Lee Filters Announces EF 11-24mm f/4L Support

[Canon Rumors Guy]

Lee Filters has announced support for Canon’s EF 11-24 mm f/4L with the <a href="http://www.leefilters.com/index.php/camera/system-sw150" target="_blank">SW150 Mark II filter system</a> adaptor ring.</p>
<p>From Lee Filters</p>
<blockquote><p>You’ve asked, we listened! Announcing the newest addition to our SW150 Filter System… The Canon 11-24mm Adaptor Ring for the Mark II!</p>
<p>*Please note that due to the physical size of this lens, and the extremely wide angle of view, the SW150 filter holder will vignette at the widest angles. To avoid this we recommend using a minimum focal length of 13.5mm when using the filter holder with two filter slots and 12.5mm when using the holder with one filter slot.</p></blockquote>
<p><strong>Canon EF 11-24mm f/4L USM $2999: <a href="http://adorama.evyy.net/c/60085/51926/1036?u=http://www.adorama.com/CA11244.html" target="_blank">Adorama</a> | <a href="http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1119028-REG/canon_9520b002_ef_11_24mm_f_4l_usm.html/bi/2466/kbid/3296" target="_blank">B&H Photo</a> | <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00T3ERXKE/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=B00T3ERXKE&linkCode=as2&tag=canorumo-20&linkId=SKIW33AKPAGADHBN" target="_blank">Amazon</a></strong></p>

 

[AvTvM]

Wow, lots of gear, lots of hassle, lots of expenses to convert an 11mm lens into a 12.5mm or 13.5mm lens. AmazingLEE weird business model.

 

[Viggo]

Wow, lots of gear, lots of hassle, lots of expenses to convert an 11mm lens into a 12.5mm or 13.5mm lens. AmazingLEE weird business model.

Agreed, this seems very weird considering the only reason most people buy the 11-24 is because of the 11mm perspective.

 

[Canon Rumors Guy]

Wow, lots of gear, lots of hassle, lots of expenses to convert an 11mm lens into a 12.5mm or 13.5mm lens. AmazingLEE weird business model.

This is for people that want the best ultra wide angle zoom lens in Canon's lineup and not to have to also own a 16-35 or 17-40. Shooting landscapes at 11mm is quite difficult in a lot cases and a lot of people will find they don't shoot all that often at the widest angle this lens offers.

The 11mm is there if you want it, but without a filter. You can get great results in the right light. However, on a recent trip to Scotland, I would have loved to shoot at 14mm with a Little Stopper on the 11-24.

We all have different things that we'll tolerate when shooting, and I'd much rather have a filter option than a second lens in the bag that covers basically the same focal range.

 

[Eldar]

A lot of 11-24mm f4L owners already have the filters, so it is a very cheap alternative to have a filter option on the 11-24. If they made a solution that covered everything, we all had to start from scratch and the filter sizes would be enormous. I will buy the adaptor ring, but I would not buy a new filter system.

 

[AbsN]

If only they'd bring out an SW150 adaptor for the TSE-17 so that you could use filters and do full shift stitching.

 

[GMCPhotographics]

I wonder if the Wondapanner will have the same issue or I wonder if they will actually design a mount and filter system which works on the 11-24mm without vignetting?
Lets face it...with the Lee system...you might as well go and buy a Sigma 12-24mm mkII...save a TON of cash and have a workable 12mm system with filters.

 

[privatebydesign]

I wonder if the Wondapanner will have the same issue or I wonder if they will actually design a mount and filter system which works on the 11-24mm without vignetting?
Lets face it...with the Lee system...you might as well go and buy a Sigma 12-24mm mkII...save a TON of cash and have a workable 12mm system with filters.

No they won't, the Wonderpana system, I have one for the TS-E 17, is 145mm based and actually vignettes worse than the Lee 150mm based system.

I did some tests a while ago just putting the naked 145mm polarizer resting on the petals of my 11-24 and the vignetting is bad. See here http://www.canonrumors.com/forum/index.php?topic=26145.msg540959#msg540959

 

[Hector1970]

It looks a pretty cumbersome and exceptionally expensive piece of kit.
I've seen another system for the Samyang 14mm.
It is massive in real life. This must be too.
Wind would be an issue with that surface area.
Not sure if it is overkill.
Black Card / Black Cloth might be a much cheaper and simpler solution.
I'm tempted to get the Canon 12-24mm.
It would be a shame to get it an not have a filter system.

I can understand in a way Lee charging alot for their filters as this is their skilled piece of work.
The filter holders price is a joke. They are only pieces of plastic.

 

[AvTvM]

I can see the need for filtering in some situations. BUT ... this is no solution, it is a bad joke.

Why do UWA lenses with bulbous front elements not all come standard with a rear filter slot? That would be the only acceptable solution for me rather than those homungous contraptions in front of the lens. Rear filter would be so much easier, less cumbersome in the field and less expensive.

 

[Viggo]

I can see the need for filtering in some situations. BUT ... this is no solution, it is a bad joke.

Why do UWA lenses with bulbous front elements not all come standard with a rear filter slot? That would be the only acceptable solution for me rather than those homungous contraptions in front of the lens. Rear filter would be so much easier, less cumbersome in the field and less expensive.

Remove the lens and switch rear filters around sand, wind and saltwater? You could only use one filter and you could not adjust them up down for the horizon, plus they are not the best quality and very brittle.

 

[Sabaki]

Filter systems are a massive reason between good landscapes and great landscapes and thus the disappointment with the filter solutions for the 11-24.

We all know that it's the 11-15mm on the wide side that must us yearn for this lens. Half that focal length is compromised by the Lee filter.

That been said, I have a quick question:

LCD tv's now come in curved variants which look flat when positioned properly in front of them. Theoretically, can a curved filter be created to accommodate these bulbous lenses? Then again, shifting a 'curved' grad presents other issues again

 

[Random Orbits]

I can see the need for filtering in some situations. BUT ... this is no solution, it is a bad joke.

Why do UWA lenses with bulbous front elements not all come standard with a rear filter slot? That would be the only acceptable solution for me rather than those homungous contraptions in front of the lens. Rear filter would be so much easier, less cumbersome in the field and less expensive.

It has a rear filter slot. Just not as flexible as filtering the front.

 

[AvTvM]

Why do UWA lenses with bulbous front elements not all come standard with a rear filter slot?

It has a rear filter slot. Just not as flexible as filtering the front.

ah, OK. Excellent. Should work at least for non-graduated ND filters including "stopper" filters. Graduated ND would be difficult/limited. Pol filters I am not sure how often they really can be useful on lenses with such extremely wide FOV. At least if there is blue sky involved in a shot pol filters never worked for me.

 

[ahsanford]

Lee responds! This is actually kind of fast for them -- they often take ages to update their product lines.

I'm actually impressed you can stack two filters down to 13.5mm and still use one at 12.5mm. Remember, this is a retrofit Mk II version of a system meant for the Nikon 14-24, which already requires crazy pricey 150mm filters. To fully cover 11mm without vignetting would take you out of that limited/expensive sandbox and put you in an even more limited/expensive sandbox.

Has anyone actually done the math on 11mm filters stepped off of the front element by the distance of the hood? 200x250mm grads for, what, $250 a pop, anyone?

So crying foul that this is expensive and doesn't let you use your 11mm prime : to its utmost with filters is a bit like a guy saying "I sure do love my 50mm f/0.9 lens, but I wish it weren't so big and heavy..."

- A

 

[Canon Rumors Guy]

Lee responds! This is actually kind of fast for them -- they often take ages to update their product lines.

I'm actually impressed you can stack two filters down to 13.5mm and still use one at 12.5mm. Remember, this is a retrofit Mk II version of a system meant for the Nikon 14-24, which already requires crazy pricey 150mm filters. To fully cover 11mm without vignetting would take you out of that limited/expensive sandbox and put you in an even more limited/expensive sandbox.

Has anyone actually done the math on 11mm filters stepped off of the front element by the distance of the hood? 200x250mm grads for, what, $250 a pop, anyone?

So crying foul that this is expensive and doesn't let you use your 11mm prime : to its utmost with filters is a bit like a guy saying "I sure do love my 50mm f/0.9 lens, but I wish it weren't so big and heavy..."

- A

Well said

 

[ahsanford]

Why do UWA lenses with bulbous front elements not all come standard with a rear filter slot?

It has a rear filter slot. Just not as flexible as filtering the front.

ah, OK. Excellent. Should work at least for non-graduated ND filters including "stopper" filters. Graduated ND would be difficult/limited. Pol filters I am not sure how often they really can be useful on lenses with such extremely wide FOV. At least if there is blue sky involved in a shot pol filters never worked for me.

Yep -- you don't use polarizers at these kind of focal lengths for sky management. If you did, that nasty polarizer sky darkening / pseudo-vignetting occurs.

But ultra wide angle users still need polarizers to tame reflections -- for landscapes with water, or for interiors with a lot of glass.

- A

 

[ahsanford]

I think a tougher question here is: will anyone (Lee, Wonderpana, etc.) ever make a filter system to get this lens all the way to 11mm?

Given the following considerations:

• Nikon has dominated the landscape gear community for some time with that 14-24 option -- it's not just a unique FL range, it was also the sharpest UWA zoom by a non-trivial margin for many years. As a result, I would hazard a complete guess that there are a solid fifty times as many 14-24 lenses in the field today than there are 11-24 lenses in the field. That will change, I'm sure, but that ratio would imply that Lee should work hard to delight Nikon 14-24 users and only do enough to placate Canon 11-24 users.
  
  
• That $3k asking price for the 11-24 will do little to increase it's number of users.
  
  
• If Lee/Wonderpana did offer an 11mm solution someday, they would get little/no pull-through of sales from other ultrawide users. Why would anyone using a Nikon 14-24 or Tamron 15-30 (a large camp without a solution right now) pay the extra money and struggle with the unnecessary size of that huge rig when the SW150 Mk II / FreeArc options already exist and will surely be smaller and cost less? That means making a system for an 11-24 lens is likely to have very, very, very low sales numbers and will therefore require a comically high price.

So in my mind -- call me a pessimist -- but I don't ever see Lee or Wonderpana making a complete, vignette-free at 11mm solution for the 11-24. The business model for that must be radioactive with non-profitability.

So if I owned an 11-24 (and I do not, for this very reason!) my needle would likely be hovering over 'pretty pumped' on my happiness meter about this current Lee offering. It might be all we ever get.

- A

 

[RolandW]

One thing that everyone should know is that it is impossible to design an adapter for the Canon 11-24 and get full focal length range if you are planning on using any size of flat filter. The first obstacle is the built in lens hood which projects forward of the front element at the top and bottom by about a half an inch, keeping any large filter from getting close to the front element. The other thing in the way is the front of the lens glass its self. The lens front is so bulbous and has such a wide field of view that a very large flat filter would need to be about a half an inch BEHIND the front of the glass in order to give an un obstructed view, which is obviously impossible. I have no doubt that Lee has their adapter system located to get the widest possible view through their filters, and the dream of a better adapter from anyone for the Canon 11-24, with more usable focal length range, is truly an impossible dream.

What we need is spherical shaped polarizers and solid ND filters for our ultra wide bulbous front lenses, along with a practical way to mount them, but I doubt that third party suppliers would ever come up with those. Canon on the other hand has the resources and technical skills to do that, so lets pressure them for a polarizer solution for the 11-24. And of course I understand the issues of sky variation when using a polarizer on a wide angle lens, but still very much want the option for water reflection control, as well as enhancement of many landscape scenes.

I have the round 145mm WonderPana filters and bayonet mounting adapter for my Canon 17mm TS-E, and would like them to also offer an adapter for the 11-24, even though I know the limitations of focal length would be about the same as the Lee system. Right now the rear gel filter slot on the 11-24 gives me solid ND functionality, even though it requires un mounting the lens, and handling the gel filters.

 

[ahsanford]

The lens front is so bulbous and has such a wide field of view that a very large flat filter would need to be about a half an inch BEHIND the front of the glass in order to give an un obstructed view, which is obviously impossible.

I've heard this elsewhere on this forum, and I must admit that I don't understand. See my picture, where I've dropped a 117 degree horizontal FOV over the 11-24 from the top. Surely, once the filter (blue) gets large enough, it will cover the entire FOV and do it's job without vignetting, correct?

I may 100% have the front-to-back location of that 117 degree arc incorrectly placed -- I chose the lens hood cutouts. But even if I got that wrong and the green arc is much closer to the mount, the same principle applies, doesn't it? If the filter is larger than the FOV, it should work, right?

(Not trying to pick an argument here, I honestly don't understand your point. Please straighten me out, thanks.)

I have no doubt that Lee has their adapter system located to get the widest possible view through their filters, and the dream of a better adapter from anyone for the Canon 11-24, with more usable focal length range, is truly an impossible dream.

Put another way, swap your red text above with "through the filters Lee chooses to give us", but the dream is only impossible for financial reasons that I've enumerated earlier in this thread. Surely, an epically large filter, like dinner plate sized, would work if Lee chose to offer such a monster.

- A