Ladies and gentlemen, it’s time to raise our hats to a forgotten lens, launched in 1991 and discontinued without remorse in 2013. The original 200mm f2.8 L had a built-in hood and sluggish autofocus; the Mark II that arrived in 1996 was optically identical but quicker, and came with a bigger, detachable hood. It’s the more desirable – and slightly more expensive – of the two.
However, in the early noughties, this was barely a desirable lens. Its existence was undermined in four respects by Canon’s excellent 70-200/2.8: the later zooms were slightly quicker to focus; to all intents and purposes equally sharp (depending on which vintage you compared – see below); crucially, they were image-stabilised; and even more crucially, they came with a free 70-199mm zoom lens of unmatched quality.
Why would anyone buy the 200mm prime? Well, most didn’t. Yet the optical performance was never in doubt: aside from the wide-open chromatic aberration inevitable for lenses of that period, it was state-of-the-art. It’s just that the 70-200/2.8 made it redundant.
But let’s consider it again from today’s perspective.
Benefit 1: The 200/2.8 L was always cheaper than the 70-200/2.8 – sometimes retailing at one-third of the price of the zoom. Right now, the L prime is cheaper than some kit lenses. It’s still 200mm f2.8 – still an expensive focal length/aperture combo to achieve. Canon lenses are pre-eminently adaptable to any mirrorless camera. What are the alternatives? The Sony 70-200/2.8 is £2000+ new, and £1000 used. Even the budget Tamron 70-180mm G2 is £1000 and most of that figure used. The Canon 200/2.8 L is £200-350.
Benefit 2: Assuming you’re buying used rather than new, the prime lens is a safer bet than a (more expensive) Canon 70-200/2.8. We’re seeing a lot of Canon’s pro zooms on the market now that are simply worn out: defunct IS, shredded zoom mechanisms and failed AF servos. Whereas the simpler mechnicals of the 200/2.8 prime have aged well. The manual focus has a much nicer feel than the zoom and you’re much more likely to get another ten years’ trouble-free usage from the prime.
Benefit 3: Similarly, the simpler optical scheme (9 elements in 7 group v 23 elements in 19 groups) has nicer bokeh. And the prime is comparably sharp to the (still in production, £2,200) Mark II/III L zoom (see below).
Benefit 4: The prime was smaller and lighter than the zoom: 755g / 140mm vs 1480g / 200mm – roughly half its weight and volume. Which leads to . . .
Benefit 5: In an ironic twist of fate, the prime now has better stabilisation. Much surviving EF glass is currently used via adaptors on camera bodies with internal stabe. Often, the elderly IS systems of the lenses interfere with the more effective IBIS and have to be turned off – leveling the playing field between the once-dominant zoom and the neglected prime. In fact, the prime is easier to stabilise because of that size and weight advantage. I distinctly recall fearing handholding the 200/2.8 on the Canon 5D III, but on my Sony A7 IV, it’s a delight. Similarly . . .
Benefit 6: Shooting the 200/2.8 is a great experience on stabilised Fuji GFX bodies: via the Fringer adaptor, the autofocus is at least equal to native lenses and it covers the larger sensor with barely any vignette – again, barely more than a native lens. And the compact size and weight balances beautifully, delivering the look of a 135mm f2 lens on full frame. For comparison, the 70-200mm vignettes more strongly at all focal lengths on GFX.
Benefit 7: Did I mention how sharp and sweet-rendering this lens still is? Sorry. But I forgot to mention that it has zero geometric distortion, and less vignetting than the Canon 70-200mm.
Some Sharpness Comparisons
When comparing the Mark II and Mark III 70-200mm L lenses, some have observed that the later lens took a tiny step backwards in terms of central frame resolution at wide apertures at 200mm in favour of slightly more consistent performance across the frame. The Mark II did suffer from the ‘Zone B Dip’ we’ve commented on before. Compare the following MTF charts from Canon, which predicts the zoom to be sharper in Zone A than the prime. But note the matching of meridianal and sagittal lines with the prime . . .
Fortunately several sites have made direct or indirect comparisons of the contemporary Mark II zoom and 200/2.8 prime. There isn’t a perfect consensus: blame sample variation, test method errors, and/or undisclosed variation in working distances at which each test was conducted.
LensTip tested a sample of the Canon 70-200mm f2.8 L IS Mark II and the Canon 200mm f2.8 L II between 2010-2014 on a 1Ds Mark III. They found as follows:
| f2.8 (lp/mm) | f4 (lp/mm) | f5.6 (lp/mm) | |
| Canon 70-200mm f2.8 L IS II @200mm | Zone A: 41 Zone B: 30.5 Zone C: 29 |
Zone A: 44 Zone B: 33 Zone C: 31 |
Zone A: 45 Zone B: 37 Zone C: 33 |
| Canon 200mm f2.8 L Mark II | Zone A: 36 Zone B: 29 Zone C: 26 |
Zone A: 44 Zone B: 36 Zone C: 31 |
Zone A: 45 Zone B: 38 Zone C: 33 |
While these figures show a modest advantage in wide open performance for the zoom, we see stronger Zone B resolution from the 200/2.8 when stopped down.
Imaging Resource also tested the 70-200/2.8 L IS II and the 200/2.8 L II and concluded: “The 70-200mm is an extremely versatile lens, but doesn’t quite match the optical quality of the dedicated 200mm ƒ/2.8 prime. At 200mm, the prime lens is notably sharper – you’ll have to stop the zoom lens down to ƒ/8 to match it – and distortion is much more prominent.”
On the other hand, back in the day when PhotoZone mattered, and 3,800 LW/PH was the maximum a 21MP Canon 5D II could resolve, Klaus Schroff recorded the following MTF50 figures for the Mark II zoom, which seems broadly in line with Canon’s published data:
| f2.8 (MTF50) | f4 (MTF50) | f5.6 (MTF50) | |
| Canon 70-200mm f2.8 L IS II @200mm | Zone A: 3265 Zone B: 3004 Zone C: 3100 |
Zone A: 3456 Zone B: 3102 Zone C: 3180 |
Zone A: 3490 Zone B: 3310 Zone C: 3263 |
| Canon 200mm f2.8 L Mark II | Zone A: 3116 Zone B: 2746 Zone C: 2708 |
Zone A: 3475 Zone B: 2951 Zone C: 2887 |
Zone A: 3554 Zone B: 3125 Zone C: 3045 |
However, the visual comparison at Digital Picture demonstrates less difference than these figures suggest, apparently showing a moderate Zone B advantage for the prime, which in their review recorded more favourable chromatic aberration and distortion figures. On the ruthless 5Ds-R, the 200/2.8 prime here seems to offer slightly crisper results at all apertures, although Zone C fringing is clearly worse.
If there is a bottom line we can grope toward in this murk, perhaps it’s that the 200mm f2.8 is securely among the best lenses Canon made, however we might crave tidier hair-splitting.
Adding to the confusion, here’s how my 2006 copy of the prime compares to a nice sample of Tamron’s 70-180mm G2, with equalised framing on the easy-going 33MP Sony A7 IV – first at 1m, then at 10m . . .
An Undocumented Problem
Via the Meike EF-TR Sony adaptor I wasn’t able to obtain solid autofocus on the A7 IV, although it focused reliably via the Fringer adaptor on my ancient GFX 100. On the Sony, focus hops about erratically and never locks onto the subject in any focus mode. It made no difference whether the adaptor was set to Contrast or Phase Detect.
My sample is UU coded (therefore dated 2006) and running firmware 0.14. If you visit the Canon website seeking information about the 200/2.8 L II, it’s thin on the ground: no firmware history is given, and Canon’s bulletin doesn’t list it as suitable for user-installable upgrade, or available for free Service Centre upgrade. Seemingly it’s been forgotten.
Raising a service ticket with Canon UK eventually resulted in the rather bleak report that this lens was not firmware upgradeable, period. Some adaptor manufacturers report full AF compatibility with the 200mm L II version 0.17 and later. A second sample of the lens was obtained with a date code UY (therefore 2010) running V0.XX. I also tried using the V0.14 with two other adaptors . . . watch this space
Image Samples
TBA
Conclusion
Time has been kind to the 200mm f2.8 L, turning the tables on its commercial nemesis. It always represented good value, but it’s now easier than the zoom to get good handheld results, nicer to focus, more adaptable, and more reliable. It always gave prettier results, but the cost of the prime is now so low, even the disadvantage of versatility is minimised: it’s cheap enough that you can buy a (faster) 85mm prime with the leftover change.
I say this mindful of the incontrovertible fact – one of the few reliable cornerstones of lens selection – that a fast 70-200mm (or 35-150mm) zoom – is indispensable when shooting events with moving subjects. You absolutely need that flexibility. The success of the 70-200mm over the 200mm prime wasn’t a disservice in need of correction: the Mark II 70-200 was, overall, a slightly sharper lens – and a 200mm prime is an odd fish – a specialised tool that will rarely see daylight in a professionals kit bag – and when it does, those special moments tend to deserve f2. But the 200mm f2.8 L can now be seen as a satisfying complement: certainly a more desirable portrait lens than the zoom. Man-maths may even permit it to slot into that tiny gap just above the reach of the Tamron 70-180mm G2. It should also be mandatory for GFX owners. At current prices can you really say no?