Which lens to use? Tamron 18-250mm, or Canon 18-200mm?

[Mary Anne]

Arthur a good pick up I should have used the word blur not bokeh even though my canon L 300mm f/4 gives both beautiful bokeh and blurred BG's.

[Geoff79]

Just returning back to this thread with something that popped up today, and is worthy of note if anyone should ever find themselves considering these two lenses, especially if they don't mind a bit of macro photography here and there.

I should start by saying that I have not had a chance to look through and/or process today's photos, but... I had quite a few issues, and a rather stressful day today, thinking I'd wrecked my 70D. It turns out the absolute last fix I tried online (to error message Err 30) seems to have - fingers crossed - fixed the issue. But that's another story not worth going into. Either way, the kids went down for a nap this afternoon and I found myself with almost an hour to spend in the garden with my dodgy macro gear. As my 70D was inactive, I took the 40D out today, which was housing my canon 18-200mm lens, rather than the 18-250mm Tamron I have been using lately.

I'd mentioned in quite a few threads, that with the extension tubes (and especially when I attach the Raynox Macro Extension) I had been having real problems with the manual focus.

But I took out the 40D today with just the extension tubes and my Canon 18-200mm lens. And I have to say, it was an instant world of difference in terms of getting a decent focus. Just seemed a lot more likely to get a decent focus with this lens. I assume it might be the inclusion of Image Stabilisation, that the Tamron lens does not have. But whatever the case, it felt a lot better using the Canon lens compared to the Tamron. I just hope the results reflect this feeling. Though I know the breeze and lack of flash robbed me of some good images.

Only bummer is I can't use the Raynox extension with this lens as the lens' outer diameter is 72mm and the Raynox extension only fits on lens' up to 67mm. But with decent sized bugs n' stuff the extension tubes seem to do a decent job.