We hang out in our yard often, and this is one more thing for us all to enjoy. We have found the moon and used different lenses to zoom in closely.Will keep you updated when we find a planet or anything else up there!

This is my first L lens and I'm hooked!!! I did a lot of research before purchasing this lens. I wasn't planning on spending $1,700 on a lens, but I am very glad that I did. I was looking at the other 70-200mm options that can has as well as some other brands. What finaly made me decide on this lens is I couldn't find a single complaint about it. All of the other lenses had good reviews, but none were perfect across the board. Many said that they settled for lesser lenses and then upgraded down the road.Pros:This is a remarkably crafted lens. It is built like a tank. The zoom is amazingly smooth and the focas is beyond fast. I have taken 100's to 1,000's of photos with it so far and have yet to have it wonder. It is quick and percise on my Canon 30D. This is no light lens either. You can feel the sturdiness when you hold it. I added the battery grip to better balance the camera and its a beautiful combination. The two stage image stabilization works wonderfully as well. My previous zoom was a Sigma 135-400mm and had a heck of a time hand holding it. There is no problem at all hand holding this lens. Even with the 1.4x extender it takes crisp sharp photos. I will have a hard time even thinking about buying another lens that doesnt have IS. Contrast and colors are also gorgeous with this lens. I didnt know what I was missing until I purchased this lens. Lastly, and by far least is the 2.8 constant aperture. If you can afford it buy this 2.8 lens. You will not be sorry. The effects of the blurred background is brilliant! You can really make your subject pop and opens up all kinds of opportunity for creativity. Personally I think a large percentage of photography is mental. If you have awesome equipment you will strive to take better photos. This lens will do that for you and more!Cons:Really there are none. My only word of warning is this, as it relates to higher end lenses and bodies as well. A great lens does not make a great photographer. There is also a smaller margin for error in higher end equipment. As I upgrade to better equipment I am finding how challenging it can be to be a "real" photographer. A zoom of this caliber and 2.8 aperture can be difficult to get good high quality shots until you have mastered shooting at 2.8. Especially if you are are fairly close to your subject. The days of point and shoot are gone. It's time to think like the pros. hehe... I have no doubt that with some practice persistance i will be able to produce much higher quality photos with this lens than with any other lens that I could have chosen.Conclusion:If you can afford this lens buy it! If you can't afford it but have a credit card, buy it! If you have to sell a couple other lenses to be able to buy it, buy it! I'm sure the other choices out there, weather they are non IS or are F4 are great lenses. This is a superb lens though. You will not be disappointed.

I use this product when out shooting with my Fujifilm GFX100 camera and GF lenses. That combination is heavy and is very expensive. No way did I ever want to drop that camera and lens. And I wanted to give my arms a rest when shooting. This shoulder strap accomplishes both of those goals. It is much better than the simple strap that comes with the camera because it is padded and puts pressure on the shoulder rather than on the neck. It is adjustable too. As the product picture shows, you can easily pull up the camera when it is time for shooting. If you have an expensive camera, then buying this strap is the best and cheapest insurance policy you can have.

I bought a Z mount platform specifically for the S line lenses, and yet again, this doesn't disappoint. I bought this because I found I've been trying to do more "macro" style photography with my regular zoom lenses, which doesn't really work very well. As such, this is my first macro lens. Well, this delivers.My one and only complaint isn't really about the lens itself, it's more about Nikon's website/documentation about the lens. Yes, it technically has a max aperture of f2.8, but that's only achievable when focusing further than about 1.7 meters away. If you get closer than that (which you need to for macro photography), it starts incrementally stopping down. At closest focus, it's maximum aperture is f4.5. After I thought about it for a bit, I realized that's just how it has to be due to how the aperture ratio works, so it makes sense and I'm not upset by it. F2.8 at closest focus would be absolutely ginormous and it would make the lens huge. I just wish the documentation said something about that. Maybe it does and I missed it, but in case it doesn't or in case you missed it too, now you know. (I also have to assume most other macro lenses do something similar, in the same way a lot of zoom lenses have variable max apertures, but I don't have the experience with macro lenses to know.)

A great overall lens that’s largely replaced everything except my zoom lenses. Note that if you’re using this on a crop sensor camera like I am, the actual equivalent of the 50mm lens is about ~80mm or so in reality, so take that into account. AF is great, and of course the depth of field is great as well.

Most photographers who consider themselves serious amateurs and probably almost all professionals will have at least occasional need for an ultrawide lens. Interiors, architectural exteriors, and some travel scenes are best recorded by a lens whose angle of acceptance approaches or exceeds 100 degrees. If you like and want to produce images in which large foreground objects play against smaller objects in the background while all remain in sharp focus, an ultrawide lens is a necessity. Some may also be surprised to hear that the ultrawide lens can produce interesting portraits when the goal is not just to show the individual, but rather to set a person in a context and let the environment become part of the portrait. For decades the usual focal length for such a lens has been 17mm, though of course even wider lenses, including those which do not attempt rectilinear correction, are available for special purpose image capture. This lens is an ultrawide zoom that pretty much covers the entire wide-angle range that most photographers will need -- extremely wide at the low end and just below normal at the upper.Its advantages include its utility as an all-purpose wide angle lens (capture range from slightly wide to ultrawide) and its relatively low price for a complicated semi-specialty lens. At f/4 it is not a fast lens, and as has been pointed out in other reviews it suffers from slight softness at some apertures. It is one of Canon's L (red ring) lenses, which are higher-end products, and one can trust the company to have minimized the negative issues that can emerge in complex lens designs. If you feel the need for a perfectly satisfactory wide-angle zoom or primary lens, but don't want to break the bank to get the best one, this is a good lens to consider.On the other hand, if you want a faster lens with a bit more lateral grasp, Canon also offers the 16-35mm f/2.8 zoom lens (also in the red ring/L class) at about twice the price of this one. The more expensive lens offers not only what the 17-40mm zoom does (though it does not go quite as close to a normal focal length on the high end), but provides in addition extra light capture for lower-light environments and the slightly wider angle of acceptance. If I had thought a little longer about the differences between the two lenses, I would have ordered the more expensive one. I may upgrade at some point in the future if I ever feel constrained in the use of the one I did buy. But I am not dissatisfied with this lens and have no qualms giving it the five-star rating it deserves in its own right. It is a solid and reliable tool, well made, and provides excellent images.

I have had a Canon digital SLR for several years, but have never owned an L series lens until now. I never thought I would drop this much $$$ on a lens, but it became pretty much a necessity in order to shoot all of my kids' sports activities especially gymnastics where I needed a fast telphoto zoom lens because all the events are inside and there is no flash photography allowed! I considered the non IS version, but my experience with other Canon IS lenses moved me to make this choice.So far I haven't been disappointed in any way. The lens is very solidly constructed. The IS and USM work great, and the zoom is very smoooth. All of the images I have shot with this lens are sharp throughout the zoom range.The bottom line...this is an awesome lens though it is a bit pricey for non professional photographers. The upside is that these lenses retain their value well when properly cared for as can be attested to on Ebay.

I have had this fabulous lens for 2 months now. This is my second lens in Canon's line up of L lenses. I have a 70-200 f4 non-IS also. This is my first wide angle zoom L lens and i have come to know what i have been missing. Till now the widest lens i had was a 50mm f2.5 macro and 50 f1.8. Although on a 1.6x sensor like 20D which i own, this lens is not so wide it performs excellently. The focusing is very fast, sharp crisp images and consistent quality as the aperture range remains the same throughout the entire zoom. This may not be suitable for some the semi-pros or pros since its a little slow being f4, i would recommend this to anyone who does serious photography as a hobby. In indoors too it performs flawlessly. Most of the time i dont use a tripod and its difficult to maintain a fast enough shutter speed especially with aperture more than 8. so if you are like me, then you may want to take a look at the 17-85 IS or the 17-55 IS since the IS compensates atleast 2 stops in low light for hand holding. But if its outdoor then u can easily handhold this and shoot some great photos in good lighting conditions. Also i would like to mention that being a L lens this is a little heavy because of its solid construction. Its also big compared to the other startup lenses. It takes 77mm filters and it can be used even on full frame cameras like 5D. hope you enjoy this lens as much as i am doing.