28-200 zooms

Hi

I’m looking at getting a 28-200 zoom and it’s either the Tamron XRII or the Canon USM, or maybe the Canon Non-USM.

The Canon has been panned on review sites for not being sharp and having barrel distortion but then so has the Tamron. Does anyone know where there’s a write-up from someone who has used both lenses or has used both themselves? I’m only really worried about picture quality as in sharpness and distortion problems. Not so much about the filter size.



Cheers,

Mark

Making such a lens is obviously difficult, at least with any level of quality. So, I'd suggest you take the reviews to heart. They don't usually say there's distortion in a lens if there isn't.

Pro-quality lenses ought to be better than that. But they're correspondingly pricey.

I’ve read the reviews and thank you all for your input but I wonder what camera some of these people used, not an 11 mega-pixel D2 I hope. Because I’ve been using the Tamron 28-200 lens in various forms since 1994 and I’m actually shocked that it isn’t highly rated in some people’s opinion.

If they just used an EOS 630, like the one that went into the sea the other week with, 100asa film (and you’ll be happy to know is in a repair shop) you may never be aware of any of the problems with the resolution, you just may notice the vignetting.

The link was taken with that camera and lens, the full frame version is on my page in the first gallery (In The Woods There Grew A Tree).