Canon officially announces the RF 15-35mm f/2.8L IS USM, RF 24-70mm f/2.8L IS USM and new firmware for the EOS R and EOS RP

Sep 17, 2014
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It's interesting that both lenses are no smaller than their EF variants...but have IS...which doesn't have any size impacts. So from a technical point of view...there was no technical reason that IS couldn't be added to a future EF lens....only marketing reasons.

How do you know that the new lenses would be possible with IS in EF mount and current sizes?
We still don't know the image quality but if they are better and have IS, that can be possible because of the new mount. The 15-35 is also wider than the EF.
 
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tron

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It's sad cause we can easily find differences on MTF charts between RF 85 1.2 vs EF 85 1.2 II, RF 50 1.2 vs EF 50 1.2, RF 24-70 vs EF 24-70 II, but with RF 15-35 vs EF 16-35 4.0 IS it's not so sweet.
I haven't seen anything but if that is so then EF16-35 2.8L III which is better than EF 16-34 4L IS will be better than the RF 15-35. But I will wait for Lens Rentals and TDP to test and compare. But both 16-35 III and 16-35 4l IS are very good lenses so an RF lens equally good shouldn't be an issue...
 
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It's sad cause we can easily find differences on MTF charts between RF 85 1.2 vs EF 85 1.2 II, RF 50 1.2 vs EF 50 1.2, RF 24-70 vs EF 24-70 II, but with RF 15-35 vs EF 16-35 4.0 IS it's not so sweet.
The EF 50 1.2 and 85 1.2 we're pretty soft however and there was a lot of room to improve. Arguably the 16-35 f4 is already quite a sharp lens and doesn't need improvement quite as much.
That said more sharpness would still be nice, especially with the rumored 80mp Sensor.
 
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6degrees

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Sep 6, 2018
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The 15-35 is only $100 more than the MSRP of the EF 16-35 2.8 III and goes even wider. The 24-70 2.8 will sell at almost any price, and with people dying for an IS version for years they'll be flying off the shelves for the $400 premium.

I'm still waiting to see the 70-200 price because the price implied by recent rumors ($300 more than the other 2 lenses) seems excessive to me, but again it's a lens that many people want to own.

None of this is to mention that anyone that can wait another year will probably see rebates before then and a chance to buy them for a couple/few hundreds less.

If Canon releases EOS R pro body with IBIS, will the extra expense on IS still valuable?

I just do not feel mirrorless lenses high prices are justified. Sony 24mm F1.4 GM price makes more sense, and also indicates those lens providers are ripping customers off.
 
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Jul 21, 2010
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It's sad cause we can easily find differences on MTF charts between RF 85 1.2 vs EF 85 1.2 II, RF 50 1.2 vs EF 50 1.2, RF 24-70 vs EF 24-70 II, but with RF 15-35 vs EF 16-35 4.0 IS it's not so sweet.
Just be careful which MTF charts you’re comparing, by which I mean where you find those charts. In 2018, Canon changed the way they calculate the curves resulting in a more stringent assessment. So, if you compare the same lens with the ‘old’ and the ‘new’ MTF method, the performance looks substantially worse on the ‘new’ MTF curves. For all lenses pre-2018 currently in the lineup (which includes all the EF lenses you listed above), Canon revised their MTF charts to the new method, and for a valid comparison you need to compare the RF lenses (which all use the new method) to those revised MTFs. BUT...while Canon Japan shows the updated MTF plots, other regions e.g. Canon USA did not replace the old charts with the new ones.

Kudos to @AlP above for using all new-format MTFs. For others doing their own comparisons, the easy way to tell is the old charts have 8 lines, the new ones have only 4 lines. Only compare new-to-new or old-to-old.
 
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AlP

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No, this is incorrect. To start they are not the same sizes, the new RF lens are slightly larger and slightly heavier. They are close in size, so much that most won’t notice a difference in hand. But the RFs are larger and heavier somewhat. Check the EF sizes on the-digital-picture.com ...

Second, it is a totally different mount, RF vs EF, that changes how the lens can be designed.

Particularly the 24-70 which has a more complex optical formula than the EF version (the images a adjusted quite roughly in size, so this is not a precise comparison):

24-70 construction comparison.png

And here for the 15-35. Note that in this case there's something odd with the outline, as matching the diameter of the lens and of the mount with the EF version makes it look like the RF lens would be longer. According to Canon's data it should be shorter (126.8 mm vs. 127.5 mm):

1X-35 construction comparison.png
 
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Aug 26, 2015
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15-35 MTF seems same to worse, 24-70 MTF is a lot better at 24mm in the corners. But I'll wait for lensrentals to test RF lenses before looking at more MTF charts :)
I mean, a 15-35 (with 2.8 and IS) is still different to a 16-35, right? :) May not cause quite a stir like the 11-24 did, but it is still a good step forward.
 
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Aug 26, 2015
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Another tease of that lovely wee fat 70-200mm. Really looking forward to that and the 24-70(which comes after the 70-200 and super tele). Really looking forward new R camera too, frankly the only thing stopping me on the current R is that it used SD cards instead of CF cards.
Looking at the C500 Mark II indicates that they are dropping CF in favour of CFExpress and they probably keep SD as the secondary card slot.
 
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The EF 50 1.2 and 85 1.2 we're pretty soft however and there was a lot of room to improve. Arguably the 16-35 f4 is already quite a sharp lens and doesn't need improvement quite as much.
That said more sharpness would still be nice, especially with the rumored 80mp Sensor.
Erm...no...the ef 50mm f1.2L for sure but not the ef 85mm f1.2L...it's seriously sharp wide open. I've owned 3 copies of the '50L and processed the output from a few more (2nd photogs) and they were all slightly soft. But every copy of the ef 85 f1.2 II L has been razor sharp.
 
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Joules

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Erm...no...the ef 50mm f1.2L for sure but not the ef 85mm f1.2L...it's seriously sharp wide open. I've owned 3 copies of the '50L and processed the output from a few more (2nd photogs) and they were all slightly soft. But every copy of the ef 85 f1.2 II L has been razor sharp.
Looking at the comparison between the Sigma 85mm 1.4 Art and the Canon EF 85mm 1.2 II, both at 1.4 aperture... Saying that the 85mm II had a good amount of room for improvement seems like a fair statement to me. And Sigma doesn't have the advantage of the new Mount that Canon had with the RF 85mm 1.2. Unfortunately we don't have a 50 MP R yet, so there's no fair comparison there.

 
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Looking at the comparison between the Sigma 85mm 1.4 Art and the Canon EF 85mm 1.2 II, both at 1.4 aperture... Saying that the 85mm II had a good amount of room for improvement seems like a fair statement to me. And Sigma doesn't have the advantage of the new Mount that Canon had with the RF 85mm 1.2. Unfortunately we don't have a 50 MP R yet, so there's no fair comparison there.

Your argument is unfortunately is misinformed and naive. The Sigma lens has the massive disadvantage of Sigma's notorious AF inconsistency issues. A Sigma is NOT a comparative replacement to Canon's L range...regardless of the focal length and Aperture claim. The Canon is 1/3 stop brighter....that's a lot of real world light. The Canon has a focus by wire design that is slow but way more accurate than the appalling AF system implemented in the Sigma Art 35/50/85mm lenses. Then there's the Canon build quality...plus the resale value...Sigma is still some way behind Canon's finest. After all these years (the basic design of the 85IIL heralds from when the ESO system was first implemented...very pre-digital) and yet Sigma or Nikon haven't caught up...go figure. They copy and fall a bit short.
 
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Your argument is unfortunately is misinformed and naive. The Sigma lens has the massive disadvantage of Sigma's notorious AF inconsistency issues.
It used to be the case on DSLR, new Art lenses like 105 f1.4 are extremelly accurate.
On eos R, all compatible Art lenses are as accurate as Canon lenses, they focus dead on the spot
 
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Joules

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Your argument is unfortunately is misinformed and naive.
I'm not making any argument about any Sigma lens being better or worse than a similar one from Canon. That depends entirely on the lens and use case, as well as subjective preferences. For me, for example, the 35mm 1.4 Art beats the Canon 35mm 1.4 II... Because one is affordable enough for me to buy it and take pictures with - and the other is not. And I rarely use AF, since I use that lens primarily for landscape and astro photography. But that was not the point at all.

Somebody said that the EF 85mm 1.2 II was relatively soft, so there was a lot of potential for improvement in IQ for Canon to tap into with the RF equivalent. You replied to that, saying the EF 85mm 1.2 were "seriously sharp wide open". Which may be true in terms of pure resolution in the image center. I just wanted to demonstrate that it still left room for improvement, because the Sigma version is clearly way sharper wide open across the frame compared to the EF one stopped down slightly. And the RF version is likely even better, but we don't have an appropriate body to test that yet. There might be some measured MTF curves out there that would support that claim, but I won't look for them. It doesn't matter for the point I wanted to support: the old 1.2 primes might have been great, but they did still have some optical flaws that can be corrected in the newer lenses to give greater IQ.

I'm sorry if I offended you in any way.
 
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