Opinion: Canon’s mounting woes

[David - Sydney]

I don't get all the debate on this topic. What I would get is a 17-22 f/1.4 and a 14-16mm f/1.4, both appropriate for astro. Primes, of course. MF is fine, of course. I really don't care who makes it, but I do want RF mount.

I agree but I am happy to adapt from EF as I don't see any advantage of R mount if there is no AF

 

[dolina]

I don’t get why people are really pissed at this, it’s their mount, their company. I guess they can do what they want? I purchase rf lenses so I have no issue with this.

Smarter people would just buy a Sony system and 3rd party it.

Leave Canon alone.

 

[Dragon]

I can personally second that experience from my time working in China.
Team China is the inexorable goal for them... there is a reason "china" in chinese (Zhongguo) literally means central state or more commonly middle kingdom.

Yep, they ruled the world as they knew it for 4,000 years until Queen Victoria screwed the place up by importing shiploads of opium. Mao fixed that with 2 in the back of the head for all the dopers. Mean way to solve the problem, but it worked.

 

[Richard CR]

Smarter people would just buy a Sony system and 3rd party it.

Leave Canon alone.

Except we loathe Sony. Takes alot to get over that throw up a bit in your mouth feeling.

there lies the problem.

I jest (sorta) but I could never really feel that comfortable with a Sony camera body. Ergonomics and feel were just .. ick. Now they have gotten better recently, so there's that.

 

[Jethro]

Except we loathe Sony. Takes alot to get over that throw up a bit in your mouth feeling.

there lies the problem.

I jest (sorta) but I could never really feel that comfortable with a Sony camera body. Ergonomics and feel were just .. ick. Now they have gotten better recently, so there's that.

And I think most of us would agree ...

But the point was, I think, that if posters' chief and long-ongoing beef is the lack of specific RF lenses, and full (AF etc) access to 3rd party RF mount lenses, then ... there are real options out there for them. Sony built up its mirrorless range based on 3rd party lenses. If that is peoples' priority, then maybe that is a natural home there for them, if they can get around the Sony bodies and menus, obviously. If they can, they'll take some great pictures - because there is nothing wrong with Sony cameras / sensor / lenses of all types.

 

[dolina]

And I think most of us would agree ...

But the point was, I think, that if posters' chief and long-ongoing beef is the lack of specific RF lenses, and full (AF etc) access to 3rd party RF mount lenses, then ... there are real options out there for them. Sony built up its mirrorless range based on 3rd party lenses. If that is peoples' priority, then maybe that is a natural home there for them, if they can get around the Sony bodies and menus, obviously. If they can, they'll take some great pictures - because there is nothing wrong with Sony cameras / sensor / lenses of all types.

The propensity of people to complain about the little things

The FE mount was greatly helped by 3rd party lenses and accessories. If Sony did not license it out it would have failed.

Canon has no economic incentive to license out the RF mount until such a time they have a fully fleshed out line up of lenses and accessories.

I'd never begrudge them for it as it means their operations are fully funded for decades to come. Last thing anyone wants is an orphaned system.

 

[EricN]

Again, I was shooting EF-M, there is no L glass for that mount, and L glass is huge and very expensive. It did not make sense for a M50. And your statement about the quality of the glass is just uninformed. I get L quality glass on Fuji for a fraction of the cost. As a prime shooter, I'm very happy with the XF18mm f/1.4, 33mm f/1.4, the Viltrox 75mm f/1.2 and the 90mm f/2 all of which compare very well to L glass. The test that one reviewer performed putting the $899 XF33 up against the RF50mm f/1.8 and RF50mm f/1.2 found the Fuji option was nearly as detailed as the RF50mm f/1.2 despite being around a third of the price and a small fraction of the size/weight, and way beyond the detail and overall performance of the f/1.8 version. Fuji's latest generation of glass is extremely competitive with anything Canon is putting out, even on their latest 40MP sensor.

All that said, again where did I say I wanted to shoot 'sharper'? I was pretty clear that the reason I value fast glass is *light* while maintaining a DoF wide enough not to leave a person halfway out of focus. That is easier to accomplish practically on APS-C than it is on FF, especially outdoors rather than in controlled environments. Yes, I am aware there are other parts of the exposure triangle, however sometimes aperture is the one in my control, in fact that's my most common situation so I value it.

You need to stop making assumptions about others' photography and simply accept what they say as their experience. It's not your place to continue to tell them how they should be looking at things. Nobody is doing that to you.

If you're happy on fuji, why are you here? Is this is a support group for people who feel abandoned by Canon? Or you have M50 veteran by your name, maybe it's a therapy session for the post traumatic stress Canon put you through when you were fighting the M50 war?
Dude you're telling me exactly what I need to, should and shouldn't do while totally misunderstanding why I'm wasting my time on you. Are you the internet police? I thought it was you that made that comment to me, but maybe it was somebody else. I didn't make an assumption about your photography; I hadn't even bothered to look to see if you posted any photos. I'm not telling you how you should look at things, it's offering you other ways. You can choose your own worldview no matter how absurd I think it makes you. I can't stop you. Although it is a waste of time, it is very amusing to me - absolutely better than a Marvel movie.

I was pretty clear that the reason I value fast glass is *light* while maintaining a DoF wide enough not to leave a person halfway out of focus.

I was giving you a reason that a lens with a wider aperture is helpful even if you don't want to use it wide open. do you know you can step back to increase the the depth of field without making the aperture smaller? If you really think somebody trying to explain things you don't appear to know (or are just plain ignoring because you do contradict yourself) and offering you the chance to to learn something you might not know is hurtful, maybe you can cry about it then feel better. Oops I made a suggestion! You might misinterpret tat as me telling you what to do because I don't know why an adult would, but this is the internet so hypocrisy, clichés and drama queens abound...

 

[EricN]

There may be only a couple of RF-s lenses at this point, but the RF 16mm, the RF 28mm, and the RF 50mm f/1.8 are all priced (and sized) like RF-s lenses and my R7 loves them all, but then so does my R5, and the RF100-400 wouldn't get measurably smaller designed for RF-s, so maybe, just maybe Canon's strategy is to make a future transition to FF from RF-s much easier than the transition from EF-s to EF. All that is missing at this point is a really wide crop frame lens and the rumor mill keeps hinting a that. Sounds like a solid strategy to me and surprising that there are so many commenters that seem to be fixated on an RF-s label. One has to wonder if buyers and particularly sales folks in places like B&H are similarly short sighted. Somehow, I doubt it. BTW, I also have an M3, an M6-II, and all the M lenses and am not upset. If I were looking for a very portable system today, I would be happy to pick up an R50, but for most uses, the R7 is a much better camera than either the M6-II or the R50 and it is still not that big.

I don't have an RF-S body, but I bought an R50 for my niece. I thought like you about those stm lenses and got her some of those and she hasn't complained. I thought for the price, size and weight, the RF 16mm was quite nice, so I bought one for myself. I find it hard to find a reasonable reason to not be happy enough (unless it's about photographing sports or wildlife the motor might be slow).

 

[EricN]

the only people I hear complaining about Canon's RF mount decisions are amateurs and youtubers. All the pros I work with love RF glass

In this internet age, any armature can delude themselves into thinking they are a genius because they got some likes on Instagram or whatever.

 

[Richard CR]

And I think most of us would agree ...

But the point was, I think, that if posters' chief and long-ongoing beef is the lack of specific RF lenses, and full (AF etc) access to 3rd party RF mount lenses, then ... there are real options out there for them. Sony built up its mirrorless range based on 3rd party lenses. If that is peoples' priority, then maybe that is a natural home there for them, if they can get around the Sony bodies and menus, obviously. If they can, they'll take some great pictures - because there is nothing wrong with Sony cameras / sensor / lenses of all types.

are there real options though?

I could never get used of Nikon or Sony ergonomics or "method of thinking/mindset" of the camera body. That directly can impact your craft and creativity.

Even if Canon comes out with a bastardized ergonomic camera like the R7, the camera still behaves like a Canon camera, and let's face it Canon's RF camera bodies are awesome. So what you are saying is that we are forced to make a difficult decision and trying to balance the "cons" to see where we end up.

 

[EricN]

Yep, they ruled the world as they knew it for 4,000 years until Queen Victoria screwed the place up by importing shiploads of opium. Mao fixed that with 2 in the back of the head for all the dopers. Mean way to solve the problem, but it worked.

Now, some people say China is sending Fentanyl (or the ingredients to make it - I can't remember) across the pacific and in USA the total of gun related deaths and auto related deaths is only slightly more than opioid related overdoses.

 

[EricN]

And I think most of us would agree ...

But the point was, I think, that if posters' chief and long-ongoing beef is the lack of specific RF lenses, and full (AF etc) access to 3rd party RF mount lenses, then ... there are real options out there for them. Sony built up its mirrorless range based on 3rd party lenses. If that is peoples' priority, then maybe that is a natural home there for them, if they can get around the Sony bodies and menus, obviously. If they can, they'll take some great pictures - because there is nothing wrong with Sony cameras / sensor / lenses of all types.

There is always Nikon

 

[EricN]

are there real options though?

I could never get used of Nikon or Sony ergonomics or "method of thinking/mindset" of the camera body. That directly can impact your craft and creativity.

Even if Canon comes out with a bastardized ergonomic camera like the R7, the camera still behaves like a Canon camera, and let's face it Canon's RF camera bodies are awesome. So what you are saying is that we are forced to make a difficult decision and trying to balance the "cons" to see where we end up.

I can't guess how long it would take, but I think if people can drive on the other side of the road when they go to another country, you could probably adjust to the other brands. It might feel like hell during the adjustment period.

 

[Jethro]

So what you are saying is that we are forced to make a difficult decision and trying to balance the "cons" to see where we end up.

That's exactly what I'm saying. I wouldn't want to do it either, but I know there are a number of people (including on this site) who maintain multiple brands in their bag - so I guess it varies a lot between people.

But, coming back to the original point, if people are THAT peeved by the lack of native (and 3rd party) RF mount lenses then there ARE options for them. The downside being different ergonomics, the cost of change-over etc etc. But - think of all those juicy lenses at the end of it!

 

[Jethro]

if people can drive on the other side of the road when they go to another country, you could probably adjust to the other brands.

I mean, if that goes wrong (and it does sometimes) the results tend to be tragic ...

 

[JTP]

I'll be honest here, I too am quite frustrated with Canon, but not for the same reason. I am frustrated because of how large and heavy their equipment has gotten. As a working professional wedding photographer who shoots between 30 - 50 weddings per year on average, on top of a similar amount of E-shoots, and then various other shoots, the weight of this new RF gear is just becoming too much for my back and wrists. For quick events like an E-shoot, it isn't so bad, but for wedding days I'm literally dead and super sore afterwards these days. My video friends show up with their Sony cameras and lenses and their setups are legit 1 - 2 pounds lighter, and while that might not seem like that much to a non wedding photographer, it's a huge deal, especially for moments like first dances where I hold my camera to my face the entire dance. If the new Leica Q3 had dual card slots I would have that thing in my hands for 50 - 75% of a wedding day. I cannot wait for the day to come to where I can pick up a camera like the Q3, with a fixed lens, with a high MP crop/zoom and not look back. Until that day, I will dream. Once my wedding season is over this year, for the first time in 12 years as a professional, I'm looking at jumping ship on Canon, and heading over to Sony for the weight and size savings.

Also, the EL1's are the biggest POS flashes I've ever used in the last 12 years in weddings. all 5 of mine are the most inconsistent wireless flashes I've used to date, and I've had them since their release date. I recently had to use an assistants Cheap godox flashes because the EL1's just wouldn't fire through a brick wall while his handled them just fine.

Has been a fun ride with Canon, but I think we're nearly our end together.

 

[SNJ Ops]

A better overview doesn’t seem to be the goal. It’s more pushing an agenda. Even when acknowledging Canon’s inexpensive RF lenses that deliver good IQ at an accessible cost, @SNJ Ops tacks on a ‘Yeah-but-‘.

I was replying to someone to said Sigma Art lenses would cost as much as Canon primes which going by current prices on other emount Sigma Art lenses are almost always significantly cheaper than GM ones.

Yes there are very cheap lenses available on Canon at f1.8/f2 that cost less than Sigma’s equivalents. Note the Sigma I series lenses are made of metal, have aperture rings, come a magnetic lens cap as well as classic one and all metal lens hood.

 

[HMC11]

Um, some of us need the light. The advantage to crop is that I can have, say, f/1.2 level light but with FF f/1.8 DoF. Depending on what you are doing that can be an advantage. I find it to be for how I shoot anyway. You may not, and that's cool, that's your style.

This is an amateurish attempt to answer the question of whether an APSC system has a ‘brightness’ advantage over a FF system. To do this, let’s consider the case of capturing the same composition using a FF lens (say, 70-200mm F4) on an APSC and a FF body. We can then ask the question of whether at a specific F-stop, the APSC could get more light compared to the FF shot (adjusted to have the equivalent Focal Length and F-stop).

To set up the comparison, consider using 100mm with f5 on an apsc body vs 160mm with f8 on a FF body (canon’s crop factor is 1.6, so this set up will provide the same composition for the same subject distance). Below is a summary of these and other operating assumptions:

Same lens: say, 70-200mm F4
Equivalent composition, same subject distance, identical light intensity (all spectrum)
Same shutter speed of S and same Light Intensity of L (ISO can be changed to achieve the same exposure) – this is for a ‘fair’ comparison.
All light entering camera falls uniformly onto the image circle – this is inaccurate but a decent simplifying assumption.

The table below tabulates the various parameters as well as the total ‘amount’ (can think of this as the total number of photons across different frequencies) of light reaching the respective sensors.

	Focal Length	F-stop / Diameter	Aperture Area	Amount of light entering body	Sensor area / image circle*
APSC Body	100mm	F5 / 20mm	0.00126	L x S x 0.00126 = T	23%
FF Body	160mm	F8 / 20mm	0.00126	L x S x 0.00126 = T	59%

*The FF lens has an image circle with a minimum radius of 21.6mm (canon’s ff sensor size is 36x24mm). It means that the sensor covers an area approximately 59% of the image circle whereas an APSC sensor would cover 23% of this an FF image circle.


Based on the scenario above, the APSC body, when using a FF lens, would actually receive ‘less’ light than an FF body, so it does not quite have the ‘brightness’ advantage.

What about using an APSC lens? This is hard to compare accurately with a FF lens without the optical details of the lenses. However, an APSC lens would have a smaller image circle, and, in general, is likely to have smaller lens elements, which broadly translate into a reduced ability to ‘collect’ light. If we ignore this, and assume that the amount of light collected is simply dependent on the aperture size and shutter speed, and all of it falls uniformly across the image circle, then the total amount of light reaching the APSC sensor would also be about 59% of that reaching its image circle. All else being the same (mostly not quite true), then there is still no real ‘brightness’ advantage for an APSC body, even with an APSC lens operating ideally.

Having said all this, it ultimately depends on personal preferences with how the image looks. As long as one is happy with it, then use the system that best meet one's preferences. For me, I use APSC to save weight and cost. However, with the RF mount, the weight 'disadvantage' of FF is reduced considerably. There is still the pricing, of course, so one good lens at a time and mix in with EF lenses work for me.

 

[Walrus]

I'll be honest here, I too am quite frustrated with Canon, but not for the same reason. I am frustrated because of how large and heavy their equipment has gotten. As a working professional wedding photographer who shoots between 30 - 50 weddings per year on average, on top of a similar amount of E-shoots, and then various other shoots, the weight of this new RF gear is just becoming too much for my back and wrists. For quick events like an E-shoot, it isn't so bad, but for wedding days I'm literally dead and super sore afterwards these days. My video friends show up with their Sony cameras and lenses and their setups are legit 1 - 2 pounds lighter, and while that might not seem like that much to a non wedding photographer, it's a huge deal, especially for moments like first dances where I hold my camera to my face the entire dance. If the new Leica Q3 had dual card slots I would have that thing in my hands for 50 - 75% of a wedding day. I cannot wait for the day to come to where I can pick up a camera like the Q3, with a fixed lens, with a high MP crop/zoom and not look back. Until that day, I will dream. Once my wedding season is over this year, for the first time in 12 years as a professional, I'm looking at jumping ship on Canon, and heading over to Sony for the weight and size savings.

Also, the EL1's are the biggest POS flashes I've ever used in the last 12 years in weddings. all 5 of mine are the most inconsistent wireless flashes I've used to date, and I've had them since their release date. I recently had to use an assistants Cheap godox flashes because the EL1's just wouldn't fire through a brick wall while his handled them just fine.

Has been a fun ride with Canon, but I think we're nearly our end together.

I'm in the same spot as you, I totally feel you; I'm not ready to jump ship completely, but next season I'll implement an A7II/III as a backup body (I have almost all EF lenses, so Sony can take them) and see how it goes; if I can overtake the ergonomics and menu system, between 2024 and 2025 I'll probably complete the transition, if in the meantime third parties won't be available for RF mount.

 

[Brikna]

I'll be honest here, I too am quite frustrated with Canon, but not for the same reason. I am frustrated because of how large and heavy their equipment has gotten. As a working professional wedding photographer who shoots between 30 - 50 weddings per year on average, on top of a similar amount of E-shoots, and then various other shoots, the weight of this new RF gear is just becoming too much for my back and wrists. For quick events like an E-shoot, it isn't so bad, but for wedding days I'm literally dead and super sore afterwards these days. My video friends show up with their Sony cameras and lenses and their setups are legit 1 - 2 pounds lighter, and while that might not seem like that much to a non wedding photographer, it's a huge deal, especially for moments like first dances where I hold my camera to my face the entire dance. If the new Leica Q3 had dual card slots I would have that thing in my hands for 50 - 75% of a wedding day. I cannot wait for the day to come to where I can pick up a camera like the Q3, with a fixed lens, with a high MP crop/zoom and not look back. Until that day, I will dream. Once my wedding season is over this year, for the first time in 12 years as a professional, I'm looking at jumping ship on Canon, and heading over to Sony for the weight and size savings.

Also, the EL1's are the biggest POS flashes I've ever used in the last 12 years in weddings. all 5 of mine are the most inconsistent wireless flashes I've used to date, and I've had them since their release date. I recently had to use an assistants Cheap godox flashes because the EL1's just wouldn't fire through a brick wall while his handled them just fine.

Has been a fun ride with Canon, but I think we're nearly our end together.

For someone who has so many gigs a year, you'd think you'd be in better shape. If you have trouble holding a mirrorless camera with any lens during the first dance in front of your eye, then you have a really serious problem. As for videographers, I somehow doubt that their equipment is ever lighter than that of us photographers - they also have gimbals, microphones, cages, follow-focuses, lights, monopods, tripods, external recorders...
I also prefer when the equipment is lighter than heavier, but when I compare the current equipment with what DSLR equipment used to be, the gain in the lightness of the equipment is already big, so it's hard for me to understand such points of view.
In fact, it's best for you to really change your system and start working with Sony equipment. As someone who used to work with Canon equipment, you will quickly realize how wrong you were by switching to Sony. The younger crew that started with Sony doesn't know that there is better, but you will and you will suffer even more.