Lenses for the R7

antonio-salieri wrote:

I am sure the RF-S system will add some more lightweight and affordable options soon.

According to some rumor sites, the following will be the next RF-S lenses to be announced.

• Canon RF-S 22mm f/2 STM
• Canon RF-S 11-55mm f/4-4.5 IS STM
• Canon RF-S 55-250mm f/4.5-7.1 IS STM
• Canon RF-S 16-55mm f/2.8 IS USM
• Canon RF-S 32mm f/1.4 STM

Obviously I can't verify that, but it sounds fairly plausible for the next steps to build out the system. I think the 32mm f/1.4 might be an interesting option to a lot of people.

I expect my M system gear will serve me well until this vapourware comes into existence.

We already have most of this lineup, with the notable exception of the F2.8 standard zoom. I already suggested that Canon should license Sigma's 16-50 f/2.8 as a re-badging exercise to get around their 3rd party AF lens ban.

The 11-55 sounds like someones fantasy to me.

In the meantime, the strength of the EF-S system (with lenses from Canon and some excellent third-party options too) is there to tide people over, so the R7/10 are hardly useless, but still, there is definitely room for improvement.

Based on the EF-S history, Canon is not likely to be focusing mainly on the RF-S cameras. I think it's well-established that they see APS-C as a secondary system and/or stepping stone. And their real flagship lenses (still-EF 35mm f/1.4, 50mm f/1.2, 85mm f/1.2, 400mm f/2.8 and other superteles, L-zoom trinity, etc.) are going to be full frame, as they always have been (although of course these lenses all work perfectly on APS-C cameras too).

I think this is probably especially true now that more serious FF users are becoming more and more of who's still buying cameras and lenses. I think of a friend of mine, around my own age (I'm in my twenties, but an enthusiast). She has a Canon APS-C DSLR she got as a teenager (just like I did when I started out). She still uses it sometimes, but I don't think she ever bought a second lens for it. There are many users like her who bought a DSLR then for general photography. I suspect most people who were in our position probably use their smartphones now and won't buy an R10 or the upcoming R100. Now, I went from APS-C to eventually using FF and getting into various different types of photography, using different lenses and so on. The users who are still interested in that will probably still go on to use FF systems, but the RF-S cameras will probably never be as popular as the EF-S equivalents.

On the other hand, dedicated camera body purchasers seem to also be shifting towards video more than before... And videographers seem more willing to use APS-C in a lot of cases, so maybe that will have a compensatory effect. I'm sure the rumored tiny R100 with no EVF will appeal to vloggers.

I think the RF-S system is a little bit brilliant, although it also exposes a flaw in the EF-M system and maybe the RF system. Obviously the EF system existed for a long time before EF-S was a twinkle in anyone's eye. It was for FF film SLRs. There were smaller film formats, but the APS standards had yet to be invented. Even their original film APS and early APS-C DSLRs were only EF mount and expected EF lenses that would also work on FF. EF-S, of course, split this, creating a second lens pool only for their APS-C DSLRs, which was justifiable enough considering how many they'd go on to sell. FF EF lenses remained the standard, though. Especially without video/video crop modes there was little reason to use an APS-C lens on a FF body even if you were able to, anyway.

The EF-M system's real problem was that they never took it seriously. It was reportedly developed by the PowerShot department rather than the same people who worked on the DSLRs. And it was apparently always thought of as a kind of toy ILC, which only later came to be taken semi-seriously. I mean... look at the original EOS M and the early follow-ups. They clearly were not intending for that to be the future of Canon cameras.

I think that the viability of FF mirrorless took Canon by surprise. When competitors started showing it could be done, they started to look into it. So they developed RF, which, unlike EF-M, enabled some significant technical improvements besides the reduction of the flange distance. But here something came back to bite them; it was decided that the smaller diameter of EF-M was not preferable for RF, and they decided instead to maintain the EF diameter. Now, although Sony of course demonstrated it's perfectly possible to have a diameter like EF-M's on a FF mount (though I'll admit it looks a bit silly), it was clear to Canon (and Nikon, of small diameter fame previously!) that a larger diameter was preferable for physical construction reasons (and maybe to a lesser extent for optical reasons, but really I think it came down to physical construction). Canon kept EF's for RF, which was logical, especially as the EF team worked on RF. But unfortunately as soon as they decided to not use EF-M in an extended form for the RF mount, any hope of adapting EF-M lenses probably ended right there. Even if they had adopted an even shorter flange distance than EF-M, which would be possible though pushing it a little, the only kind of adapter that would work in terms of form factor would be akin to the Techart E-Z, which is of a precarious enough form factor that Canon would never market such a thing.

If Canon had only conceived the whole system from the beginning as their eventual successor to EF/EF-S, there probably would never have been this sort of "lost era" covered by EF-M. The one good thing, though, is that RF/RF-S is likely to remain Canon's mount for many years to come, and the two are now actually compatible with one another, unlike EF/EF-S, for whatever benefit that may bring, especially for videographers.

The ignored factor in all of this is weight. I travel light on multi-day hikes. The M system offered true competition to M4/3 in this regard. For a more weatherproof, lightweight and inexpensive option, I might acquire an Olympus body and the matching weatherproof walkaround zoom.

Canon's complicated inter-divisional history is for them to wrestle with. As a discerning user of photographic tools, I'll place my money where the offer fits my needs.