R7 with RF 70-200 f2.8 for Wildlife (paired with R5/RF 100-500/1.4x)

Has anyone paired the R7 with the RF 70-200 f2.8 for wildlife purposes?

I have my R5 paired to the RF 100-500 L w/ the 1.4x Extender attached to get an AOV of 480mm - 800mm. Being as I can’t put the extender on the 70-200 f2.8, I was thinking of putting this on the R7 to obtain an AOV of 112mm - 320mm.

This set up seems like it would cover a wide range of wildlife situations without having to worry about taking on/off extenders.

Thoughts? Personal experience?

Captive18 wrote:

Has anyone paired the R7 with the RF 70-200 f2.8 for wildlife purposes?

I have my R5 paired to the RF 100-500 L w/ the 1.4x Extender attached to get an AOV of 480mm - 800mm. Being as I can’t put the extender on the 70-200 f2.8, I was thinking of putting this on the R7 to obtain an AOV of 112mm - 320mm.

This set up seems like it would cover a wide range of wildlife situations without having to worry about taking on/off extenders.

Thoughts? Personal experience?

It might be simpler to put the 70-200mm on your R5, and the 100-500mm on the R7 (giving 160-800mm equivalent FL). Now you have 70-800mm covered with the highest pixel density on the longer FLs, with 2 bodies/lenses and no restriction or optical losses due to the extender. If you need more reach, put the 1.4x on the R7+100-500mm to extend your reach to 1280mm equivalent.

Does that fit your needs?

Steve Balcombe wrote:

Captive18 wrote:

Has anyone paired the R7 with the RF 70-200 f2.8 for wildlife purposes?

I have my R5 paired to the RF 100-500 L w/ the 1.4x Extender attached to get an AOV of 480mm - 800mm. Being as I can’t put the extender on the 70-200 f2.8, I was thinking of putting this on the R7 to obtain an AOV of 112mm - 320mm.

This set up seems like it would cover a wide range of wildlife situations without having to worry about taking on/off extenders.

Thoughts? Personal experience?

I agree with the others that the 100-500 should be on the R7 and the 70-200 on the R5. My reasons are:

- The 100-500 without the TC on the R7 gives very similar results to the 100-500 with the 1.4x on the R5, but without the annoying zoom restriction. This has been my anecdotal experience from practical use; others have carried out more formal tests and come to the same conclusion.

- I don't see much value in using the 70-200 on the R7. If you're shooting in a situation where the 112-320 mm range is important, you can achieve this (in your scheme) by not using the Extender on the R5 + 100-500. Far better to use the 70-200 on the R5, for the 'full frame advantage' in situations where that is useful, mainly low light but anywhere you need a large aperture. (Don't forget equivalence applies to aperture as well as focal length - the 70-200 is 112-320 mm f/4.5 equivalent on the R7.)

I would still carry the 1.4x, because it gives you more options.

Yeah. Those are good ideas. I didn’t think of switching it around to make use of the full zoom range of the 100-500. I’ve been so used to that staying at 300mm (420mm with the extender).

So R5 would have 70-200mm @ f2.8

R7 would have 100-500 giving angle of view of 160mm-800 @ f7-f11’ish.

Therefore I would have an effective range of 70-800mm and f2.8-f11

Honestly, as I type that out, that isn’t much different than just having the 100-500 on the R5 to begin with and carry one lens. The 70-100 range for wildlife wouldn’t be too crucial. I guess my main point was to be able to extend the range of the RF 70-200 f2.8 (because you cannot put extenders on it) without losing megapixels in crop mode on the R5.

Steve Balcombe wrote:

Captive18 wrote:

Has anyone paired the R7 with the RF 70-200 f2.8 for wildlife purposes?

I have my R5 paired to the RF 100-500 L w/ the 1.4x Extender attached to get an AOV of 480mm - 800mm. Being as I can’t put the extender on the 70-200 f2.8, I was thinking of putting this on the R7 to obtain an AOV of 112mm - 320mm.

This set up seems like it would cover a wide range of wildlife situations without having to worry about taking on/off extenders.

Thoughts? Personal experience?

I agree with the others that the 100-500 should be on the R7 and the 70-200 on the R5. My reasons are:

- The 100-500 without the TC on the R7 gives very similar results to the 100-500 with the 1.4x on the R5, but without the annoying zoom restriction. This has been my anecdotal experience from practical use; others have carried out more formal tests and come to the same conclusion.

- I don't see much value in using the 70-200 on the R7. If you're shooting in a situation where the 112-320 mm range is important, you can achieve this (in your scheme) by not using the Extender on the R5 + 100-500. Far better to use the 70-200 on the R5, for the 'full frame advantage' in situations where that is useful, mainly low light but anywhere you need a large aperture. (Don't forget equivalence applies to aperture as well as focal length - the 70-200 is 112-320 mm f/4.5 equivalent on the R7.)

My understanding is that equivalent aperture pertains to depth of field, though, not light transmission. So it would still be f/2.8 for light, but with less ability to blur the background. Is that correct?

I would still carry the 1.4x, because it gives you more options.

I have that combination but I only use it for sports. It's just not long enough for the type of wildlife I shoot. I suppose if I were in Yellowstone where the wildlife is sometimes, extremely close it would work.

I can't remember ever taking a wildlife image with a 112-320mm lens.  That is a lot of money to put into that lens unless you have other uses for it.

I too would be putting the big zoom on the R7.  Perhaps consider a relatively cheap used EF prime or zoom as your second lens.

bodeswell wrote:

Steve Balcombe wrote:

Captive18 wrote:

Has anyone paired the R7 with the RF 70-200 f2.8 for wildlife purposes?

I have my R5 paired to the RF 100-500 L w/ the 1.4x Extender attached to get an AOV of 480mm - 800mm. Being as I can’t put the extender on the 70-200 f2.8, I was thinking of putting this on the R7 to obtain an AOV of 112mm - 320mm.

This set up seems like it would cover a wide range of wildlife situations without having to worry about taking on/off extenders.

Thoughts? Personal experience?

I agree with the others that the 100-500 should be on the R7 and the 70-200 on the R5. My reasons are:

- The 100-500 without the TC on the R7 gives very similar results to the 100-500 with the 1.4x on the R5, but without the annoying zoom restriction. This has been my anecdotal experience from practical use; others have carried out more formal tests and come to the same conclusion.

- I don't see much value in using the 70-200 on the R7. If you're shooting in a situation where the 112-320 mm range is important, you can achieve this (in your scheme) by not using the Extender on the R5 + 100-500. Far better to use the 70-200 on the R5, for the 'full frame advantage' in situations where that is useful, mainly low light but anywhere you need a large aperture. (Don't forget equivalence applies to aperture as well as focal length - the 70-200 is 112-320 mm f/4.5 equivalent on the R7.)

My understanding is that equivalent aperture pertains to depth of field, though, not light transmission. So it would still be f/2.8 for light, but with less ability to blur the background. Is that correct?

I don’t think so, at least not using in-camera crop. Using in-camera 1.6x crop you are “cropping out” any light that hits the cropped out portion of the sensor. This makes it similar to an f4 light gathering capable lens…I think I’m thinking about that right.

I would still carry the 1.4x, because it gives you more options.

For setting ISO and shutter speed, it is still an f2.8 lens no matter what camera you put it on, and no matter how you crop the final image.

Captive18 wrote:

bodeswell wrote:

Steve Balcombe wrote:

Captive18 wrote:

Has anyone paired the R7 with the RF 70-200 f2.8 for wildlife purposes?

I have my R5 paired to the RF 100-500 L w/ the 1.4x Extender attached to get an AOV of 480mm - 800mm. Being as I can’t put the extender on the 70-200 f2.8, I was thinking of putting this on the R7 to obtain an AOV of 112mm - 320mm.

This set up seems like it would cover a wide range of wildlife situations without having to worry about taking on/off extenders.

Thoughts? Personal experience?

I agree with the others that the 100-500 should be on the R7 and the 70-200 on the R5. My reasons are:

- The 100-500 without the TC on the R7 gives very similar results to the 100-500 with the 1.4x on the R5, but without the annoying zoom restriction. This has been my anecdotal experience from practical use; others have carried out more formal tests and come to the same conclusion.

- I don't see much value in using the 70-200 on the R7. If you're shooting in a situation where the 112-320 mm range is important, you can achieve this (in your scheme) by not using the Extender on the R5 + 100-500. Far better to use the 70-200 on the R5, for the 'full frame advantage' in situations where that is useful, mainly low light but anywhere you need a large aperture. (Don't forget equivalence applies to aperture as well as focal length - the 70-200 is 112-320 mm f/4.5 equivalent on the R7.)

My understanding is that equivalent aperture pertains to depth of field, though, not light transmission. So it would still be f/2.8 for light, but with less ability to blur the background. Is that correct?

I don’t think so, at least not using in-camera crop. Using in-camera 1.6x crop you are “cropping out” any light that hits the cropped out portion of the sensor. This makes it similar to an f4 light gathering capable lens…I think I’m thinking about that right.

Maybe if cropping in camera, but if not cropping in camera I believe you would still be using all of the light that reached the sensor.

I would still carry the 1.4x, because it gives you more options.

bodeswell wrote:

Captive18 wrote:

bodeswell wrote:

Steve Balcombe wrote:

Captive18 wrote:

Has anyone paired the R7 with the RF 70-200 f2.8 for wildlife purposes?

I have my R5 paired to the RF 100-500 L w/ the 1.4x Extender attached to get an AOV of 480mm - 800mm. Being as I can’t put the extender on the 70-200 f2.8, I was thinking of putting this on the R7 to obtain an AOV of 112mm - 320mm.

This set up seems like it would cover a wide range of wildlife situations without having to worry about taking on/off extenders.

Thoughts? Personal experience?

I agree with the others that the 100-500 should be on the R7 and the 70-200 on the R5. My reasons are:

- The 100-500 without the TC on the R7 gives very similar results to the 100-500 with the 1.4x on the R5, but without the annoying zoom restriction. This has been my anecdotal experience from practical use; others have carried out more formal tests and come to the same conclusion.

- I don't see much value in using the 70-200 on the R7. If you're shooting in a situation where the 112-320 mm range is important, you can achieve this (in your scheme) by not using the Extender on the R5 + 100-500. Far better to use the 70-200 on the R5, for the 'full frame advantage' in situations where that is useful, mainly low light but anywhere you need a large aperture. (Don't forget equivalence applies to aperture as well as focal length - the 70-200 is 112-320 mm f/4.5 equivalent on the R7.)

My understanding is that equivalent aperture pertains to depth of field, though, not light transmission. So it would still be f/2.8 for light, but with less ability to blur the background. Is that correct?

I don’t think so, at least not using in-camera crop. Using in-camera 1.6x crop you are “cropping out” any light that hits the cropped out portion of the sensor. This makes it similar to an f4 light gathering capable lens…I think I’m thinking about that right.

Maybe if cropping in camera, but if not cropping in camera I believe you would still be using all of the light that reached the sensor.

whether you crop in post or in-camera, wouldn’t it be the same thing?

I would still carry the 1.4x, because it gives you more options.

Captive18 wrote:

bodeswell wrote:

Captive18 wrote:

bodeswell wrote:

Steve Balcombe wrote:

Captive18 wrote:

Has anyone paired the R7 with the RF 70-200 f2.8 for wildlife purposes?

I have my R5 paired to the RF 100-500 L w/ the 1.4x Extender attached to get an AOV of 480mm - 800mm. Being as I can’t put the extender on the 70-200 f2.8, I was thinking of putting this on the R7 to obtain an AOV of 112mm - 320mm.

This set up seems like it would cover a wide range of wildlife situations without having to worry about taking on/off extenders.

Thoughts? Personal experience?

I agree with the others that the 100-500 should be on the R7 and the 70-200 on the R5. My reasons are:

- The 100-500 without the TC on the R7 gives very similar results to the 100-500 with the 1.4x on the R5, but without the annoying zoom restriction. This has been my anecdotal experience from practical use; others have carried out more formal tests and come to the same conclusion.

- I don't see much value in using the 70-200 on the R7. If you're shooting in a situation where the 112-320 mm range is important, you can achieve this (in your scheme) by not using the Extender on the R5 + 100-500. Far better to use the 70-200 on the R5, for the 'full frame advantage' in situations where that is useful, mainly low light but anywhere you need a large aperture. (Don't forget equivalence applies to aperture as well as focal length - the 70-200 is 112-320 mm f/4.5 equivalent on the R7.)

My understanding is that equivalent aperture pertains to depth of field, though, not light transmission. So it would still be f/2.8 for light, but with less ability to blur the background. Is that correct?

I don’t think so, at least not using in-camera crop. Using in-camera 1.6x crop you are “cropping out” any light that hits the cropped out portion of the sensor. This makes it similar to an f4 light gathering capable lens…I think I’m thinking about that right.

Maybe if cropping in camera, but if not cropping in camera I believe you would still be using all of the light that reached the sensor.

whether you crop in post or in-camera, wouldn’t it be the same thing?

Depends on what we are talking about. I was thinking about the taking of a picture, not the post-processing.  If I apply a 1.6 in camera crop on a full frame camera with a full frame lens mounted, I am indeed "throwing away" some of the light that reached the sensor. If I put the same lens on a crop sensor camera, I will capture less light because the sensor is smaller, but I would be using all of the light that reached the sensor.

I would still carry the 1.4x, becausescene  it gives you more options.

Sittatunga wrote:

bodeswell wrote:

Depends on what we are talking about. I was thinking about the taking of a picture, not the post-processing. If I apply a 1.6 in camera crop on a full frame camera with a full frame lens mounted, I am indeed "throwing away" some of the light that reached the sensor. If I put the same lens on a crop sensor camera, I will capture less light because the sensor is smaller, but I would be using all of the light that reached the sensor.

Yes, Canon's APS-C sensors have <40% of the area of their 36x24mm sensors, so although they use all the light that hits them, it's still <40% of the image forming light that hits the whole of the 36x24mm sensor. So cropping a 36x24mm sensor to 22.3x14.9mm will indeed give just about the same results as using a Canon APS-C sensor of the same generation and pixel density. But the R7 has the highest pixel density of all Canon's RF mount cameras, so it will give the most pixels per duck with the same lens. We seem to be coming to the same conclusions by different routes.

Yup.

Steve Balcombe wrote:

bodeswell wrote:

Captive18 wrote:

bodeswell wrote:

Steve Balcombe wrote:

Captive18 wrote:

Has anyone paired the R7 with the RF 70-200 f2.8 for wildlife purposes?

I have my R5 paired to the RF 100-500 L w/ the 1.4x Extender attached to get an AOV of 480mm - 800mm. Being as I can’t put the extender on the 70-200 f2.8, I was thinking of putting this on the R7 to obtain an AOV of 112mm - 320mm.

This set up seems like it would cover a wide range of wildlife situations without having to worry about taking on/off extenders.

Thoughts? Personal experience?

I agree with the others that the 100-500 should be on the R7 and the 70-200 on the R5. My reasons are:

- The 100-500 without the TC on the R7 gives very similar results to the 100-500 with the 1.4x on the R5, but without the annoying zoom restriction. This has been my anecdotal experience from practical use; others have carried out more formal tests and come to the same conclusion.

- I don't see much value in using the 70-200 on the R7. If you're shooting in a situation where the 112-320 mm range is important, you can achieve this (in your scheme) by not using the Extender on the R5 + 100-500. Far better to use the 70-200 on the R5, for the 'full frame advantage' in situations where that is useful, mainly low light but anywhere you need a large aperture. (Don't forget equivalence applies to aperture as well as focal length - the 70-200 is 112-320 mm f/4.5 equivalent on the R7.)

My understanding is that equivalent aperture pertains to depth of field, though, not light transmission. So it would still be f/2.8 for light, but with less ability to blur the background. Is that correct?

I don’t think so, at least not using in-camera crop. Using in-camera 1.6x crop you are “cropping out” any light that hits the cropped out portion of the sensor. This makes it similar to an f4 light gathering capable lens…I think I’m thinking about that right.

Maybe if cropping in camera, but if not cropping in camera I believe you would still be using all of the light that reached the sensor.

It makes no difference where you crop, the amount of light collected is reduced by the same amount.

The lens is still f/2.8 because this is a property of the lens alone, and this is what counts for the purposes of the exposure calculation. But it's f/4.5 equivalent for DoF -

Agree

and for total light collected,

Well, that's due to the sensor size, nothing changes from the lens's point of view.

which is what matters for image quality.

Image quality is, I think, a slippery concept, but I think I understand what people mean when they say this.

To fully explain would require an essay about equivalence, but I'm spared that as there are some good existing references online, not least of which is https://www.dpreview.com/articles/2666934640/what-is-equivalence-and-why-should-i-care. Also the original and still the best: http://www.josephjamesphotography.com/equivalence/

I would still carry the 1.4x, because it gives you more options.