Canon R Mount - Lack of Third Party Lenses

[StefanMundt]

I am shooting with Canon cameras for decades. I once owned the original EOS 1 SLR and the EOS 3 classic film cameras. I have a photography business and five canon bodies sitting here. I have plenty of original canon gear that I accumulated over the years. 

I was always loyal to the canon brand but consider to switch to a competitor. The reason being, that I cannot purchase third party lenses for the canon R mount. 

It is really frustrating! 

[shadowsports]

Greetings,

Happy Holidays.  I would suggest waiting about 60 days before walking the plank.  (Just a rumor)  You might get a surprise mid February.  

[Tronhard]

This comes up from time to time, and my advice to you is be patient and, in the meantime, do some research.

Canon  is compared often to Sony, which currently has a slew of third party lenses made for it.  However, I went to the effort of logging the release dates of Sony-compatible 3rd party lenses and  when Sony released their lens mount back in 2011 there was a gap of about 5 years when very few third party lenses were available and many of those had limited features. The vast majority of 3rd party lenses have been released since 2017. 

If you compare that to Canon's engagement, and particularly considering that we had massive disruption from COVID to design, manufacture and distribution - which is still going on for a combination of causes, including wars.  Canon are, in fact ahead of the game here.
This list from Canon Rumors is over a year old but still not insignificant:
Third Party Lenses for the RF mount (canonrumors.com)
My point is that there have been some third-party lenses available for Canon's R mount for a while - is it that they many not be the ones you want?  They have generally been manual focus and/or aperture lenses, for much the same reason as happened for Sony. 

That is, that during the development of a lens mount there is a dynamic situation as lot of changes are made to firmware for both camera bodies and lenses.  That makes releasing such data for the much more sophisticated systems on the R-mount carries risk for all parties if that data is changed. 

Also, on a purely economical bases, an OEM has every right to claim exclusivity over the lenses for a period to get its own native lenses out and recoup the many millions involved in developing the whole new system.  No-one has the right to automatically take over the IP of another company and use it to make competitive products.  That said, both Nikon and Canon have said they will work with trusted manufacturers to release 3rd party lenses on a case-by-case basis.   

As an indicator of this, there are indications of an announcement in February by Sigma of several R-native lenses coming from them.  In fact, the likelihood is that this has been agreed upon some time ago, but developing a lens range is not a simple or fast process.  There were indications of that this might be the case in two interviews:
July 2022: Interview with SIGMA Corporation CEO Kazuto Yamaki - July 2022 (youtube.com) check out timestamp  16:40.

at the end of last year when, in an interview, the head of Sigma was showing off their massively expanded factory, incorporating a doubling of their design engineer complement - and in a question posed about this specifically, Kazuto Yamaki's answer was that this expansion to deal with development for the new lens mounts - note the plural.  There are only two such mounts: the Nikon Z mount and the Canon RF mount.
In the meantime, Sigma made a video stating that their EF lenses work as well with the RF mount as the EF mount, but very recently they have withdrawn that - logic suggests that this is because they now want the market to embrace their new RF native lenses.
I have used Sigma and Tamron lenses with no issues on my R5, R6 and R6II cameras. 

So, I am curious as to  what is there about using current 3rd party lenses that is inhibiting your photography to the point of ditching a long-term association? Or, perhaps is this a matter of philosophical outlook?

[Winblows]

consider this EF-EOS R adapter

[Waddizzle]

I feel Canon is getting unfair criticism for the lack of third party lenses on their new RF mount.  People like to point to Sony as an example of how they think it should be done.  Unfortunately, the Sony E-Mount is a really bad example to use.

Why?  When Sony first introduced the E-Mount in 2011 they were not making their own lenses.  They hired out production of “Sony” branded lenses to Hasselblad and Leica.  These two companies were initially the only third party companies offering lenses for the Sony E-Mount, which began in 2013.  Companies like Sigma and Tamron introduced lenses soon after.

But, these initial third party lenses from Sigma and Tamron, as well as Hasselblad and Leica were not very good lenses.  Sigma only offered 3 or 4 wide angle primes, no zooms.  Until as recently as 2017, most Sony users were using Canon EF mount adapters so they could use Canon EF mount zoom lenses and longer focal lengths.  

It was between 2017 and 2019 that third party lens production for the E-Mount really took off.  Notice that this was some 6 to 8 years after the Sony E-Mount was first introduced.

Unlike Sony who was forced to open their E-Mount from day one, Canon produces their own lineup of lenses.  Canon released the EOS R five years ago in the fourth quarter of 2018.

Many third party manufacturers jumped on the bandwagon and began producing RF mount products, EF-RF mount adapters and lenses.  Nearly all of them caused problems.  In some cases the incompatible products probably damaged cameras and lenses.  It was causing Canon a lot of grief and a bad reputation.  So, Canon forced those third party manufacturers to stop selling RF mount products.

Rumor has it this may change next year, possibly within the first few months of 2024.  This is a timetable that is a little shorter than the one Sony followed, and Sony was using third party lenses for the start.

[quintenverniers]

I fully understand what you are saying but I don't really agree.
While indeed Third party RF products caused issues, the reason for it is that canon just doesn't give out any details of how RF is supposed to work. They didn't with EF either but manufacturers have found a way to reverse engineer the mount/communication and make lenses.

For RF until now (in 2024 sigma and tamron announced and released RF-S lenses) was locked down. It was not allowed by canon to make Autofocus lenses for the RF mount.

now it seems like that ban is lifted slightly, only for APS-c for now.
In my opinion it's not an issue of third parties offering worse products, it's canon that doesn't want other companies selling lenses so that we all are forced to buy canon lenses.

The thing is: canon lenses are too expensive for non-professional use.
I'd love a 24-70 2.8, but the RF version is €2700.
The EF version is around €1800 while the EF sigma version is €1200 new.
If sigma made a RF 24-70 at €1500, it would be an option for non-pros.
Currently the RF mount is not attractive to hobbyists.
I'm staying patient, adapting EF lenses for the time being,
but if canon doesn't allow third party full frame lenses soon, I'm switching to Sony.
Sony's offering is just as good, but overall options are cheaper.

[Waddizzle]

“ I fully understand what you are saying but I don't really agree.
While indeed Third party RF products caused issues, the reason for it is that canon just doesn't give out any details of how RF is supposed to work. They didn't with EF either but manufacturers have found a way to reverse engineer the mount/communication and make lenses. “

I must question your understanding.  Why should Canon invest millions of dollars into years of R&D, and then just simply give away the fruits of their labor, their intellectual properties, to competitors free of charge?

I am sorry that Canon is not living up to your expectations.  As I pointed out above, Canon is moving at a pace that is faster than what Sony did with their E mount.  The first few third party lenses have been announced.  Just like with Sony, the first few lenses are wide angle primes.

It would be another 3 years after their initial offerings that Sigma and Tamron expanded their E-mount lens lineup beyond those first few primes.  This would be a timetable that would be nearly 15 years since the introduction of the E-mount.

The RF mount was introduced in September 2018.  If Canon followed Sony’s timetable, then third party lenses would not be introduced until some time after 2018, with a full lineup of lenses not hitting the market until the 2030s.

[Tronhard]

I wrote at some length to explain the context for the situation at present, so I'm not going to repeat myself, but will emphasize that  limiting access to IP is normal business practice. 

If you can't understand and accept that, I really would encourage you to go to Sony - that is the benefit of a free market.