Kenko Teleplus PRO 300 AF 3x Teleconverter for Canon EOS

Rating:
Summary: Not for action photography
Review: I'm going to state up front that I haven't used this 3x teleconverter. I have no idea whether it has acceptable optical quality or not. The idea of a 3x teleconverter sounds very promising and nifty, but there is a large tradeoff involved. If you use this teleconverter, the effective aperature of the lens you are using will go up be three stops. This makes for eight times less light entering the camera lens, resulting in shutter speeds that are eight times slower than the lens would achieve without this teleconverter.

Most long telephoto lenses need all the light they can get, even expensive, high end lenses with image stabilization do. If, say, your lens's maximum aperature is F4 without a teleconverter, it will become F11 with any 3x teleconverter. A fast F2.8 zoom would become an F8 zoom, and the long focal length will exaggerate any vibration of the camera or motion in a much more noticable manner (Most camera bodies will not autofocus with an F8 lens, although some will). If you use this lens with a very large aperature prime lens (F2 or better), autofocus will still work, and shutter speeds might be reasonable, but capturing action would still be a difficult ordeal.

Because of these limitations, I would strongly recommend against this for anyone that intends to shoot any action with it at all, a tripod is an absolute must, and it would be most useful for taking pictures of still objects on a bright day. A smaller 1.4x teleconverter would be much more appropriate to those shooting sports and in situations other than bright and sunny.