Canon talks EOS R3, and confirms that it is not the flagship mirrorless

Sep 20, 2020
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Something around 5000 Euros and not 7200 Euros like the 1D X. I hope the EU will force Canon to open up the mount for others. Otherwise it is anti-competitive beheviour.

It is not anti-competitive at all.
No one has the obligation to share technology and anyone can read the patents.
 
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I'm curious – what great 3rd party lenses are there for which there are no Canon equivalents? The optically stellar manual focus Zeiss lenses come to mind (although there are Canon L-series equivalents, just slightly less optically impressive and much cheaper). There are a handful of 3rd party options for lenses like the TS-E lenses

It's not just about great it's about choice. There are niche lenses that a large company like Canon is never going to bother with. But the third party companies can spread those niche lenses over multiple mounts
 
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"The Canon EOS R3 is not intended to replace the Canon EOS-1D X Mark III."

While I believe this is true in this case, they always say this tho, Just the usual marketing talk.
Yup. This is the R1 in all but name, they just don't want to call it that for a few reasons:

- they don't want to make 1DX owners feel bad about their year-old camera already being made obsolete

- they feel the 'real' R1 isn't ready and want to make a splash when they finally get quad pixel autofocus (or whatever feature they have planned) ready

- they want to avoid direct comparisons against the Sony A9, whether on price or features

Look at the form factor. There's no way Canon is going to have both an R1 and R3 exist alongside each other. Once Canon finally feels like they can make a good enough camera called the R1, they'll quietly forget about the R3, just like they did with the EOS R.
 
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Mar 27, 2015
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I'm curious – what great 3rd party lenses are there for which there are no Canon equivalents? The optically stellar manual focus Zeiss lenses come to mind (although there are Canon L-series equivalents, just slightly less optically impressive and much cheaper). There are a handful of 3rd party options for lenses like the TS-E lenses (Schneider) and MP-E 65 (Venus, Mitakon), but again, Canon has versions.

The converse seems more true, for me at least – there's no 3rd party 600/4 for Canon, no 3rd party 11-24 or fisheye zoom, no TS-E Macro lenses.
Well Sigma 14mm 1.8 and sigma 20mm 1.4 both helped me make some nice shots in low light situations. And I don't really know what the Canon equivalent is for these lenses.

I also used Sigma 20-35 f2.0 for a couple of low light reportages.

I don't own a 120-300mm 2.8 but I can imagine a couple of scenarios where that lens would be usefull.

And then there are a bunch of lenses that have a Canon equivalents or something in similar focal range, but are cheaper and do the job just as well. Sigma 40mm 1.4 is one of those lenses that I use a lot. It is really sharp and I actually sold my 35mm and 50mm to use the 40mm insteead.

And then the Sigma... 135mm 1.8
Sure Canon has an old 135mm 2.0 model, but it is a bit outdated and too soft for my taste.


Since mirorless cameras have a different AF system I think that makes fast aperture lenses (where focus accuracy is critical) much easier to use. And therefore maybe gives companises even more incentive to produce some niche fast aperture third party lenses.
Heck, I even find I use my 24mm TS-E more just because now I also habe the option to zoom in preview the focus in the viewfinder while shooting handheld.
 
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Billybob

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If it were similar to the R5 for stills, why would anyone want an R5 other than price?
Well, Canon has already stated that the R3 is slotted between the R5 and 1DX, so I'm expecting it to be better than the R5 for stills in every way. My only question is whether it will match or exceed the R5's resolution. While I think that it will be at least 45MP (see my previous posts), there's not enough information available yet to be certain of that conjecture.

To address your question, the R3 will differ from the R5 in price and form factor. I'm hoping that it will come in under $6000, but I would not be surprised if it matched the Sony A1's $6500 price.
 
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GoldWing

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"Wildlife, sports, racing, and photojournalism" sound very much like the bread and butter for the 1DXIII, even if the R3 is not supposed to replace it.
Just more bait and switch from Canon. The R1 will decide if Canon makes a HUGE amount of money transitioning over their professional base. It represents many billions of dollars if they get it right.
 
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Ozarker

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It is not anti-competitive at all.
No one has the obligation to share technology and anyone can read the patents.
I always saw it as "competitive" behavior. How these people view it as anti-competitive is a mystery to me. Let Canon develop the tech/mount, and then give it away to competitors who'll cut Canon off at the knees? Weird.
 
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Ozarker

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Just more bait and switch from Canon. The R1 will decide if Canon makes a HUGE amount of money transitioning over their professional base. It represents many billions of dollars if they get it right.
I don't believe the "professional base" is worth as much as one might think. This is an industry in steep decline... especially the sports photographer and photojournalism base. The wedding and portrait photographers don't have much call for an R1. That's a much bigger "base", though also in decline.
 
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AlanF

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I always saw it as "competitive" behavior. How these people view it as anti-competitive is a mystery to me. Let Canon develop the tech/mount, and then give it away to competitors who'll cut Canon off at the knees? Weird.
Patent law allows you to patent a mount for your camera but you are not allowed to patent accessories that fit on to that mount. And that is to prevent a monopoly situation. Similarly, US and other intellectual property law allows reverse engineering of coding protocols if it enables third party devices to work better. It might stop Canon making even more profit but the law is there to protect us the consumer .
 
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Well they certainly shared the RF mount with Red. And this explains why Canon is allowed to use the higher compressed raw flavors in camera.
Long time Reduser, first time poster: I don't think its true that Canon shared (do you have some evidence?) Red's just gotten some RF lens control capability in BETA fairly recently - probably just reverse engineered. Also, thought I read somewhere that although they won the patent suit with apple on compressed raw it may be somehow limited to 4K and below so cameras above 4K aren't subject. .R3D has been a big part of Red's success but in fairness I've never been convinced that compression of it was patentable. Compression of large files - particularly of media files, has been widespread and either open or licensable for free for at least 30 years - so the idea and execution (.r3d is a flavor of wavelet (JPEG2000?) compression) so fairly obvious and obvious extensions of existing technologies are not supposed to be patentable. Patents like that come down to patent lawyer language, someone's willing to contest, and the USPTO's ability to understand the technology.

This is just stuff they I have vague knowledge of and not heavily researched so take it all with a grain of salt.
 
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Hm, okay, maybe not many lenses, but certainly quite some some.

Until recently Canon got no 50mm that was as good as the Sigma 50mm Art. The 1,2L was noteable less sharp and slower.
I think there was no wide angle with IS and f 2,8 like the Tamron 15-30 f2,8 VC which I used a lot for a lot of beautiful, handheld shots in low light.
Laowa got lots of unique lenses. The 24mm macro Probe is certainly VERY unique. Also they got the insane 15mm Macro (unique look) and some nice 2X Macros (Canons Macro was only 1X I think?). The Zero Distortion 12mm also got a lot of good feedback, a light and sharp Super Wide lense.
Tamron got the first 35mm IS lense I think. The Sigma and Tamron 150-600 was also very popular, I am not sure if Canon got a comparable lense?

Thanks, agree that some Laowa offerings are unique. Regarding the 2x macro, Canon has had the MP-E 65 for decades, that's a 1x-5x macro. I forgot about the 12/2.8.

Here are a few that come to mind:

Sigma contemporary 150-600 zoom
Sigma sports 150-600 zoom
Tamron 150-600 zoom
Sigma sport 120-300 f2.8 zoom
Tokina 11-20 f2.8 zoom (APS-C)
Sigma art 105 f1.4

There are others, but these are just the ones I could come up off the top of my head. Great, of course, is a purely subjective term that depends on a combination of quality, versatility, price and other factors.

I had certainly considered the 150-600mm zooms from Sigma/Tamron, but IMO those don't really count – Canon's 100-400mm II and more so the RF 100-500 offer much better IQ, sufficiently better that either cropping to the 600mm framing (where the 150-600 lenses are weakest) yields similar or better IQ, and adding a 1.4x TC to a Canon 100-400/500 yields a longer lens with similar IQ. The Sigma/Tamron are actually pretty good at the short end, but I doubt anyone is buying a 150-600mm lens to use it in the 150-300mm range.

On balance, while there are a handful of unique offerings, on balance I think the main advantage the 3rd party lenses deliver is lower cost, which as I stated is certainly a meaningful advantage.
 
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I had certainly considered the 150-600mm zooms from Sigma/Tamron, but IMO those don't really count – Canon's 100-400mm II and more so the RF 100-500 offer much better IQ, sufficiently better that either cropping to the 600mm framing (where the 150-600 lenses are weakest) yields similar or better IQ, and adding a 1.4x TC to a Canon 100-400/500 yields a longer lens with similar IQ. The Sigma/Tamron are actually pretty good at the short end, but I doubt anyone is buying a 150-600mm lens to use it in the 150-300mm range.

On balance, while there are a handful of unique offerings, on balance I think the main advantage the 3rd party lenses deliver is lower cost, which as I stated is certainly a meaningful advantage.
Ha, I totaly agree on the 100-400!
I had the 150-600 Tamron, but now I have the 100-400 Canon. The Image Quality is indeed a bit better, even If cropped in to match the 600mm framing. Given the much lower weight and size, its indeed the better lense for me.
I am curious about the 150-600 Sigma Sports lense- this looks pretty impressive build. But I guess its still not worth the weight over the 100-400 or ne new RF 100-500 which also looks interesting.
I agree with you on the quality aspect =)
 
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Ozarker

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Ozarker

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If Tammy makes an RF 150-600 G2 style I'd be all over it. I have seen numerous images with the EF adapted for birding on R5/6's and they are phenomenal.
I’ve been thinking the same. I have a love/hate relationship with Tamron. Under really bright conditions, my Tamron 45mm is a POS. Other than that, it’s a really nice lens. Also used to have Tamron’s 15-30. Another nice lens.

I’ve recently moved to a tiny town in the Arkansas Ozarks. I’m very tempted to get into birding again. While I’d love a great white, a good zoom would be more practical for me, and far less money.
 
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Ozarker

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Patent law allows you to patent a mount for your camera but you are not allowed to patent accessories that fit on to that mount. And that is to prevent a monopoly situation. Similarly, US and other intellectual property law allows reverse engineering of coding protocols if it enables third party devices to work better. It might stop Canon making even more profit but the law is there to protect us the consumer .
I understand that. What I don’t get is people demanding Canon help the competition.
 
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snapshot

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I understand that. What I don’t get is people demanding Canon help the competition.
demand is a strong word. and helping the competition is never what somebody wants to do. on the otherhand, building a community of partnerships might create a larger market for your stuff. there is value in having the ability to accessorize and build a system using components within an active community of suppliers. and i am ok with folks choosing components based upon interoperability and adherence to formal and informal standards.
 
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