Canon Targets Nikon, Sony With $2,300 Mirrorless Full-Frame EOS R

This site may earn affiliate commissions from the links on this folio. Terms of use.

Canon this week made its spring into the arena of full-frame, mirrorless digital cameras, following Nikon by a couple weeks and Sony the better office of a decade. Some of the Canon's specs are fabulous: The EOS R photographic camera body has a 30.3-megapixel sensor with five,655 focus points and the ability to focus almost in the dark. The starting time lenses are the aforementioned quality as Canon's white Fifty lenses and have a control band that lets you apace adjust a setting.
At $ii,300 for the body with no lens, the price and features seem to put the EOS R closer to the prosumer Canon 6D Mark Ii full-frame ($1,600) than the pro workhorse Canon 5D Mark Four ($3,100). Optimists will see it as a cheaper 5D. The EOS R and kickoff R lenses ship in October.

What Catechism Announced: the Body

Canon's Sept. 5 announcement included one camera body, several lenses, and adapters to fit existing total-frame EF and crop-sensor EF-Due south Canon lenses to the EOS R body. The new lenses won't fit Catechism DSLRs because they're meant to exist mounted closer to the sensor than a mirror-box camera allows. EOS R will be the terminology for Catechism's mirrorless full-frame system, and RF (which sounds confusingly similar radio frequency) volition be the term for the lens system, which appears to be all blackness. So much for Catechism ads showing pros at a sporting event, the majority shooting with Canon signature white body telephotos.

The photographic camera uses the Canon Digic 8 image processor. ISO is up to forty,000 native, expandable to 102,400. Yous can shoot by streetlight and even moonlight. The 5,655 focus points embrace the shooting surface area to 100 percent vertical and 88 percent horizontal coverage. Catechism claims autofocus in as piddling as 0.05 seconds. It includes some of the things you look from bespeak-and-shoots, such equally eye detection.

The electronic viewfinder (EVF) has iii.69 1000000 dots and, Catechism says, provides 100 percent scene coverage. Subjects should be viewable in nearly-dark, in right colour. A rear LCD swivels and tilts. "Touch and Elevate AF" allows choice of the focus point. GPS, Bluetooth, and Wi-Fi are embedded, and video as loftier every bit 4K is supported.

What Catechism Appear: the Lenses

When the EOS R ships, it tin be had with a 24-105mm f/4 lens. Information technology'due south $ane,100 on its own (subsequently in the year) or adds $one,100 to the kit cost. (When Canon bundles the existing 24-105 in a kit, often it knocks $100-$200 off the kit price). There will as well be:

50mm f/1.2 L-serial prime lens
RF 24-70mm f/ii USM lens
RF 35mm f/i.8 MACRO IS STM lens

The RF lens mount has a 20mm flange back and 54mm mounting bore, which should let for broad, bright lenses in the future. The lens Control Ring lets the shooter quickly change (one at a time) settings such every bit aperture, shutter speed, exposure compensation, or ISO. Lenses take prototype stabilization congenital in. Canon says it's better than in-camera IS. Just information technology too makes the lenses heavier and bulkier.

Where Canon EOS R Fits In

The EOS R camera that Catechism announced falls into the realm of enthusiast camera for sure. Some pros may see it as a way to go a mirrorless 5D Mark Iv for $800 less. If Canon's focus-speed specs agree upwards in testing, it'south a solid offering equally a video-centric camera.

Existing Canon owners of recent DSLRs from amateur, enthusiast, and working pro realms volition like that it takes Catechism's ubiquitous $65 LP-E6N lithium-ion bombardment, simply they won't exist enthused past Catechism's rating of 370 shots per accuse. Catechism'due south DSLRs on a goodbye of field-shooting (sports) tin get every bit many as i,000 frames. There'south a two-battery grip that steals the onboard battery slot for its connectedness and makes the EOS R DSLR-bulky.

Early analyst reports are mixed. For instance, Ichiro Michikoshi, an analyst at BCN Inc. in Tokyo told Bloomberg:

Sony was the only option until now, but with Nikon and Canon at present out, we'll see this space become very agile. There'southward a lot more buzz now, and so perhaps people who have forgotten virtually standalone cameras will accept some other wait. … At above 200,000 yen [USD $one,800], it's also high. You need to get downwardly to 120-130,000 [$1,075-$one,170] for people to consider it. But lenses are also expensive. And then I don't see a huge number of users flowing in.

On the positive side, the price is in line with what well-heeled enthusiasts will pay. And enthusiast followers of cameras, cars, or entertainment systems are solid brand-recommenders. If Canon hooks them and and so their colleagues, it has a practiced chance at chipping away at Sony'south pb.

At that place's also the Nikon duo. Every bit ExtremeTech's David Cardinal detailed last calendar week, the Nikon Z7 and Z6 SEEAMAZON_ET_135 See Amazon ET commerce are effectively equivalents and replacements for the Nikon D850 and D750 DSLRs. They have in-torso vibration reduction, work with Nikon's in-lens vibration reduction, have a new lens mountain (Z-mount), and there are adapters for existing Nikon F-mountain lenses. It uses a single XQD carte du jour slot that is bully for loftier-speed video simply not widely used outside the Nikon world. The Z7, shipping Sept. 27, is $3,400 for the camera body or $four,000 with a Z-mount 24-70mm f/4 lens. The Z6 ships in November, $2,000 for the torso, $two,600 for the lens.