Review on Tokina ATXAF247FXC 24-70mm f/2.8 Pro FX Lens Canon EF - Enhanced SEO by Alan Massey

Update 01/15/15: This lens has serious auto focus issues. For the past two weeks I've been testing this lens and adjusting the camera's focus, but to no avail. It may be a defective copy. With telefocus, focusing is accurate about 75% of the time. not good. It is unsuitable at the wide end, 40 mm and wider. Willy-nilly it goes from extreme back focus to extreme front focus and is rarely accurate. I like everything else about this lens, but if I can't open it wide due to focus issues, it's useless to me. The original review is below. Optically, this lens is exactly what I was hoping for. Like many others, I chose it over the Canon 24-70 f/2.8 L II because of the price and good reviews. It's extremely sharp and great at wide open and/or maximum zoom. I use this lens for portraits and headshots and so far it seems perfect for the task. However, this is not ideal. I had to set up this zoom lens on my Canon 6D camera. -3 in width and -12 in body. What I also don't like is the focus ring when switching from autofocus to manual. Sometimes it sticks, as if the gear wasn't properly engaged. I have another Tokina lens, 16-28 2.8, and it has the same problem, so it's more of a design flaw than a defect. This is easy to fix, just slide the ring back into automatic mode, twist it a bit and pull back into manual mode. Basic, but a bit lame for a lens that's otherwise built like a tank and offers such excellent optics. In any case, I almost never switch from automatic to manual or vice versa, so it's not a problem for me. Overall it's not a problem for the price and then some.