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Archive 2013 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?

  
 
Milan Hutera
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p.5 #1 · p.5 #1 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?


All reviews should be taken with a grain of salt. Just compare the photozone.de numbers on these reviews:

The legendary Canon 300mm f2,8 L IS scored 1640 points in center wide open: http://web.archive.org/web/20060424173023/http://www.photozone.de/8Reviews/lenses/canon_300_28is/index.htm

and the puny Canon 18-55 IS scored 2009 points in center wide open at 18mm:
http://www.photozone.de/canon-eos/181-canon-ef-s-18-55mm-f35-56-is-test-report--review?start=1

No wonder the 300L review was pulled and never re-published. Thank God for the Web Archive...



Dec 23, 2013 at 04:42 AM
jpeter
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p.5 #2 · p.5 #2 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?




a real MTF test of the lens conducted by Hasselblads MTF lab in Gothenburg Sweden, old Photodo with the world largest MTF tests were performed by Hasselblad in Sweden , today the magazine Photo (Foto) here in Sweden runs a number of real tests every year

Thanks for the Photodo site, looks like a good resource.
JP


Dec 23, 2013 at 08:00 AM
Peacekpr
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p.5 #3 · p.5 #3 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?


@Ratsnest, rest assured that your Nikon friend was happy to find something like this that gave him the warm and squishy feeling about his own lenses. I have a degree in LASERs and Optics. Even I have a difficult wading thru the myriad of lenses on the market. While I'm confident that Canon L grade glass is at the cutting edge of optics there are others making awesome lenses as well. Sigma's programmable lenses may not have the best elements but the flexibility this evolution provides puts it on my wish list. The bottom line is this website exists to market a product (the software). As such it's bound to cater to the widest audience possible and that will influence the results.



Dec 23, 2013 at 09:12 AM
ratsnest74
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p.5 #4 · p.5 #4 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?


yes the Nikonian was not being nice and trying to upset me. I knew he was full of it but didnt understand the data, now I do, thanks to you all!


Dec 23, 2013 at 10:51 AM
skibum5
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p.5 #5 · p.5 #5 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?


Milan Hutera wrote:
All reviews should be taken with a grain of salt. Just compare the photozone.de numbers on these reviews:

The legendary Canon 300mm f2,8 L IS scored 1640 points in center wide open: http://web.archive.org/web/20060424173023/http://www.photozone.de/8Reviews/lenses/canon_300_28is/index.htm

and the puny Canon 18-55 IS scored 2009 points in center wide open at 18mm:
http://www.photozone.de/canon-eos/181-canon-ef-s-18-55mm-f35-56-is-test-report--review?start=1

No wonder the 300L review was pulled and never re-published. Thank God for the Web Archive...


yeah they had some weird results with their old long prime tests, they had to test then outdoors with a different setup and things obivously didn't translate, so they got rid of all those tests and even gave up on longer than 200m for a while I believe



Dec 23, 2013 at 08:52 PM
skibum5
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p.5 #6 · p.5 #6 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?


Milan Hutera wrote:
All reviews should be taken with a grain of salt. Just compare the photozone.de numbers on these reviews:

The legendary Canon 300mm f2,8 L IS scored 1640 points in center wide open: http://web.archive.org/web/20060424173023/http://www.photozone.de/8Reviews/lenses/canon_300_28is/index.htm

and the puny Canon 18-55 IS scored 2009 points in center wide open at 18mm:
http://www.photozone.de/canon-eos/181-canon-ef-s-18-55mm-f35-56-is-test-report--review?start=1

No wonder the 300L review was pulled and never re-published. Thank God for the Web Archive...


yeah they had some weird results with their old long prime tests, they had to test then outdoors with a different setup and things obivously didn't translate, so they got rid of all those tests and even gave up on longer than 200m for a while I believe

BTW, the 18-55 IS is actually not so puny, at it's best settings it's actually astonishingly sharp, it tends to be a bit drabber with colors and contrast and has some other weird aspects, but it's actually fully up there with sharp L lenses in many respects of pure sharpness (and no I'm not accidentally thinking o the 17-55 IS)



Dec 23, 2013 at 08:53 PM
skibum5
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p.5 #7 · p.5 #7 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?


Paul Mo wrote:
The most reliable lens tests for me have always been whether or not I am envious of another photog's work.

I often find their test charts on the walls at World Press Photo, VII, or Magnum exhibitions, or inexplicably hidden inside things called 'books' in so-called libraries.


Isn't that a photographer test not a lens test?



Dec 23, 2013 at 08:55 PM
skibum5
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p.5 #8 · p.5 #8 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?


dehowie wrote:
Skibum nailed it right on the head.
And people place faith in DXO ratings is the scary thing as many dont know any better.
Roger C's blog has a good post about why basing lens ratings on sensir res is basically as flawed a testing method as you can have. Yet the self proclaimed leaders in testing tech(in there own minds anyway) continue to plow on with pathetic testing proving time and again how poor the Canon super tele range is easily outperformed by the consumer lenses.
Yet people continually place DXO as some kind of bench mark...a company which rates cameras without
...Show more

To be fair I think their idividual sensor plot data is pretty accurate and quite useful. So I wouldn't just toss them off. I DO think they have some very good stuff there.

Everything else though.... basically anything to do with lenses I find suspect, even the individual data plots in many cases (some maybe accurate but some seem tobe very far from and how do you know which are which unless you've tried the lenses yourself and read a ton about them elsewhere at which point why bother with their plots). And any sort of overall scores for whatever they test seem to be dubious at best (including sensors since no single score will focus on what everyone cares about most or maybe even anyone, how do you mash low and high ISO DR and SNR and color and so on all together? and not even count MP at all?).



Dec 23, 2013 at 09:01 PM
codyconway
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p.5 #9 · p.5 #9 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?


I love how its always a Nikon shooter that points out the D scores . . . and then tells me that his D600 with kit lens will destroy my L glass heh . . . silly nikonians


Dec 24, 2013 at 11:36 AM
Mark K
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p.5 #10 · p.5 #10 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?


Mikael Risedal wrote:
a real MTF test of the lens conducted by Hasselblads MTF lab in Gothenburg Sweden, old Photodo with the world largest MTF tests were performed by Hasselblad in Sweden , today the magazine Photo (Foto) here in Sweden runs a number of real tests every year



I wonder what happened to Photodo



Jan 19, 2014 at 08:36 AM
Mark K
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p.5 #11 · p.5 #11 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?


Just found...Photodo


Jan 19, 2014 at 09:02 AM
molson
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p.5 #12 · p.5 #12 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?


ratsnest74 wrote:
http://www.dxomark.com/Lenses/Ratings/Optical-Metric-Scores

First page (top 28 lenses):

10 Nikon Lenses. 1 Canon. Even Tamron and Sigma each have 2 in the top 28...




Hey - it could be worse... you could be a fan of Sony lenses.



Jan 19, 2014 at 08:02 PM
tsdevine
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p.5 #13 · p.5 #13 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?



Wait until they post the 35 and 55 FE results...

molson wrote:
Hey - it could be worse... you could be a fan of Sony lenses.




Jan 19, 2014 at 08:05 PM
Paul Mo
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p.5 #14 · p.5 #14 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?



skibum5 wrote:
So I wouldn't just toss them off.


Neither would I - as measurebators they're tossing themselves off just fine.



Jan 19, 2014 at 08:31 PM
molson
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p.5 #15 · p.5 #15 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?


tsdevine wrote:
Wait until they post the 35 and 55 FE results...




Perhaps... but what about all of the other Sony lenses?



Jan 20, 2014 at 06:29 PM
tsdevine
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p.5 #16 · p.5 #16 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?



Per your earlier post that DxO favors higher resolution....the 35 FE and 55 FE will be tested on the a7R, which is close to D800E performance.

Should get Sony a lens or two in the top 28, since you mentioned that things could be worse (than Canon)...could be Sony. Most likely Sony and Canon will have about the same number of lenses in the top 28 then (per the original post...not sure what magic there is in the top 28 though.)

If/when Sony comes out with a 36 MP FF DSLR, some of their other lenses will probably move up the list. Same for when Canon gets around to releasing their high MP camera.

-Tim

molson wrote:
Perhaps... but what about all of the other Sony lenses?



Jan 20, 2014 at 06:40 PM
molson
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p.5 #17 · p.5 #17 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?


tsdevine wrote:
Per your earlier post that DxO favors higher resolution....the 35 FE and 55 FE will be tested on the a7R, which is close to D800E performance.

Should get Sony a lens or two in the top 28, since you mentioned that things could be worse (than Canon)...could be Sony. Most likely Sony and Canon will have about the same number of lenses in the top 28 then (per the original post...not sure what magic there is in the top 28 though.)

If/when Sony comes out with a 36 MP FF DSLR, some of their other lenses will probably move up the
...Show more

Sony's had higher-resolution sensors than Canon for several years now, so that must not explain their lower ratings...



Jan 20, 2014 at 06:42 PM
tsdevine
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p.5 #18 · p.5 #18 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?


From a full frame perspective Canon's 21/22 MP offerings are pretty close to Sony's 24 MP. I was talking in the D800/E range of 36 MP.

When that happens...the Sony lenses will move up, maybe higher than some Canon's. When Canon releases their 36 MP cameras, they'll move up again and will leapfrog some of the Sony lenses that had move up the list due to a higher MP camera. Canon has good glass no doubt.

In any case, specifically with the a7R + the 35 FE and 55 FE I think they'll move up the list. I think they really hit the ball out of the park on those two lenses.

-Tim

molson wrote:
Sony's had higher-resolution sensors than Canon for several years now, so that must not explain their lower ratings...



Jan 20, 2014 at 07:07 PM
kzoockof
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p.5 #19 · p.5 #19 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?


You think these reviews are useless, go to audiogon.com and read the reviews how one 3 foot long power cable valued at $6,000 blows away another brand of 3 foot long power cable valued at $9,000, when hooked up to your $12,000 CD transport that doesn't even come with a power cable.

Now have a few more cups of coffee and take that 800mm lens out and see just how sharp it is compared to the scores.



Jan 20, 2014 at 07:24 PM
gdanmitchell
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p.5 #20 · p.5 #20 · Why Do Canon Lenses Score so Low?


kzoockof wrote:
You think these reviews are useless, go to audiogon.com and read the reviews how one 3 foot long power cable valued at $6,000 blows away another brand of 3 foot long power cable valued at $9,000, when hooked up to your $12,000 CD transport that doesn't even come with a power cable.


I used to have a friend whose job was doing location recording of jazz performers and symphony orchestras. He was one of the first folks I knew who did digital location recording, using a system that captured converted analog audio to digital and then recorded the audio data on video cassettes - cutting edge stuff in those days.

He knew his audio inside out, and he knew sound really well.

I always think of him telling a story about an audiophile product that he swore up and down was real back in those days (more than a few years ago), called "Wonder Solder." Apparently the schtick of this audiophile product was that you would first go out and buy the highest-end gear you could afford at stratospheric prices. But this wasn't good enough because, according to the Wonder Solder people, the sound could have been much better if the manufacturers of these best of the best products had only used better solder. So... one was to desolder the components of the miraculously good state of the art gear and resolder them using Wonder Solder... for an astounding improvement in clarity, dynamic contrast, an expansion of the sound stage, better frequency response, and other wondrous improvements that those who needed the best could not possibly forego. By the time he got to this point in telling the story he was invariably laughing so hard that he could barely talk and was in danger of falling over...

Meanwhile, there was usually a symphony orchestra playing on the stage at which he told these stories... and no matter how good your audiophile system is, it can never equal the sound of an actual symphony orchestra.

Funny stuff.

Dan



Jan 20, 2014 at 07:34 PM
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