Canon R100 + Canon RF 24-105mm f/4-7.1 IS STM

[Chako]

Another sunny day and another brief walk at the local park. Today was my first outing with a new used lens that I found locally off of Amazon marketplace. The seller had it up for 4 weeks and nobody expressed interest in it. When I found out about it, it was already heavily discounted, so I paid 200 Canadian for it which is a great deal consider the seller only used the lens a few times, and she did not care for it. It retails in the 500 dollar range new. Considering I only have the kit 18-45mm and the 800mm lens for these new mirrorless cameras, adding this one to the group seemed to be a smart move, and it was a local pickup.

Anyways, these were taken earlier today with the Canon RF 24-105mm lens on the R100 body. The lens worked great, and there are no issues with it. It appears to have a not bad macro function at 105mm end. I did find it very limiting for wildlife. There were a few times on my brief walk that I wanted more reach. Now this is an RF lens meaning it is designed for full frame cameras. With the crop factor of 1.6X, the lens acts like a 38.4-168mm lens which is a weird focal range. I have a 70-200mm EF lens that I used recently, and found that the converted 112-320mm was perfect for birding up close. I plan on buying an RF 100-400mm lens to fill in the gap for wildlife photography down the road anyways. Still happy with my rather cheap purchase, and there is nothing I can fault the lens for. I am viewing it as more of a landscape general purpose lens. Can't argue with the price.

Now today, I did a silly faux pas. I neglected to set my autofocus to Servo AI, which means that once I press the shutter, the camera does not update the focus on the fly. This explains why my 2 impromptu Pigeon bird in flight shots did not turn out as I would have liked them. It was quick and I am amazed that I was even able to get the bird in frame. I had set the camera to continuous drive...so although the camera took several shots in sequence, it failed to update the focus. I share them here because they are still nice if not as in focus that I would like them to be.

Enough ramblings, and onto today's photos.

The lens is sharp and excels at this type of imagery.
IMG_1198A by Chako, on Flickr

IMG_1206A by Chako, on Flickr

IMG_1215A by Chako, on Flickr

The old power generating plant on the Sault Michigan side.
IMG_1221A by Chako, on Flickr

IMG_1224A by Chako, on Flickr

IMG_1226A by Chako, on Flickr

A bunch of Cobra Chickens relaxing in their natural environment...planning their next victim.
IMG_1233A by Chako, on Flickr

They are not that bad. I have never been attacked by one, even though this one was sizing me up.
IMG_1247A by Chako, on Flickr

IMG_1249A by Chako, on Flickr

Pigeons or Rock Doves are very pretty birds, especially if you can get the lighting good to highlight their iridescent plumage.
IMG_1260A by Chako, on Flickr

Not sure what it was today, but the Cobra Chickens all looked at me a bit funny.
IMG_1261A by Chako, on Flickr

Here are my 2 bird in shot flights that could have been a bit better if I had the camera settings correct.
IMG_1273A by Chako, on Flickr

IMG_1274A by Chako, on Flickr

[tosh]

Hey Dan
I have the same lens….and if I’m honest I don’t  particularly like it 😬
The 7.1 max aperture is  just appalling for a modern lens.
Instead I now opt for primes
RF16, 28, 50 and 85is (the 24-105 never sees use) With the crop factor that gives 25,45, 80 and 135
Usually I just take two (16 & 80)

It’s odd because I have a few 24-105 both F4 and F5.6 but for some odd reason I hate the slow 7.1 max aperture. It pushes my iso up which then gives noisy images.

I’m surprised you didn’t get the R7 or even the R3/R1 as we all know you. 🤣👍🏻

I had the RP, but I’ve just given it away after I purchased both R100 & R50
Hence I have a lens on each and no swapping when out - the exposed fragile sensor freaks me out. 🫣

Both mine are fitted with the Neewer cage  (Amazon) to me it trumps smallrig as the Neewer has 3point fixing (smallrig has 1). The cage helps ergonomics  with bigger lenses. I have a few  L’s both zooms and primes and with the cage fitted the bigger grip helps on the tiny R50.

I can’t recommend it enough. Incase you didn’t know the cage fits both R50 and R100 hence why I bought those bodies. As for the R100… canons cripple hammer reputation  went too far. The lack of touchscreen  is unforgivable in my view, I can appreciate omitting the swivel screen and disabling  the ability for the body  to utilise the control ring  - which tbh  is just downright  vindictive of canon. But the lack of touchscreen really does ruin the camera and ofcourse the lack of sensor cleaning too!!

Ridiculous

For context I still have the entire inventory of the former canon M system, every model and every lens and canon managed perfectly well to incorporate both touch screen and sensor cleaning on all!!

As a result I’ve now abandoned buying more canon  (after almost 40yrs) I’ll keep what I have but if I need more tech I’m jumping to Nikon…. 👍🏻

[MadPlumbarian]

Interesting, the kid wants to get into photography, what he wants as far as a camera goes I have no clue..
JR

[Chako]

Sorry for the late response. I am having a bit of a medical issue which necessitated my having a one week hospital stay and daily visits to a wound care clinic.

I do not care about touch screens honestly as most of my older cameras never had them. I recently came into a very cheap 80D which I have only used a few times...so the R100 not having one was a non issue for me.

As far as slower lenses, I have found that these new Canon mirrorless cameras deal with that quite effectively, especially when compared to all of my Canon DSLRs and EF/EFS lenses. The fact that I can hand hold an 800mm f11 is phenomenal. Mind you, I did it all day long on a Sigma 50-500mm with no stabilization on my DSLRs. That was a weight training exercise compared to these much lighter newer lenses.

I have never played with the M series Canons.

I found the R100 with kit lens for 200 Canadian. I then bought the 800mm f11 because I enjoy wildlife, and thought the slow lens would be limiting. I have not found that to be the case. I then bought the RF 24-105 because someone locally was selling it on Amazon Marketplace. It was fairly cheap. I then bought an R10 which I think is the sweet spot in bang for your buck. I tend to shoot wildlife and am not interested in full sized sensor cameras. Besides, I have a 5D Mark II if I needed it on tap. The R10 is phenomenal as far as the autofocus and tracking goes. It feels like I am cheating at times. I just got in an RF 100-400mm f5.6-8 IS USM yesterday. After using the 800mm f11, I am no longer worried overly much about using slower lenses on R series cameras.

As for Nikon, Canon is trashing Nikon on the autofocus front. If I had a choice, I would go with Sony over Nikon personally.