Monday, July 31, 2023

A great combo: Canon EOS R and RF 35!

I haven't blogged in a while and I figured this was one worthy of a post.

Last week we took a nice vacation.  Normally when I go on vacation, pack EVERYTHING photographic.  Camera, all the lenses, film camera w/film, extra batteries, extra SD cards, etc, etc.  That usually is about 35-40 lbs of gear with the bag alone.  This year, I decided to much smaller:

That was it!  No film cameras, no zoom lenses, just a more "bare bones" approach that would fit in my small shoulder bag I got off of Amazon a few years back along with an insert that fit it perfectly.  My thought was just to go slim and I'm glad I did.



I found after a few days that I was using the 35mm lens and not the others.  The Canon EOS R is a 30MP camera that hit the market several years ago and was one of the first Canon mirrorless cameras.  I jumped on the mirrorless bandwagon, (even though I bought a 5D Mark IV the previous year), and I haven't looked back!

What I found this week as I really deep dived into shooting with it is that the lens and camera combo are fantastic!  The sharpness and detail I got from my images I feel rivals anything I've ever captured with the 5D and my Tamaron and Sigma lenses.

The 35mm lens is a macro lens as well and you can get REALLY close to your subjects while being able to maintain a wide angle of view which gives you a lot of room to play with depth of field.  To often in the past, I've forced myself to use either my 24-70 or 70-200 because I didn't want to miss a shot.  But this time, I stopped worrying and stuck with primes.  

In my experience, the STM line of glass didn't really hold up as well as the L series of glass that Canon has produced with regards to sharpness and clarity.  But with this recent generation of lenses, that really seems to have changed.  I LOVE my EOS R.  Sure, it's a 5 year old camera and doesn't have all the fancy bells and whistles that the newer line of Canon R bodies that are on the market, but I am content with this camera.  I don't shoot a lot of video so I know there's missing features that video creators look for, but if you're looking for a step into the mirrorless world, I highly recommend this camera.  Sure, I want an R5, but will probably settle for an R6 Mark II or the R8 which has most all the same "guts" of the R6mII, but for around $1000 less!

For now, I'll keep shooting with this combo because after having a week to intentionally slow down and enjoy the process and not worry about missing things, I think I found something great that I've been missing out for a long time.  I think next on my list will be a day with the RF50!

Here's some of what I captured from the Cleveland Museum of Art and The Age of Steam Roundhouse.  Enjoy!