A patent for a 16-40mm f/4 has appeared. This could be a sign that the EF 17-40mm f/4L may be on its way out. We have been told that there was a possibility that the EF 16-35 f/2.8L II replacement could be wider, maybe the information was the EF 17-40 f/4L replacement instead.
Patent Publication No. 2015-206976 (Google Translated)
- Published 2015.11.19
- Filing date 2014.4.23
- Zoom ratio 2.36
- Focal length 16.48 24.40 38.90
- F-number 4.12 4.12 4.12
- Half angle (in degrees) 52.70 41.56 29.08
- Image height 21.64
- Overall length of the lens 177.74 162.40 159.73
- BF 38.00 45.51 63.40
One thing that stick out to us about this patent is the size of the lens and the fact that it's not an internal zoom design like the current EF 17-40mm f/4L, the ‘new' lens is also looks to be larger. Canon has increased the size of a lens recently with the EF 35mm f/1.4L II. The original was 3.4″ inches long and the new one comes in at just over 4.1″ (Canon spec), though it measures at 4.43″ according to TDP.
There has been a flurry of patent activity on optical formulas lately. We could be in for another good year of new lenses releases.
Note: We removed the “L” from our original post, we put it there out of habit. The patent makes no mention of a red ring.