Hello All,
When Canon introduced the 70-200/2.8L IS they claimed that the IS for this lens reduces jitter by an equivalent of 3 stops. Before, Canon always claimed 2 stops improvement. At that time two possibilities for that change were suggested. Either, Canon was too conservative before and with Nikon's VR they just got more aggressive and claimed 3 stops instead of the 2 stops before. Or, Canon has introduced a better improved IS. Therefore, I wonder if anybody has done some test that can shed more light on this issue.
Robert
I have a number of IS lenses, including the 70-200 and 100-400. The IS on the 100-400 when it came out was one of the reasons I switched to Canon. I think that IS is more significant an advance than AF or AE, as it allows you to take many pictures that were essentially impossible before, whereas AF and AE are more in the line of conveniences and rarely allow you to take a picture you couldn't without them (unless you are chronically unprepared when photographing).
I have found the IS in the two zooms to be equally effective; I have shot many times with the 100-400 at 1/15 sec at 400mm under circumstances where I would be able to shoot with 1/125 sec without IS, so the 3 stop advantage seems to hold. The 70-200 performs similarly and generally allows up to a 3 stop advantage.
From the preceding my conclusion would be that Canon underestimated/responded to Nikon marketing pressure in changing its position.
The 28-135, btw, while it does buzz occasionally, also provides about the same advantage, and my lens is also quite sharp. Performance of the lens is better at 135 than at 28. Some of my standards for image quality in this range are set by my Leica-M 90/2 Apo-Aspheric and 35/1.4 Aspheric, as well as a number of Canon primes which, while not as good as those two Leica M lenses, are excellent in most ways. Not that the 28-135 comes that close to these lenses, but its not too shabby either.
The above comes from experience with a couple of different film bodies and a D60.
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