Canon confirms discontinuation of EF and EF-S lenses
- Thread starter Richard CR
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Yes, Canon has reduced their current list of EF lenses to 27. That's one more than the 26 RF lenses currently in production. It takes a special kind of intelligence to think that 27 lenses aren't enough for a system, but 26 lenses are. In fact, the EOS M system is aimed at consumers, remains extremely popular, and has only 7 lenses. Since most of the current DSLR sales are in the price range of the EOS M system (i.e. entry-level APS-C), 27 EF and 6 EF-S lenses are actually overkill for the current state of APS-C DSLRs. Canon can keep on discontinuing EF lenses, and release new entry-level DSLRs. This isn't difficult for most people to understand.
It also takes a special kind of intelligence to think that Canon will imminently walk away from 40% of the ILC market. Fortunately for Canon's shareholders, Canon is smarter than that.
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Some EF (and EF-S) lenses are being discontinued. Not all of them. And there is no indication at all that blanket discontinuance of DSLRs (or M series bodies) will happen 'soon'. As a matter of interest, what does 'soon' actually mean to you? This year? Within 3 years? 5 years? 10?
As keeps being said here interminably, until there are low / entry level-priced RF bodies on the market, and they are being popularly taken up (in preference to M-series and entry level DSLRs), there is no rational reason for Canon to stop selling those existing bodies, and the kit lenses that sell like hotcakes with them. The focus of R&D spend is obviously on R series bodies, and RF series lenses, but that doesn't mean that new lower and entry-level DSLRs and M bodies (and maybe even lenses to go with them) won't be released. They probably will be, although we won't know that until (eg) the rumoured lower-$ R series bodies are announced later this year.
And, with all respect, it takes a special degree of intransigence not to acknowledge that.
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May I also add that given the strong sales of the APCS systems (DSLR & M), as long as they are not making a loss, it does make sense to keep it going to continue to capture the mindshare for the Canon brand, as well as to use that as a pathway for at least some to transit into FF (RF). I am assuming, though it could be wrong, that prosumers who are already familiar with the Canon system would tend to stick with the same brand if they transit to FF.
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The Buddhists tell us that one of the causes of suffering is mistaking temporary things for permanent things, and becoming attached to them, or something like that...
All technology platforms have a finite life, including the EF and EF-S lens mount systems. Canon will keep on producing the cameras and lenses that are profitable to manufacture, and slowly phase out the ones that aren't. Over time, they will look to phase out the older system, to rationalise or "optimize" their product lines.
To quote the Petapixel article:
"Canon has gone on the record in the past saying that it doesn’t like to think of lenses as being discontinued or abandoned, but rather that the system is being optimized. Canon is clearly focused on mirrorless in 2022, and more EF lens discontinuations should be expected."
In the meanwhile, all EF and EF-S cameras will still continue to work perfectly well, and produce the same quality they've always produced. Pro photographers will keep using their current gear until it breaks, or until there is some financial advantage in moving over to the RF system. Most regular people will still buy masses of M50s and Rebel cameras, and for these people, a kit lens or a kit with two kit lenses will be plenty.
On the EF-S platform, to complement a kit lens, the 55-250mm, and 10-18mm covered the long and wide end. The compact EF-S 24mm pancake and EF 50mm 1.8 covered a lot of the common focal lengths for primes and a EF 100mm took care of macro and longer prime. Those five lenses could do plenty and had half-decent IQ! A small handful of M-series lenses caters to all the needs of everyday users on that platform, especially with the Sigma offerings.
These two groups, Rebel and EOS M users, most likely constitute the greater portion of Canon's photography market and revenue stream. There's a lot more of them than pro-am or pro photographers, and they don't need that many lenses.
Canon discontinuing lenses just means that people who use them will either have to get them repaired, buy second-hand replacements, or eventually have to move over to the RF platform. By then the older camera bodies will have expired anyway, as lenses last a lot longer than camera bodies these days...
All technology platforms have a finite life, including the EF and EF-S lens mount systems. Canon will keep on producing the cameras and lenses that are profitable to manufacture, and slowly phase out the ones that aren't. Over time, they will look to phase out the older system, to rationalise or "optimize" their product lines.
To quote the Petapixel article:
"Canon has gone on the record in the past saying that it doesn’t like to think of lenses as being discontinued or abandoned, but rather that the system is being optimized. Canon is clearly focused on mirrorless in 2022, and more EF lens discontinuations should be expected."
In the meanwhile, all EF and EF-S cameras will still continue to work perfectly well, and produce the same quality they've always produced. Pro photographers will keep using their current gear until it breaks, or until there is some financial advantage in moving over to the RF system. Most regular people will still buy masses of M50s and Rebel cameras, and for these people, a kit lens or a kit with two kit lenses will be plenty.
On the EF-S platform, to complement a kit lens, the 55-250mm, and 10-18mm covered the long and wide end. The compact EF-S 24mm pancake and EF 50mm 1.8 covered a lot of the common focal lengths for primes and a EF 100mm took care of macro and longer prime. Those five lenses could do plenty and had half-decent IQ! A small handful of M-series lenses caters to all the needs of everyday users on that platform, especially with the Sigma offerings.
These two groups, Rebel and EOS M users, most likely constitute the greater portion of Canon's photography market and revenue stream. There's a lot more of them than pro-am or pro photographers, and they don't need that many lenses.
Canon discontinuing lenses just means that people who use them will either have to get them repaired, buy second-hand replacements, or eventually have to move over to the RF platform. By then the older camera bodies will have expired anyway, as lenses last a lot longer than camera bodies these days...
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I remember a lot of folks proclaiming the DSLR was already dead when Sony introduced the first α7. Wasn't that 2013? There was no "five years from now" in many of the proclamations. It was, "THE DSLR IS DEAD! LONG LIVE THE SONY MILC!"
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The entire list of every officially discontinued lens is right there.
There is no need for any speculation:
生産を終了した商品 EF LENS ：レンズ交換式カメラ・レンズ
一眼レフ用交換レンズの販売終了した旧製品の一覧です。機種仕様と対応オプション品についてご確認いただけます。cweb.canon.jp
The three TS-E lenses in that list were all replaced by newer TS-E lenses about a decade ago. Those three were older designs.
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They haven't got the EF 1200mm f/5.6 on that list.The entire list of every officially discontinued lens is right there.
There is no need for any speculation:
生産を終了した商品 EF LENS ：レンズ交換式カメラ・レンズ
一眼レフ用交換レンズの販売終了した旧製品の一覧です。機種仕様と対応オプション品についてご確認いただけます。
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Primes have always had a slower replacement cycle than zooms. The original 35/1.4 L came out in 1998. The EF 35mm f/1.4 L II didn't appear until 2015. That seemed, more than anything else, to be prompted by the Sigma 35mm ART that takes better pictures of flat test charts.
In the case of the EF 135mm f/2, those who use it know that flat test charts aren't the only measure of a lens' usefulness for taking images of a 3D world. But overdoing flat field correction to get better corners in a test chart photo has consequences for how out of focus areas look in photos of three dimensional spaces.
The last thing Canon needed to do was replace the EF 135mm f/2 L with a newer version that produced clinical looking images with nasty bokeh like Sigma's 135. Let the uninformed Philistines rave about how great their Sigma 135s are because they're so good at imaging flat test charts while the rest of us make beautiful photos with our "outdated" EF 135mm f/2 L lenses!
Canon could have probably sold a few more EF 135mm f/2 L II lenses over the past five years than they actually sold EF 135mm f/2 L lenses over that same time period, but they probably would not have sold enough more of them to recover the additional R&D they would have spent to create such a lens.
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Yet still you managed to deliver a (not very well) veiled insult based on your misunderstanding of the facts. @unfocused should be very disappointed in the behavior you are modeling here for the forum.
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Especially when a simple fact checking at this right time is enough to see that none of the EF-M lenses has been discontinued anywhere, and that most gears of the system are still available new nearly everywhere (with the exception of 18-55mm kit lens, that has been discontinued long before now, for some other reasons )...
It looks like some here wants EOS M line-up to die since the beginning, and I'm still wondering why...
Everything has an end, for sure, but if this system can talk, it would have kept saying "The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated" since last five years at least...
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This was almost immediate; if I recall, the second or third comment started talking about EF-M
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