Messages

136

Lenses / Re: Would a tilt/shift adaptor be possible/likely for the M system?

« on: August 26, 2012, 06:52:20 AM »

As I see it -

1. There's no point in using a TS-E lens without a tripod, so reducing the size & weight of a TS-E lens would be negligible.

2. There might be some IQ benefit, but TS-E lenses are a niche market, which I guess is why Canon didn't make any TS-E lenses for specifically for crop sensors. I've heard the 17mm TS-E lens was introduced to be a TS-E 24mm equivalent on crop sensors, but it's still FF compatible.

In short - if there's money in tilt-shift lenses for EOS-M bodies, Canon (or some other lens manufacturer) will probably make some. My guess is there isn't any, so there wouldn't be any.

The most obvious advanatge to me seems to be price, a specialist TSE lens on a EF-S mount would still I'd guess come in at around $1000 or more for a manual focusing prime.

Question is how many photographers would like to buy a lens they would have to upgrade when upgrading the camera.

I'd guess a TS-E adaptor could be significantly cheaper than that and could be used with multiple lenses that would still AF when used on a DSLR or with the regular EF adaptor.

Canon's TS-E lenses do not autofocus. The electronic contacts are used to control the aperture & record EXIF, but focus is still fully manual.

There does seem to be an increased interest in using selective focus via tilt recently which could be capitalised on with such a product without damaging the market for more serious FF specialist TSE lenses.

Like the lensbaby, only with better optics & electronic contacts?

I actually thought of buying a Lensbaby Edge 80, but the price is too high, at least for what seems to me like a semi-toy.

137

Lenses / Re: Would a tilt/shift adaptor be possible/likely for the M system?

« on: August 26, 2012, 04:46:08 AM »

As I see it -

1. There's no point in using a TS-E lens without a tripod, so reducing the size & weight of a TS-E lens would be negligible.

2. There might be some IQ benefit, but TS-E lenses are a niche market, which I guess is why Canon didn't make any TS-E lenses for specifically for crop sensors. I've heard the 17mm TS-E lens was introduced to be a TS-E 24mm equivalent on crop sensors, but it's still FF compatible.

In short - if there's money in tilt-shift lenses for EOS-M bodies, Canon (or some other lens manufacturer) will probably make some. My guess is there isn't any, so there wouldn't be any.

138

Lenses / Re: Canon Celebrates the Production of 80 Million EF Lenses

« on: August 24, 2012, 09:31:56 AM »

80 million seems like a lot of lenses, where are all of them? Closets? Have you ever thrown a lens away? Is there a lens landfill.

I haven't thrown any EF lens away, but I've thrown my film Minolta w/ kit to the trash, as well as a couple of Vivitar F mount lenses.

Glass bottles are recycles in many countries. Are lens glass elements recycled anywhere? Expensive probably has a very long life (I've seen one of the f/1.2 FD lenses in a 2nd hand shop, though it had fungus on one of the elements - the shop owner probably knows there's a good chance somebody will pay to have it cleaned), but there's lots of glass in cheap lenses.

139

Lenses / Re: Canon Celebrates the Production of 80 Million EF Lenses

« on: August 24, 2012, 09:23:03 AM »

...the typical DSLR owner has between 2 to 3 lenses in their kit bag on average.

On average.  But I bet the distribution not normal - a sharp peak at 1 lens (lots of people buy the body+lens kit and stick with that), and trailing shoulder from 2 on up, meaning if you buy a second lens you're pretty likely to have 3-4 total.

I have the impression 2 & 3 lenses kits are popular. E.g. two of my cousins bought Canon's two lenses kit (18-55mm + 55-250mm), a guy who bought a D90 + similar pair of lenses + 16mm fisheye(!) from ebay before going to a first photography course, etc. Then I've seen a lot of people buy a kit with one lens, then buy a cheap telephoto, say 75-300mm.

I wouldn't be surprised if the peak was around 2-3, falling sharply at 4.

140

Lenses / Re: Canon Celebrates the Production of 80 Million EF Lenses

« on: August 22, 2012, 11:59:58 PM »

It also makes one wonder how many camera bodies have they made to date, they surpassed the 25 millionth mark a few years ago, so must be somewhere between 28 to 30 million camera bodies??

Ergo, the typical DSLR owner has between 2 to 3 lenses in their kit bag on average.

That figure ignores 3rd party lenses.

141

EOS Bodies / Re: Poll: What are the chances that specs for rumored 7D Mark II will become true?

« on: August 21, 2012, 05:40:41 AM »

On the one hand, I find it hard to believe Canon (a) has released a v2 firmware a short while before a mk2 is released, and (b) will release high res APS-C body before releasing a similar res FF body. On the other hand, the 7D was surprisingly good at the time of it's release.

Considering the 7D's age and delats in Canon's release schedule, I wouldn't rule out the rumored high res FF body has been delayed, so Canon released a firmware upgrade to extend the 7D's life until the FF body is released as well.

142

Lenses / Re: New Wide Angle Zoom Discussion & Opinion

« on: August 19, 2012, 12:54:35 AM »

My impression from reviews is that Nikon's equivalents to the EF 16-35mm f/2.8 (the 17-35mm f/2. and EF 17-40mm f/4 (the 16–35 mm f/4 VR) do not have the kind of advantage which would make people switch to Nikon, or prefer it in the first place.

Though the 16-35 & 17-40 would benefit from an upgrade, IMHO Canon's priority would be a lens to compete with the 14-24mm.

143

Lenses / Re: New Wide Angle Zoom Discussion & Opinion

« on: August 16, 2012, 02:09:40 AM »

I have a savings account with several thousands dollars in it release next year.

If Canon has a good EF 14-24mm by then, I'll buy EF 14-24mm + EF 24-70mm f/2.8 mk2, selling the 17-40mm along the way.

If not, I'm off to buy a Nikon FF camera + Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8

144

Third Party Manufacturers / Re: A Small Sigma 180 f/2.8 OS Macro Issue

« on: August 14, 2012, 06:21:25 AM »

So Canon doesn't provide a proper way for other manufacturers to make EF lenses without paying horrendous licensing fees. Then it purpously breaks compatibility with existing 3rd party lenses with new bodies. That doesn't sound good to me. All Canon would have to provide would be a proper way to ID the lenses. A simple manufacturer ID + item ID would be sufficient.

Third party manufacturers can assign their own lens ID, they do not need to use a Canon ID.  They are merely trying to be clever, and it backfired.

As long as Canon doesn't set aside those numbers (before or after the fact), it's possible Canon would happen to reuse that ID for one of it's own lenses later on, causing the problem to arise at that time.

However, the only way for a camera to know the optical and capable characteristics of a lens, is for the lens to be in the internal table that resides in the camera.

That's not what I've suggested. My suggestion is to set aside lens IDs, then not perform any illumination correction. That would avoid the problem with practically zero effort and expense for Canon.

145

Third Party Manufacturers / Re: A Small Sigma 180 f/2.8 OS Macro Issue

« on: August 14, 2012, 06:15:41 AM »

e.g. automatic illumination correction or area focus, I see no problem here. The consumer would make a conscious between features (price, IQ, lens specific processing), and do what he sees fit.

2. Lens specific processing is misapplied, because 3rd party manufacturer had it's lens ID itself as an other lens.

That works only if specific processing is optional.

IMHO, illumination correction is optional, e.g. the user can turn it off.

Furthermore, what would happen if a customer would mount a new lens without upgrading to a firmware version that knows how much illumination correction to apply?  What if the firmware version that knows that happens to have a bug?

I think it's reasonable for the firmware to fallback to no illumination correction for lenses it doesn't recognize.

But those cases are only the tip of the iceberg, the real trouble starts when the camera needs the processing to work properly. Sure, you could set the AF to "dumb as a rock" as long as there is no proper ID, which likely would result in accusions of deliberatly crippeling 3rd party lenses.

If that happens, Canon should reply those are unrealistic expectations, same as expecting it to buy such 3rd party lenses, invest man hours to measure it's light falloff, & add the appropriate illumination correction to the cameras's firmwares.

146

Third Party Manufacturers / Re: A Small Sigma 180 f/2.8 OS Macro Issue

« on: August 13, 2012, 05:25:37 AM »

But a basic problem remains: Canon doesn't do lens specific processing for fun, but because advanced techniques work only with certain lenses or at need specific data for others. That was a problem in the past when Sigma lenses only reported AF parameters for consumer bodies but lacked the second set for area-type sensors. Most of the time only the pro bodies were affected, and the 7D is using the center of most lenses, but if the 5d3 is an indicator for upcoming high end prosumer bodies...

I think it would be appropriate to distinguish between two cases:

1. Lens specific processing is not applied, because 3rd party manufacturer did not pay for the benefit.

As long as the 3rd party manufacturer does not falsely advertise that the lens would benefit from lens specific processing, e.g. automatic illumination correction or area focus, I see no problem here. The consumer would make a conscious between features (price, IQ, lens specific processing), and do what he sees fit.

2. Lens specific processing is misapplied, because 3rd party manufacturer had it's lens ID itself as an other lens.

IMHO, both the OEM and 3rd party manufacturer should cooperate to avoid this case. When a consumer buys a lens, he does not know which lens specific features would be introduced in future cameras, and how much effort it would take to circumvent it's misapplication.

In other words, I expect manufacturers to apply defensive design to avoid this cases.

147

Third Party Manufacturers / Re: A Small Sigma 180 f/2.8 OS Macro Issue

« on: August 12, 2012, 06:56:14 PM »

This would be a very good idea for a start.

They actually might have done that - but for an outside party the only way to differentiate between reserved for 3rd party and reserved for future lenses would be to ask.

Or Canon could publish a list of lens IDs on it's web site that goes "ID A lens a, ID B lens b, ...., L through P reserved for reverse engineered lenses, ..."

148

Third Party Manufacturers / Re: A Small Sigma 180 f/2.8 OS Macro Issue

« on: August 12, 2012, 10:19:26 AM »

There was a similar problem with Tamron lenses over a year ago - Canon apparently limited the functionality of focus points for some of it's lenses, and Tamron lenses which used the same IDs were hurt as well.

The more lens-specific-processing Canon adds to it's cameras, the more this kind of problems will occur, giving Canon bad rep as the brand that does not play well with others.

IMHO, the best solution for Canon would be to set aside a block of IDs for lenses by companies that reversed engineer the mount protocols, and not doing any lens specific processing for lenses that use an ID in that block.

149

Third Party Manufacturers / Re: A Small Sigma 180 f/2.8 OS Macro Issue

« on: August 12, 2012, 03:54:49 AM »

Whilst the issue of making a lens mount open or closed is an interesting argument, the fact of the matter is that you know full well that the EF mount is currently a closed system.  On that basis, it is not fair to bang one's fists on the table and demand a solution to a problem caused by a competitor's unauthorised reverse engineering of Canon's product.

Reverse engineering when done properly is 100% legal and does not need to be "authorised".

I'm not a lawyer or U.S. citizen, so I might very well be missing something, but doesn't the DMCA put some limits on reverse engineering?


As Sigma completes Canon's line of lenses, IMHO, Canon would benefit from having their cameras avoid such SNAFUs. Examples would be fisheyes - until the 8-15mm, Canon made only a diagonal fisheye for FF, and Sigma made circular fisheyes for APS-C & FF + diagonal for APS-C.

150

Third Party Manufacturers / Re: A Small Sigma 180 f/2.8 OS Macro Issue

« on: August 11, 2012, 10:29:06 AM »

If Canon makes a good lens, it will sell. If the competitor is better, Canon needs to "protect their market".

That would stifle competition, which is bad for consumers. Canon should compete by making a better lens.

That's beside the fact that the above statement simplifies things, e.g. there's a competition on price/performance.