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#1
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Are IS lenses doomed ?
The release of Sony Alpha with the image stabilization in camera ( although
this is not new) highlighted the fundamental problem with Canon. Canon have had IS lenses long ago as it would be very difficult to do in-camera stabilization in film cameras. The digital cameras had to support older lenses including the ones with IS. If Canon developed a camera with in-body stabilization it would hurt Canon sales and reputation. So I guess Canon will continue with its nonstabilized bodies and when Sony or someone else will achieve the same image sensor quality Canon will find itself in a very difficult situation. There is a very small advantage in having IS in the lens but it is not significant enough to grant double and triple cost of the same quality lenses. What do you guys think ? |
#2
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Are IS lenses doomed ?
VC wrote:
The release of Sony Alpha with the image stabilization in camera ( although this is not new) highlighted the fundamental problem with Canon. Canon have had IS lenses long ago as it would be very difficult to do in-camera stabilization in film cameras. The digital cameras had to support older lenses including the ones with IS. If Canon developed a camera with in-body stabilization it would hurt Canon sales and reputation. So I guess Canon will continue with its nonstabilized bodies and when Sony or someone else will achieve the same image sensor quality Canon will find itself in a very difficult situation. There is a very small advantage in having IS in the lens but it is not significant enough to grant double and triple cost of the same quality lenses. What do you guys think ? Until someone comes up with a sensor-based IS that is as effective as Canon and Nikon IS/VR at all focal lengths, they have nothing to worry about save for Sony's less-than-honest marketing tactics. -- Images (Plus Snaps & Grabs) by MarkČ at: www.pbase.com/markuson |
#3
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Are IS lenses doomed ?
because in-camera IS would /eventually/ kill off their market for IS
lenses, but a huge number of photographers (including myself) would consider in-camera IS on Canon DSLRs to be a godsend, & would be saving their pennies to buy one ASAP. There might even be a little to be gained by using an IS lens on an IS chip. Probably not much, but possibly something. Also, I'm thinking IS in a 300+ mm lens is going to do a lot better than on a chip. |
#4
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Are IS lenses doomed ?
In article , VC
writes The release of Sony Alpha with the image stabilization in camera ( although this is not new) highlighted the fundamental problem with Canon. Canon have had IS lenses long ago as it would be very difficult to do in-camera stabilization in film cameras. The digital cameras had to support older lenses including the ones with IS. If Canon developed a camera with in-body stabilization it would hurt Canon sales and reputation. So I guess Canon will continue with its nonstabilized bodies and when Sony or someone else will achieve the same image sensor quality Canon will find itself in a very difficult situation. There is a very small advantage in having IS in the lens but it is not significant enough to grant double and triple cost of the same quality lenses. What do you guys think ? AIUI, the problem with in-camera IS is that the range of movement required in the chip is *much* greater than the movement required in an optical correction element in the middle of the lens. Thus, other things being equal, an in-lens system will always have the advantage, and be capable of being smaller, lighter, faster acting, or more effective (more f-stops effective benefit) or all of the above. The corollary is of course that you will need one in every lens, instead of just one in the body, but at least that one in each lens will be optimised for that lens, not constrained to some generic compromise value. So it is probably a choice of cheapness versus maximum effectiveness. I know which side I come down on, YMMV. David -- David Littlewood |
#5
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Are IS lenses doomed ?
"VC" wrote in message
... The release of Sony Alpha with the image stabilization in camera ( although this is not new) highlighted the fundamental problem with Canon. There is no problem, that's just marketing hype. Canon have had IS lenses long ago as it would be very difficult to do in-camera stabilization in film cameras. The digital cameras had to support older lenses including the ones with IS. If Canon developed a camera with in-body stabilization it would hurt Canon sales and reputation. Where do you get that idea? Canon has a good reputation as it stands, so how would adding another feature to the dozens of current features hurt their market share? Was Canons rep hurt when they introduced a sensor cleaner in the XTi? While we know the sensor cleaners are mostly hype, it doesn't seem to hurt image quality or camera performance, so how is it detrimental to sales? What do you guys think ? I think you're an easy target for marketing campaigns. :-) |
#6
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Are IS lenses doomed ?
Lionel wrote:
Also, I'm thinking IS in a 300+ mm lens is going to do a lot better than on a chip. On that, I agree with you. In-camera IS would need a huge amount of travel to compensate for the amount of shake you get with big tele lenses. What actually happens with in-body IS is that the travel is the same in extent, it's just the velocity (speed of travel) which increases with longer focal lengths. Sony (Minolta) use angular momentum sensors, since it is an angular shake which counts, so shake is not considered in mms it's in degrees (or small fractions of a degree) plus velocity. When a lens covers 8 degrees a quarter degree of shake is substantial, when a lens covers 80 degrees it's not so much. However, you are 'safe' to shoot at 1/30th without IS on an 18mm lens, but you have to use 1/500th to be safe on a 300mm lens (both APS-C examples). The long lens magnifies the shake in effect, so that the image moves as far in 1/500th with the 300mm, as it moves in 1/30th with the 18mm. The long lens only gets into 'huge amount of travel' if you try to hand-hold 1/30th at 300mm. With anti-shake, you can do 1/8th and maybe 1/4 at 18mm. You can do 1/250 or 1/125 at 300mm. In each case, the sensor is travelling about the same amount, but it is having travel faster for the 300mm. Shake does not just keep going in one direction, anway. It tends to be tremor or vibration-like when it is not a brief, fixed jerk caused by pressing the shutter. Sony's SSS will cope with tremors between 1Hz (swaying gently back and forth once a second - heartbeat, breathing) and 60Hz (someone just plugged you into a wall socket by mistake). Most shake is apparently around 10Hz, a typical frequency of human body tremor. So the system, whether in the lens or the body, has to respond to acceleration, fixed velocity, vector (direction) including rapid changes of all three. Both in-lens and in-body IS appears to function equally well over a wide range of conditions. It's not possible to state that in-lens IS is definitely superior at long focal lengths, on in-body superior with extreme wides and hand-held 1/4s. In practice I have found my KM and Sony bodies very similar to Canon IS with 100-300mmm/70-300mm lenses (the KM 100-300mm is much smaller and lighter than our early Canon IS 70-300mm, but I don't think this improves the efficiency - if anything the large Canon lens is a bit easier to hand-hold steadily). What I forget - and I suspect many others forget - is that you really should not be able to use 1/30th with either system, if the lens is at 300mm. I do so regularly, and the result is nearly always perfectly sharp. That's 4-5 stops of stabilisation, not the claimed 1-2 for the older Canon lens, or 2-3 for the KM/Sony systems. Yet both, with a little care, will give a high success rate. David |
#7
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Are IS lenses doomed ?
"VC" wrote in message
... The release of Sony Alpha with the image stabilization in camera ( although this is not new) highlighted the fundamental problem with Canon. Canon have had IS lenses long ago as it would be very difficult to do in-camera stabilization in film cameras. The digital cameras had to support older lenses including the ones with IS. If Canon developed a camera with in-body stabilization it would hurt Canon sales and reputation. So I guess Canon will continue with its nonstabilized bodies and when Sony or someone else will achieve the same image sensor quality Canon will find itself in a very difficult situation. There is a very small advantage in having IS in the lens but it is not significant enough to grant double and triple cost of the same quality lenses. What do you guys think ? The lenses are doomed, the companies that make them are doomed, photography as we know it is doomed, we are all doomed. -- Skip Middleton www.shadowcatcherimagery.com www.pbase.com/skipm |
#8
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Are IS lenses doomed ?
"VC" wrote in message ... snip a bunch of words There is a very small advantage in having IS in the lens but it is not significant enough to grant double and triple cost of the same quality lenses. What do you guys think ? I keep seeing this bandied about as the premium for IS/VR, but nowhere do I see it in actual practice. It is about a $400-500 increase in price over the non IS version, if such does exist in the lineup. The only times this has occurred is with the old 75-300, a cheap lens with a gimmick, as far as I am concerned, the 70-200 f2.8L ($1100 vs $1600) and the current 70-200 f4L ($600+ vs. $1100). Not exactly triple the price. When you get into the long teles, the price premium becomes such an insignificant part of the whole as to drop out of consideration, like with the 600mm f4L at more than $7000. So far, newer Canon IS lenses maintain their lead over sensor based IS, the 24-105 f4L and 70-200 f4L IS lenses give a minimum of 4 stops of correction. -- Skip Middleton www.shadowcatcherimagery.com www.pbase.com/skipm |
#9
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Are IS lenses doomed ?
David Kilpatrick wrote:
Lionel wrote: Also, I'm thinking IS in a 300+ mm lens is going to do a lot better than on a chip. On that, I agree with you. In-camera IS would need a huge amount of travel to compensate for the amount of shake you get with big tele lenses. What actually happens with in-body IS is that the travel is the same in extent, it's just the velocity (speed of travel) which increases with longer focal lengths. Sony (Minolta) use angular momentum sensors, since it is an angular shake which counts, so shake is not considered in mms it's in degrees (or small fractions of a degree) plus velocity. When a lens covers 8 degrees a quarter degree of shake is substantial, when a lens covers 80 degrees it's not so much. However, you are 'safe' to shoot at 1/30th without IS on an 18mm lens, but you have to use 1/500th to be safe on a 300mm lens (both APS-C examples). The long lens magnifies the shake in effect, so that the image moves as far in 1/500th with the 300mm, as it moves in 1/30th with the 18mm. No, you haven't worked out your math. Your 1/500 on 300 mm is above the 1/fl guide, so IS is not needed. Newest IS on canon claims 4 stops, so if 1/300 is the guide, then 4 stops is 1/20 second. At 18mm, the guide is 1/20 second, and 4 stops is 1 second. The IS feedback loops don't work well at 1 second. Image shake of ~1 arc-minute per 1/20 second, and tracking needs to be at least ~10 times that level (you can't keep your shake to 1 arc-minute pointing accuracy). Thus a range of 10 arc-minutes is needed at a rate of 20 arc-minutes/second. For a 300 mm lens that works out to a range of 0.9 mm (900 microns), and a rate of 1800 microns/second, with a required accuracy of ~ 2 microns (pretty difficult. Now try that with a 600 mm lens, then a 600 mm + 2x TC. Rate goes up in proportion to focal length, but so does the range, because you can't accurately point to the 1-arc-minute limit, you need a larger limit, and that is at best constant and in reality worsens as you hold more weight. Thus 1200mm would require 3.6 mm range at a rate of 7200 microns/sec with an accuracy of ~2 microns. It can be done in a lens because you can tune the power of the optical element being moved to give image movement within the range and accuracy of the device doing the movement. Also, in my experience, the 1/fl guide falls apart as the lens size goes up, and the longer you hold the lens. Try holding an 8-pound 500 mm f/4 lens for a while. Thus, for telephoto work, in lens IS is the only reasonable engineering solution. Here are example of high magnification hand help in lens IS: For this image, a friend was shooting with a 300 f/2.8 non IS lens and got no good images, despite using faster shutter speeds and lower magnification. My image was 1/1600 sec at 500 mm: http://www.clarkvision.com/galleries...598.b-700.html This one even with IS, about half the images I took were sharp, the other slightly blurry: http://www.clarkvision.com/galleries...wk.b-600..html Roger The long lens only gets into 'huge amount of travel' if you try to hand-hold 1/30th at 300mm. With anti-shake, you can do 1/8th and maybe 1/4 at 18mm. You can do 1/250 or 1/125 at 300mm. In each case, the sensor is travelling about the same amount, but it is having travel faster for the 300mm. Shake does not just keep going in one direction, anway. It tends to be tremor or vibration-like when it is not a brief, fixed jerk caused by pressing the shutter. Sony's SSS will cope with tremors between 1Hz (swaying gently back and forth once a second - heartbeat, breathing) and 60Hz (someone just plugged you into a wall socket by mistake). Most shake is apparently around 10Hz, a typical frequency of human body tremor. So the system, whether in the lens or the body, has to respond to acceleration, fixed velocity, vector (direction) including rapid changes of all three. Both in-lens and in-body IS appears to function equally well over a wide range of conditions. It's not possible to state that in-lens IS is definitely superior at long focal lengths, on in-body superior with extreme wides and hand-held 1/4s. In practice I have found my KM and Sony bodies very similar to Canon IS with 100-300mmm/70-300mm lenses (the KM 100-300mm is much smaller and lighter than our early Canon IS 70-300mm, but I don't think this improves the efficiency - if anything the large Canon lens is a bit easier to hand-hold steadily). What I forget - and I suspect many others forget - is that you really should not be able to use 1/30th with either system, if the lens is at 300mm. I do so regularly, and the result is nearly always perfectly sharp. That's 4-5 stops of stabilisation, not the claimed 1-2 for the older Canon lens, or 2-3 for the KM/Sony systems. Yet both, with a little care, will give a high success rate. David |
#10
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Are IS lenses doomed ?
Skip wrote: I keep seeing this bandied about as the premium for IS/VR, but nowhere do I see it in actual practice. It is about a $400-500 increase in price over the non IS version, if such does exist in the lineup. Canon's 8x25 IS Binoculars retail for $200 after rebate. While implementation complexity (& cost) will obviously vary, this does suggest at least that a low performance IS system has to cost less than $200. In general, I think that the "+$400-ish" rule of thumb is probably around the mark (retail), which means that anyone claiming "double", "triple", etc are only doing their comparisons based on one or two cheap lenses, rather than considering a broader range of IS lenses. -hh |
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