An EF 70-200 f/4L IS II in Mid January? [CR1]

[Canon Rumors]

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The lenses keep on coming I received some pretty good detail about a new EF 70-200 f/4L IS that may be announced in the next month.

The first version of this lens is terrific, and for a while outperformed the 2.8 IS counterpart (other than light gathering ability).

Some points on the reported new lens.

• It will include a newer version of the Canon fluorine coating reducing light scatter within the lens.
• The new coating will drastically increase the scratch resistance on the front element.
• The lens will be fully metal, besides the zoom and focus rings.
• The image quality is supposed to be the best as far as Canon zooms go (like version 1 was).
• Mid January announcement.

We have been told that Canon will be updating a lot of current lenses in 2012.

cr

[Canon-F1]

im curious to see if they can really squench out a visible better IQ then with the older version.

btw: a bit off topic... but why does your negative karma goes back in numbers but ours not?
i noticed you had more then 11 negative karmas but now your back to 10.

[neuroanatomist]

Interesting...  Unlike the 24-70mm and the 35L, the 70-200/4 IS seems like it doesn't really need an upgrade at all - it's pretty close to the 70-300 L and the 70-200/2.8 IS II in terms of IQ, has sealing, etc.  Fluorine coatings on exposed elements would be nice and all, but hardly worth an upgrade...

[idigi]

Canon is in need to increase prices on their lenses in order to stay competitive and profitable.  They cannot just bump up the price $500 on current lenses.  So, they add a little "upgrade", call it MK II, and increase the price.  That way people don't go wild saying that Canon went insane and increased the price of current lenses for no reason.

[Canon-F1]

Canon is in need to increase prices on their lenses in order to stay competitive and profitable. 

 ....... 

[traveller]

If ever there was a lens less in need of an upgrade it was this one... So I'm sure that this rumour will come true!

[Viggo]

Canon is in need to increase prices on their lenses in order to stay competitive and profitable.  They cannot just bump up the price $500 on current lenses.  So, they add a little "upgrade", call it MK II, and increase the price.  That way people don't go wild saying that Canon went insane and increased the price of current lenses for no reason.

This might be meant ironic from your side, but if it's not I disagree that they won't increase prices, they've done it a few times before, and it IS for a reason, like the earthquake. For that reason alone I made crazy money on my 300 f2,8 IS, because I bought at low market price and sold it when it was bumped. Supply and demand, no secrets there. It's much better for Canon to say the world economy forces us to up the prices worldwide, than do a halfass attempt to squeeze more money out of customers by slight upgrades, then no one would by them either, and production costs, it just wouldn't make them any money....

Plenty of other lenses waaaay before the 4 L IS in the line for upgrade. 135, 35, 400 5,6, 300 4 IS, 100-400 for example...

[Maui5150]

btw: a bit off topic... but why does your negative karma goes back in numbers but ours not?
i noticed you had more then 11 negative karmas but now your back to 10.

Elementary... A person can hit Smite by mistake and it will go to say 11, then click on Applaud and the smite goes back to 10 and the applaud up

[idigi]

... they've done it a few times before, and it IS for a reason, like the earthquake. Supply and demand, no secrets there.

That's one of the reasons to increase prices, too - natural disaster; supply and demand.  The same thing is happening with prices of hard drives due to flood in Thailand.

It's much better for Canon to say the world economy forces us to up the prices worldwide, than do a halfass attempt to squeeze more money out of customers by slight upgrades, then no one would by them either, and production costs, it just wouldn't make them any money....

It won't be "halfass" - you'll get new coating that will reduce light scatter and increase scratch resistance; or in the case of 35L you may get weather sealing, too.
So, what price increase scenario is more likely to be accepted by the public?
1. World economy forces us to up the prices worldwide
or
2. We are "improving" the current close-to-perfect lens with new coating and/or weather sealing and that's why the price of new lens is higher now.

p.s. You have to look at this from Canon's, as a business, point of view rather than from customer's point of view: how to increase profit with minimal expenses.

[smirkypants]

I really have to echo what others have said. This lens is already extremely good and an upgrade would take it from 4.5 stars to 4.7 stars. How many different versions of a 70-200 are needed? Meanwhile there are lenses in other focal ranges that are in desperate need of help. Many people would love something in the 100-300 f4 range. The 200-400 is vapor. The 100-400 *desperately* needs some lovin'. Don't all of us already own at least one 70-200?

[Fleetie]

I have to say, my first thought when I saw this was the same as that of many others, judging from the comments here. I just traded my 70-200 f/4 L IS in for the f/2.8 version, BUT not because of poor performance.

The lens already has stellar image quality (sharpness (Oh yes!), and bokeh) and IS.

The 24-70 L, although I've never even used one, from what I've read about it, could really use the attention, and to be honest, although I do love my 24-105L IS as a walk-around, it does suffer from CA at the edges, and it could use an upgrade to fix the edge/corner performance and sharpness generally.

[Wahoowa]

Like many others, I think this is the lens that needs to be updated the least.

Besides 24-70L and 35L, I would think these lenses need to be updated first:

- 17-40L
- 24-105L
- 50/1.4
- 135L

[Isaac]

The f/4 is a superb lens, I think the II will sell even better. However I still think the f/2.8 is a far better option generally speaking.

[RC]

Upgrading the 70-200 F4 IS?    Naaa, got to be just a rumor.

Canon, work on upgrading lens that actually need to be upgraded!  The 50mm family for example.

[distant.star]

First, this is a [CR1] so discussion is wildly speculative. To the extent it proves out, I suspect it's more marketing than anything technical or performance oriented. If you add $10 to unit cost at manufacturer level on the back end, the marketing devils can turn that into $100 more revenue on the front end.

From a discussion standpoint, I'm more interested in other lenses named as needing upgrade. I wonder why the 135L is in that group. I can understand there hasn't been much, if any, change to this lens for a long time, but otherwise I wonder what an upgrade would look like.

If you had carte blanche to upgrade this lens, what would you do? What specs would it have after your upgrades?

I'm especially interested in Big Brain's take on this since he has pro optics credentials. But I'm interested in everyone's dream list for making the 135 better than it already is.

Thanks, everyone.