Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM

Looking for a Canon 100mm lens review? Read on to find out what we uncovered in our objective optical lab tests.

Photographer Dustin Abbott shares a thorough, real world review of the Canon RF 100mm F2.8L Macro IS USM premium macro for EOS R mirrorless

The Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM ushered in a new era of handheld macro shooting

A high-quality macro lens with specially-designed image stabilisation plus dust- and moisture-resistant sealing.Back in July 2009, Canon announced a new 'hybrid' image stabilisation system designed for macro photography. Able to compensate for both the standard angular movement and the small shifts in the angle at which the lens is pointed during hand-held shooting. Announced less than two months later, the EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM is the first lens to use this new system.

The Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 Macro USM may not be the company's top of the line macro lens, but it does capture sharp images with 1:1 magnification.

The Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM lens, sitting on my desk, is only 4.84-inches long, or tall if you prefer, but the ET-73 lens hood measures 3.25 inches which makes the lens look bigger and bulkier than it really is. All photos © Joe Farace “The trick to forgetting the big picture is to look at everything close-up.” — Chuck Palahniuk

Back in July, Canon took the distinctly unusual step of announcing a new technological development completely in isolation from any products. The subject was a novel 'Hybrid' optical image stabilization system designed to compensate for two distinct types of camera shake. You can read more about it here, but in essence the stabilizer is different from existing systems, which only detect and correct for changes in the angle the lens is pointing, by also compensating for vertical and horizontal shifts in the position of the lens caused by handshake. This has little benefit at long focus distances, but as the subject gets closer it becomes progressively more important, and in principle offers maximum benefit for macro shooting.

Canon has a huge library of lenses, but some are more well known than others. There are a few hidden gems hiding among the more popular options, however, and this great video review takes a long-term look at one of them, the EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM. Coming to you from Dustin Abbott, this excellent video review takes a look at the EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM lens. I personally love this lens; you can read more about it in my overview of Canon's portrait lenses here, but it essentially boils down to the fact that it is a dependable, high quality workhorse at an excellent price.