The Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM Lens' real world image quality and image quality improvement over the original version are impressive - much better than I expected. The 70-200 f/2.8 IS II is very sharp wide open from the center of the image circle right into full frame corners at all focal lengths. Of the three copies I evaluated, the second traded some 200mm image quality for slightly improved 70mm image quality. The with-extender tests at 280mm and 400mm confirm this of course. Feedback from others is that the "sample 2" lens is indeed an outlier - but still very good. Contrast is especially impressive from all three lenses - a noticeable improvement over the version 1 lens. Stopping down increases sharpness only very slightly.