Patent: Canon EF 200-600mm f/4.5-5.6 IS

[Loswr]

1) The 200-400 is internally zooming. So that 200-400 length represents what 400mm needs. I'd bet my left nut this 200-600 will not get that royal all-inside treatment. I'd expect this lens to telescope out when shooting long like a 24-something or 100-400 lens.

[quote author=Translated Canon patent]
Zoom ratio: 3x
Focal length: 200.00 340.00 600.00
F-number: 4.60 4.60 5.20
Angle of view: 6.18 3.64 2.07
Image height: 21.65 21.65 21.65
Overall length of the lens: 355.16 355.16 355.16
BF: 65.16 65.16 65.16
[/quote]

Three different focal length examples, same overall length of lens – that means an internal zooming mechanism like the current 200-400L.

I hope you won't miss your left nut too much.

 

[ahsanford]

Three different focal length examples, same overall length of lens – that means an internal zooming mechanism like the current 200-400L.

I hope you won't miss your left nut too much.

Ouch. I just did a Benny Hill-style groin-clutching pratfall.

- A

 

[ahsanford]

The patent list the length of the lens as 355mm at wide, middle, and Tele ends. I take that to mean that it is non extending.

It's so odd how Canon chooses what is internally zooming (non-extending) vs. externally zooming (extending):

UWA zooms -- typically do not extend
Standard zooms -- all extend
Short tele zooms -- 70-200 L lenses do not extend
Longer tele zooms -- non-L / 70-300L / 28-300 / 100-400s extend, the 200-400 doesn't

Why is that?

- A

 

[Eldar]

1) The 200-400 is internally zooming. So that 200-400 length represents what 400mm needs. I'd bet my left nut this 200-600 will not get that royal all-inside treatment. I'd expect this lens to telescope out when shooting long like a 24-something or 100-400 lens.

[quote author=Translated Canon patent]
Zoom ratio: 3x
Focal length: 200.00 340.00 600.00
F-number: 4.60 4.60 5.20
Angle of view: 6.18 3.64 2.07
Image height: 21.65 21.65 21.65
Overall length of the lens: 355.16 355.16 355.16
BF: 65.16 65.16 65.16

Three different focal length examples, same overall length of lens – that means an internal zooming mechanism like the current 200-400L.

I hope you won't miss your left nut too much.
[/quote]
It is apparently 1cm shorter than the 200-400, giving about the same range, without a built in extender. So the argument for building one must be to lower the price. It may be a bit lighter, but probably not much.

 

[NorbR]

By the way, is it just me, or is it a bit weird that the quoted numbers are so round?

[quote author=Translated Canon patent]
Zoom ratio: 3x
Focal length: 200.00 340.00 600.00
F-number: 4.60 4.60 5.20
Angle of view: 6.18 3.64 2.07
Image height: 21.65 21.65 21.65
Overall length of the lens: 355.16 355.16 355.16
BF: 65.16 65.16 65.16
[/quote]

I'm no expert in patents, but from those that I've seen before on CR, I think that *exact* focal lengths for the optical design were always given. Just digging a bit in recent posts, the patent for the EF 24-300mm quotes 24.30mm and 294.95mm, the patent for the EF 28-200mm quotes 28.90mm and 193.10mm, the patent for the EF-S 9-20mm quotes 9.50mm and 19.70mm ... I'll stop here.

Now I'm having a hard time believing that this optical design would provide precisely 200.00mm and 600.00mm at each end. So any reason for Canon to suddenly start rounding numbers like this?

Admittedly not a very important question ... it just tickles my brain a bit to see those numbers.

 

[Eldar]

By the way, is it just me, or is it a bit weird that the quoted numbers are so round?

[quote author=Translated Canon patent]
Zoom ratio: 3x
Focal length: 200.00 340.00 600.00
F-number: 4.60 4.60 5.20
Angle of view: 6.18 3.64 2.07
Image height: 21.65 21.65 21.65
Overall length of the lens: 355.16 355.16 355.16
BF: 65.16 65.16 65.16

I'm no expert in patents, but from those that I've seen before on CR, I think that *exact* focal lengths for the optical design were always given. Just digging a bit in recent posts, the patent for the EF 24-300mm quotes 24.30mm and 294.95mm, the patent for the EF 28-200mm quotes 28.90mm and 193.10mm, the patent for the EF-S 9-20mm quotes 9.50mm and 19.70mm ... I'll stop here.

Now I'm having a hard time believing that this optical design would provide precisely 200.00mm and 600.00mm at each end. So any reason for Canon to suddenly start rounding numbers like this?

Admittedly not a very important question ... it just tickles my brain a bit to see those numbers.
[/quote]
Maybe it is a 198,3 - 602,1 mm zoom :

 

[AlanF]

The Nikon 200-500mm is another lens I have been thinking about and dismissed as not being up to the 100-400mm II. There are two pretty good reviews of the Nikon. In ePhotozine:
https://www.ephotozine.com/article/nikon-af-s-nikkor-200-500mm-f-5-6e-ed-vr-review-28326

you can see from the measured MTFs that it has to be stopped down to f/ll at at all focal lengths for optimal sharpness, and it is pretty soft at 500mm and f/5.6 and f/8. This is confirmed from shots of a Sieman's chart in Cameralabs:
http://www.cameralabs.com/reviews/Nikon_Nikkor_AF-S_200-500mm_f5-6E_ED_VR/sharpness.shtml

The Nikon is really no better than the Sigma 150-600mm C and weighs nearly a pound more. The 100-400mm II will outperform it all the way up to 400mm and based on comparisons of the Canon with the 1.4xTC at 560mm with the Sigmas and Tamron in Cameralabs and my own direct comparisons of the 100-400 with them, I am sure the Canon beats the Nikon.

A 200-600mm f/5.6 would be too heavy for me. A new 400 or 500 f/5.6 prime would be what I would want.

You are correct, the Nikon is not a world beater, but it 'gets there' focal-length-wise for $1400 without teleconverters. But it's first party AF should outperform the Tamron and Sigma and easily justify the price.

So I'm not calling that Nikon lens a gamechanger for IQ, it's just a gamechanger for first-party reach for the dollar in a zoom lens. It's the sort of lens that gets an amateur into birding.

- A

The field reviews say that the 200-500 focuses slowly and the Nikon 80-400 is recommended if you want fast AF. It's very amusing reading the Nikon sites. They complain more than us, particularly about being beta testers for Nikon. Their new lightweight 300mm Fresnel was recalled because the IS failed between about 1/80 - 1/320 and the lens was sharper with the IS (VR) off. The problem still has not been solved on re-issue.

 

[kaihp]

ahsanford, where (and when) did you get that matrix from?

Umm.... Google Docs. I made it myself. It's not real. It's just my read on things.

No worries, all good here. I was just wondering if you were pointing to some hidden source I didn't know about.
Reading up on things and presenting the data like you did is perfectly ok with me.

 

[9VIII]

you can see from the measured MTFs that it has to be stopped down to f/ll at at all focal lengths for optimal sharpness, and it is pretty soft at 500mm and f/5.6 and f/8. This is confirmed from shots of a Sieman's chart in Cameralabs:
http://www.cameralabs.com/reviews/Nikon_Nikkor_AF-S_200-500mm_f5-6E_ED_VR/sharpness.shtml

The Nikon is really no better than the Sigma 150-600mm C and weighs nearly a pound more. The 100-400mm II will outperform it all the way up to 400mm and based on comparisons of the Canon with the 1.4xTC at 560mm with the Sigmas and Tamron in Cameralabs and my own direct comparisons of the 100-400 with them, I am sure the Canon beats the Nikon.

The test charts aren't 100+ feet away, they don't represent sharpness in telephoto applications.

In the test where they actually take pictures of things far away, corner performance on the 200-500 is worlds better than the competition at 500mm and wide open, and even with a teleconverter it gets more detail (600mm f8 is still pretty bad for Tamron specifically).

 

[Maximilian]

1) The 200-400 is internally zooming. So that 200-400 length represents what 400mm needs. I'd bet my left nut this 200-600 will not get that royal all-inside treatment. I'd expect this lens to telescope out when shooting long like a 24-something or 100-400 lens.

[quote author=Translated Canon patent]
Zoom ratio: 3x
Focal length: 200.00 340.00 600.00
F-number: 4.60 4.60 5.20
Angle of view: 6.18 3.64 2.07
Image height: 21.65 21.65 21.65
Overall length of the lens: 355.16 355.16 355.16
BF: 65.16 65.16 65.16

Three different focal length examples, same overall length of lens – that means an internal zooming mechanism like the current 200-400L.

I hope you won't miss your left nut too much.

It is apparently 1cm shorter than the 200-400, giving about the same range, without a built in extender. So the argument for building one must be to lower the price. It may be a bit lighter, but probably not much.
[/quote]
IF this patent is comming true my guess is that it'll be treated like the other "big whites" and priced halfway beween the 200-400 and the 300/2.8 - hopefully much closer to the 300

If I was Canon, I'd make it because of the size advantage. But I'd never bet nuts, guts or limbs on anything 8)

 

[Viper28]

You know what, I'd rather they just built it as a 600/5.6 IS. It would probably be lighter, cheaper and sharper.

 

[9VIII]

Canon needs a long telephoto in an EF-S mount with the STM and IS!

With the 7d2 and the soon to be 80d and 7d3 Canon will have the speed crop bodies for awhile so no reason not to do a crop EF-S lens.

Why EF-S? In the long tele range, there's no real advantage in terms of lens size/weight (or cost) to an EF-S lens, because the size of the image circle is not limiting. Therefore, there's no reason to restrict such a lens to the EF-S mount.

I still think there is some merit to EF-S telephoto because it allows you to design a lens for what would otherwise be weak corner performance.
If we've learned anything from Roger (lensrentals) over the years it's that no lens is perfect (at least below $10,000), they're always balancing IQ across the frame, sharpness in one area comes at the expense of sharpness in another. Even an off the shelf 100-400MkII could probably be tuned for better crop performance at the expense of the corners.
The problem as I see it is that Canon isn't going to want to sell an EF lens with weak corners. Even if they say "it's made for crop, but works on full frame" people are going to stick it on their full frame camera and say it sucks.
If it's made for crop it shouldn't have the "EF" designation.
Basically what I'm suggesting at this point is that they should take exactly the same lens, give it a different mount, and tune it optically for center sharpness.
Would it be worth the distribution nightmare? Probably not.

 

[Loswr]

You know what, I'd rather they just built it as a 600/5.6 IS. It would probably be lighter, cheaper and sharper.

A lens with only one focal length? Who'd want something like that?

 

[Maximilian]

You know what, I'd rather they just built it as a 600/5.6 IS. It would probably be lighter, cheaper and sharper.

+1

Maybe even a 500/5.6 IS, well usable with the x1.4 TC for the f8.0 AF bodies

I am with you, because anything else will be out of reach for most and me, too

 

[lycan]

Again, trusting my reading abilities, it's a patent for a non-L. So it won't compete with the big whites or even with 100-400 L ii. It will be cheaper. With cheaper materials, slower Af and not as sharp..... Because it is a non-L

 

[ahsanford]

You know what, I'd rather they just built it as a 600/5.6 IS. It would probably be lighter, cheaper and sharper.

A lens with only one focal length? Who'd want something like that?

One could argue people buy the 100-400L / 100-400L II as it's the cheapest 400 prime with IS by a few thousand dollars. Canon gets you to buy the zoom because they don't offer the prime you really want -- a 400 f/5.6L IS.

Apple PCs are frustrating like this as well. If you want a nice mid-level performer (better than a jacked up Mac Mini and slower than a Mac Pro, which is a huge range of performance a lot photographers would fall within), you have a choice of either a suped up laptop sitting in a dock all day or a PC embedded in a large monitor. Both options kind of suck if you just want a desktop and already own a monitor.

Canon's annoying like that with long glass. Great options, but there is no balanced/middle sweet spot -- it's a boatload of $1k - $2k options and then things explode price-wise.

- A

 

[9VIII]

Or, perhaps saying this a different way, how would you rate the value of:

100-400L II image quality +
first party reliable/consistent/fast AF +
600mm reach @ f/5.6 without teleconvertered cripplling of your AF spread?

...because there is no way to get that with an EF mount right now without buying a $11.5k 600L II.

In that light, Canon could throw down the gauntlet at $4k or so at launch and many might say "That's better than teleconverters. Sold. Take my money."

- A

This presents a tough choice for 300f2.8 owners. Basically if you're using one of those with the 2X TC it's going to become obsolete the moment a 600f5.6 hits the market. Maybe the 300f2.8+2xTC would still have the IQ advantage, but not AF, and it's much less convenient.
If the 200-600 costs under $4K then it's going to destroy the used market for the 300f2.8.

 

[lycan]

Or, perhaps saying this a different way, how would you rate the value of:

100-400L II image quality +
first party reliable/consistent/fast AF +
600mm reach @ f/5.6 without teleconvertered cripplling of your AF spread?

...because there is no way to get that with an EF mount right now without buying a $11.5k 600L II.

In that light, Canon could throw down the gauntlet at $4k or so at launch and many might say "That's better than teleconverters. Sold. Take my money."

- A

This presents a tough choice for 300f2.8 owners. Basically if you're using one of those with the 2X TC it's going to become obsolete the moment a 600f5.6 hits the market. Maybe the 300f2.8+2xTC would still have the IQ advantage, but not AF, and it's much less convenient.
If the 200-600 costs under $4K then it's going to destroy the used market for the 300f2.8.

It won't destroy. Because it is a non-L (I could do this all day ).
I'll bet my right nut it will cost less than the 100-400L ii

 

[Maximilian]

... it is a non-L

non-L with > 115.4 mm FE? And best for < 2k or 3k bucks ... ?
Man, I'd like to smoke what you have...

 

[lycan]

... it is a non-L

non-L with > 115.4 mm FE? And best for < 2k or 3k bucks ... ?
Man, I'd like to smoke what you have...

We will see