600mm f/11 or 800mm f/11 - which one would you buy?

Assume the prices will be similar (as in, price if you could afford one, you could afford the other). All else being equal, which one would you pick?

My initial reaction was the 600mm, but I realized if I bought the 1.4x teleconverter, my 100-400mm would be a 560mm f/8, and I could see eventually buying the RF 100-500mm. As such, if I was 'limited' to f/11 on both, might as well get the 800mm and use it for special occasions. I have a heavy tripod with a Wimberley-style head, which would be useful on this lens.

I buy either and then a battery powered strobe with long throw reflector.

Probably 800mm.

How about neither?

Neither would entice me to buy an RF mount camera

Message to Canon:
Sorry Canon,  if you want me to buy into the EOS R system, cheap long slow lenses won't do the trick. You need to offer me an APS-C EOS R7 as an upgrade to my 7D2, or you need to offer a very high Megapixel R camera which will have a seamless  in-built 1.6x crop mode to 32Mpix and with fps and AF performance better than the 7D2

Peter

Neither. f/11 is too slow.

If they did a 600mm f/8 DO which was highly portable, perhaps.

Now that we've seen what they look like and they are obviously retractable so the 800 is not too long to pack easily, there is no reason I can think of to buy the 600 over the 800.

If the 600 was f/8 that would be a different story.

But if I'm after "reach" for birds (which I am), the 800 is the only one that makes any sense to me.

I spent an entire day last week shooting at f/11 at 840mm (with my 600GM and 200-600) just to see what I could accomplish at that slow of an aperture.

One certainly has to pick one's battles carefully and background management is critical (which it should be anyways even with an f/4 lens) but I was able to accomplish a number of pleasing images at f/11 even shooting GHOs in forest with low light.

Not sure if I'd every buy the 800/11 but if price was $1500 or below I might consider one for a lightweight walk around option.  Of course I'd much rather have a lens like my 500PF that can get to 1000 f/11.

CanonKen wrote:

Assume the prices will be similar (as in, price if you could afford one, you could afford the other). All else being equal, which one would you pick?

My initial reaction was the 600mm, but I realized if I bought the 1.4x teleconverter, my 100-400mm would be a 560mm f/8, and I could see eventually buying the RF 100-500mm. As such, if I was 'limited' to f/11 on both, might as well get the 800mm and use it for special occasions. I have a heavy tripod with a Wimberley-style head, which would be useful on this lens.

Neither, too slow and lack of background separation at f11 renders these two useless for me.

just because modern cameras can go to high ISO’s doesn’t mean you want to.

I'm just asking for what is on offer, what option?

Wildcard...what if the 600mm is actually f/8 and the 800mm is the f/11?  The math is nearly identical (73 vs. 75) if you divide the two numbers.  If so, then the 600mm would be my pick.

Colin46 wrote:

Neither, too slow and lack of background separation at f11 renders these two useless for me.

just because modern cameras can go to high ISO’s doesn’t mean you want to.

Big lack of background separation in this thread full of f/11 images.

https://www.fredmiranda.com/forum/topic/1649828/7

KevinRA wrote:

Neither. f/11 is too slow.

If they did a 600mm f/8 DO which was highly portable, perhaps.

That sounds like the Minolta 500 F/8.0 reflex mirror being versatile and highly portable. I have owned it and really enjoyed it. If you really want quality, then the we will have to wait for a RF400/2.8.

Same here (100-400II + 1.4xIII). 800mm or bust It could be a reason I switch to RF system.

Andy Blanchard wrote:

Messier Object wrote:

Neither would entice me to buy an RF mount camera

Message to Canon:
Sorry Canon, if you want me to buy into the EOS R system, cheap long slow lenses won't do the trick. You need to offer me an APS-C EOS R7 as an upgrade to my 7D2, or you need to offer a very high Megapixel R camera which will have a seamless in-built 1.6x crop mode to 32Mpix and with fps and AF performance better than the 7D2

Peter

"Neither" was my first instinct too, but that's possibly just because I'm used to thinking that superteles need to be f/4 for use in low light. Set that preconception aside and think afresh and maybe there is a usage case for both of these.

You need that kind of wide aperture speed when you are shooting at have low light levels and are limited in your ISO by when noise becomes a problem. When I first started with digital, anything above ISO800 was problematic, and I managed just fine with f/4 super teles most of the time - actually I had too, because it's as good as it got.

Yesterday evening, I was out in my garden getting perfectly usable shots of bats (pipistrelles) in flight at ISO 25600 f/5.6 with a 1DX MkIII at well after 22:00. That's *six* full stops over the f/4 ISO800 combo, whereas f/4 to f/11 is just three. f/11 also gives you a lot more usable DoF, especially at 600mm or 800mm where it can be a challenge to get larger animals sharp front-to-back if you're not stopped down to f/8 or f/11 anyway.

So, if Canon can pair these with a sensor with the ISO performance of a 1DX III, provide acceptable AF performance at f/11, *and* give decent image quality for the money, then I can well believe that a lot of wildlife, and especially bird photographers, that can accept the loss of background seperation will be all over these. From what I've seen of the rumoured specs though, neither the R5 or R6 is going to be that body, and there's still not even a really plausible hint of an R1.

Andy

I think iso tolerance must be subjective, I’ve never been happy with any camera over 3200 for birds and fine feather detail. Topaz mask AI does an incredible job with high iso images but I prefer to not have to use it.

i will stick with the big guns for now until canon release something similar to Nikon’s 500 f5.6 pf. A 600 f5.6 DO would be amazing and something I would definitely go for.

Not sure where this idea is coming from.  Nikon once offered a 600/5.6 and 800/8, so it seems these would be more appropriate for Canon too look into.

Also in the past f11 was generally acceptable for lenses in the 1200 to 2000mm range.