to be truly sharp, offer good contrast and reproduce colors faithfully.

Since Canon makes quite a few telephoto prime lenses and telephoto zoom lenses in the L-series, you would have to decide which is "best" for your purposes and which of these is the most affordable.

-- Lee (Leemarthakiri@sport.rr.com), January 30, 2002.