Patent: Canon continues to develop fast RF prime lens optical formulas

Mar 26, 2014
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Any word on the tilt shift?
There's this post, which says two auto focus tilt shift lenses for the RF mount are planned.

Its a niche in which Canon has a lead on other manufacturers, so TS-R lenses will arrive sooner or later. Canon would have to offer more than just slapping on an extension tube with drop-in filter & improved electronics for people to upgrade. So a big upgrade, such as wider lens or AF motor, are required, which makes me bet on later.
 
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I'm just waiting for the price of the 100-500mm to drop to a more affordable level and become more easily available. I've already got the 24-105mm F4L, the 600mm F11 and 800mm F11. Most of the other existing RF lenses and those on the roadmap have limited appeal to me - the 100mm macro for example is optically no better than my existing 11 year old EF 100mm macro, and the "aspherical aberration control" is just an unwanted extra for macro work.

It would I suppose be nice to have AF in a tilt-shift, but I can happily live with the manual focus of my 24mm TS-E. A lens that would be really useful to me would be a compact stabilised AF 180mm F5.6 macro, but I'll be banging my head against a brick wall forever more waiting for that to happen. Ends of minor rant, relax, take a pill.

Out of interest, why both the f/11 superteles?
 
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entoman

wildlife photography
May 8, 2015
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Out of interest, why both the f/11 superteles?
i have the RF 600mm F11, RF 800mm F11 and EF 100-400mm with 1.4 extender.

The 800mm is for maximum reach when photographing small birds in good lighting, e.g. it was my main lens when photographing birds recently in Kenya. In the UK it's less useful due to the lower light levels. The 600mm is mostly for photographing larger birds in the UK - swans, ducks, geese, gulls etc, where I don't want or need the extra reach of the 800mm. I can get away with slower shutter speeds with the 600mm. Both of these lenses are very light and have excellent stabilisation, so are used almost entirely for hand-held work.

The zoom is mainly for when I'm on safari photographing animals and birds of varying sizes, from a vehicle, when I have less control over camera-subject distance. It's also useful for dragonflies and small reptiles/amphibians, due to the much closer MFD.

Yes, it's overkill and I'll get around to rationalising my setup in 2022. I'll most likely sell the 100-400mm, 1.4 extender and 600mm F11, which can all be replaced by the RF 100-500mm. I'll keep the 800mm though.
 
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AJ

Sep 11, 2010
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CRGuy's lens roadmap lists a 24mm f1.8 STM macro, not sure if this is the same lens, but I'd be surprised if Canon released both an "L" and non "L" version in the same aperture/focal length.

If I had to guess, I would be surprised if we will see all these lenses, especially in the near term. Hard to imagine both an 18mm and a 20mm. Eighteen, 24 and 28 make the most sense to me, although I'm not sure how popular 28mm lenses are today.

Yes, too I wonder if these are patents for the rumored 24/1.8, along with similar formulas to prevent copycats. I doubt these are L lenses - they'd be f/1.4 to compete with Sigma's Art lenses, for these focal lengths.
 
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i have the RF 600mm F11, RF 800mm F11 and EF 100-400mm with 1.4 extender.

The 800mm is for maximum reach when photographing small birds in good lighting, e.g. it was my main lens when photographing birds recently in Kenya. In the UK it's less useful due to the lower light levels. The 600mm is mostly for photographing larger birds in the UK - swans, ducks, geese, gulls etc, where I don't want or need the extra reach of the 800mm. I can get away with slower shutter speeds with the 600mm. Both of these lenses are very light and have excellent stabilisation, so are used almost entirely for hand-held work.

The zoom is mainly for when I'm on safari photographing animals and birds of varying sizes, from a vehicle, when I have less control over camera-subject distance. It's also useful for dragonflies and small reptiles/amphibians, due to the much closer MFD.

Yes, it's overkill and I'll get around to rationalising my setup in 2022. I'll most likely sell the 100-400mm, 1.4 extender and 600mm F11, which can all be replaced by the RF 100-500mm. I'll keep the 800mm though.
Thanks!
 
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AlanF

Desperately seeking birds
CR Pro
Aug 16, 2012
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i have the RF 600mm F11, RF 800mm F11 and EF 100-400mm with 1.4 extender.

The 800mm is for maximum reach when photographing small birds in good lighting, e.g. it was my main lens when photographing birds recently in Kenya. In the UK it's less useful due to the lower light levels. The 600mm is mostly for photographing larger birds in the UK - swans, ducks, geese, gulls etc, where I don't want or need the extra reach of the 800mm. I can get away with slower shutter speeds with the 600mm. Both of these lenses are very light and have excellent stabilisation, so are used almost entirely for hand-held work.

The zoom is mainly for when I'm on safari photographing animals and birds of varying sizes, from a vehicle, when I have less control over camera-subject distance. It's also useful for dragonflies and small reptiles/amphibians, due to the much closer MFD.

Yes, it's overkill and I'll get around to rationalising my setup in 2022. I'll most likely sell the 100-400mm, 1.4 extender and 600mm F11, which can all be replaced by the RF 100-500mm. I'll keep the 800mm though.
Interestingly, WEX has had 6 used 600mm f/11s on sale for a few weeks now - they don't seem as popular as the 800/11. I'm keeping the RF 100-400mm as well as the 100-500mm as it is so light and much less conspicuous for me as an alternative and my wife loves it. You might want to keep the RF 1.4x as it pairs very well with the 100-500mm, as does the RF 2x. The RF 800mm f/11 is better than the RF 600mm f/11 in low light as delivers more photons per duck, equivalent to nearly one stop (8/10ths). I find the 100-500mm like you just right for using framing close up and shooting insects very close up.
 
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