New - EF 50 f/1.2 L in February 2006 ?

Talks about it in Fred-Miranda forum here:
http://www.fredmiranda​.com/forum/topic/32147​4

Added the rumor link on DPReview:
http://forums.dpreview​.com …rum=1029&messag​e=16220076

I heard that rumour too, but as always with Canon, there's a lot of noice and only a bit of signal. Not in their cameras of course

Anybody know a good source for Canon "pre-announcements" like these?

P.

Thinking back i don't think i can remember a rumour about lenses that has ever come true.They seem to surprise us every time-the opposite of the cameras it seems where most can guess approximately what is comming next.

I really don't see much point to an f1.2 50mm lens.
About the only scenario that makes sense to me is if they replace the expensive 50/1.4 with the 1.2 without raising the price (much).
That would at least give them some justification for charging SO much more for their good fifty compared to the budget 50/1.8
And it would give them some neat one upmanship over nikon

Didn't we have a $1000+ 50mm 1.0L, why go down that road again.
The only reason to launch this lens is to give Dante something else to buy.

If this were true, there would finally be an L for the 50. I doubt it would kill off the production of the 1.4 because I'm sure it sells well.

They can have both as long as the 1.2 would have full ring usm, better build quality, and sharp wide open.

Last time I saw one go it was priced at $3000+

OK so I didn't know the price off my head....geez.
http://www.popphoto.co​m …ction_id=2&arti​cle_id=588

Anyway here is the review. I still question the need for an L 50mm, like a world of photos is missing from the current group of 50mm on the market Canon or not. I think some folks just want the red ring...

^^There are differences that could be made. Like full time manual focusing with ring USM. Better build quality, and sharp wide open. Although it is tough to really improve on a great lens like the 1.4 is.

The current 50mm is a FT-M lens now, ring USM or not. Now we are simply nit picky. An L 50 1.2 would run likely around $1500, wow that is alot of cash for 50mm standard lens. You could kill a few 1.4 lenses in the rain and not rack up that kind of change too. But for those that must have Lverything in a photo I guess....

The build of my L's doesn't improve the pictures I take, they are just as crappy as any other photo my skills produce.

Now, I can really see the value of fast glass, but from 1.4-->1.2 that just seems niggly don't you think? I mean the 50 f1.4 isn't exactly in the league of bad glass to use.

MrChad wrote:
The current 50mm is a FT-M lens now, ring USM or not. Now we are simply nit picky. An L 50 1.2 would run likely around $1500, wow that is alot of cash for 50mm standard lens. You could kill a few 1.4 lenses in the rain and not rack up that kind of change too. But for those that must have Lverything in a photo I guess....

The build of my L's doesn't improve the pictures I take, they are just as crappy as any other photo my skills produce.

Now, I can really see the value of fast glass, but from 1.4-->1.2 that just seems niggly don't you think? I mean the 50 f1.4 isn't exactly in the league of bad glass to use.

Yeah, my mistake. on the full time. I should know that myself, having the lens.

Well the 1.2 85 is probably going to be more, since it takes more glass. So I'd expect the 1.2 to be a little less than the 85 1.2.

Well, thats where I disagree a little. Generally the good L's have better contrast and saturation. I have owned/used the 70-200 L IS and Sigma 70-200 2.8. And one of the things that stood out to me was the better contrast and saturation. The same is seen between the 85 1.2 and 1.8.

Now is that worth the huge price difference. Depends on who you are. For someone who does portraits for a living, I can see a huge market for it especially on cropped cameras(80 on a 1.6 crop).

And will this lens make me trade in my 1.4 ever. No. Just saying there are some things that can be done to it to make it better and possibly have an argument for people to buy it over the 1.4, which is nearly an L itself.

Any reason for this assumption? The 85 1.2 is about that price, longer, more elemets. Why would a normal focal lenght like 50mm be more expensive?

Is there reason for it? Maybe not for general purposes, but for some who shoot in available darness like myself and need every bit of light we can get it might come in handy, even though it's less than a stop faster than the 50 1.4

Anyway, just rumors at this point.
If the price were reasonable when/if such a lens should appear on the maeket, I'd deffinitely consider it.

**Edit: Grego beat me to it

The 50/1.4 is a wonderful lens, but there are some things that could be better - a lot better. The build is adequate, but that 50/1.0L like it's 85 mm counterpart, was built like a tank. It had a manual-focus ring designed so that you could actually manually focus with great accuracy. It had a floating focus mechanism as opposed to the more standard setup used on the 50/1.4 & 50/1.8.

And of course, you can't argue with the bokeh of the 50/1.0. It wasn't the stellar performer that it could have been in terms of sharpness, but it was a bokeh-monster.

I think part of what made the 50/1.0L so expensive was that it had such a complex design - much more complex than the more simple 50/1.4 and even simpler 50/1.8.

Anyway, after saying all that, I would prefer that Canon simply update the 50/1.4 to the same ring-type USM scheme and build as the 28/1.8, 85/1.8, and other lenses. It's a much smoother system. And they could tweak the optics a bit as well, though it certainly isn't a slouch in that department.

cmM wrote:
Any reason for this assumption? The 85 1.2 is about that price, longer, more elemets. Why would a normal focal lenght like 50mm be more expensive?

Is there reason for it? Maybe not for general purposes, but for some who shoot in available darness like myself and need every bit of light we can get it might come in handy, even though it's less than a stop faster than the 50 1.4

Anyway, just rumors at this point.
If the price were reasonable when/if such a lens should appear on the maeket, I'd deffinitely consider it.

**Edit: Grego beat me to it

It really doesn't reflect a potential 50/1.2L lens in the future, but the 50/1.0L had 11 elements in 9 groups as opposed to the 85/1.2L's 8 elements in 7 groups. I suspect though that there was an optical hurdle in getting to f/1.0 that may not be a problem if f/1.2 is the goal.

My thoughts exactly.

Anyway, we;re discussing the lens design of a 50mm that doesn't exist yet.

When I first started using an SLR I seem to recall that most of the manufacturers had an f/1.8, f/1.4 and f/1.2 50mm or 55mm lens. I agree with Tom that there is likely an "optical hurdle" to cross to get to f/1.0.