Canon RF 200-800mm REVIEW: super-telephoto first-looks 

Yes pls do this comparison!

Me too

Please make a review of this lens on R7

This lens is equivalent to about a 1200mm on the R7 frame, right? Since it's APS-C, the lens gets a ~1.6x multiplier

Yes it would be fun to try it on the R7, maybe with a TC as well!

You need to do the scary walk like I did there Chris...

I actually kinda like that the tripod collar is fixed on. I've had my RF 100-500 fall off it's tripod collar pretty easily unless you have it tightened down so tight that you can barely rotate the lens.

Agreed. A tripod collar that isn't arca-swiss is useless to me, and I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels that way.

Do any Canon lenses come as arca swiss? Don't recall any. You always have to buy a plate or new foot. Not everyone uses arca swiss.

I would think it would be comparable or slightly better. You are at f9 either way, but the 100-500 costs almost $1,000.00 more, plus the cost of the teleconverter and it still won't get you to 800. If you already have the 100-500, and 700 is enough reach, I wouldn't buy this lens, but if you want/need 800, or are debating between lenses it gets interesting.

I'll take the optic quality of a Canon lens over 2/3 of a stop at 600 of a third party lens. There are plenty of very good noise reduction softwares available that can easily deal with 2/3 of a stop! Plus, I CAN go to 800 when I have the light.

It’s such a great compact lens

That lens is an amazing value, and works great on the R7, for closer / larger creatures 🙂 I use it often in the backyard bird blind. I need 800mm in the field though.

@@Chris_Wolfgram yeah, I picked it up refurbished from Canon for $379 which is ridiculously cheap for what it does. I make no money from my wildlife photography only weddings, so of the 3 lenses released today, the 24-105 would be most useful in making money from it.

@@zayanything3124 that's an awesome deal, on a lens that is worth every penny of full cost in the first place ! :) My best deal was a like new (open box) 600 F11, for $509 :)

@@zayanything3124 Ugh, when did you pick that up? I've been watching Canon refurb for the last several weeks straight and they're not even in stock, let alone being marked down for Black Friday. I want one so bad!

Exactly right

Ehhhhhhhhhh…. It’s not just a difference of adding 800mm f9. Its f7.1 at 260mm, f8 at 450mm and f9 at 630, external zoom (😢), super long zoom throw and based on MTF no where near as sharp. For roughly the same price of a 180/200-600. I’m taking the 180/200-600 every time personally.

@@livejames9374 took s look at the mft charts and they where not bad at all , even better real World review on f-stoppers ”the images came out crispy, with plenty of detail and with next to no color aberrations if you disregard color noise of the sensor. ” Seems like the image qualty is just fine

Why, though? Let's compare to something like the Sony 200-600. This Canon lens gathers less light at all apertures below 600mm, it has the same entrance pupil size (actually slightly smaller) at 800mm as the Sony does at 600mm (so cropping into a Sony image would produce essentially the same amount of noise, albeit less detail), this lens weighs essentially the same amount and is the same length when collapsed but doesn't have internal zooming... What makes this a more compelling option other than if you already own Canon gear?

@@TechnoBabble you answered it , why would I buy a Sony lens when I shoot canon ? And with cropping why even buy a 600 lens when you can crop a 400 etc

Exactly, I think it will be a big seller!

Internal zoom would mean half a meter lens already! No, thanks.

@@jan.tichavsky The lens is the same price as the Sony 200-600 and it has a smaller entrance pupil because of the f9 aperture. It's also essentially the same length and weight as the Sony already, without the telescoping zoom.

I mention the minimum focusing distance in the video, hope you got the info.

Probably not very. At those focal lengths you are probably better off using a higher resolution sensor and just cropping.

I will be doing those tests!

​@@cameralabswould also he curious which is sharper, this lens at 800mm or the 100-500 with a teleconverter

@@wcsdiaries I'd like to know that too and will try to find out when i test them fully.

Great! Looking forward to it.@@cameralabs

Probably because they don't want to pay a licensing fee or get sued.

I agree, and always ask for a dovetail. I assume it's a licensing thing.

@@cameralabs I see, makes a lot more sense when its put that way. I still wish they sold offical feet with the arca swiss cuts on the side though. Folks who want an OEM foot with the cuts can have one, the OEM's gets more money from them and it doesn't increase the cost of the lens for anyone who don't want the arca swiss compatibility.

There's no way in hell you would get internal zooming at that price.

You prefer the hefty expensive boys? There will be an L-Version somewhere in this zoom range in some future, I expect it to be limited to 600mm.

@@badboyvr4 It's the same price as the Sony 200-600 with a stop slower aperture on the long end...

I'm sure the 100-500 as an L lens and a shorter range will be noticeably better,

In normal use, though, you will almost never have to zoom from 200-800 quickly. 400 to 800 I could definitely see, but the distance to rotate is less at the long end, as is typical for zooms.

I also enjoy how lightweight the 800 mm f/ll is. What is the 200-800 like to hand hold while shooting? @@falxonPSN

Probably similar. At those long focal lengths performance drops off pretty sharply.

The 150-600 has focusing issues on RF mount bodies

I use the Sigma 150-600mm (Contemporary) too on R6II, from what I see on reviews both Canon RF 100-500 and even this 200-800mm are as sharp or more (especially the 100-500 as you said) BUT are going to push ISO level with those apertures. I think the biggest upgrade is going to be in the focusing performances

If the focusing is quicker then I can work out extra iso noise in post. My 150-600 sigma struggles to lock on at times. Lost quite a few shots. However this combination is still way better than the sigma on the 7d2. I’m gonna wait to see how real world reviews go and also see whether Sigma gets chance to offer 150-600 in Rf. maybe that’s why canon havnt?

Should have said using it on an r7

@@vegthemuso7404 Sigma AF work better on RF adapter than on EF for me too, but there is still a lot of place for improvements that why I'm looking for some big zoom made for the RF system myself. And as much as I like Canon, they are very protective of their business, so I really doubt they let Sigma do a 150-600mm for RF that will challenge the sales of their cheap 600 and 800mm F11 and 100-400mm, but also the 100-500mm L / 200-800mm white zooms lenses... (Hoping to be wrong about this)

It's gonna be interesting on an R7 for sure...

I think you will have great difficulties with this lens with wildlife photography in low morning and afternoon light at f/9. With tele extenders of 1.4x and 2x, good luck getting decent shots at f/11 and f/16! Your ISOs will be too high and the subject isolation will be null.

@@jonerikrolf2029 It is the price that makes it attractive. If you are a billionaire you can always buy a €14.000 lens.

@@jonerikrolf2029 have you seen images shot with the RF 800mm f11 prime? Of course it's completely different to a bright aperture prime or even zoom, but these are different lenses aimed at a lower budget and lighter weight. They do have the big guns if you can afford them and are happy lugging them around. But ultimately yes, in low light, these aren't ideal.

@@angeloplayforone Well if affordability is paramount, then there are more affordable and usable lenses for FF wildlife photography. One needs high shutter speeds and apertures as wide open as possible. A maximum aperture of 5.6 or 6.3 is doable if the background is not too close. F/9, F/11 and F/16 are both too slow and the dof too great. I do not swap out backgrounds as it is forbidden for nature/wildlife photo competitions.

They could have, but it would have been much larger, heavier and more expensive. This one was designed to be more affordable as I said in the video.

just take a look at either the Sigma 300-800 F/5.6 and Sigma 200-500 F/2.8. I think those 2 show that not everything that is physically possible is nescessarily something interesting to the user

Thankyou!

Yes but they're not 800 mm are they and if they stayed faster they would be heavier! People seem to want cheap, fast, light, small, and top IQ. Ain't gonna happen!

I think it's a combination of build, optics, sealing, accessories, controls etc. Just compare it to the 100-500 and you'll notice some differences, but that doesn't mean it's bad in any way, just not their ultimate.

@@cameralabs Thanks Gordon

I honestly haven't heard anything, although if I were under NDA I wouldn't be able to tell you! Anyway, it's one of the great mysteries why we haven't seen a new macro from Sony. Surely one must be coming next year... certainly if I were buying the 90 now, I'd be looking for killer deals.

As always... THANKS Gordon! @@cameralabs

Which aren't exactly "exceptions" when this lens is in the same price range. Only less expensive lenses from the likes of Tamron and Sigma have external zoom.

@@TechnoBabble Both the Nikon 180-600 and the Sony 200-600 can be found at about 1700-1800 dollars, the same as the Sigma 150-600 Sport, which is much heavier, worse stabilization, a very long zoom range which costs quick change of focal length and with external zoom

@@josemariagallardo2377 Seems you thought I was disagreeing with you. I'd take another read over my comment.

Indeed, I have an ATX along with their APO attachment which I use with a Canon EOS M50 so it has about 2600mm I think. Swarovski optics are great for viewing but at distance photos are only suitable for identification and frankly a guy next to me holding an ancient mobile over the lens gets just as good pictures from his scope. It also takes forever to set up tripod, camera and get the settings right so only good for something that's not going to move in the next 5 minutes. Closer the image quality is better but I suspect it would be way better with an R7 and this lens. As you say they don't overlap in functionality but I am quite tempted by this lens with a crop body.

Maybe licensing? Most companies don't which is sad as it'd be very useful.

@@cameralabs Well TAMRON does. :)

@@WildlifeVeterans I think Sigma does as well, but the big camera companies themselves don't. Er, apart from maybe Olympus back in the day!

@@cameralabs I can confirm Olympus\OMDS lenses still have the Arca profile machined into the lens foot.

Yeah the lack of internal zoom is concerning. Gordon looked like he needed to twist it 4 times to get to 800mm

@@jeffbronson3696it’s no problem , most f(if not all ) 150-600 lenses are external zoom and I never has any problems even in bad condition . The amount of twisting might be a concern for some but if I buy a lens like this I either shoot at the longer end or shorter end so I don’t zoom from 200-800 constantly anyway . Rf 70-200 is worse with the throw cause that’s a lens I zoom in and out with

Considering it's in the same price range as the Sony 200-600 and Nikon 180-600, whilst having a smaller entrance pupil than either of those lenses on the long end, I fully expected this to be internal zooming.

@@TechnoBabble seems like their goal was to make this lens as small. Making it with external focus would make it much bigger zoomed in

I'm curious how you feel about the 800 F11 ?

I was surprised how small the 100-500 was next to it...

I have a 70-200 2.8, 800mm f11 2x extender and the 100-500 my go to lens that l really love it’s a must have. I pre-ordered the 200-800 and very excited to have it in my collection especially for Surfing and Seascapes.

@@josemcmurray5100 let us know what you think when you get it!

Possibly! They did have some monstrous lenses back in the day...

I sold my 100-500 today. But now I’m worried about the autofocus speed. Will it be fast enough for birds in flight ? Please Mr Laing. Help us know !!!!

I did schedule it BUT I was up until 2am finishing them all!

Yes, the fact they can AF at slow apertures is impressive. I show you the possible DF at f6.3 and f9 in the video and there is certainly some blurring

a 150-600 F/8 would be a fov of 900 F/12, not F/8. The Aperture is 1/8th of F=600mm, not 1/8th of F=900mm. It's a misconception that the F/x number doesnt need to account for a crop factor. Same with the light. If the lens has a diameter of 600mm/8=75mm, it will only collect light for 75mm of diameter. A change of sensor size will not affect how many photons can get though that front element in any way. Thats why i personally hate calling lenses "F8" and so on, because it's not 8, it's the focal length F divided by 8 and many people sadly forget about that, thus spreading quite some misconceptions...

You're not getting the light of an f/4.5 on that Olympus lens when comparing to full frame. Yes, the aperture is physically f/4.5, but the focal length is ALSO physically 400mm, NOT 800mm. If you want to talk equivalence then you adjust both values. The reason being that a smaller sensor with similar manufacturing technology will produce more noise. The Olympus 150-400 f/4.5 is equivalent to a 300-800 f/9 on full frame. For example, an MFT camera at 400mm, f/4.5, 1/500, ISO 400 will give you the almost the same DoF, angle of view, and noise as a full frame camera at 800mm, f/9, 1/500, ISO1600.

Not sure yet

I have the RF800mm. It has a DO lens element, that is why the oof bokeh is not smooth. I dont use it at all.

@@nordic5490 I agree when the background objects create concentric rings but for the most part I actually prefer the DO bokeh, mainly because it can have a slightly "dreamy" look. The RF 100-400 has worse bokeh which can be too contrasty and also has these onion rings. My main gripe is the contrast in strong light and it can be sensitive atmospheric haze. I've still yet to see anything comparable to a 60x spotting scope (3000mm equivalent) that can break through heat haze, maybe a successor to the Nikon P1000.

Actually that would be nice!

Thanks for asking, but I very rarely do live streams - I don't have the setup for it, and when I have done them, they generally have very few views compared to a separate edited review video, so it's not an effective use of time - for me anyway! They can be great for others, just not me!

@@cameralabs Their is more to photography than just views. Doing reviews is about helping people and so are livestreams. People find value in livestreams podcasts and find them interesting and informative and it spreads the word of your channel. I dont care if I help 1 person or a million every one has value to me.

@@canonlensesandcameras4425 I hear what you're saying, but if I only have time to make one video or one livestream, the video will reach and help way more people than the livestream - based on what I've done so far in 17 years on this platform. Again your mileage may vary, but that's for me. I know some live streams can work really well, but just not for me.

This is a neat lens but for the price point I’m very happy to be in the Nikon ecosystem.

FF f9 has the same DoF as m43 f4.5, but indeed when it comes to light m43 behaves like f4.5. But then again, FF has better high iso performance.

You've made a few errors here which are incredibly common but, in my opinion, undermine the validity of the micro four thirds system. You don't need to change shutter speed when comparing systems of different sizes, you can just multiply the ISO setting by the square of the crop factor and and get similar noise and dynamic range characteristics. In addition, there is minimal difference in subject isolation, depth of field, or overall light gathering capability when you multiply the aperture setting by the crop factor. A 200-800mm f/6.3 - 9 lens on full frame will theoretically be very similar in optical characteristics to a 100-400mm f/3.1-4.5 on m43. In practice, I do think the m43 kit has some important advantages. Measurements presented by Bill Claff on his photons to photos website indicate that, at equivalent high-ISO exposures, the OM-1 has just over a half stop photographic dynamic range advantage over the EOS R3. In addition, like you said, the 150-400mm is likely much better dust and weather sealed, to the point where it has an actual IP53 rating (this is huge in my opinion). The 150-400mm is lighter and is much shorter than the 200-800mm when extended. We don't yet know how sharpness, longitudinal and lateral chromatic aberrations, T-stops, vignetting, and bokeh quality compare and I will not speculate on those, but I would be very surprised if the OM lens wasn't competitive.

@@jonpaulpepen9470 Thank you for your considered and informative response. You make some good points in your second paragraph, but I disagree with points made in your first paragraph - namely )1 the in-equivalence of FF and m43 apertures, 2) depth of field and 3) shutter speed issues. The last point is easy to explain what I meant. As you are aware, animals and birds are not static but move. A sharp image without blurring wings, beaks or legs requires using high shutter speeds (even up to 1/4000 sec for small twitchy birds). So a person with the R3 and myself with an OM-1 will probably have the same high shutter speed according to the animal’s behavior to be photographed. In lower light, correctly exposing for fast shutter speeds (certainly 1/4000 or 1/2000 sec) requires some combination of wide aperture and boosted ISO. I would much prefer to be shooting at f/4.5 with a medium high ISO than at f/9 at a much higher ISO. The issue of aperture equivalence re FF and m43 sensors can get confusing when discussed by fan boys from their respective sensor camps. An F/4 for FF sensor and F/4 for an m43 sensor will give the same exposure for the image taken with the same shutter speed and ISO settings. This is a fact, and it is supported by my many years of field experience. The FF sensor is physically larger than the m43 sensor so the FF lens has to project a wider circle than the lens for the m43 sensor. (As you know, this is why m43 lenses can be built smaller.) The lens’ projected area of light is not the issue here. Those who say that f/4 on m43 sensors is really f/9 is not correct for the exposure but it is for depth of field. About depth of field, my depth of field calculator presents these dof results. At 100’ for an R3 with an 800mm lens set at f/9 the dof is 2.57’. At 100’ with my OM-1 lens set at 800mm FF field of view f/4.5, the dof is 1.29’. This difference can be important for subject separation from distracting objects in the foreground or background. Most wildlife photographers want to avoid f/9 or higher.

@@jonerikrolf2029 Thank you for your reply. I do have to respectfully disagree with the conclusion you've came to regarding exposure, but first I just want to say that I currently shoot m43 and have been for several years, and want it to continue to succeed in the market place, but I also want that to happen for the right reasons and with users understanding exactly how systems really compare, and the pros and cons of each. In your second paragraph, yes I agree that for wildlife we are severely shutter speed constrained, which typically means compensating with wider apertures and higher ISO. However, f/4.5 ISO 1600 on m43 and f/9 ISO 6400 on FF (same shutter speed on both) would really be neck and neck for almost all measurable qualities aside the half stop dynamic range benefit of m43 I mentioned previously. For your third paragraph, there is no doubt that the luminous flux per unit area on the sensor plane (long way of saying "Illuminance") is the same for all lenses at a given aperture value, internal light loss, and scene illumination, regardless of sensor size. And agreed, the ISO setting is designed to dictate what given Illuminance over time on the sensor plane corresponds to middle grey in the output JPEG, again regardless of sensor size. Therefore, yes, crop factor corrected focal lengths with the same shutter speed and numerical ISO setting produce superficially similar JPEG images. My stance is that the JPEG output is misleading and does not tell the whole story. For the purpose of taking actual images, I do not believe the luminous flux per unit area is actually relevant, and I believe it was a bad decision for the ISO standard to be based on this metric. I contend that the amount of light that falls into each "circle of confusion" during the exposure is the critical value, since this inherently scales with the factors that govern how we actually view images (i.e. print size and viewing distance, but if those are fixed to some standard, then it just scales with sensor size). Using "luminous flux per CoC over time" as a metric, it is easy to demonstrate that 1/2000 sec f/4.5 on m43 puts the same amount of light in the applicable circle of confusion as 1/2000 sec f/9 on full frame sized circle of confusion, and if the ISO were based on that, the equivalent ISO numbers for each format would be the same, instead of having to do the "crop factor squared" conversion. Many other useful concepts, such as photographic dynamic range, depth of field, more accurate maximum print sizes, come when you use the circle of confusion as your ruler, so I see no reason why exposure shouldn't use this as a basis. In terms of your depth of field calculator, I'm not sure how you're getting those numbers. The calculator I use says FF 800mm f/9 at 100' distance should have a 2' 5.1" depth of field, and m43 400mm f/4.5 at 100' distance should give 2' 4.4" depth of field, only off by .7" or 2.2%. Both of those scenarios yield a 3.1° diagonal field of view, and a 5" 4.9" diagonal entrance window. For what it's worth, the ideas I'm using (except for the exposure based on CoC, that might just be a me thing) mostly come from the paper "Equivalence theory for cross-format photographic image quality comparisons" by D. Andrew Rowlands, which have been experimentally verified by many including the DPReview and DPReview TV team, Tony Northrup, etc. Overall, it just kills me that over the years so much debate and emotion has corroded what should be purely a technical tidbit

@@jonpaulpepen9470 lots of detail in your response. Thank you. Perhaps our different results for depth of field results is caused by our using different circles of confusion. The calculator I use is the DOFC app (iOS). I have written to the developer to learn what the defaults are for the R3 and the OM-1 as I am not specifying specific circles of confusion. I too have been a m43 guy - using Olympus/OM Systems gear since I switched from Nikon (D500, 300 f/2.8, 200-400 f/4 80-400 etc). For telephoto lenses I have the 40-150 f/2.8, 300 f/4 and the 150-400 1.25x that I use on my OM-1, the MX-1 and EM-1 mark iii. Both the 300mm and the 150-400 were said to be maximally sharp wide open, and I believe it. I did not study physics or optics but instead pursued a scientific career a clinical psychologist and as a principal investigator of public health prevention projects across cultures. I am now retired and have enjoyed wildlife photography across 7 continents. This has been just a hobby for me although I have won awards in regional, national and international nature photography competitions. BTW, Janine- a professional wildlife photographer with Pangolin Safaris in Botswana - just reviewed the same new Canon 200-800mm lens. She liked the lens for its weight and affordability but brought up concerns as to its suitability for the more demanding types of wildlife photography.

I meant native mirrorless lenses which are still in production

Yeah, that's the worst aspect of the lens. But then I thought that if you put a 1.4x teleconverter on the nikon 180-600 for example you get 252-840 f8-f9. Yeah you can take it off but when you are birding the unexpected flyover might happen and you wouldn't have time to swap the teleconveter all the time. So then you would have to pick between having to crop to 800mm or losing a third of a stop of light but the canon is in the middle between the two.

Yes, I foresee some frustrating focus racks back and forth at critical times! But hopefully we can full-time MF overrride it to get it back on track if necessary

No one has done it yet as its pre production right now and we can't test it.

True. I meant native mirrorless and in production.

Sadly not, I'm not a shop

This is a first-looks initial review, as stated in the first few seconds and on the thumbnail. This is how I present all my reviews, starting with a short preview, then following-up with actual optical tests once a final production sample is available. At this point no-one is allowed to test it, so I've presented the physical side of things, as well as aperture changes.

@@cameralabsI won’t argue as I really do like your online reviews.

@@StillAliveAndKicking_ thanks! I promise optical tests will come, but in part two when I have a final production lens. Thanks for your patience!

Didn't you see the video of me? I reached out and pushed the button

It's a bit stormy across the UK today

I did have it, but it was too long, so I left it in the description and obviously say it within the first few seconds.

Exactly what people said about the 800 F11 too, and they are completely wrong. Sounds like you have some expensive, heavy gear :) I'd love to see your work, and wouldn't be afraid to show you mine :)

@@Chris_Wolfgram and they are right because few are seen in the wild.

Yes, I should try and do a comparison with the 100-500 using TCs

i've got my hands on both lenses yesterday, if you have the 100-500 and TC already, i dont think there's much value to a change. Dont get me wrong, the 200-800 is very comparable to the 100-500 with extender, but since you already have that, there's no point really in switching. The 100-500 definitely has it's advantages (you dont realize how much 500g is until you hold both lenses next to each other, the zoom ring can be moved much easier without effort, you have different IS modes, etc). The only reasons i could see to switch is: - you want to use the 200-800 and still have the option to put the TC on it to get 1120mm (i cant complain about the quality with TC, even the 2x positively surprised me) - you REALLY get annoyed by the 100-500 not fully collapsing with TC (if it's just mildly annoying, i dont think it's worth the trouble and cost switching) - you want to "downgrade" in order to sell the 100-500 and have a chance to get more money than you pay (i dont think that would be a wise choice to do, since the idk 200-400bucks you can get back is most likely not worth it. I just wanted to mention this for completeness). I could only try them in the field and i couldnt pixel-peep, so a proper lab comparison would definitely be more assuring, but i doubt the results would make any wildly different conclusion