EOS R, is it worth it?

It’s September 2019 and you wondered if the EOS R is still a viable camera given that the Sony’s eye-AF is now the de-facto for autofocusing.

I came across the same question when I realized I have to either upgrade my apsc 6400 to A7III or another FF system.

I love the a6400, with the 30 1.4 it’s like a dream combo for general shooting including candid portraits.

There is no good reason to change the a6400. I needed to upgrade it solely because now i know enough of Sony’s tech to make an informed decision on its eyeAF game changing feature.

I have several Canon lenses, a noctilux f1 from my Leica days and an Otus 55 that demands a FF body.

** For videos need, I have settled on m43, as much as I tried using m43 with the noctilux, the 4mm sensor stack glass is unsuitable for the M lenses ( Leica M9’s width is 0.8 mm). I m sorry to say this but m43 is in many ways a much weaker format when it comes to lower-light availability. Lower light scenarios which poses no problems to FF affects m43 image quality noticably. Unless u have a tripod.

The decision to go with the EOS R is based on my own long term observation of my character. Looking at my existing inventory, I always kept lenses that I considered legendary.

The Otus 55, Noctilux f1, 90 f2.8 summicron R, Zeiss 50 f2 Makro Planar are lenses that have resisted changing hands or traded in during my photography tools discovery.

If lenses are the main drivers to what I treasure in my tools, the mount and how that affect the images in the near future as a system, is important.

The RF mount now supports some lenses that I find to be amazing, 50 1.2 RF, 28-70 2.0 RF and 35 1.8 RF. Amazing? How?

It is in the way Canon tried to show the capability of the mount with novel ideas and the balls to pursue it.

Nikon launched the Z mount with a 24-70 f4? Really? That’s pretty lame.

Sony doesn’t have any lenses that I couldn’t find the equivalent in the DSLR world and those mount are as old they go. In a way Sony’s apsc was a more interesting line.

Thinking along this line, the EOS R is the system for me. I respect that Canon came out with 28-70 f2, a lens that is never seen before and the aged reviews of the 50 1.2 RF proves that the RF mount does delivers on its promise of great optical designs.

Is the EOS R superior in anyway compare to the Sony A7iii’s lineup (A7R4 is available too) ?

Technologically, no. Nobody is.

The Canon EVF and hand held ergonomics however, are better. The colors are beautiful and the shutter sound is addictive. These small wins are good enough to make up for the loss in specs on paper.

Having said that, Canon has announced that there will be a firmware this month to ease the gap between the focusing technologies.