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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

New Canon Speed Booster

Now if someone made a bottom plate which secured the speed booster to the Komodo, I would not complain. Just sayin'
 
Christoffer Glans said:
Different in that Canon's is tested against their glass and has much better optical quality than the metabones. That's been a main issue for many who decided not to buy the metabones one. As for protruding into the body, yes, a little.

1600933654_IMG_1421924.jpg
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Thanks Christoffer!

I meant different in design/size/thickness (not necessarily quality), but that image does a good job of showing it. Looks lower-profile than other Focal Reducers, so it could be a new optical design entirely.

Long shot, but are the technical drawing/dimensions of Canon's Focal Reducer anywhere (I can't find anything)?
 
Christoffer Glans said:
Wondering though, since it has a screw set to lock it into place, if it's possible to lock a mount to the Komodo in a similar way? If it has play while focusing, that's gonna be pretty bad. This is a worry for the normal adapter as well.
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Ok, so are we to believe it works or is this still a "maybe" due to unconfirmed play while focusing ?
 
David Collard said:
Ok, so are we to believe it works or is this still a "maybe" due to unconfirmed play while focusing ?
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It's a maybe until we can test it out thoroughly. The best thing would be if someone made an actual adapter setup where we could use the four screws around the adapter. I'm not sure that's possible on the Komodo, but that would be the best way to lock it into place, since as Björn mentions, even though the foot can be locked into place, it can bend. It will however not be any worse than a normal adapter, like the normal adapter that comes with the Komodo, but if we got something to lock the four screws into place, that would be perfect. Looking at the images, however, I think that would require screw holes into the actual camera body.

We know that it works, so if it has too much play or not has to be tested. Maybe you could test it at a local photography store?
 
I prefer speed booster, but now I would rather wait until some major brand finish their special design for Komodo.
 
Christoffer Glans said:
Different in that Canon's is tested against their glass and has much better optical quality than the metabones. That's been a main issue for many who decided not to buy the metabones one. As for protruding into the body, yes, a little.

1600933654_IMG_1421924.jpg
Click to expand...

Do you have a link to an actual optical comparison? The examples in the Canon patent aren't impressive.
 
Brian Caldwell said:
Do you have a link to an actual optical comparison? The examples in the Canon patent aren't impressive.
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Well, I may be at fault for induction logic in this, but metabones has been criticized for lowering the general quality of the image. Canon's adapter is tested with the CN-Es, it's the primary reason it exists, to work with the C70 and the CN-E primes and zooms. If they design it around that and use the optical quality of their decade-old experienced lens manufacturing, of course, the optical quality will be superior. Metabones aren't even close to where Canon stands in terms of lens manufacturing. It's also reflected in the higher price, essentially, you get what you pay for. People can try and prove me wrong on this, but the inductive conclusion is pretty sound for this.
 
I've tested many speedboosters for various projects. Metabones is the best quality out there. Most of the issues with metabones in the field were user error IMO. Canon certainly has vast talent and resources. They don't have the experience in designing speed boosters. Don't under estimate Brian's years of track record with focal reducers. He is the brain behind this whole "movement"
 
Jacek Zakowicz said:
I've tested many speedboosters for various projects. Metabones is the best quality out there. Most of the issues with metabones in the field were user error IMO. Canon certainly has vast talent and resources. They don't have the experience in designing speed boosters. Don't under estimate Brian's years of track record with focal reducers. He is the brain behind this whole "movement"
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They literally have decades of experience making optical expanders, which is just the opposite. And they have decades of experience making lenses. There's no magic to speed boosters, it's basically just a lens with a lens attached to it and Canon is one of the world leaders in manufacturing photographic glass.

I'm not concluding anything based on anything else than the reviews from people who used this gear. Some are ok with optical degradation, but some are not. Brian is a genius for pushing these things, but someone's vision may not be enough up against a titan when it comes to glass manufacturing.

Then there's the question of functionality. It's easier to deduce that Canon EF lenses will work better on something designed by Canon. It's made to work with their lineup of lenses, which means the functionality from RF to EF is more likely to work than on third party gear. It's even reported that metabones have functionality issues with Komodo while the Canon one do not.

Of course, until we can get our hands on it we won't know for sure, but the rational argument is in favor of the Canon having better quality for this purpose of shooting.
 
Christoffer Glans said:
Of course, until we can get our hands on it we won't know for sure, but the rational argument is in favor of the Canon having better quality for this purpose of shooting.
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Do you have a link to an actual optical comparison?
 
Try both first, and state your opinion later. All speedboosters degrade the image does not matter who makes them, can be more or less ofcourse but you put thick optics behind your lens that is not optimized for all focal lengths so results may vary between one reduducer to another differently between focal lengths for example. All boosters come with some quirks so nomatter how big of a lens manufacturer canon is does not matter much they still need to make compromises when making it. And yes canon do make really good lenses and a lot of them, but they also make a lot of plasticy low quality stuff. So I dont see their name as a stamp for quality. Metabones on the other hand I only had good experience with. Thier boosters hit way above thier price and the build quality is not canon plastic. And the pass trough electronics bettween the different mounts, metabones has done such for basically every mount out there without issues.
 
Björn Benckert said:
Try both first, and state your opinion later. All speedboosters degrade the image does not matter who makes them, can be more or less ofcourse but you put thick optics behind your lens that is not optimized for all focal lengths so results may vary between one reduducer to another differently between focal lengths for example. All boosters come with some quirks so nomatter how big of a lens manufacturer canon is does not matter much they still need to make compromises when making it. And yes canon do make really good lenses and a lot of them, but they also make a lot of plasticy low quality stuff. So I dont see their name as a stamp for quality. Metabones on the other hand I only had good experience with. Thier boosters hit way above thier price and the build quality is not canon plastic. And the pass trough electronics bettween the different mounts, metabones has done such for basically every mount out there without issues.
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The canon speed booster is made with the same metal as the L series and isn't priced as Canon's plastic lineups. But even their plastic lenses, the cheapest 50mm around is still optically better than most equally priced lenses on the market.
But the kicker in this is that the Canon speed booster is tested with their glass, primarily with cinema lenses in mind. So if using EF Canon lenses, this speed booster was made based on how they perform with these lenses, especially the CN-Es. As an owner of this lineup of lenses, I don't think the Metabones speed booster, at least not in this setup.

We shall see in December when they arrive, but so far, all reports from the ones who tested the Canon one seems to confirm improvements over existing speed boosters, Metabones included.
 
Björn Benckert said:
All speedboosters degrade the image does not matter who makes them,
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The good news is that things aren't quite that simple. In the whitepaper linked below I show measured MTF data demonstrating that a speedboosted Zeiss Otus at f/1.0 actually outperforms a plain Otus at f/1.4. Of course, proper speedbooster design is essential for this to happen. In the same paper I also demonstrate how a "real world" focal reducer can actually be better than "perfect". The key here is to understand that a large majority of photographic lenses have a similar aberration balance - especially near the optical axis - and its possible to be "better than perfect" by compensating for those aberrations.

https://www.metabones.com/assets/a/...Speed Booster ULTRA for M43) - Whitepaper.pdf
 
Brian Caldwell said:
The good news is that things aren't quite that simple. In the whitepaper linked below I show measured MTF data demonstrating that a speedboosted Zeiss Otus at f/1.0 actually outperforms a plain Otus at f/1.4. Of course, proper speedbooster design is essential for this to happen. In the same paper I also demonstrate how a "real world" focal reducer can actually be better than "perfect". The key here is to understand that a large majority of photographic lenses have a similar aberration balance - especially near the optical axis - and its possible to be "better than perfect" by compensating for those aberrations.

https://www.metabones.com/assets/a/...Speed Booster ULTRA for M43) - Whitepaper.pdf
Click to expand...


Yes its natural that the image improve the MTF and quality of the image in such sense that the projection get more concentrated. But you also introduce more corner softness and other oddities as you use more of the rim of tge projection.

Will be interesting to see the canon booster side to side with metabones. My guess is they both have their quirks.
 
Brian Caldwell said:
The good news is that things aren't quite that simple. In the whitepaper linked below I show measured MTF data demonstrating that a speedboosted Zeiss Otus at f/1.0 actually outperforms a plain Otus at f/1.4. Of course, proper speedbooster design is essential for this to happen. In the same paper I also demonstrate how a "real world" focal reducer can actually be better than "perfect". The key here is to understand that a large majority of photographic lenses have a similar aberration balance - especially near the optical axis - and its possible to be "better than perfect" by compensating for those aberrations.

https://www.metabones.com/assets/a/...Speed Booster ULTRA for M43) - Whitepaper.pdf
Click to expand...

When was this paper written/published? I remember Roger Cicala first being sceptical about the "speedbooster" but pleasently surprised after testing.
And an other question: is this https://petapixel.com/2019/07/05/goodbye-aberration-physicist-solves-2000-year-old-optical-problem/ already a thing in optical design, with a fixed optical design like the speedbooster?
 
Misha Engel said:
When was this paper written/published? I remember Roger Cicala first being sceptical about the "speedbooster" but pleasently surprised after testing.
And an other question: is this https://petapixel.com/2019/07/05/goodbye-aberration-physicist-solves-2000-year-old-optical-problem/ already a thing in optical design, with a fixed optical design like the speedbooster?
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I wrote that back in 2014, although I don't think it has circulated widely. Regarding the other item, I think the answer is no. Its much simpler and far more generally useful to use conventional damped least squares optimization techniques rather than a massive pile of algebra to solve a limited design problem. The case at hand was designing a singlet with no spherical aberration or astigmatism. However, in that case you'd still be left with field curvature, chromatic aberration, etc..
 
Björn Benckert said:
Yes its natural that the image improve the MTF and quality of the image in such sense that the projection get more concentrated. But you also introduce more corner softness and other oddities as you use more of the rim of tge projection.

Will be interesting to see the canon booster side to side with metabones. My guess is they both have their quirks.
Click to expand...

That's why we measured the MTF over the full image circle to do the comparison.
 
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