Canon EF 75 300mm F 4 5 6 III Review | 54 Data compared

The Canon EF 75-300mm f/4-5.6 III USM is identified as an extremely affordable, lightweight telephoto zoom lens offering significant focal reach for budget-conscious users. While featuring a decent 7-blade aperture for its price point, the lens is noted for mediocre performance and a flimsy build. The-Digital-Picture.com Key disadvantages include poor optical quality, with soft images at all focal lengths, particularly wide open and at 300mm. Lacking image stabilization and featuring a slow aperture, the lens requires bright conditions for sharp, handheld shooting.

The Canon EF 75-300mm f/4-5.6 III is an ultra-affordable, lightweight, and compact entry-level zoom lens that delivers a versatile telephoto range suited for casual photography. Its primary advantages include its low price point and accessible, easy-to-carry design for beginners. However, the review highlights significant drawbacks, including overall mediocre image quality that is soft when wide open, especially as the lens zooms towards 300mm. Additionally, the lens lacks image stabilization and features unrefined, rough focus and zoom rings that require bright lighting to achieve acceptable results.

The Radojuva review characterizes the Canon EF 75-300mm f/4-5.6 III as a highly affordable, compact, and lightweight entry-level telephoto zoom lens compatible with both full-frame and APS-C cameras. It is noted for delivering decent color, good bokeh, and adequate performance in daylight thanks to Super Spectra coatings. YouTube · However, significant drawbacks include the lack of optical image stabilization, which makes sharp, handheld shooting difficult, along with notable softness at the 300mm end and heavy chromatic aberration. Additionally, the lens features a plastic build, noisy autofocus, and no full-time manual focus override, making it a budget-compromised option. The original review can be found at Radojuva. YouTube

The DXOMARK lab review evaluates the Canon EF 75-300mm f/4-5.6 III USM telephoto zoom lens (released April 1999) mounted on a high-resolution full-frame Canon EOS 5DS R camera body. The combination achieves a mediocre overall DXOMARK Score of 21, with the optics performing at their peak at a focal length of 75mm with an aperture of f/4. On the pros side, the test metrics reveal that geometric distortion is relatively low and well-controlled at 0.5%. Additionally, the lens features a decent sharpness score of 13 P-Mpix when taking advantage of the camera’s high-megapixel sensor. However, the lens shows significant weaknesses across several optical metrics that compromise image quality. A major con is the strong vignetting measured at -1.8 EV, which causes noticeable corner darkening during wide-open shooting. Furthermore, light transmission is somewhat poor, dropping down to a measured 5.4 TStop, meaning it lets in less light than its nominal f-stop values would suggest. Finally, chromatic aberration is recorded at 10 µm, which translates to visible color fringing around high-contrast edges in your final images.

The Canon EF 75-300mm f/4-5.6 USM III is a budget-friendly, lightweight telephoto zoom lens featuring a quiet Micro USM motor and good control over optical distortion. It is considered a portable option for amateurs, particularly when used at shorter focal lengths. ePHOTOzine However, the lens suffers from significantly reduced sharpness at 300mm, slow autofocus hunting at the long end, and a plastic construction with a rotating front element. It also lacks full-time manual focus override and has a loose focusing ring.

The Canon EF 75-300mm f/4-5.6 III USM is a highly affordable, lightweight telephoto zoom lens compatible with both APS-C and full-frame Canon camera systems. Aimed at budget-conscious photographers, it features a respectable build quality for its class, constructed primarily of plastic but notably including a durable metal lens mount. The lens is equipped with an Ultrasonic Motor (USM), which ensures that autofocus operation is both quick and quiet. Additionally, its design provides a comfortable grip around the main barrel and allows for full-time manual focus override while in autofocus mode to assist with fine-tuning. However, the lens delivers an overall average performance with several notable drawbacks in image and mechanical quality. Optically, it suffers from a general softness—particularly around the edges of the frame—and lacks any outstanding sharpness spikes. Chromatic aberration is a significant issue; while it remains fair to good at the wider 75mm end, it becomes very poor at the 300mm telephoto end, displaying high color fringing. Mechanically, the zoom action on the tested sample felt loose, and the focus ring operation proved to be somewhat jerky when...