PhotoPlus The Canon Magazine

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Year: 2023

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PhotoPlus The Canon Magazine. Issue 216 (Spring 2024)

Text

FREE VIDEO GUIDES

EOS
VIEW THE VID

FREE RAW EDITING EBOOK
Issue 210 • Nov 2023

196
PAGES
WORTH
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SHOOT THE SEASON!

THE MAGIC OF
EOS EXPERTS

10 inspirational projects to help you capture
the drama and colour of this golden season

CANON
SCHOOL

Turn down noise
in your images

CANON PROFILE

TASTY
PHOTOS
The best kit for
food photography

IN-DEPTH TESTS

CANON RF
LENSES
Best zoom upgrades
for EOS R cameras

FREE VIDEOS
TO
FOLLOW
ONLINE
Watch our expert guides to improve your skills

SIMPLE STUDIO
PHOTO TIPS
Learn six creative lighting
setups with Russ Tierney

• Great video tutorials for you – see page 5 for details

PLUS BUYERS’ GUIDES • PHOTO STORIES

THE MAGIC
OF AUTUMN
We have 10 inspiring
photo projects to
help you capture all
the colours of this
stunning season
Page 28

Getty / WorawootSripirom

OUR GUARANTEE
• We’re the only photo magazine in the
newsagent that’s 100% DEDICATED
TO CANON EOS CAMERA USERS
so we’re 100% relevant to your needs.

Welcome
A
Peter Travers
Editor

XMAS OFFER!

Subscribe now & get
a free Lowepro bag
worth £95! Page 40

s if we all need an excuse to get out with our Canon cameras,
autumn is the season that offers an abundance of photographic
opportunities. In our big Canon photo skills guide this issue, we
have 10 exciting photo projects for you to try in your local areas. Shoot
a misty autumn sunrise, capture parkland wildlife, head to town for
urban scenes, or get down low for colourful canopies in forests full of
fiery red foliage. Alternatively, for bad weather days, capture close-ups
indoors of autumn leaves with a shallow depth of field. See page 28.
Our PhotoPlus Apprentice has a great time in Canon pro Russ Tierney’s
cool photo studio, learning how to capture six creative portrait styles, with
a mixture of models, simple lighting and different backdrops, on page 8.
In our brilliant Canon Skills sections, new photo projects include the
beauty of backlighting, sensational seasonal still-life shots, and get down
low for unique street shots. Plus image-editing tutorials in Photoshop,
Lightroom and Affinity Photo. All projects and tutorials come with free
video guides to follow along, from page 45.
We interview versatile Canon photographer James Musselwhite, who
shoots everything from weddings to pro wrestling! Turn to page 62.
There’s more of your great Photo Stories, page 70, and learn the best kit
for tasty food photography with Monika Grudzinska, page 74.
In Canon School, discover how to turn down the noise in your images,
from page 78. We also test eight of best zoom lens upgrades for Canon
EOS R mirrorless cameras, from page 88. And don’t
miss our comprehensive Canon EOS camera and lens
buyers guides from page 100.
Also get your FREE Teach Yourself Raw in Photoshop
ebook worth £17.99, download details on page 5.

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CONTENTS
52
AUTUMN PHOTO SKILLS

How to shoot the
magic of Autumn
10 inspirational photo projects to capture
the drama and colour of this golden season

ESSENTIALS
20Inspirations

CANON PROS
08The Apprentice

NEW TESTS
88Super Test: RF zoom lenses

42David Clapp Column
74 My kit

100 Buyers’ Guide

Some of our favourite images
taken on Canon cameras from the Bird
Photographer of the Year competition

The Magic of Autumn

Be inspired by the vivid colours of this
stunning season and capture dramatic images
on your doorstep from misty to moody

40
70 Photo Stories

Xmas Subscription Offer!

Subscribe to PhotoPlus today and
receive a Lowepro camera bag worth £95

One reader builds his portrait portfolio
on business trips to India, while self-portraits
are the choice of a landscape photography fan

107 Next Issue
114 Focus Point

Find out what you can expect in
next month’s packed issue of PhotoPlus

Your letters, stats and web news –
stay up-to-date with the world of PhotoPlus

Canon pro Russ Tierney gives our
Apprentice a masterclass on six simple studio
lighting setups for creative portrait shots
Beauty of the Lake District meets the
ridiculous charges of the light brigade

We test essential Canon EOS R camera
PLUURUOHVV]RRPXSJUDGHVWRÀQGWKHEHVWRI
the bunch for all-round performance

Stay up-to-date with the facts and
ÀJXUHVIRUDOOWKHODWHVW&DQRQ(26'6/5DQG
mirrorless cameras plus more than 200 lenses

Food photographer Monika Grudzinska
reveals her perfect Canon kit for tasty photos

CANON SCHOOL
78 Part 32 Canon School

Our Canon expert Marcus Hawkins
tackles image noise to create cleaner images
and master longer exposures in camera

82Software Solutions
84EOS S.O.S

Mix multiple exposures with the
Digital Photo Professional compositing tool
Brian answers your technical questions

ISSUE 210 NOVEMBER 2023
WAT
THE VIDCEHO
S

LINKS TO
VIDEOS ONVLIEW
ON THE PAG INE
ES!

VIDEO GUIDES #210
6 WAYS TO IMPROVE YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY TODAY

50
Project 2 Take stunning
autumn still life shots at home
with basic kit on a rainy day

Project 1 Learn to light your subjects from behind for
stunning portraits with simple but powerful backlighting
LIGHTROOM

ACCESS YOUR
FREE EBOOK
How to get your free Teach yourself Raw in
WORTH
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computer, click the icon top-right to download it. On a mobile
device, click the share icon and Save To Files (or similar).

The Canon Magazine

46
PHOTOSHOP

Project 3 Go low with our top
tripod tips that help you reach
new perspectives for city shots
AFFINITY

Tutorial 1 Guide the eye to
your focal point with a
vignette in Lightroom

Tutorial 2 Use Photoshop
Actions to speed up your
editing workﬂow

Tutorial 3 Create super sharp
scenes with Afﬁnity’s focus
merge command

READ THE TUTORIALS… THEN WATCH OUR EXPERT VIDEOS

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Meet the team...

PhotoPlus: The Canon Magazine
Future PLC Quay House, The Ambury, Bath BA1 1UA

Who we are and our favourite Canon content in this issue…

Peter Travers

James Paterson

Editor • 5D Mk IV & R6

Technique writer • 6D Mk II

peter.travers@futurenet.com

james.paterson@futurenet.com

“There’s an overwhelming amount of
photo ops in autumn time, and
this issue we offer you inspiring
ways to capture the colours of
nature, wildlife and more!” PAGE 28

“Backlighting is a brilliant way to
capture more creative portraits,
plus it’s so easy yet effective!
I show you all the lighting gear and
techniques in my project.” PAGE 46

Dan Mold

Matthew Richards

Deputy editor • R & 7D Mk II

Technical writer • R5

dan.mold@futurenet.com

photoplus@futurenet.com

“This month I hit the streets of
Stamford, Lincolnshire, to show you
how to dramatically shake up your
photography with a low angle
perspective in the city.” PAGE 52

“I’ve been testing the best zoom lens
upgrades for Canon EOS R mirrorless
cameras, in the main wide-angle,
standard, telephoto and supertelephoto categories.” PAGE 88

Editorial
Editor Peter Travers peter.travers@futurenet.com
Deputy Editor Dan Mold
Art Editor Martin Parfitt
Production Editor Chris McGine
Lab Manager Ben Andrews
Head of Design Dean Usher
Photography
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This issue’s contributors…

Printed by
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Distributed by
Marketforce, Future, 121-141 Westbourne Terrace, London, W2 6JR
For enquiries please email mfcommunications@futurenet.com

Russ Tierney

Andrew James

James Musselwhite

Steven Kruit

Portrait pro Russ shows
our Apprentice six simple
lighting setups at his cool
studio in Wales. PAGE 8

Great Canon photographer
Andrew shows you ten great
photo projects to capture the
magic of autumn. PAGE 28

From weddings to wrestling,
James talks to us about is
varied photo portfolio and
career post-Covid. PAGE 62

Steven made the most of his
working holidays to bolster
his portraits in India and
Bangladesh. PAGE 70

Martin Leighton

Monika Grudzinska

Marcus Hawkins

Brian Worley

Canon photographer Martin
puts himself in his beautiful
landscapes for the ultimate
selfie shots. PAGE 72

Pro food photographer
Monika shows us the key
Canon kit she can’t shoot
without. PAGE 74

Learn how image noise can
be controlled with Canon
EOS settings for cleaner
exposures. PAGE 78

EOS expert Brian answers
your toughest Canon EOS
technical questions, and
rates your images. PAGE 84

Our contributors Jon Adams, Ben Andrews, David Clapp, Monika Grudzinska, Marcus Hawkins, Andrew James,
Sean McCormack, James Musselwhite, Catherine O’Donnell, James Paterson, Matthew Richards, Lauren Scott,
Russ Tierney, Brian Worley

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Tel +44 (0)1225 442 244

www.digitalcameraworld.com

THEAPPRENTICE
APPRENTICE
NAME:

JONATHAN
PEARSON
CAMERA:

CANON EOS R5
JONATHAN, 54, is a self-employed
pest controller from Chester who
loves to take portraits. He’s been
using a camera since he was 17,
first practising on his friends when
he was still in school. Nowadays,
he devotes his spare time to
arranging photoshoots with
models, and loves to experiment
with indoor and outdoor setups.
In addition to his latest Canon EOS
R5 he also shoots on several film
cameras too as he sometimes
prefers the look. See his lovely
work on Purpleport.com under the
username jukeboxjohnnie.

CANON PRO
NAME:

RUSS
TIERNEY
CAMERA:

CANON EOS R5
SHOOTING for more than a decade
as a professional portrait
photographer, Russ works in his
cool Splash Point Photo Studio in
Rhyl, North Wales. He’s won and
is regularly commended on photo
competition sites like Viewbug,
PhotoCrowd and Gurushots, which
has led to his work being displayed
and exhibited all around the world.
We met up with him at his indoor
studio, complete with an infinity
curve, neon wall and a swimming
pool to help PhotoPlus Apprentice
Jonathan raise his portraiture.
www.splashpointphoto.co.uk

www.digitalcameraworld.com

SHOOT WITH A PRO

This month portrait pro Russ Tierney shows our
Apprentice Jonathan six simple lighting setups
at his Splash Point Studio in Wales
The Canon Magazine

THEAPPRENTICE
TECHNIQUE
ASSESSMENT
In Manual mode, Apprentice Jonathan
has complete control of the exposure

HOT
SHOT
#1

MANUAL MODE
TO BEGIN, Russ asked
Jonathan to start with
his Canon EOS R5 set to
its Manual mode to take
full control of the
exposure. He suggested
starting with ISO100 for
best image quality as the lights can be made more
or less powerful instead of changing the ISO. The
aperture was set to f/9 to provide a large depth
of field to ensure all of model Natalia’s body was in
sharp focus. Shutter speed was set to 1/125 sec,
which was below the maximum sync speed so that
it wouldn’t cause any issues with flash sync.

SETTING A MANUAL
WHITE BALANCE
RUSS SETS a manual
white balance setting on
his Canon EOS R5 to
make sure the colours
look perfect. Shooting in
RAW also gives you the
ability to change the temperature and tint of
images back in Photoshop too. As Russ and
Jonathan were switching between flash, constant
LEDs and neon lighting the auto white balance
may not always get it 100% correct, so Russ
suggested Jonathan set a manual white balance of
5500K for the first setup using flash and check it
throughout the day as the lighting changed.

Lens

Sigma 50mm f/1.4 DG HSM | Art

Exposure

1/125 sec, f/9, ISO100

RUSS’S COMMENT
Our first model of the day, Natalia (@natalia.ifbb) met me and
Jonathan in the studio in the morning. She’s a bikini fitness
model and overall women’s winner of the International Fitness and
Bodybuilding Federation earlier this year. I wanted to start Jonathan
off with a simple low key setup, using a black background roll and one
flash with a large softbox to her left with a grid attached to it to focus the light onto
Natalia, and stop the light spilling onto the background, so it stayed dark. This lighting
setup works brilliantly for athletes, and this dramatic image is packed with
contrast, but also helps highlight the contours of Natalia’s muscles and curves.

www.digitalcameraworld.com

SHOOT WITH A PRO

HOT
SHOT
#2
After I’d got used to
shooting with the
one light, Russ added in a
smaller stripbox. This was
positioned behind Natalia on
the right and I used a grid once again to focus
the flash light onto her side to add some
beautiful rim lighting. The second flash was set
to a low power so my settings didn’t need to
change. As a professional model Natalia was a
natural in cycling through poses. I love this shot
as the dramatic lighting highlights her athletic
shape. Editing the RAW image I then
warmed up the white balance a little.
Canon RF 28-70mm F2L USM

Exposure

1/125 sec, f/9, ISO100

BUILD UP THE
LIGHTING
WHEN RUSS was starting
out he bought a mannequin
head and experimented with
different camera settings,
light setups, flash modifiers
and LEDs to get a better
understanding of how to
improve his lighting setup.
This made him more
confident when using studio
lights and saved time with his
models as he’d already
worked out the lighting look
he wanted before the shoot.

JONATHAN’S COMMENT

Lens

EXPERT INSIGHT

LEFT SIDE LIGHT

+ RIGHT SIDE LIGHT

TOP GEAR #1
Flash & triggers
RUSS HAS four mains-powered Bowens flash heads
with individual controls on to tone down or increase
the flash power. He uses a flash trigger on the hotshoe
of his Canon EOS R5 with a corresponding receiver
plugged into his main flash head. Other flashes are set
to receiver mode so that the primary flash triggers
them at the same time so they all fire in sync. Russ
uses inexpensive NiceFoto 4Channel triggers.

+ BEAUTY DISH

EXPOSURE SIMULATION
ONE OF Russ’s top tips is to switch off
exposure simulation on mirrorless Canon
EOS cameras when working with flash. This
setting combines the set shutter speed,
aperture and ISO to give you an accurate
preview of your final image in Live View on the LCD or through the electronic
viewfinder. However, Russ chooses his settings to make sure natural light
doesn’t interfere with his flashes – with Exposure Simulation enabled, that
would mean the viewfinder and LCD screen would be totally black, so it’s off.

The Canon Magazine

+ HAIR LIGHT

THEAPPRENTICE
RUSS’S TOP 10 TIPS FOR
SUCCESS IN THE STUDIO

Relaxed vibes
Russ has upbeat music playing in his studio which
helps to ﬁll in any awkward silences and keep the
environment relaxed.

Check your sharpness
Always check the sharpness of your portraits on the
back LCD screen and zoom in to make sure the eyes
are pin sharp. If they aren’t, it doesn’t cost anything
to take another shot!

Use ﬂash gels
Taping some cheap coloured acetate in front of your
ﬂash is an easy way to change up the colours of
your lights for more vibrant portraits.

POSES WITH
HANDS

Show the models your shots
It’s important to build a rapport with your model
and an easy way to do this is by sharing your shots
on the back of the camera so they can see what
you’ve been able to photograph.

Find local models
You can easily ﬁnd models by putting a casting
call out on sites like Purple Port or Model Mayhem.
You’ll usually ﬁnd models starting out with little to
no experience – willing to work for free in return for
images to help bolster their portfolio – or you have
the option to pay for a model with more experience.

THERE’S A lot of posing opportunities for models to use
their hands, it can sometimes look a little static and boring
if their hands and arms are straight down by theirs sides as
this can look a little stiff and awkward. Professional models
usually know the poses that work best for them, shifting
their bodies and placing their hands in interesting ways
on their face, touching their hair or on their hips.

Use mood boards
Put together a mood board on a site like Pinterest
so you can ﬁnd similar photos and themes you’d like
to shoot. You can then share this with the model so
they know what sort of clothes to wear and have an
understanding of what sort of make-up is needed.

Change of clothes
Models ideally bring a suitcase full of different
items of clothing, so they can change for a new look
to avoid your photos looking too similar.

Have fun!
Back in the days of ﬁlm you’d have to think very
carefully before taking your shot, but with modern
digital photography, exposures don’t cost anything
so ﬁre away and have fun with your portrait shoots.

9
10
12

Follow the rules – then break them!
Learn the rules for consistency and conﬁdence,
such as the using the rule of thirds, or positioning
lights at 45º, then don’t be afraid to break them to
set your pictures aside from the crowd.
Use a model release
Model releases are available for free to download
online and are always worth ﬁlling out as it’s a clear
agreement between you and the model that sets out
what you can or can’t use the images for.

TOP GEAR #2
Full-frame Canon EOS body
RUSS upgraded from a Canon
EOS 5D Mark III to an EOS R5
and has seen a notable change
in how his new equipment has
revolutionised his portraiture.
He loves using the Eye Detection
autofocus which gives him one less thing to worry about. The EOS R5
is a full-frame mirrorless Canon with In-Body Image Stabilisation and
a huge 45MP resolution. He also pairs it with a Canon EF-EOS R
adapter so that he can use his favourite, reliable Canon EF lenses.

EXPERT INSIGHT

EYE DETECTION
AUTOFOCUS
THE EYES are usually the focal
point of portraits, so Russ mainly
focuses on them to make them
pin-sharp. On his old 5D Mark III DSLR he used to place a single AF
point over the model’s closest eye to the camera, but nowadays he
uses the brilliant Face and Eye Detection autofocus on his R5 to lock
onto the eyes continuously, which makes focusing so much easier.

www.digitalcameraworld.com

SHOOT WITH A PRO

HOT
SHOT
#3

JONATHAN’S COMMENT

Lens

Canon RF 70-200mm F2.8L IS USM

Exposure

1/100 sec, f/10, ISO100

We went for a stronger
lighting effect which
works great for athletes. Russ
said because the light is very
harsh, it’s used on male
athletes like American footballers, but as Natalia
has a great sporty look it would still work well.
Russ built up the lights with two large strip boxes
either side of Natalia, and put a beauty dish
above and to the front at a lower power for a
darker shadow in the middle of the face. I noticed
that Natalia’s dark hair was getting lost against
the dark background so we also added another
strip box above and behind Natalia to
help add definition to her hair.

THEAPPRENTICE

JONATHAN’S COMMENT
We just had time to
squeeze in a third
lighting setup so Natalia got
changed for a fashion-look on
a brighter background to add
some variety. Russ has a large infinity curve
that’s painted white and sits at one end of his
studio, although he said that he prefers not to
have a completely white background as this can
look a bit dull. Russ lowered the flash down a
little to retain some detail in the background.
For our fashion setup we set up two flashes
with large octaboxes attached in front of
Natalia, with each light pointing at 45º
from above for gentle and even lighting.

HOT
SHOT
#4
14

Lens

Canon RF 28-70mm F2L USM

Exposure

1/100 sec, f/9, ISO100

www.digitalcameraworld.com

SHOOT WITH A PRO

TOP GEAR #3
Wide-angle lens
YOU MAY think a wide-angle
lens is a strange choice for
portraiture but Russ always
keeps one in his bag. He says,
“I use a Canon EF 17-40mm
f/4L USM lens and usually get
up on a step ladder to shoot
from a high angle which works
well with the wider framing.”

TOP OF THE CROPS
RUSS WENT for a more three-quarters
portrait look by shooting with his
telephoto Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS
USM. When zooming in the trick is to
crop your shots just above any joints, like
the knees or elbows, as including them
can look a little distracting. You also
need to make sure you’re not cropping
off hands and fingers awkwardly in your
compositions too. Luckily, the Canon
EOS R5 gives Russ 45MP to play with, so
he can shoot a little wider and crop in at
the editing stage if required.

EXPERT INSIGHT

DOUBLE TROUBLE
RUSS HAD arranged for there to be a
short overlap between models Natalia
and Emma, where Jonathan could
practise group shots. In no time at all, they were creating some fun
and natural poses – you’d have thought they’d known each other for
years! Ahead of the shoot Russ had shared his mood board with them
to ensure they had outfits to work well together in shots.

RUSS’S
FAVOURITE
THREE
PORTRAITS
Taking chances and breaking all the rules make for an impressive portfolio…

AMO MANN

KAYAH LOUISA

ZOE PAGE

THIS WAS a shot I always wanted – an
aerialist from below with a super-wide
lens to emphasize the perspective.
When a model friend said she was
doing pole fitness it all fell into place.

I LOVE a colourful, quirky, bold image,
and I also love breaking all the rules and
using a wide-angle for portraits – this
image of Kayah, taken from above, just
has a playful vibe that I enjoy.

I LOVE texture, especially in black and
white images – such as denim, leather,
zips and stitching for fashion images.
This was about the softness of the
model’s skin against the rough rope.

THEAPPRENTICE HOT
SHOT
#5

RUSS’S COMMENT
Our afternoon
session with Emma
(@emmastarmoresmith) gave
Jonathan’s shots a bit of variety
as both models have a very
different look. My home came with some lovely
old furniture like this Chesterfield sofa which
Jonathan wanted to use in our portraits. Using
Jonathan’s battery-powered flashes this time,
we took the studio to the sofa and took a few
pictures straight on, but I wanted to try from the
balcony. I set up a key light with a large softbox
and another light to Emma’s right with a
smaller softbox to fill in the shadows.

Lens

Sigma 50mm f/1.4 DG HSM | Art

Exposure

1/125 sec, f/7.1, ISO100

LIGHTING MODIFIERS
RUSS HAS an
assortment of
light modifiers
available to fit on
his flash heads
to sculpt the
light to his liking.
When not in use
he mounts these
Bowens-fit
modifiers to the
wall of his studio
with some drain
pipe offcuts for
an inexpensive and tidy storage solution. Among
his modifiers are softboxes and octaboxes of
different sizes, grids, snoots and stripboxes as
well as beauty dishes to name but a few! These all
give him lots of options for differ

TOP GEAR
#4
50mm prime
ONE OF Russ’s
latest purchases is
the Sigma 50mm
f/1.4 DG HSM Art.
It’s a prime lens
which means it has
a fixed focal length,
in this case 50mm,
and it has the
same field of view
as the human eye so images look very natural. It’s a super
sharp optic even at wide apertures like f/1.4, which creates
a very shallow depth of field and blurry backgrounds. If he
finds his 50mm doesn’t provide enough reach he also has
a Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM which allows him to
zoom in more and has a wide maximum aperture of f/2.8.

www.digitalcameraworld.com

SHOOT WITH A PRO

EXPERT INSIGHT

NEUTRAL DENSITY
FILTERS

WHEN shooting
outdoors with natural
light, or even indoors
with constant LED
lighting, Russ often
likes to shoot with a
wide open aperture for super
shallow depth of field. This isn’t
usually possible when working with
flash though, as the flash power is
often too powerful even at the
lowest setting. This stifles creativity
as it forces you into shooting with a
narrower aperture. Russ gets
around this problem by adding a
strong 7-stop neutral density (ND)
filter so he can shoot at wider
aperture values like f/1.4 or f/2.8.

RUSS’S COMMENT
For our final
setup with
Emma, we went for a
boudoir look with
Emma changing into a
light body suit to match the beige tones
of this couch in my living room. As
there was a large bright window in front
of the sofa, there was no need to use a
flash, we simply used lenses with a
wide aperture to suck in natural light.
I made full use of my Sigma 50mm
f/1.4 prime lens by opening the
aperture to its widest f/1.4 setting to
blur the background. This allowed me
to shoot at ISO100 for the best image
quality with a shutter speed of 1/160
sec, fast enough to shoot handheld.
It was just a case of guiding Emma
through some poses and taking the
shot when I was happy with
how it was all looking.
The Canon Magazine

HOT
SHOT
#6

Lens

Sigma 50mm f/1.4 DG HSM | Art

Exposure

1/160 sec, f/1.4, ISO100

THEAPPRENTICE

JONATHAN’S COMMENT
Russ has a brilliant
‘neon’ lights wall in
his studio that makes for an
incredibly vibrant and unique
backdrop. He’s spent years
cultivating the LED and neon signs, and he
explained that the various signs have a different
brightness and colour temperature which can
throw up curveballs. He uses LED lighting rather
than flash to light the models, making it easier to
balance the foreground and background, as well
as using a wide aperture to transform the signs
behind into lovely blurry bokeh. We used a blue
LED and green LED to Emma’s left and right
to add colour and create a ‘sci-fi’ look. I
then shot at f/2 to blur the background.

RUSS’S VERDICT
Jonathan was a great
Apprentice and I was
eager to show him as many
different lighting setups as time
would allow so that he would
come away from the shoot with a huge variety of
shots, and new skills to add to his repertoire.
Jonathan clearly has a lot of experience under his
belt considering he’s been taking portraits since
he was 17! This was evident from the natural and
clear directions he gave to both models, he was
calm, funny and made the models feel relaxed,
which always helps you get the best poses. We’ve
spoken about arranging another shoot in the
future back at my studio so I can’t wait
to see what we come up with next time.

NEXT MONTH WELSH LANDSCAPES

SHOT
OF THE
DAY!
Lens

Canon RF 28-70mm F2L USM

Exposure

1/125 sec, f/2, ISO125

you need help to take your Canon photography to the next level? Let us know what genre you’d like help
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WINNING CANON SHOTS FROM THE BIRD PHOTOGRAPHER OF THE YEAR 2023

www.digitalcameraworld.com

FANTASTIC CANON PHOTOGRAPHY

REUSENS BEST PORTRAIT: GOLD
“Venturing into the tropical forest in the Mashpi
Amagusa Reserve, Ecuador, I was excited to
spot the rare glistening-green tanager. After
hours of waiting, I saw the vivid-green bird on
a perfect heart-shaped leaf. Its shimmering
feathers reflected a dazzling array of colours.
I captured every detail, grateful for this magical
moment amid the lush jungle backdrop.”

The Canon Magazine

Lens

Tamron 100-400mm f/4.5-6.3 Di VC USD

Exposure

1/500 sec, f/7.1, ISO400

01 GLISTENING-GREEN TANAGER BY NICOLAS

INSPIRATIONS

02 A MOTHER’S LOVE BY QIUQING MU

All of the images in this
month’s gallery are from the
2023 Bird Photographer of
the Year competition, and
we’ve picked our favourites
taken on Canon EOS
cameras to showcase. The
Bird Photographer of the
Year 2024 contest is now
open for entries, so be sure
to submit your best birding
photos for a chance to win a
share of the £11,500+ prize
fund and £3500 top prize,
as well as the coveted Bird
Photographer of the Year
title! The entry deadline is
10 December. Check out the
website for more info:
www.birdpoty.com

BIRD BEHAVIOUR: BRONZE
“A great grey owl adult was hunting in a wheat
field, and a juvenile flew to the edge of the
field to be fed. Suddenly, the parent caught
some prey. I quickly pressed the shutter and
captured a heart-warming moment between
the parent and the next generation.”
Lens

Canon EF 400mm f/2.8L IS II USM

Exposure

1/2000 sec, f/4, ISO1000

03 DAWN AT THE DOOR OF THE FARMHOUSE

BY JULIAN FERNANDEZ
URBAN BIRDS: BRONZE
“This image features an abandoned farmhouse
in my town, with a painting of a woman and
a European stonechat perched on the door.
I orientated the door to let the sunrise in and
used three flashes to illuminate the painting.”
Lens

Canon EF 70–200mm f/2.8L IS II USM

Exposure

1/250 sec, f/20, ISO125

04 A MOMENT OF PRAYER BY ARTO

Lens

Canon EF 600mm f/4L IS II USM

Exposure

1/50 sec, f/5, ISO1600

LEPPÄNEN URBAN BIRDS: GOLD
“During winter migration, owls from northern
Finland often head to the south where they can
find more food due to less snow. This great
grey owl chose a cemetery with abundant voles
as its hunting ground. While hunting, the owl
would often stop on tombstones or other
structures to observe the area. Keeping
to a safe working distance, I managed to
capture this fleeting moment when it landed
on a beautiful angel statue.”
03

www.digitalcameraworld.com

FANTASTIC CANON PHOTOGRAPHY

The Canon Magazine

INSPIRATIONS

www.digitalcameraworld.com

FANTASTIC CANON PHOTOGRAPHY
05 URBAN PARADISE BY XIAOKE WANG

URBAN BIRDS: SILVER
“From October to March, Shenzhen, China,
is a wintering ground for over 100,000
migratory birds. In January 2022, tens of
thousands of great cormorants were spotted
flying over Talent Park, adding to the area’s
avian diversity.”
Lens

Canon EF 35mm f/1.4L II USM

Exposure

1/8000 sec, f/5, ISO1000

06 VERDITER FLYCATCHER BY ARINDAM

SAHA 11 AND UNDER: GOLD
“Pelling is one of the most beautiful hill stations
in India. I observed so many birds when I visited
the area. I captured this very colourful bird in
a garden near our hotel. The extremely vibrant
blue colour makes this verditer flycatcher
(Eumyias thalassinus) so beautiful.”
Lens

Canon EF 100–400mm f/4.5–5.6L IS II USM

Exposure

1/400 sec, f/5.6, ISO500

CONSERVATION (SINGLE IMAGE): GOLD
“A Maltese hunter stands proud, having legally
shot a European turtle dove, a prized quarry on
the island. European Union legislation bans the
hunting of turtle doves in the breeding season.
Nevertheless, across the Mediterranean, an
estimated 0.34–0.87 million are killed every
year. Generations of Maltese have hunted this
species on migration; a few continue to hunt
and follow tradition.”
Lens

Canon EF 35mm f/2 IS USM

Exposure

1/200 sec, f/8, ISO800

The Canon Magazine

07 DON’T MAKE WAR BY EWAN HEATH-FLYNN

INSPIRATIONS

www.digitalcameraworld.com

08 GREEN PLANET FLAMINGOS BY PAUL

09 PARENTING GOALS BY THOMAS VIJAYAN

10 FLYING SWORD BY RAFAEL ARMADA

MCKENZIE BIRDS IN FLIGHT: SILVER
“This aerial photograph taken above Lake
Bogoria, Kenya, captures a flock of lesser
flamingos in flight over a vast and concentrated
bloom of cyanobacteria (sometimes called
blue-green algae), their staple food source.
The photo was taken from the open doors
of a light aircraft.”

BEST PORTRAIT: SILVER
“Before capturing this image, I spent two days
observing these Emperor penguins, lying flat
on the ice to avoid scaring them. Waiting for the
chick to appear, I finally got this touching shot
of parental love. I trekked eight hours a day
on soft snow to reach this colony and even
made friends with some penguins.”

BIRDS IN FLIGHT: GOLD
“The sword-billed hummingbird has the
world’s longest bill relative to its size. It’s
ideal for feeding on flowers with long corollas
and makes it a vital pollinator, as bees and
butterflies can’t reach the nectar. This image
captures the bird approaching a feeder, with
natural backgrounds and lighting.”

Lens

Canon RF 100-500mm F4.5-7.1L IS USM

Lens

Canon RF 100-500mm F4.5-7.1L IS USM

Lens

Canon EF 600mm f/4L IS III USM

Exposure

1/4000 sec, f/7.1, ISO400

Exposure

1/1600 sec, f/7.1, ISO125

Exposure

1/1000 sec, f/4, ISO5000

The Canon Magazine

FANTASTIC CANON PHOTOGRAPHY

HOW TO SHOOT THE MAGIC OF

10 inspirational photo projects to capture the drama and colour
of this golden season with Jon Adams and Andrew James

very season has its pros
and cons when it comes
to new photographic
opportunities, but when
you look at autumn’s long
list of benefits, you can understand why
it’s a time of year that has been getting
creative people excited for centuries.
As the green canopy of summer
begins to evolve into more muted but
highly evocative oranges and reds, and
the skeletal shape of woodland starts to
appear, the transformation of the natural
world seems made for inspirational

photography. With sunrise and sunset
occurring at more civilised hours, and
changeable weather that can bring
glorious sunshine one minute and dark,
stormy skies the next, autumn’s appeal
is undeniable. Of course, there are some
downsides, though. Unpredictable and
cooler weather can drive you indoors,
but the bonus here is that you can always
take a bit of autumn inside with you to
carry on shooting.
The real beauty of autumn is that
often you don’t need to travel that far in
order to get the best shots. Whether you

are just mooching around in your garden
or hunting the your local woodlands for
inspiration, there will always be great
shots that are easily accessible.
Over the next 12 pages, we’re going to
unpick this potential, explore some of
the subjects you’ll find and reveal the
techniques needed to succeed. From
detailed macro work where you control
the light, to chasing elusive wildlife
through its parkland landscape, we have
10 exciting photo projects for you to try in
your own local areas. So jump into
autumn and follow along to get started...
www.digitalcameraworld.com

SHOOT AUTUMN MAGIC

Jon Adams

Exposure

1/8 sec, f/4, ISO100

The strong reds and limited
depth of field in this shot create
an evocative and arty still life

SHOOT CLOSE-UP
AUTUMN SHOTS
IN YOUR HOME

Bring nature indoors for more intimate photos
o create your own
seasonal still life,
collect a handful of
fallen leaves and
set up indoors on a
table. We’re going to use a
macro lens, so depth of field will
be limited, meaning we can
make a complementary
background from the extra
leaves that will fall out of focus.
For the main focal point, place a
few drops of water on the main
leaf with a fine-tipped brush,
and focus on the droplet that
you’d like to be the focal point.
You can light the still life using
natural window light. For more
directional lighting, use an LED
light, too. Even with extra

Getty / Baks

lighting and a wide aperture,
such as f/4, the shutter speed
is going to be slow. To counter
this, put the camera on a tripod
and use Live View to organize
your composition.
Once you have everything
how you want it, use the
camera’s self-timer or a cable
release to fire the shutter so
you don’t introduce any camera
movement and blur the image.
Check the results on the screen
and zoom in to ensure that
your droplet is pin-sharp.
Below: Applying water drops when
shooting leaves indoors adds
key points of interest and will
create an extra light source

CONTENTS
1 Shoot indoor autumn detail
2 Capture parkland wildlife
3 Shoot a misty autumn sunrise
4 Make art with camera movement
5 Go to town for urban scenics
6 Use naturally occurring mirrors
7 Get down low for colourful canopies
8 Add mood lighting in editing
9 Accentuate detail in your shots
10 Five creative tips for autumn
The Canon Magazine

29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
38
39

Using a macro lens can
help you achieve great
artistic close-ups

AUTUMNPHOTOSKILLS
This red deer stag is framed by
the seasonal bracken and an
uncluttered background. The
direct eye contact makes it
much more visually appealing
1/800 sec, f/5.6, ISO800

Andrew James

Exposure

CAPTURING PARK
WILDLIFE

Zoos are great for honing your wildlife skills, but you can boost the
challenge with semi-wild parkland deer in local nature reserves
here are lots of parkland
locations where red deer
roam free. Although these
animals are captive, their
ability to move around such a
big space means you need to exercise
some solid skills to get close enough for a
good image. Luckily, autumn is the perfect
time to do this, as it’s when they breed.
It’s important to remember that red deer

are large animals and during the rutting
season they can be dangerous, so keep
your distance by using a telephoto lens.
As your subject is likely to be moving,
make sure you have your AF mode
switched to Continuous (AI-Servo), and
that you can take a burst of shots in quick
succession rather the default single-shot
mode. A lot of wildlife shooting is reactive,
so you need to find a subject and watch

what it’s doing. Just like any form of
photography, finding your subject isn’t
enough – you want to take a photograph of
it in the right spot that shows it as part of
its wider environment.
Keep your shutter speed high, even for
static shots, as this will prevent subject
movement and camera shake. As a
minimum you want to achieve a shutter
speed of 1/500 sec and use a focal length
between 200mm and 400mm. An aperture
of f/5.6 will diffuse your background to allow
the subject to stand out.
Getting your focus point right on the
subject’s lead-eye is critical. The most
accurate way of doing this is to use a single
AF point. Patience is key – don’t take your
shot until the subject is looking in the right
direction or doing something interesting.
www.digitalcameraworld.com

Getty

Finding a high vantage point or
using a drone is the order of the
day when it comes to capturing
creative misty morning shots

Exposure

1/125 sec, f/8, ISO100

GET HIGH FOR
MORNING MIST

A misty morning sunrise creates an eye-catching image, but
you may need to shoot from above to get the best results

PRO GEAR
isty conditions are a common
feature of autumn scenes, and
the type that often makes for
the best images happens after
a clear but cold night.
Although it’s hard to predict, we often get
a few mornings of misty conditions in a row,

so keep a watchful eye on the weather in
your area and get out there before sunrise if
you think it’s a possibility. Mist that hugs the
ground is often best photographed from a
higher vantage point, and shooting into the
light as the sun starts to appear can add
an extra creative twist to your shots.

PRO TECHNIQUE EXPOSING FOR CONTRE-JOUR SHOTS

Long lenses
If you’re serious about wildlife shots, you’ll need
a telephoto lens. They come in both prime and
zoom versions, and while primes will be faster, a
zoom gives you more flexibility. The longer the
focal length, the more you can focus on distant
objects, but for a lot of wildlife, a 100-400mm is
more than adequate.

Investing in a good telephoto lens can help
you capture outstanding wildlife images

The Canon Magazine

01 CHECK YOUR HISTOGRAM

02 ADD COMPENSATION

The camera’s meter is likely to
underexpose your misty landscape
shot. Take a test shot at the exposure
the camera is giving you and take a look
at the brightness histogram. It’s likely
that most of the tones will be bunched in
the middle of the graph, with very few to
the right-hand side. If you have the sun
in the frame you may see a highlight
peak to the right, but the majority of
tones will probably still be in the middle.
You need to compensate for this.

Dial in some positive exposure
compensation to move the tones to the
right and brighten the shot. Start with a
setting of +1 and review the result on
both the histogram and the LCD screen.
This may be enough, but don’t be
surprised if you need to go to +2 or more
to shoot an image that represents what
you’re actually seeing. You still need to
ensure you’re not blowing out all of the
brightest tones, but you can fine-tune
in third-stop increments to get it right.

Impressionist-style pictures are
easy to create in woodland by
employing intentional camera
movement with a slow shutter
speed of around 1/15 sec

Andrew James

AUTUMNPHOTOSKILLS

MAKE ART WITH
CAMERA MOVEMENT

Use a slower than normal shutter speed and a smooth up-anddown motion to create expressive, painterly woodland images
typical woodland scene is
busy and complicated. With
time you can always find a
way to simplify the scene
to get a good shot but
one surefire way to do this is to use
intentional camera movement and
reduce its form to shape and tone.
Autumn is an especially good time for
this technique because the colours and
reduced leaf canopy mean you can create
some really interesting compositions.
For consistently successful shots,
choose your scene well. Close one eye and
squint the other to visualize the tonal
contrast in the scene. You want a range of
tones, but some extremes for strong shapes

to form. Set a shutter speed of 1/15 sec. To
get this, make sure you are at your lowest
ISO for the best image quality and stop
down the aperture to f/16 or f/22. If you still
can’t get the shutter speed slow enough,
you will need a filter that darkens the scene
(see ND filters panel right).
Pre-focus on the nearest tree trunk
and, with a smooth up-and-down motion
underway, squeeze the shutter. Reviewing
the captures is essential, and you may
want to decrease shutter speed further or
exaggerate your motion even more. This
technique is hit and miss – therefore it’s
important you take quite a few shots and
change your shooting position frequently,
remembering to refocus each time.

PRO TECHNIQUE

ND ﬁlters
In very bright conditions, the only way to reduce
the light to get slower shutter speeds is with a
Neutral Density or Polarizing filter. In very bright
conditions an ND that holds back more than 2
stops of light may be needed. Screw in or hold the
ND over the lens to hold back the light. Simple!

www.digitalcameraworld.com

Exposure

1/8 sec, f/16, ISO100

GO TO TOWN FOR
URBAN SCENES

Above: The yellows, oranges
and reds alter the mood of
this chocolate-box scene, but
the framing is held together
by strong lines that lead in to
the key points of interest

Take advantage of how seasonal textures and colours impact urban
environments and capture familiar sights in a new way
here’s often the assumption
that good autumnal images
can only occur in natural
environments. This of course
isn’t the case but we all think
about leaves and colours and don’t
consider how they can be used in context.
Although the visual aspects of what we
perceive as ‘autumn’ can be short-lived,

PRO GEAR POLARIZERS
A polarizing filter lets you tone down or
remove reflections in glass or water, and filters
out any stray light bouncing around a scene,
resulting in more intense colours. The
downside is that it will rob you of about 2 stops
of light at its maximum setting, so use a tripod
to keep the camera still over the extended
shutter speed, especially when using a small
aperture to keep the scene sharp.

The Canon Magazine

when it happens, it happens everywhere!
That means the warm colours and carpet of
fallen leaves give you the opportunity
to add seasonal context to manmade
environments as well as natural scenes.
When the season is under way, revisit
familiar urban settings like towns and
villages, and capture how their character
is transformed under the autumnal veneer.

TECH ADVICE

Lead-in lines
When composing urban landscapes, think hard
about the foreground content that will grab the
viewer’s eye and take them into the scene. You
can use walls, fences, tracks or roads to literally
lead in to the areas of interest further back in the
shot. The trick is to make sure they go
somewhere, so place your camera in the
position that allows this.

AUTUMNPHOTOSKILLS
Capturing the beauty of a
reflection in a lake is a great
project, but the right lighting
conditions are vital
Exposure

1/800 sec, f/11, ISO125

USE NATURE’S
MIRRORS
Getty

Get creative with reflections to capture vibrant, double-take
scenes, or generate your own abstract art in-camera
o photographer can resist
the appeal of an autumnal
scene reflected in a calm
lake, but conditions need to
be right for the reflection to
have depth and be well-saturated. That
calls for strong sunlight and ideally this will
be early or late in the day when the sun is
lower. Although a polarizing filter will
intensify the colours present, they will also
suppress any reflections, so if you have
one fitted, you’ll need to back it off to its
minimum setting or remove it.
One of the trickier aspects of reflection
shots is deciding where to place the
horizon. It’ll be tempting to place it in the
middle of the frame to show the symmetry

between the real and reflected content,
but while this can work, it can also cut the
scene in half and result in an
unsatisfactory composition.
A better tactic is to treat the reflection
horizon in the same way as you would a
regular horizon, and place it around one
third or two-thirds up the frame. This
means you’ll be allowing either the real
scene or the reflection to dominate the
overall image, so try both when framing up
to see which is most effective.
If the mirror-like calm is lacking in
impact, and you want the reflection to be
more rippled, a carefully pitched rock is all
it takes to break up the surface and
provide texture. While classic reflection

This reflection shot shows a blend of three
exposures of reflections on a river, with the
ripples coming from three ducks swimming by
shots are great, water provides
tremendous opportunities for abstract
images, and for many of these, you won’t
need a large expanse like a pond or lake – a
puddle will do!
You may want to feature only the
reflection in the frame, or decide that
including the edge of the puddle works
better. Either way, you’ll again need to
decide if you want the reflection to be
mirrorlike, or broken and distorted. The
former will take care of itself, but for the
latter, you can break up the surface with
a few foot taps at the edge of the puddle.

www.digitalcameraworld.com

Getty

SHOOT AUTUMN MAGIC

1/250 sec, f/8, ISO100

Getty

Exposure

GET LOW FOR
CANOPIES

A tree canopy of red and gold against a blue sky is
an essential seasonal shot, but it takes a little prep

Focus on reﬂections
There are two options with focusing, and that’s
to focus on either the reflection in the water or
the surface of the water. These give very
different results, but you’ll need to use a large
aperture like f/2.8 or f/4
to make the effect
clear and
pronounced. After
locking on, it’s
often best to
switch to Manual
Focus (MF) to stop
the AF hunting.

The Canon Magazine

necessary to use a tripod when shooting into
a blue sky, so hand-holding is fine if your
shutter speed is fast enough to avoid camera
shake. With a wide-angle lens like a 24mm,
anything 1/60 sec or faster will be fine.
With your shot decided on, wait for the
right conditions to arrive, which means a
sunny day when the leaves are fully turned.
If, when nature has obliged, you find that the
sun is in the frame, don’t worry – you can
‘hide’ it behind the leaves for a strong
backlight effect, or even have it creeping out
to give a burst of light that adds extra
interest to the frame.
With this kind of image, the shoot is over
quickly, but it’s the preparation and
constant observation of the conditions that
makes the difference.

Jon Adams

PRO TIP

hen the leaves really turn,
you’re presented with a
fleeting opportunity to catch a
shot that’s awash with colour
and texture. We say it’s
fleeting, because if the wind gets up, that
moment will pass, as all those leaves will
soon be on the ground!
To increase your chances of bagging a
colourful canopy, take the time to recce
possible locations where the leaves are
already on the turn. Pick places close to
home that you can get to quickly, and don’t
worry about the surrounding environment
– for this shot, a copse of trees planted as a
noise suppressor next to a dual carriageway
is just as good as a fairy glade! You’re only
interested in the canopy, so what lies
adjacent to it is outside the frame.
Once you’ve found a nearby spot that you
can get to fast, pop down with your camera
and a wide-angle lens and size up the
options. You might want to take
a reference shot, but you don’t have to – line
up the canopy in the viewfinder
so you know what you’re going to do.
You’ll likely find that you need to get low to
squeeze in a good display of colour, which will
often mean shooting from ground level. If you
need to do this to make the most of your
chosen location, take a bin liner to protect
your clothes from the ground. It’s rarely

If the sun is in-frame when conditions are right,
you can ‘hide’ it behind the leaves or branches
to avoid it becoming too dominant

AUTUMNPHOTOSKILLS

BEFORE

AFTER

ADD SOME
MOOD LIGHTING

Discover how to change the atmosphere and create an
autumn feel in your landscapes with a few simple toning skills

EXPERT ADVICE
t’s not always easy to arrive
at a location at the right time
– often the light isn’t right, or
the angle of the sun too high,
or the colours too dull. While
there’s no substitute for nailing the shot
in-camera, if you want to change the mood
after the fact then there are a few tools
in Adobe Photoshop CC that can help.
In this tutorial, we’ll explain how to totally
alter the atmosphere in our woodland
scene here with a combination of brush
skills, layer blending modes and adjustment
layers. With these simple Photoshop tools,
you can change the colours to give the
scene a dreamy atmosphere, add in spots
of flare and even suggest mist floating
through the forest.

We have suggested specific colours and
settings for you to try out, but bear in
mind that these are tailored to the image
shown above, so if you want to use similar
techniques in your own scenes then
it’s worth experimenting with different
shades until you hit upon the right look.
Along the way, you’ll learn key Adobe
Photoshop skills that will serve you well in
all kinds of editing tasks. We’ll utilize the
power of adjustment layers to build up
non-destructive tonal changes. We’ll also
control the effect with layer masks so that
the tonal changes can be applied selectively
to different areas with ease. What’s more,
we’ll explain a nifty trick with the Radial Blur
filter for making atmospheric streaks of

Transition from day
to night
Once you’ve created an effect like this, it’s easy to
go from day to night. First, add a Gradient Map
adjustment layer (as in Step 1, above right) and
then customise the gradient so that the blend
goes from black to dark blue (try #455E78 here).
Next, fine-tune the lightness of the image using
a Levels adjustment layer until it looks suitably
moody. Finally, hit Ctrl/Cmd+Shift+Alt+E to
merge a copy of all the layers, then grab the Burn
tool, with Range set to Midtones and Strength at
20%, then paint to darken down the foreground,
gently hiding the details that would naturally
be in near darkness.

light that filter through the forest.

www.digitalcameraworld.com

SHOOT AUTUMN MAGIC

01 CUSTOMISE A GRADIENT

02 ADJUST THE COLOURS

Go to the Layers panel, click Create Adjustment Layer
and choose Gradient Map. Click the gradient strip, then
double-click the ‘colour stop’ icon at the bottom left.
Choose a purple (#472084) and click OK. Now, open the
colour stop icon opposite and choose a yellow (#FFD200).

Reduce the opacity of the layer to 25%. Click Create
Adjustment Layer and choose Solid Color. Select a purple
tone (#320227) and click OK. Set the layer’s Blending Mode
to Exclusion. Add a Color Balance Adjustment Layer with
extra red and yellow in the midtones and highlights.

03 PAINT A FLARE

04 DARKEN THE EDGES

Click Create New Layer and set the Blending Mode to Linear
Dodge (Add). Next, grab the Brush tool, right-click, and set
Hardness to 0. Set the foreground colour to a greenish tone
(#696310 here) then, using a fairly large brush size, click
once to add the flare.

Add a new layer, set Blending Mode to Linear Dodge (Add),
choose a brown (#695310), paint a couple of spots to add to
the flare effect. Click Create Adjustment Layer, choose
Curves and drag down to darken. Paint over the flare with the
Brush tool to hide the darkening effect.

05 ADD A BURST

06 BLEND THE EFFECT

Add a Threshold adjustment layer set to 120, merge all layers
(Ctrl/Cmd+Shift+Alt+E), delete the Threshold layer and
highlight the new layer. Go Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur,
Amount 10. Go to Filter>Blur>Radial Blur, enter Amount 100,
set Blur Method: Zoom, and position the blur on the flare.

Change the Blending Mode to Screen, then lower the opacity
to tone down the effect. Click the Add Layer Mask icon, then
grab the Brush tool. Set the colour to black and hit 4 for
40% opacity, then paint to gradually tone down the blur
effect so that it stays subtle.

The Canon Magazine

AUTUMNPHOTOSKILLS

HOW TO ACCENTUATE
DETAIL IN YOUR SHOTS

Use an unconventional technique involving desaturation to draw attention to detail

BEFORE
he idea that applying an
effect that desaturates an
image to increase detail
may sound impossible,
but by applying a bleach
bypass effect to your images, you will
see how this effect is much more useful
than simply applying a movie-style
colour effect to your shots. It will change
the colouring of your images slightly,
but they will maintain a natural look, and
the effect can be controlled with ease.
The bleach bypass effect has been
around for a long time, first used in the
movie industry as a colouring effect. As
the name suggests, when processing
the transparency film the bleach step
was missed out, resulting in increased
contrast with desaturation and washed
out-looking mid-tones. The effect has
been replicated in Photoshop, and while
there are several ways to achieve the
effect, this is the best method.
It works well for macro photography
as it accentuates texture and detail,
and also takes the edge off
oversaturated parts of the image.

“Bleach bypass is a
simple technique that can
be applied to literally any
image to good effect”
38

AFTER

STEP-BY-STEP HOW TO ACHIEVE BLEACH BYPASS
Use Photoshop to enhance detail and control oversaturation

01 CREATE A LEVELS ADJUSTMENT

02 USE A BLACK & WHITE LAYER

Open the image and click on the Create new Fill or
Adjustment Layer icon (the black and white circle at
the bottom of the Layers panel). Select Levels from
the menu, and when the dialog box opens, type 200 in
the box below the histogram set to 255. Close the box
and change the Layer Blending mode to Multiply.

Click on the Create new Fill or Adjustment Layer icon
and select Black & White. When the Adjustment Layer
dialog box opens, close it immediately, because the
default settings are perfect, then reduce the opacity
of the layer to 40%. This can be found at the top right
of the Layers panel, and is set to 100% by default.

03 LIGHTEN THE IMAGE

04 REFINE THE EFFECT

The ﬁrst step with Levels will have darkened the
image, so we now need to lighten it to roughly its
original brightness. Create a Curves Adjustment Layer
and left-mouse click on the centre of the curve before
dragging up to the left until the brightness looks
correct. If you place a point you don’t need, simply
left-mouse click on it and drag it off the curve.

The Curves Adjustment Layer at the top of the stack
should be active, so hold down the Shift key and
left-mouse click on the levels Adjustment Layer above
the background layer. You should now have three
layers selected. Press Ctrl+G to group the layers, then
double-click on Group 1 to rename it before lowering
the opacity to between 25 and 50%.
www.digitalcameraworld.com

TIP 2
Use a polarizer

CREATIVE
AUTUMN TIPS

Try these tricks and learn to capture bold colour like
a professional for unique and memorable images

We’ve already mentioned this in project 5, but it’s an
important fact that this photographer’s secret weapon
is also ideal for boosting autumn colour. When shooting
in an autumn environment, the surface of leaves and
rocks reflects back polarized light, reducing apparent
colour saturation. Add a circular polarizer and rotate
the front to observe how surface sheen is removed, and
fiery reds, yellows and oranges are restored.

TIP 1
Experiment with
White Balance

WITHOUT POLARIZER

WITH POLARIZER
Shutterstock

One of the main reasons
autumnal images fail is
because the camera
selects a white balance
that neutralizes the
strong colours we expect
from them. The
dominance of reds and
oranges often fools the
camera into adding
blues and cyans. To maintain colour with the iconic autumn ‘wow’ factor, instead of the
Auto White Balance (AWB) or Daylight setting, manually select the Shade or Cloudy
white balance preset to hold those warm colours and exaggerate the colour bias. This
can create perfect autumnal colours in one easy step.

TIP 3
Shoot into the sun

Some of the most impactful colour
can be captured when leaves are
backlit by the sun. During autumn
months, the sun is already lower in
the sky in the mid morning and late
afternoon, allowing the
photographer to position
themselves so colourful trees are
placed between the lens and light
source. Try using positive
exposure compensation if the
camera mistakenly underexposes
your images and compose so that
the sun is partially covered
for creative effect.

TIP 4
Shoot ultra-wide

It can be hard to capture the
splendour of a panoramic
autumnal scene. One technique is to
use an ultra-wide angle lens, like a
10-20mm optic, place the camera close to the ground and shoot
upwards to include the spread of the canopy. If you don’t have a
lens as wide as this, use your smallest focal length and turn the
camera into portrait orientation.

TIP 5
Family portraits in local forests

Autumn is an amazing time for portraits as the colours in
the leaves and on the ground make great surroundings.
Use a long lens, such as a 70-200mm f/2.8, or the longest
focal length on your kit lens, and a wide aperture, then
focus on your subjects to throw the scenery out of focus.
This creates a diffused background, which keeps attention
on your subject, and suggestion and impression of colour,
rather than including the whole woodland scene.

The Canon Magazine

ers
Future / Peter Trav

39
Catherine O’Donnell

THECLAPPCOLUMN

Ridiculousness
in The Lake
District
Castle Crag, Lake District. 11:14am. 3 November 2012

David and his mate Justin get into all sorts
of logistical nonsense in the Lake District,
while in search of striking autumnal scenery

he year is 2012 and my
pilgrimage to the Lake
District has just begun.
After a quick visit in
an exceptional autumn
focused my attention
the year before,
a return to this spectacular
mountainous region was
inevitable. I have travelled up with
my good mate Justin, whose
0HUFHGHVHVWDWHLVQRZÀOOHGZLWK
black bags, tripods and Gortex.
It’s another grey afternoon as we
approach Penrith. As a passenger (which
is a rarity) I have been monitoring trees
all the way up, my anxiety rising and
falling with every bare branch. The Lakes
can be a really glorious, but with wind
and rain also likely to ravage the October
run up, we have decided to stay in
Borrowdale. The geography of this area is
pretty much like a bowl, so you can often
ÀQGZRQGHUIXOFRORXUZKHQWKHWUHHV
elsewhere are somewhat scraggy.
Our accommodation is built of stone
and slate, a comfortable classic with south
views towards Great Gable and beyond.

The acclimatisation drives we make
around the region are promising, with a
few targets already calling us onwards to
potential photographic adventure.
One morning an optimistic Justin goes
missing in the rain. Three hours later he
returns plastered in mud, to me curtain
twitching. A routine turn around in a
lay-by, his luxurious company car
becomes wedged against a four inch drop.
Wheels spinning it literally digs itself in
DQGGHVSLWHDOODWWHPSWV ÀULQJKLVIRRW
ZHOOPDWVRYHUDZDOO LWZDVÀUPO\
wedged. A long walk to get a mobile
signal yielded a grateful roadside
recovery. This event prompted him to

“I can't help but think how
magical the snow completes
this beautiful scene –
autumn and winter in the
same frame”

Lens

Canon EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6L IS USM

Exposure

1/400 sec, f/5.6, ISO400

purchase the tastiest Land Rover
Defender the following year.
We’re doing out best to collect lake
UHÁHFWLRQV6XFFHVVZLWK%OHD7DUQDIHZ
years before will not be repeated this
time. Over a sandwich, we believe it
could be possible to actually surf across
Buttermere. At least our cosy warm house
is always a welcome return.
7KHVWUDQJHYROFDQLFSURÀOHRI&DVWOH
&UDJLVKLJKRQP\OLVWVRZHWDNHDVWUROO
through Grange and up the valley
towards this unusual quarried hill. The
topography rises steeply towards the end
of the climb and, although the views from
the top are rewarding, they are not today.
It’s 10am the next day, and time to
check out. We open the front door and
there is the landscape photograph that
www.digitalcameraworld.com

CANON PRO CLAPP

KDVEHHQHOXGLQJXVDOOZHHN6QRZRQ
Great Gable overnight, the sun has side-lit
WKHPLVWKXJJLQJ&DVWOH&UDJDQGLW·VDOO
visible from the driveway. Then the mood
quickly changes as the owner’s daughter
informs us that we owe an astounding
IRUHOHFWULF6HYHQW\WKUHHSRXQGV
for six days! Firstly, who charges their
guests electricity? Justin quickly
calculates that's over an impossibly huge
£4000 a year total! I continue to assemble
P\&DQRQ'0N,,,DQGKHDVVHPEOHV
his camera, and although we’re feeling
cold, the temperature starts to rise.
:LWKDQ()PPI/]RRP
I have ample range to frame a beautiful
Lake District moment as my mind
FDOFXODWHVWKLVEL]DUUHWRWDOELOO7KHWUHHV
beneath are still in full colour and mist
The Canon Magazine

ÁRDWVEHWZHHQWKHKLOODQGVQRZFDSSHG
mountains above. There’s just enough
dynamic range to capture it all in one
VKRW²DWIVHF,62²DQG
as the mist swirls, I take multiple shots as
we continue to argue the electrical total,
now with the addition of her brother.
I can't help but think how magical the
snowy mountains complete this beautiful
scene – autumn and winter in the same
frame. Justin is getting impatient so he
takes the upper hand. The sun disappears
into clouds, and we strike a disgruntled
KDOIZD\FRPSURPLVHRI
Arguing about electricity bills while
photographing? Truly one of my strangest
experiences while using my camera!

NEXT MONTH MOSCOW

DAVID CLAPP
Canon professional photographer
DAVID CLAPP has been a full-time Canon
professional photographer for 15 years
and for the last 12 he has lead exciting
workshops. He regularly works for Canon
UK and is represented by Getty Images.
Visit www.davidclapp.co.uk for
a portfolio of inspiring photos and
information on all of his workshops.

HOW TO VIEW OUR E
LIN
VIDEO GUIDES ON
PROJECT AND

VIDEO GUIDES #210

ALL OF OUR NEW PHOTO N BE VIEWED
IMAGE-EDITING VIDEOS CALINKS ON
ONLINE VIA THE WEB
PAGES 46-61!

Sharpen up your photography skills with
our all-new photo projects and expert guides

Dan Mold

Deputy editor
dan.mold@futurenet.com

New projects with video guides
Follow our Canon camera walkthrough guides and Photoshop editing videos

Welcome…
THIS month we’ve got a
great bunch of photo
projects you can try out
– no matter what the
weather. For those rainy
days be sure to see the Big
Project on page 46, where
James shows you how to set
up off-camera lighting at
home for beautiful
backlighting. Meanwhile,
I’ve been out foraging for
quintessential autumn
produce to create a
sensational still life shot
indoors – shot with basic
camera kit (page 50). For
those sunnier autumn days
be sure to check out my low
angle photography project,
where I run through my
favourite tips and tricks to
help you take impressive
low-to-the-ground city shots
to change your perspective
(page 52). If you’d like to
brush up on your editing
skills, see Sean’s vignette
tutorial in Lightroom on
page 56, or James’s run
down of Photoshop Actions
on page 58, and how to
create a sharp stacked shot
in Affinity, on page 60.

The Canon Magazine

46Beautiful backlighting 50 Seasonal still life
Learn to light your subjects
from behind for stunning portraits

Take stunning autumn still
life shots at home on a rainy day

56 Lightroom Classic CC

52 Low angle city shots

Guide the eye to your focal
point with a vignette in Lightroom

Go low with our top tripod
tips to capture a new perspective

VIEW THE VIDEOS

58 Tool school

Use Photoshop Actions to
speed up your editing workflow

60 Affinity Photo

Create super-sharp scenes
with Affinity’s focus merge command

WHENEVER YOU see
this icon, you’ll ﬁnd
an accompanying
video to watch
VIEW T
online, so you
HE
can follow along.
You can view
the videos on a
smartphone, tablet or
computer. See the links
on the project pages.

VIDEO

THE MISSION
Learn how to
backlight portraits
with studio lighting
Time needed
One hour
Skill level
Intermediate
Kit needed
• Flash or Speedlite
• Light stand
• Umbrella/softbox
• Canon EOS
• Camera trigger

The beauty of
backlighting
James Paterson shows you how to easily backlight your subjects
lace a light behind
a person to one side
– or two lights either
side and the light
glances off the edge of
the subject in the most
wonderful way. This is one
of the simplest, yet most
powerful lighting skills you
can learn. Get to grips with
backlighting and you can
craft sensational portraits.
We’ve used a set of lights from
DKRPHVWXGLRNLWKHUHHDFKÀWWHG
with a softbox. But you don’t
necessarily need to go and buy

a whole load of new kit for this
project. Any light source can be
used for backlighting. A Speedlite
and a cheap white umbrella will
give amazing results, but even
a household lamp can be used
to great effect. Then of course
there’s the sun. When it’s low in
the sky, it can create an attractive,
warm backlighting if you position
your subject with the setting
sun behind them.
This kind of lighting is ideal for
side-on poses because it highlights
the edge of the body. As such, it’s
perfect for a pregnant subject like

Kelli here, highlighting her
beautiful bump and glancing off
WKHHGJHRIKHUIDFHLQSURÀOH
It’s also ideal when you want your
subject to stand out from their
surroundings, or to give them
a heroic, cinematic impression
(backlighting is used all the time
LQÀOPVDQGWHOHYLVLRQ 2YHUWKH
next few pages we’ll look at how
to shoot and edit quality portraits
like this. From exposure settings
to light placement, you’ll learn
the best methods to backlight
your subjects for beautiful
low-key photos.
www.digitalcameraworld.com

VIDEO
E
H
T
VIEW

MOOD LIGHTING

WATCH VIDEO ONLINE
http://bit.ly/pp_210_1
PROJECT 1

HOME STUDIO TIPS SET UP FOR BACKLIT PORTRAITS
Learn how to use home studio lighting kits for stunning portrait results
01 LIGHT SOURCE

02 DARK BACKDROP

03 CAMERA SETTINGS

The key piece of kit is a moveable light
source, ideally with a light stand. We’ve
used an Elinchrom home studio head here.
A mains-powered light like this is perfect
for a home studio set-up. The lights can be
triggered either with a wireless trigger or
optically when detecting another flash.

A dark, uncluttered backdrop will help to
focus attention on your subject, and
contrast with the edge highlight created by
the backlighting. We’ve used a roll of vinyl
here which is white on one side and dark
grey on the other. A plain wall or a blanket
strung up will work just as well.

Here’s a good stock setting for a studio
flash set-up like this. Set your camera to
manual exposure mode with ISO100. Set
shutter speed 1/200 sec and aperture f/8.
Take a test shot then increase or decrease
the power of the light source, or open or
close your aperture until it looks right.

04 REAR LIGHT

05 POSING

06 FILL LIGHT

The positioning of the light is crucial here.
We want to lift the edge of the body and
we usually want to leave the front of the
subject in shade. There’s no right or
wrong, so start by placing it just behind
the subject to one side, angled towards the
camera, then experiment by moving the
light source incrementally forward or back.

Posing your subject is vital when it comes
to backlighting. You don’t want them to be
looking at the camera, as unless you have
a fill light to lift the shadows their face will
be in deep shade. Better to have them
looking off to the side, or with eyes down
to create more of a thoughtful pose that’s
perfect for our pregnant subject here.

A fill light here is positioned to the left side
of the subject to lift the shadows in the
face. It’s set at a lower power than the
light used to backlight the subject on
the right. You can see here that it lifts
the hair and the subject’s left shoulder.
If you prefer to keep your images dark
and moody, then stick to a single light.

The Canon Magazine

VIEW T
HE VIDE
WATCH VIDEO ONLINE
O

http://bit.ly/pp_210_1
PROJECT 1

TOP TIPS BACKLIGHTING ESSENTIALS
Learn how to sculpt the light with modiﬁers and settings

FEATHER THE
LIGHT
By feathering the light
we can make it wrap
around our subject,
so that there’s less of
a difference between
the brightest and
darkest spots. As well as
making the light more
even, it also means
less spillage onto the
backdrop. To feather
a light, simply adjust
the angle so that it
falls across the front
of the subject, rather
than straight at them.
With backlighting, this
usually means directing
the softbox so that it’s
pointed slightly more
towards the camera
position than the
subject. Now the light
hitting them comes
more from the edge of
the softbox rather than
the more intense beam
in the centre.

01 HARD LIGHT vs SOFTBOX

02 SETTING THE FLASH POWER

In general, it’s better to use a large light source like a
softbox over a small light source like a bare flash. Look
at the difference here between the bare flash used in
this image and the softbox lighting in Tip 3. The larger
the light source, the more gentle the shadows will be.

With your camera settings locked in, don’t change
them; alter the power of the lights to suit your
exposure. With more than one light, turn just one on
and work out the right power and position for it using
test shots, then add a second light and build it up.

03 GET THE LIGHT IN CLOSE

04 WORK THE ANGLES

You’ll get the best results if you bring your backlight
in close to the subject, making the light larger in
relation to the subject, and causes the light to wrap
around them. It also means less light will spill onto the
backdrop. You can cut out the light later in Photoshop.

A slight change in the position of the light can have a
big impact – look at the difference here, on the left the
light is more side-on, on the right it’s moved about a
metre backwards, for much more moody light. The
further back the light, the thinner the edge highlight.

05 TRY OPENING THE APERTURE

06 BUILD THE LIGHTING

Backlighting can also be used for a bright airy feel.
Here, the lighting is the same set-up as the dark
shots – all we’ve done is open up the aperture to
f/3.2, which blows out the backdrop and creates
overexposed edges on the subjects.

If you want to add in a second light, you can create
edge lighting around the subject, or subjects. Here
we positioned a second backlight behind and to the
left (you can see them in the edges of the frame).
Now we have an edge light for each face in profile.
www.digitalcameraworld.com

MOOD LIGHTING

TOP TIPS BOOST YOUR BACKLIT PORTRAITS
Simple editing tips and tricks to enhance your people pictures

01 TRY BLACK AND WHITE

02 FIX STRAY HAIRS

03 USE FLARE AND LIGHT LEAKS

Backlighting creates a wonderful sense of
mood and depth, which often goes hand in
hand with a black and white treatment.
Colour can sometimes be a distraction,
and without it you can emphasise the form
of the subject and draw attention to the
expression. The black and white panel is
Adobe Camera Raw and Lightroom is the
ideal place to convert to mono.

One of the pitfalls of backlighting is that it
shows up lots of distracting stray hairs
around the edge of the head. Sadly, there’s
no quick fix for this in Photoshop CC, you
simply have to get stuck in with the Spot
Removal tool to remove unwanted hairs.
The new Remove tool is great for getting
rid of larger objects like lights, and can be
handy for extending a backdrop too.

Backlighting can lend portraits a dreamy,
thoughtful mood that can sometimes be
enhanced with simple post-processing
tricks, like adding a flare or light leak effect.
We’ve used the Nik Collection, a fantastic
plugin for Photoshop. It includes Analog
Efex Pro, which offers retro effects
including light leaks that you can blend
with your photos.

TAKE IT FURTHER EXPERIMENT WITH GELS
Coloured gels can take your backlighting and edge lighting to the next level
Why not try fitting coloured gels over your light
sources to tint them different colours? A simple
shift in colour can create an entirely new mood.
Here we fitted our backlight with an orange gel, and
our frontal fill light with a blue gel. Complimentary
colours like this can work well together. So pick
colours that sit opposite one another on a colour
wheel. The fun thing about using orange and blue is
that we can also get creative with our white balance
to make the image cooler or warmer, so the balance
shifts towards vibrant oranges or blues. We
adjusted the white balance so that the blue gel has
a minimal cast, which makes the warm light from
behind even more vibrant. As well as tinting the
light sources that illuminate your subject, you can
also colour the background by directing another
gelled light on it.

VIEW T
HE VIDE
WATCH VIDEO ONLINE
O

http://bit.ly/pp_210_2
PROJECT 2

THE MISSION
Arrange and shoot
an amazing autumn
still life at home
Time needed
One hour
Skill level
Beginner
Kit needed
• Any Canon EOS
mirrorless or
DSLR camera
• A kit lens or 50mm
f/1.8 is ideal
• Tripod

PRO TIP
The great thing about still
life is you can get great
results even with an
entry level Canon camera
and a kit lens such as
an 18-55mm. A ‘nifty
ﬁfty’ lens like the Canon
EF 50mm f/1.8 STM is
very affordable at £129
and will open up shallow
depth of ﬁeld options if
you’d like to experiment
with blurry backdrops.

Capture sensational
seasonal still life shots
Autumn is a wonderfully colourful and photogenic period, Dan Mold
shows you how to shoot a still life scene full of top seasonal produce
utumn makes me think
of with wet woodland
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While there’s no shortage of
photogenic subjects to turn your
Canon EOS towards outside this
autumn, it’s easy to overlook the
bounty of still life opportunities
you can have indoors too, perfect
for those rainy days where you’re
not able to get outdoors with your
camera. In this project I’ll give you

the inspiration and key settings to
shoot your very own seasonal still
life scene indoors, oozing with
autumnal atmosphere.
Speaking of autumnal produce,
you can either collect and forage
items such as leaves, acorns,
rosehips, conkers and pine cones
when you’re next out on a forest
or woodland walk, or head to your
supermarket (or allotment) for
some seasonal veg like pumpkins
and squashes. We used a mixture
of both, and added some extra
items from a bag of pot pourri
from a craft shop which helped us
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cinnamon sticks and dried fruit.
Still life photography is a great
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muscles when you aren’t able to

get outdoors due to the ever
changeable British weather. It will
test you in new ways and help you
grow as a photographer too. One
of things I love about still life
photography is there’s no time
limit – you can really slow things
down and perfect all of the
various elements, from the
positioning of your subjects, the
composition, lens choice and
camera settings to name just a few
of the key variables. You can also
either use natural window light,
ÁDVKRUHYHQJHWFUHDWLYHZLWKD
torch as we did here to transform
the way your shots look. Below
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still life scenes this autumn,
follow along and watch the
accompanying video to see how
you can pull it off too.

STEP BY STEP SET UP AN AUTUMNAL STILL LIFE
Follow our expert tips to shoot sublime still life scenes at home

f/11

f/1.4

01 SET UP YOUR STILL LIFE SCENE

02 SET UP ON A TRIPOD

03 PLAY WITH DEPTH OF FIELD

Put some autumnal objects on a table and
rearrange them to your liking. We used
some hessian fabric to complement the
autumnal brown and orange tones and
added a vinyl background to make the
backdrop clean and uncluttered.

Now it’s time to set up your Canon EOS
camera on a tripod. This will help you lock off
the composition while you move elements of
your still life around the frame. A tripod will
also eliminate camera shake in low light
scenes indoors and help you nail the focus.

Start in Aperture priority (Av) mode and
experiment with different aperture values
and take shots both wide open such as at
f/1.8, or closed down to a mid value like
f/11 and inspect your results to see what
depth of field works best for your still life.

www.digitalcameraworld.com

BEFORE

STILL LIFE

QUICK TIP!
Your still life setup
can be as simple
or elaborate as you
want. Start with
a few items for a
minimalist scene
and build it up
as you go

AFTER

04 DIAL IN THE CAMERA SETTINGS

05 ADD ‘FAKE’ STUDIO LIGHTING

06 COOK UP SOME FOOD PHOTOS

When you’ve worked out the aperture you
would like to use, set the ISO to 100 for
best image quality and take a note of the
shutter speed, ours was 4 secs. Then go
into Manual mode and enter the exact
same settings again to lock them off. Turn
on the 2 sec Self-timer to avoid shake too.

To make the lighting a bit more dramatic,
we used a small torch with a warm LED
bulb to add light from one side to inject
some moody shadows and contrast. You
could also paint with light over the whole
scene to eliminate shadows, to mimic the
effect of an expensive five light studio!

You don’t have to pack up when you’ve
captured your first autumnal still life. If
you’re skilled in the kitchen, as well as
behind the camera, why not try cooking
some simple autumnal dishes like soup
and make the most of the seasonal
produce you’ve collected or brought.

The Canon Magazine

VIEW T
HE VIDE
WATCH VIDEO ONLINE
O

http://bit.ly/pp_210_3
PROJECT 3

THE MISSION
Boost the impact of
your shots with low
angle perspectives
Time needed
One hour
Skill level
Beginner
Kit needed
• Canon EOS body
• Canon lens
• Tripod

Get the low down

Dan Mold shows you how to change your perspective for free!
t’s generally said that
great photos are rarely
taken at headheight, so
one of the easiest, and
also cheapest, ways to add
impact to your images is
to simply change up your
perspective and shoot from
a higher or lower angle.
Shooting from a high angle can

be the trickier of the two options
– unless you’re very tall, you’ll
QHHGWRÀQGVRPHVWHSVRU
potentially use a drone to get high
enough to shoot down across the
scene. On the other hand, a low
angle perspective is easy to
achieve; just get down on one
knee and tilt your camera up to
make your subject appear more

dominant in the frame. A Canon
EOS camera with a tiltable LCD
screen will certainly help you
compose in Live View when
shooting so close to the ground,
as will a tripod that allows you to
VHWXSFORVHUWRWKHÁRRU
In this project we’ll cover the
best tips and tripod options for
shooting from a low angle.

THE SETUP REACHING NEW DEPTHS
Discover the core kit for a more low angle perspective

01
03

01 MINIATURE TRIPOD

02 INVERTING CENTRE COLUMN

03 CANON EOS CAMERA

A mini tripod like the Leofoto Ranger LS
223C pictured here, or a JOBY Gorillapod
helps you cut down on space and weight
when travelling and is ideal if you know you
need the convenience of a tripod but will
only be shooting from ground level.

Many professional tripods have the ability
for the centre column to be inverted,
rotated or swapped out for a shorter one
(more over the page on these options).
This helps you lower your camera closer to
the ground when shooting low down.

While you can shoot street scenes with
any Canon EOS camera, lighter models
like our 100D DSLR are ideal as miniature
tripods may have a lower max weight.
Lighter bodies are also easier to handle
when the centre column is inverted.

www.digitalcameraworld.com

GO LOW

QUICK TIP!
When shooting
on a tripod make
sure any Image
Stabilization,
whether optical or
in-body, is switched
off to ensure the
sharpest shots

CLEAR THE
STREETS
Street scenes can be
tricky especially if there
are cars or people in
the frame. A top tip is to
arrive early, not only will
you get the best light in
the golden hour but the
streets will also be less
busy. Another option is to
use an ND ﬁlter and long
exposure to blur people
as they walk through the
scene or clone them out
in Photoshop.

The Canon Magazine

IDEO
V
E
H
T
WATCH VIDEO ONLINE VIEW

http://bit.ly/pp_210_3
PROJECT 3

TOP TIPS A BRAND NEW LOW
Get the low down on ways to compose at ground-level

TILT YOUR
LCD SCREEN
One of the best features
on modern Canon’s is the
tiltable LCD screen which
makes it much easier
to see your composition
and frame up when your
camera is close to the
ground. All but the most
entry-level Canon’s have
a tiltable LCD which you
can use with Live View
to see your composition
and focus. Alternatively,
many Canon’s can
be paired with a
smartphone using the
Canon Camera Connect
app so you can see your
composition via your
phone screen if the rear
LCD panel or viewﬁnder
is difﬁcult to access.

01 MINI TRIPOD

02 LEG ANGLES

A miniature tripod such as the Leofoto Ranger LS
223C is perfect for low angle shots and is ideal for
saving space and cutting down weight. While it isn’t as
versatile as a full-size tripod, it’s perfect if you’re
intentionally heading out for low angle shots.

On budget tripods you’ll usually find the legs are
bound together for sharper video footage. One of the
big differences with a pro photography tripod is the
ability to change the leg angles, usually with a button
found at the top of each leg.

03 STUBBY CENTRE COLUMN

04 MANFROTTO SWIVEL CENTRE COLUMN

Some professional tripods come with a short centre
column that can be swapped out so that it doesn’t get
in the way when you set the legs to their lowest
position. Other centre columns are built in two stages
and can be twisted to reveal a shorter setting.

Many Manfrotto’s tripods, like our 055 model here,
have a 90° centre column – although it cannot be
removed or inverted, the centre column can be
positioned perfectly horizontal so you’re still shooting
with your camera in the correct orientation.

TOP TIP ENTER THE UPSIDE DOWN
Invert the centre column for a low angle perspective
MANY PRO tripods
have the ability for the
centre column to be
inverted, so check the
specs to see if yours can.
Sometimes they flip
over, while other times
they need to be removed
entirely and then
re-inserted the ‘wrong’
way around.

COMPOSING on an
inverted centre column
can be tricky with your
camera and all of its
buttons upside down.
But you can buy an
inexpensive adapter that
allows you to hang your
camera from its hotshoe
so you can shoot the
right way up.
www.digitalcameraworld.com

GO LOW

STEP BY STEP DIY MINIATURE TRIPOD
Money’s tight so here’s how we made our own mini tripod on a budget...

LENS CHOICE FOR
LOW PERSPECTIVE
PHOTOGRAPHS

01 CHOP IT DOWN TO SIZE

02 SHORTEN THE COLUMN

03 BOND IT TOGETHER

We had an old unused tripod
gathering dust and we wanted
to give it a second lease of life
as a miniature tripod. The first
step was to mark out four
inches for the top leg sections
and cut them down to size with
a hacksaw.

Next, you’ll want to modify the
centre column to make it
shorter so it doesn’t get in the
way when shooting so close to
the ground. Some tripods
come with one, but if yours
doesn’t you can again cut it
down to size with a hacksaw.

All that was left was to bond
everything together - we used
super glue as it wouldn’t be
load bearing and ideal for
adhering the metal pipes.
Finally, you need a suitably
petite tripod head, we used a
Vanguard travel ball head.

PRO ADVICE INCLUDE REFLECTIONS

A wide-angle lens is a natural
choice for both low and high
angle perspectives. When used
low to the ground, a wide angle
makes it easier to squeeze more
of the foreground into the frame
as well as your focal point in the
distance. For our foreground
we used the lovely cobbled
streets of Barn Hill in Stamford,
Lincolnshire, though you could
use anything on the ground from
ﬂowers to fence posts – even
double yellow lines can make
intesting lead-in lines. On a
Canon APS-C body a focal length
around 10-18mm will work well
due to the 1.6x sensor crop, but
for full-frame bodies a lens such
as an 16-35mm is ideal.

Add a reﬂection for an extra point of interest
WHAT’S BETTER than one focal point?
Two of course! Look out for reflections in
puddles of water on rainy days, or bring a
large bottle of water with you to create
your own! Flat pavements and tarmac tend
to work best for creating silky smooth
reflections in your street scenes.
Using a wide-angle lens on your Canon
EOS camera, you can get low down and
The Canon Magazine

close to the pool of water. This will allow
you to compose including both your main
focal point and its reflection, such as the
church in our example. You can then decide
whether to focus on your main subject, or
its reflection. You could also experiment
with using a shallow depth of field by
opening up the aperture to turn either
focal point into an attractive arty blur.

BEFORE

AFTER

Time needed
20 minutes

Direct the viewer’s
eye with a vignette

Skill level
Beginner

Sean McCormack uses Lightroom’s Radial Gradient tool to add this
effect in just a few steps and take control of how your images are seen

THE MISSION
Master the art of
xx xxx xxx xxxx
where the viewer’s
eye goes first

Kit needed
Adobe Lightroom
Classic CC

DOWNLOAD PROJECT FILES
TO YOUR COMPUTER FROM:
http://downloads.
photoplusmag.com/pp210.zip

he eye is generally
attracted to the
brightest thing in a
photo and is also drawn
to sharper and more
saturated areas – you can
use this information to
direct where your viewer
JRHVÀUVWNormally, vignetting
is bad. It’s a form of lens distortion
where the photo’s edges become
darker. It can look okay, but unless

your subject is in the middle, it’s
not great for creative control.
Vignetting can be corrected using
/HQV3URÀOHVLQ/HQV&RUUHFWLRQV
– applied for mirrorless cameras
DXWRPDWLFDOO\/LJKWURRP&ODVVLF
&&GRHVKDYHD9LJQHWWLQJRSWLRQ
in Effects, but it’s centred only
(though it is crop aware). A better
option is the Radial Gradient tool,
which is now one of the Masking
RSWLRQV<RXFDQVWLOOXVHWKLVÀOWHU

in older versions of Lightroom,
though the interface looks
different – this tutorial is for
/LJKWURRP&ODVVLFDQG
upwards. The key difference from
vignetting is that you can place
the Radial Gradient centre
anywhere. Open up one of your
images, or experiment with the
&KXUFKMSJVWDUWLPDJHIURP\RXU
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to see how it’s done...
www.digitalcameraworld.com

VIDEO
E
H
T
VIEW

STAND-OUT SUBJECTS

WATCH VIDEO ONLINE
http://bit.ly/pp_210_4
LIGHTROOM

STEP BY STEP USE A VIGNETTE TO GRAB ATTENTION
Guide the viewer’s eye to your chosen highlight with Lightroom’s Radial Gradient tool

RENAME
MASKS FOR
EASE OF USE

01 OPEN MASKING
Open the Masking pane
from under the Histogram and select the Radial
Gradient, or use the shortcut Shift+M. In this picture
the eye wanders about a bit, so you want to help
focus the view. From the centre of the church,
draw a large oval. Zoom out if needed.

02 INVERT THE
SELECTION
Normally, any effect applied is in the centre by
default. To use this filter as a vignette it needs to be
on the outside. You can either left click or right
click on the Mask 1 Icon and choose Invert to do
this. The red area of the mask swaps to the outside.

03 CREATE LENS BLUR

04 COMBINE MASKS

Now to apply the settings. Bring
Exposure down to -1.00, which
darkens the outside of the image.
Now increase Feather to 75 to help
smooth the transition. Bring
Sharpness down to -100 to create
some lens blur on the outside too.

Right-click the mask icon
again and choose
‘Duplicate and Invert Mask’
to apply a new gradient to the centre of the mask. Set
Exposure to 0.40 and Sharpness to 20. This gives a lift
to the centre of the photo. When both masks are
combined it really helps draw the eye to the church.

The Canon Magazine

For a sound working
practice, you should
rename your Masks.
Either double click on a
Mask name or right click
and choose Rename.
A dialog will appear,
allowing you to change
the name of the mask
from the default naming
in Lightroom Classic.

VIEW T
HE VIDE
WATCH VIDEO ONLINE
O

http://bit.ly/pp_210_5
PHOTOSHOP CC

Part 24 of a series

THE MISSION
Work faster with
your automated
shortcuts for
Photoshop features
Time needed
20 mins
Skill level
Intermediate
Kit needed
• Photoshop CC

DOWNLOAD PROJECT FILES
TO YOUR COMPUTER FROM:
http://downloads.
photoplusmag.com/pp210.zip

Action stations
James Paterson helps you to discover what Photoshop Actions can
do for you…start enhancing your portraits with our free actions pack
hotoshop Actions
allow you to save and
reuse a sequence of
edits, commands and
settings. As such, if you
carry out a task once, you
need never to do it all again.
In practice, you can use
Actions to automate tasks,
VSHHGXS\RXUZRUNÁRZ
and access your most used
Photoshop features. It only
takes a moment to create
an action for a sequence of
edits, then the same
sequence can be applied to
other images with a click.
But what if there are certain
points in the sequence where you

want to change things manually?
Thankfully, you can build stops
and pauses into your actions.
In this tutorial, we’ll explore some
of the key features and show you
how to create custom Actions.
As an example, we’ve used
a technique called Frequency
Separation, which is useful for
retouching uneven skin tones.
You can also make use of
actions created by others – we’ve
supplied a set of 10 handy
retouching actions for you to
try out on your own photos.
2SHQWKH3RUWUDLWMSJVWDUWÀOH
into Photoshop and follow along
to see how actions can speed up
\RXUZRUNÁRZ

RETOUCHING ACTIONS KIT
INSTALL the
10 retouching
actions in the
project ﬁles by
clicking the ﬂyout
menu in the
Actions panel (Window > Actions)
and choosing Load Actions. We’ve
used Frequency Separation, a retouching
technique to separate high frequency
and low frequency details, making it easy
to smooth uneven skin. After running it,
make a layer above the Colour layer, then
grab the Clone tool. Set it to Sample:
Current and Below, then clone.

www.digitalcameraworld.com

PHOTOSHOP ACTIONS

STEP BY STEP SAVING A SEQUENCE OF SETTINGS
Develop your user-built recorded tasks and commands to speed up your workﬂow
01 THE ACTIONS PANEL

02 MAKE A NEW ACTION

03 TAILOR YOUR EDITS

Go to Window>Actions to bring up the
Actions panel. After making an action, it’ll
appear in the list. Expand the action to see
every step that went into creating it. You
can drag to change the order of steps,
delete them or toggle the tick icon next to
each step to disable them. Double-click a
step to re-enter the setting or dialog box
and tweak the controls – these new
settings are then saved into the action.

Press the New Action button, give your
action a name and hit Record. Now, until
you hit the stop button in the Actions
panel, everything you do in Photoshop will
be recorded into the action. You can also
assign keyboard shortcuts to your
most-used actions. To tweak the action
settings or assign a shortcut later, click
the Action panel flyout menu and choose
Action Options.

Think about how the action is best
replicated for universal use. For example,
if it requires you to highlight a different
layer rather than clicking on it, try using
the shortcut Alt+] or [ to move up or down
the stack. Similarly, it can be hard to
automate brush strokes and other edits
that are area-specific. If this is essential,
turn on ‘Allow Tool Recording’ in the
Action panel flyout menu.

04 PAUSE FOR MANUAL SETTINGS

05 STOPS AND CONDITIONALS

06 RUN ACTIONS ON BIG BATCHES

The box next to each step lets you pause
the action for manual input. Once the
settings are applied, the action will
recommence. In our Frequency Separation
action here, we need enough blur to
eliminate the fine detail, but the right
setting will depend on the size of the image
and the proportions of the face. By pausing
the action, we can tailor the strength of
the setting to the image.

The flyout menu in the Actions panel has a
host of options and is found in the top right
corner of the panel. First, there’s Button
mode, which changes the view of the panel
into buttons. There are also options to
insert functions while recording actions.
‘Insert Stop’ lets you stop the action and
add a message or reminder, and ‘Insert
Conditional’ lets you go in a different
direction depending on certain criteria.

Found under File>Automate>Batch,
the Batch command lets you run actions
on a large folder of photos so you can
automate your workflow for considerable
time-savings. Choose from your actions,
select a folder then choose a destination
folder for the reworked images, or set
it to save and close them. ‘Create Droplet’
lets you run actions by dragging files onto
a droplet icon.

The Canon Magazine

BEFORE

AFTER
THE MISSION
Merge a set of focus
stack shots in
Affinity Photo with
Focus Merge
Time needed
20 minutes
Skill level
Beginner
Kit needed
Affinity

DOWNLOAD PROJECT FILES
TO YOUR COMPUTER FROM:
http://downloads.
photoplusmag.com/pp210.zip

Focus stack ﬁnesse
James Paterson shows you how to deepen depth of ﬁeld in your
landscape scenes with Afﬁnity’s focus merge command
ver the past few years
focus stacking has
gone from a niche,
little-known trick used
in macro photography to an
everyday technique called
upon by all kinds of
photographers, from those
shooting architectural
scenes to landscapes,
SURGXFWSKRWRJUDSK\ÀQH
art and more. There are two
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www.digitalcameraworld.com

VIDEO
E
H
T
VIEW

FOCUS STACKING

WATCH VIDEO ONLINE
http://bit.ly/pp_210_6
AFFINITY PHOTO

STEP BY STEP FOCUS STACKING SKILLS
Create incredibly detailed landscapes with the Focus Merge command

QUICK TIP!
If you find a messy
area in your
focus merge then
sometimes it’s
easier to remove
the area with the
Inpainting tool

01 START A FOCUS MERGE

02 INSPECT THE RESULTS

Open Affinity Photo 2 then go to File>New Focus
Merge. Click Add, navigate to your folder of photos
and drag to select them all and hit Open. Click the OK
button and sit back while Affinity Photo seeks out and
combines the sharp parts from each photo for you.

At this point you might find that you’re done. But
sometimes the merge will not be perfect. Landscapes
can often have issues, as patches of background detail
between stems or branches may be blurry, or the wind
may make plants to move like the flower here.

STACK
SHOOTING

03 FIND A SHARPER FRAME

04 CLONE TO IMPROVE

The Sources Panel lets us view each image in the
blend, so we can click through the original frames to
try and find a sharper match for our flower. Click the
eye icon then click through each image in the list.
Here image 3 has a sharper flower than the blend.

Highlight the image in the Sources Panel then click the
eye icon again to go back to the merged view. Using
the Clone tool (it should be selected) paint over the
area to clone from the source into the blended image.
Continue to paint in sharp parts from any other areas.

05 FIX MESSY AREAS

06 BLEND IN A NEW SKY

The grassy foreground has been moved between
frames. Rather than attempt to fix the blend, we could
simply remove it. Go to the Layers Panel and click the
New Pixel Layer icon then grab the Inpainting tool. Set
‘Current and Below’ in the sample options and paint.

The sky is a bit blown out here but we have another
frame with a darker sky. Open and copy this in (Cmd/
Ctrl+C to copy, Cmd/Ctrl+V to paste), then add a layer
mask and paint with black over the land so only the
sky is visible. We finished off by dodging and burning.

The Canon Magazine

To shoot for a focus stack
use a tripod and adjust
the focus ring slightly
over a series of frames
(or use your camera’s
focus bracketing
feature). The tricky part
is deciding how many
shots you need, and the
increments between
them. For landscapes
you may only need three
or four. But if you want to
include details very close
to the camera, then the
depth of ﬁeld shrinks to a
mere sliver. As such, for
a close up macro subject
you might need 40 or 50
frames. Your camera’s
depth of ﬁeld preview or
focus peaking feature
can help you judge how
much of the scene is in
focus at a given aperture.

NEXT MONTH
INFRARED
EFFECTS
61

THEPROINTERVIEW

www.digitalcameraworld.com

JAMES MUSSELWHITE
From weddings to
wrestling, James
Musselwhite is one
of the most diverse
Canon photographers
around. However, it’s
not true what they
say about being a
jack of all trades. He
is a master of many
genres, as Lauren
Scott discovered...
AMES Musselwhite
is a professional
photographer (and
videographer) who’s
hard to pin down, at
least in terms of genre.
When I speak to James
from his home in
Portsmouth – his
commercial studio is
based nearby – he’s just returned
from shooting a big wrestling
event in London and is still riding
high on the excitement.
James’s huge passion for wrestling
(www.portraitofawrestler.com) has
followed him throughout his career and
makes up a part of his portrait business
alongside weddings, pets, newborns, and
even commercial headshots.
James’s work might be varied, but it’s
portraiture and, more importantly, the
story behind the portrait, that he loves
most. His approach to gear, lighting and
client consultations is also similar – no
matter the subject. “Working out how
famous portraits have been shot is one of
my favourite things to do,” he shares.
01 LADY IN RED

A regularly user of flash and coloured gels,
James sets a manual white balance of
around 4600K and tweaks the RAW files
during post-production of his portraits

The Canon Magazine

Lens

Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L USM

Exposure

1/200 sec, f/4, ISO100

THEPROINTERVIEW
02

“I love solving the puzzle of how subjects
have been lit.” He’s equally enthusiastic,
energetic, and thoughtful, or so it seems,
to an interviewer. James spoke with
PhotoPlus before the pandemic, and now,
having come out of the other side, he
seems even more determined to push his
creative and personal boundaries. He’s
upgraded to mirrorless with the Canon
EOS R6 and R6 Mark II, opened a bigger
studio and even started sharing video
tutorials from both his portraiture and

ULQJVLGHDFWLRQ/HW·VÀQGRXWKRZWKH
past few years have been for James…
Hi James. Firstly, how are you?
Busy and excited. I shot at Wembley
Stadium a few days ago, which was really
exciting. I had access to all areas so I got
there early, got my pass and then I did
my own little stadium tour.
Wembley is a big venue! What
were you there to photograph?

I was shooting All Elite Wrestling (AEW),
a company that came over and sold
80,000 tickets. I’ve shot so much
independent, low-level stuff in my career,
and a lot of wrestlers have gone through
the ranks in that time. That means there
were some people there that I hadn’t seen
in 10 years who were on the main show,
which was really cool. It was also lovely
to be part of a big production – I’ve got to
that stage now where I’m enjoying
working in a big team, especially when
I’ve been on my own for so long.
Is your approach to working in a
big location different compared to
smaller arenas?
The funny thing was that we had the
whole of Wembley Stadium with no fans
inside of it. Everything was set up, with
multi-levels… and yet we were still
struggling around as a team to work out
where the studio was going to go because
there was no room and the power cords
ZHUHÀ[HG7KHUHZDVVSDFHEXWWKHUH
was no space.
If I go to an indie show, I can put my
light wherever, do whatever I need to,
and shoot on a wide-angle lens. I think
that lighting tends to be better planned
on a big show, whereas the lighting at
a low-level show typically isn’t great.
I know I’ll have to compromise on the
ISO or hope that the action isn’t too fast
because I’ll be using a slower shutter
www.digitalcameraworld.com

JAMES MUSSELWHITE
02 ACROBATIC MOVES

A high ISO setting is essential for fast
shutter speeds to freeze movement in the
ring, despite the ambient light in a venue
Lens

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4L IS USM

Exposure

1/800 sec, f/4, ISO4000

03 NATURAL PERFORMERS

James has made a name for himself in
wrestling, equally adept at promotional
portraits and dramatic action shots
Lens

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4L IS USM

Exposure

1/640 sec, f/4, ISO4000

04 ON THE BOX

There’s a playful nature to James’ studio
work, and he’ll incorporate props to create
a narrative in his portraits
Lens

Canon RF 24-105mm F4L IS USM

Exposure

1/160 sec, f/8, ISO100

Zoom call and discuss ideas and what
they want. Get them to submit ideas.
Then we can provide a storyboard level
on our side and send it back to them.

speed. At Wembley, I just set my ISO to
800, and I was wide open at f/2.8. It was
quite easy, I suppose is the answer.
Do you enjoy bigger wrestling
events over smaller shows?
This particular one I did at Wembley
was quite emotional. There’s only ever
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KDSSHQHGÀYH\HDUVDJRLQ&KLFDJR
– and I was one of the few photographers
invited out there to cover it. I emailed the
organisers and said that I was part of the
ÀUVWRSHQLQJDQG,·GOLNHWREHSDUWRI
the second one, and eventually, I got the
pass to work it. So for me, it was a big
cyclical thing.
The big arena is a spectacle, and it
goes by in the blink of an eye. I don’t
want to speak on behalf of the team,
but I felt at Wembley there was a lot of
pressure on it because you can’t reshoot it
– like all live events, really. I do like going
to smaller shows and showcasing my
expertise. Providing photos that go
The Canon Magazine

beyond the product that they’ve put on,
gives the promoter something that really
makes the event look fun. The purpose of
the show is to sell the next show! The
honest answer is that I really enjoy both.
You shoot quite a range of
subjects, from wrestlers to
newborns, to PR and marketing
headshots to events. Do you wear
different hats for each one, or
approach them in the same way?
I did a talk on this last year and we broke
it down. The process for a wrestling
portrait in terms of the commission is
actually quite similar to any portrait
shoot. You have your initial inquiry, then
you set up a consultation where you
discuss and storyboard ideas. As a
photographer in 2023, you should be
looking to add value and expertise as
much as possible at every step of the way.
If a wrestler wanted us to shoot their
new character, in the same way as a
newborn shoot, we would sit down on a

The consultation process sounds
really important to what you do.
Is it about setting expectations?
Whether it’s a newborn or wrestling
shoot, they can give you ideas and you
can set boundaries. For example, if the
mum shows you a picture of a skin-onskin shot with a baby, you almost know
that you’ve got the authority to approach
that. Whereas if you think it’s a good
idea, you shouldn’t just throw it on a
mum as it might be an uncomfortable
experience for her.
The experience is what it’s all about, in
terms of what we do as photographers.
We can produce an amazing image, but if
it reminds them of a bad time, they’re not
going to necessarily like it. If you’re
providing them with a good time,
a positive time, and an empowering time,
then you provide the images, the job is
already done by the time it comes down
to the sales point.
I love it when clients come to me and
say ‘I know this is impossible’, but then

“As a photographer in 2023,
you should be looking to
add value and expertise
as much as possible”
65

THEPROINTERVIEW
05 QUEEN ZOE

James has always used Canon cameras,
and he found the transition from DSLR to
the EOS R mirrorless system seamless,
using his Canon EOS R6 for this shot
Lens

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4L IS USM

Exposure

1/160 sec, f/9, ISO100

06 HARI SINGH

This close-up portrait of Punjabi British
wrestler Hari was shot at 100mm on his
zoom lens, filling the frame for intensity
Lens

Canon RF 24-105mm F4L IS USM

Exposure

1/160 sec, f/4, ISO640

07 EMPOWERING POSING

In James’ studio work, he wants everyone
who walks in front of the lens to be seen in
a way they’re happy with.
Lens

Canon RF 24-105mm F4L IS USM

Exposure

1/800 sec, f/9, ISO100

\RXÀQGDZD\WRPDNHLWFRPSOHWHO\
possible. That’s the skill in what I do;
making something a reality.
You last spoke to PhotoPlus back
in 2019. What’s changed for you
since then?
The pandemic did change everything for
us because we’re social photographers,
and I already had a certain amount of
travel as part of my job. Our world sort of
imploded, everything stopped. Coming
out the other side of it, we had to start
again. We decided to go hard and buy a
studio in Portsmouth because previously
I was working from home and we had a
small home-based studio. We bought a
big industrial unit and have just really
tried to achieve everything we always
wanted to do. The kit has changed, too.
The Canon EOS R system has
moved on hugely in the last few
years. How did your kit change?
During the pandemic, I decided to go
PLUURUOHVV,·GÁLUWHGZLWKPLUURUOHVV
cameras before from other brands just to
see what they were like, but I’d always

“I think we’ve all started
to notice the amount of
video commissions in
the industry now”
66

shot professionally with my Canon EOS
5D. And then I tried the EOS R6. Once I’d
had the settings to replicate a DSLR, it
was great. I’ve got the EOS R6 Mark II
QRZDQGWKHHOHFWURQLFYLHZÀQGHUWKDW
I was working with at Wembley at the
weekend makes photography so easy.
I shot using the R6 Mark II with an EF
lens adapter on the EF 400mm f/2.8L IS
II USM, and the facial recognition AF
proved to be astounding. Truly. I was
facing the ring from 60 metres away,
behind the ring was a sea of about 3000
people looking at me, but the autofocus
software inside the camera still managed
to pick out the face of the person I was
tracking to be pin sharp.

a gimbal and a wide-angle lens to shoot
everything at 100 frames per second and
then adding it to slow-motion music.
I think we’ve all started to notice the
amount of video commissions in the
industry now. Some couples are even
hiring content creators for their big day.

Has the EOS R system elevated
your work in other areas?
I’ve been using a mirrorless camera for
more and more video work. I struggled
with the 5D Mark III for video, whereas
with the EOS R6 Mark II, I’ve been using

Earlier we touched on the fact you
shoot a wide range of subjects.
What would you like to shoot
– either commercially or
personally – that you haven’t yet?
I’ve got a couple of projects in mind. I

What are your most used lenses?
I love a 70-200mm, and I’m actually
using my old Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L
IS III USM lens with an adapter. I’m
looking to see whether Canon can do
something around 200-500mm because
that would be a nice range, but my
workhorse is the Canon RF 24-105mm
F4L IS USM nowadays.

www.digitalcameraworld.com

walk past an allotment more every day,
and see the people working there. It’s
always the most diverse range of people.
Each one has a different character. For
example, one has signposts in the ground
that say things like ‘Narnia, 500 miles
WKLVZD\·DQGKDVJRWVRPHVRUWRIVFLÀ
and fantasy background. I want to walk
around the allotment with a bunch of
OHDÁHWVDQGOHWSHRSOHNQRZWKDW,·OOEH
back here for anyone who wants to be
part of the photo project.
I think that generation is actually
more invested in recording memories.
If I were to offer up my service round at a
TikTok convention, no one would care.
But perhaps the older generation is more
invested in ‘traditional’ photography.
The other project I’ve got in mind (one
which I’ve been waiting about six years
to do now) is to photograph pantomime
dames. I’ve got this idea for someone in
ugly sister make-up, shot in a really dark,
almost Fifties style, with a single light.
I just think there’s something
quintessentially British about that.
I don’t know if I’ll get cancelled if I do
it, but it’s the one project that I can see
myself sitting on the BBC breakfast sofa
talking about. I could see it because there
are loads of little church halls around
here and amateur dramatic societies, and
,FRXOGGHÀQLWHO\ZRUNDZD\XSWKDW
ladder and have a project that would
represent that. Wrestling is kind of like a
The Canon Magazine

STORY BEHIND THE SHOT

Aluna the Angel
James showcased Aluna’s new persona as a professional wrestler
This image was utilized to launch wrestler Aluna onto a wider stage, and more prominent
promotions both here and across Europe. Shot in the studio with two assistants, we used
high-speed shutter sync flash to create a heart-shaped powder explosion and represent her
character as a feelgood babyface inside the wrestling ring. The colour palette created a
complementary scheme and her symmetrical, open pose, leads to a balanced composition.
Dust in the background acts as both a heart and wings, representing her love of performing.

THEPROINTERVIEW

08 WRESTLER BEHIND THE MASK

James’ Portrait of a Wrestler project
began as a way to get his fellowship in
photography with the MPA and SWPP
Lens

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4L IS USM

Exposure

1/125 sec, f/16, ISO100

09 WRESTLER AND THE TEACUP

Canon’s L-series lenses give James the
best clarity, colour, and reliable autofocus
performance possible for his photos
Lens

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4L IS USM

Exposure

1/160 sec, f/13, ISO100

10 HARLEY HUDSON IN THE PINK

James often plays around with contrasting
hues on the colour wheel, using paper
backdrops and lighting gels to add impact
Lens

Canon RF 24-105mm F4L IS USM

Exposure

1/160 sec, f/7.1, ISO100

subculture where it has its own language
and its own understanding of why it
exists. And I think pantomime is that too.
I feel like you’re interested in
stories, traditions, and
generations, and that inspires
you. With portraits, where do
you get your ideas from?
:KHQ,ÀUVWVWDUWHGRXWLQDKLJKVWUHHW
studio I didn’t know an f-stop from a bus
stop, and they just threw me in there.
,·GQHYHUHYHQXVHGDÁDVKWXEH%XW
when I started piecing it all together
and learning about light and how it
works, I started looking at advertising
and billboards in a completely different
way. I’d think about where those lights
ZHUHSODFHGDQGZKDWPRGLÀHUVZHUH
used. Typically all the clues are there
and you can work it out.
When I started shooting digitally,
people at the time were still saying things
like, “Oh, the magic of the darkroom is
gone now.” But it really hadn’t, because

the magic of photography was still there,
and I could still make something happen
that wasn’t there.
My inspiration and ideas really come
down to understanding people and
trying to tell their stories, trying to get
something more out of them. I want to
capture images that really make someone
stop. The beauty of landscapes can do
that, but I just can’t shoot landscapes.
,FRXOGVLWDQGMXVWÁLSWKURXJKDERRN
of photographic portraits forever. I love
studying portraits of people because

“Don’t be shy about sharing
your stuff, and never be
afraid of asking others
for help and advice”
www.digitalcameraworld.com

JAMES MUSSELWHITE

PROFILE

James
Musselwhite
Portrait, wedding, wrestling and
commercial photographer

they’re always a story of two things,
as I think I’ve mentioned before.
It’s always trying to work out what the
photographer was trying to say because
the photographer isn’t totally in control,
and there are elements of the sitter
that are in there too.
What is the one thing you wish
you had known when you
started taking photos?
There’s a book I’ve got downstairs called
Dear Me: A Letter to My Sixteen-Year-Old
Self, with entries from people such as Sir
Elton John and Stephen Fry. It’s a really
fascinating read, I love that book.
So, what do you wish you
had known back then?
The Canon Magazine

I know that the anxiety doesn’t ever
go away, which is a weird thing for me
because you have to have a certain level
RIFRQÀGHQFHWRGRZKDW,GRDVD
portrait photographer. I’ve just learned
to manage that anxiety.
In terms of a serious answer, I actually
don’t think I wish I’d known anything.
No piece of advice could help you,
as you’ve just got to get in there and
do it. Don’t be shy about sharing your
stuff, and never be afraid of asking
others for help and advice.
Every negative and positive experience
that you have puts you on a different
journey to the next photographer, and
that’s what makes you unique. So
\RXFDQ·WLQÁXHQFHLW\RXMXVWKDYH
to learn, adapt, and change.

James Musselwhite has been shooting
professionally since 2013, and is a multitalented photographer, mentor and speaker.
Starting out in a high-street portrait studio,
he soon taught himself how to light people
and understand exposure, becoming the
experienced professional he is today.
Based in Portsmouth, James now runs
his own studio and successful business,
photographing newborns and family
portraits, corporate headshots, and more.
Outside of the studio, he also shoots
video content for events and weddings.
James is passionate about wrestling, and
well known for ongoing personal projects
such as Portrait of a Wrestler, which has
been ongoing since around 2014.
James is also an experienced
photographic educator, offering 1-2-1 tuition
as well hosting popular group workshops
that have been called practical, honest and
thoroughly fun. Endorsed by Canon, he
regularly shares insights on gear and
techniques in articles for Canon Europe.
He has also appeared at many trade shows
including The Photography Show UK, where
he demonstrates equipment with his
trademark energy and enthusiasm.
Instagram @y2jimbob
Facebook /portraitofawrestler
www.portraitofawrestler.com
www.musselwhitephotography.com

Next issue: Chris Priestley, photographer,
videographer, director and editor

Photo essays from PhotoPlus readers
and professional photographers alike

JOIN IN
THE FUN!
One of the great things
about photography is
being able to share your
view of the world. Travel
devotee captures local
characters and across the
Indian subcontinent while
a Canon convert discovers
the delights of digital.
We want your photos
and stories! For your
chance to show off your
images in PhotoPlus, email
three to five high-resolution
JPEGs, along with a brief
synopsis – explain why you
took the shots, the location,
whether they’re part of an
ongoing project or a one-off
shoot, and anything else
unusual or interesting. Also
include Canon EOS camera,
lens and exposure details.
Email images and info to
photoplus@futurenet.com
Catch us online at
www.facebook.com/
photoplusmag
www.instagram.com/
PhotoPlusCanonMag
www.twitter.com/
photoplusmag

PROJECT INFO

People person
Steven made the most of his working
holidays to bolster his portrait photography
portfolio travelling in India and Bangladesh

NAME: Steven Kruit
LOCATION: Dhaka, Bangladesh
MISSION: To improve his portrait
photography on his travels
KIT: Canon EOS R5 and Canon RF
85mm F1.2L USM
INSTAGRAM: @reportage_
photography2

’ve long associated
travelling with
photography. Even
at a young age, my
grandmother would
provide me with a camera
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went away on holiday.
I work for a European
fashion retailer and get
to visit the countries
where clothes are made
as part of my job.
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,ORYHWDNLQJSRUWUDLWVWKDW
VKRZWKHGD\WRGD\OLYHVRI
WKHSHRSOH,HQFRXQWHURQP\
www.digitalcameraworld.com

03
02
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The Canon Magazine

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PDQ\ORFDOWRXULVWV

01 RABARI SHEPHERD WITH HIS CATTLE

A wider portrait gives greater context, showing the Rabari
shepherd’s cattle in the background and has been naturally
framed with the surrounding greenery
Lens

Canon RF 85mm F1.2L USM

Exposure

1/1250 sec, f/4, ISO100

02 GRANDFATHER AT HOME

Steven opened his lens to a wide f/2.2 to suck in loads of natural
light, so he could shoot indoors without the need for flash and
blur the background too for beautiful bokeh
Lens

Canon RF 85mm F1.2L USM

Exposure

1/200 sec, f/2.2, ISO500

03 RABARI GUARD

Vibrant greenery, a red turban and gold jewellery help pull
the viewer’s eye into this colourful portrait of a Rabari guard
Lens

Canon RF 85mm F1.2L USM

Exposure

1/250 sec, f/3.5, ISO100

04 RABARI VILLAGE PERSON

Some wonderful overcast light in this portrait, featuring
a Rabari village person and his solemn stare down the lens barrel
Lens

Canon RF 85mm F1.2L USM

Exposure

1/160 sec, f/4, ISO125

FEEDBACK

ability to travel
It’s great to see Steven making the most of his
come back with
and
for work as he’s improved his portraits skills
r sharp and nicely
razo
a bounty of vibrant headshots. His images are
from his Canon
less
ing
focussed on the eyes, though we’d expect noth
ral light for
natu
best
RF 85mm F1.2L USM lens. He’s also found the
. His
flash
ving
his subjects, without complicating things and invol
ct
conta
eye
ng
shots are nice and bright, colourful and have stro
en!
which pulls the viewer right in. Great job Stev

PHOTOSTORIES

PROJECT INFO

Reﬂecting on self
Martin puts himself in his landscapes for the ultimate selﬁe shots
’ve been doing
photography for
around 20 years.
Originally, I was a
hater of digital as I
thought it was the easy
way out, I used to shoot
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camera and was very
much inspired by Joe
Cornish who used to
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format too.
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EDFN,KDYHFRPHWRORYH

I
NAME: Martin Leighton
LOCATION: UK
MISSION: To take a series of selfportraits in different landscapes
KIT: Canon EOS 5DS and Canon
EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II USM
INSTAGRAM: @spiritual_
images1984

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FKHDSHUWKDQÀOPDQGPXFK
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VRPHWLPHVUXQQLQJLQWRVFHQHV

“You do have to be a
little bit careful with
these sorts of shots
in public places”

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'LVWULFWLW·VDEHDXWLIXOSDUWRI
www.digitalcameraworld.com

YOUR PHOTO STORIES

03
01 DESTINY

Martin shot this near Scarborough, he said: “The wave that crashed
against the rock scared me at the time of taking this shot. Good job
I had multiple chances to get it right.”
Lens

Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II USM

Exposure

0.4 sec, f/16, ISO50

02 SPREAD YOUR WINGS

This is one of Martin’s favourite shots, with an epic sunrise in the Peak
District. He says: “These conditions always encourage me to spread
my wings.”
Lens

Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II USM

Exposure

1 sec, f/14, ISO50

03 ONE

Martin took his self-portrait One at Mablethorpe on a spectacular
sunset that makes it look much more like exotic location
Lens

Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II USM

Exposure

1 sec, f/11, ISO50

04 TERRITORIAL

Martin took this image on a misty day in the Peak District
Lens

04
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The Canon Magazine

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Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II USM

Exposure

1 sec, f/13, ISO100

FEEDBACK

and portrait
Martin has combined his passion for landscape
selfies! Despite
ate
ultim
of
haul
nt
brillia
photography to create a
the golden hour or
shooting at tricky times of the day, such as in
s are masterfully
shooting directly into the sun, Martin’s landscape
his self portraits
exposed, retaining loads of highlight detail to stop
running into the scene
from overexposing. By setting a self timer and
l point to scenes
to take a self portrait, he’s added a distinct foca
It could be
that might otherwise not have an obvious anchor.
se, or using
worth experimenting with a remote shutter relea
ra remotely
came
his
er
trigg
to
app,
the Canon Camera Connect
rather than relying on the self-timer modes.

Professional photographers reveal their top six
tools of the trade they couldn’t shoot without

“I dreamed of creating
photos of more than just
food. I wanted my photos
to evoke emotions”
WHAT DO I DO?

Monika Grudzinska
Professional food photographer Monika shows us the essential Canon kit
she couldn’t live without when taking pictures of her culinary delights
grew up in Gdansk in
the north of Poland.
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I
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food photographer. I gained
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hard building my portfolio for
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Monika
Grudzinska
yummydesign.photography
MONIKA, 42, is based in
Gdansk, Poland, specialising in
food and product photography
since 2017. She mainly works with
Polish brands but has recently
taken on work from Swedish and
German companies too. She tells
us: “All of my work is about
creating feelings and emotions
while using natural light. I am a
total fan of the dark mood style.”
She’s perfected her photo look
and now works with some of
Poland’s largest companies.

www.digitalcameraworld.com

CANON PROS & THEIR KIT
IN MONIKA’S BAG

04
03

02
06

Canon EOS 5D Canon EF
Canon EF
Mark III & IV 100mm f/2.8L 35mm f/1.4L
WEB: www.canon.co.uk
IS USM
USM
THE Canon EOS 5D
Mark III was my first
full-frame Canon EOS
camera and was my
workhorse for many
years, I’ve now
upgraded to the 5D
Mark IV and use my 5D
Mark III as my backup
camera. After working
with APS-C bodies
prior, both of my 5D
bodies have shown
me the significant
improvement to image
quality and low light
performance.

The Canon Magazine

WEB: www.canon.co.uk

A 100mm macro lens
is a must-have for
photographers looking
to shoot detailed
close-ups, whether
that’s food, still-life or
even insects. The
quality and detail in my
close-up food shots
with this lens are simply
incredible and might
just be my favourite
lens when it comes to
food photography.

THE Canon EF 35mm
f/1.4L USM is perfectly
suited to my Canon
EOS 5D Mark IV
full-frame body and is
ideal for the times when
I need a wider angle to
squeeze more of the
frame into view. I use
this lens alot for food
photos and also for
time-lapse videos.

Canon EF
50mm f/1.8 II

Canon RC-6
Wireless
remote

TetherTools
TetherPro USB

WEB: www.canon.co.uk

THIS IS one of
the smallest and
cheapest lenses you
can buy, but this ‘nifty’
50mm has huge
capabilities. This is the
first lens that
completely changed
photography for me –
I discovered the shallow
depth of the field and I
created my first
successful bokeh
photo effect! Its wide
maximum aperture of
f/1.8 also makes it a
great option when
shooting in a dark
environment.

WEB: www.canon.co.uk

THE Canon RC-6 is a
remote that allows me
to fire my Canon EOS
5D Mark IV wirelessly.
This is crucial for my
work as it prevents
camera shake from
touching the shutter
button, and allows me
to fire it when I’m
looking at the Live View
on my computer
screen, and not
standing directly next
to my camera. It’s an
ideal gadget for sharper
food photography and
making films.

WEB: www.theﬂashcenre.com

THE TetherTools
TetherPro USB 3.0 to
Micro-B is a very helpful
gadget that allows me
to connect my Canon
EOS 5D Mark IV to my
computer. This means
I can see my image in
Live View on a much
larger screen, which is
essential for seeing
which details are sharp
when working with a
shallow depth of field.

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POP-UP GALLERIES!

NEWSERIES

CANON
SCHOOL
In part 32 of our series: Learn how image noise can be
controlled with Canon EOS settings for cleaner exposures

MARCUS HAWKINS
PHOTO EXPERT
Marcus has been passionate about
photography for more than 25
years. A former editor of our sister
publication Digital Camera, he has
written about photography and
cameras for a wide range of clients,
including Canon and Jessops, and
uses a Canon EOS 5D Mk IV.

Minimising noise
How to get less ‘grainy’ images in camera
oise is not unique
to digital cameras.
Whether it’s a
buzzing sound on a
telephone line, hissing
IURPKLÀVSHDNHUVRU
electrical interference
on a TV, noise manifests
itself in various ways.
In digital photography, the
interference makes itself
known in essentially two
ways: luminance noise, which
looks a bit like static across
the image, and colour noise.
While luminance noise is
acceptable up to a point – and
DOLWWOHOLNHÀOPJUDLQLI\RX
really squint – colour noise is
distracting. Fortunately, the
coloured speckles are easy
to remove in photo-editing
software without affecting the
underlying image too much.
Reducing luminance noise
however, can leave details

looking smudged and
indistinct. While noise is
unavoidable at certain
settings, there are ways you
can reduce it when shooting
with your EOS camera.
One of the best ways to
make sure you have a strong
‘signal-to-noise’ ratio is to
shoot in an appropriate
amount of light, or to open the
aperture for more light. That
way you won’t need to amplify
the image with a higher ISO
or use a long exposure – both
of which can give you noisy
results. Noise is more obvious
at high ISO speeds, although
the threshold at which it starts
becoming unacceptable varies
between EOS cameras. Your
camera will have one or more
‘ISO expansion’ settings for
shooting in very low light, but
image quality gets decidedly
choppy at these extremes.

Longer exposures can lead to more noise
HEAT CAN build up in your EOS
camera during a long exposure,
which can be a source of
interference. It’s particularly
noticeable when you’re shooting
exposures of 30 seconds or
longer using your camera’s Bulb
mode, or if you’ve been recording
video. Long exposure noise
reduction can help to reduce the
type of noise that’s associated

with extended exposure times
of one second or longer, but it
effectively doubles the length of
time it takes to save an image to
the card. You can help to reduce
the chances of long exposure
noise by letting your camera cool
down between shots. If your
camera’s has a Vari-angle screen,
consider folding it out to avoid
the body warming up too quickly.
www.digitalcameraworld.com

KEEP THE NOISE DOWN
THE RAW FACTS

Create cleaner images
Get the exposure right and avoid pushing it
f you shoot RAW,
you’ll be able to
reveal detail in the
dark and bright areas of
an image that may have
appeared lost when
reviewing images on the
camera. RAW software such
as Adobe Camera Raw gives
you the tools to brighten the
overall exposure, similar
to using the exposure
compensation function on
your camera, or selectively
brighten or darken the
shadows and highlights.
It’s easier to brighten up
images that are underexposed
than it is to try to restore detail

in images that are overexposed
– and it’s amazing how much
detail can be revealed in areas
that appear almost black on
screen. But doing this risks
making noise more visible
– particularly in images taken
at a high ISO. Less picture
information is recorded in the
dark areas of a picture, so the
signal-to-noise ratio is lower.
So, attempting to recover
details in the shadows by
brightening them in software
means the noise is amplified in
these areas too – as you can
see in these example images
(the ‘after’ RAW image had
the exposure increased in

High ISO Speed NR

Original
software). To avoid this, try to
get an accurate RAW exposure
in-camera. You could even
slightly overexpose the image
when you shoot (but don’t
blow important highlights) in

After
order to capture more detail,
and correct the exposure later.
Alternatively, take several
different exposures from the
same position and combine
the best bits in software.

Off

Low

Standard

High

Check this setting when you’re shooting JPEGs
anon EOS cameras
typically include
three types of noise
reduction settings: High
ISO Speed, Multi Shot and
Long Exposure.
High ISO speed noise
reduction (NR) is automatically
applied in the Basic Zone auto
shooting modes, but you can
activate and adjust it manually
in the Creative Zone modes.
It can actually be applied at
every ISO setting, but its effect
is more noticeable at higher
sensitivities. Three strength
settings are available – Low,
Standard and High – and an
option to switch it off.
With the High setting
activated, there’s a noticeable
drop off in sharpness and
definition as the noise is
reduced – notice the
smudging of fine detail in the
feather here – while Standard
gives a better compromise.
You can’t fine-tune the
chrominance and luminance
settings for each image as you
can in editing software,

The Canon Magazine

because the one-size-fits-all
presets are designed to deliver
noise reduction at speed.
Like white balance and
Picture Style, High ISO Speed
NR is added when the image is
converted to a JPEG – either
in-camera or in software. Even
though you can activate High
ISO Speed NR when you shoot
RAW files, it won’t be applied
to the underlying image.

CANONSCHOOL
AVOID MOVEMENT

High ISO Speed NR

Multi Shot NR setting
Shoot static subjects for less noise but more ‘bite’
f your camera offers
Multi Shot noise
reduction, you’ll find
it listed in the High ISO
Speed NR menu screen
(scroll through the strength
settings to find it). It tackles
image noise in a similar way to
focus stacking: when you press
the shutter release button,
four images are taken in quick
succession. These are then
aligned and compared. The
camera retains the details that
are in the same place in each
frame, and attempts to remove
the noise that appears
randomly in each picture.
Multi Shot can give a high
degree of noise reduction while
delivering better image quality
than a
single hit
of highstrength
noise
reduction
applied to a
single image.
The main
drawback is
that it’s
designed to

Multi Shot NR

Here, the Multi Shot NR has retained more textural definition than
the High ISO Speed NR, which has been used at the highest setting

be used on stationary
subjects, as any movement
detected between the frames
could be seen as noise and
removed by mistake.
Ideally your EOS camera
should be used on a tripod, as
any camera movement can
lead to misalignment of the
frames and a weaker noise
reduction effect. Using a tripod
might seem counterintuitive,
as you may well be increasing
the ISO to get sharper
handheld shots. An image
stabilized camera or lens can
really make a difference when
the shutter speed isn’t
ridiculously slow though.
As with the other High ISO
Speed NR options, Multi Shot
NR is only applied to JPEG
images. In fact, it will be greyed
out if you’ve set the camera’s
image quality to RAW or
RAW+JPEG. There are other
camera settings that conflict
with Multi Shot NR and mean
you’ll be unable to select it
– including Auto Exposure
Bracketing, White Balance
Bracketing and long exposure
noise reduction.

Long Exposure NR
Exposing for longer than one second? Try this out!
LONG Exposure NR is designed to
remove the fixed-pattern noise that
you typically see when the sensor is
exposed for extended periods of
time. Unlike the two other types of
noise reduction, Long Exposure NR
can be activated whether you’re
shooting either JPEG or RAW.
This type of noise reduction
sees your camera make a second
exposure. The camera shuts off the
shutter for the second exposure so
no light reaches the sensor. The
second shot contains only a noise
pattern, which the camera uses to
map where the noise is in the main

image in order to remove it. After
this, your image is saved to the
memory card. Note the second
exposure may last as long as the
exposure for your image.
Like High ISO Speed NR, you’ll
find Long Exposure NR is in the red
Shooting menu or in the Custom
Function menu. There are two
options for activating Long Exposure
NR: Auto and Enable/On. Set the
Auto option and the camera will only
apply noise reduction to images
exposed for one second or longer
when it detects noise typically
caused by a long exposure.

The Enable/On option always applies noise reduction to images exposed
for one second or more. It can reduce noise that may go undetected
www.digitalcameraworld.com

KEEP THE NOISE DOWN
SEPARATE SLIDERS

Software options
Take precise control of noise reduction
he more powerful
processing and
nuanced noise
reduction tools available in
image editing software can
produce excellent results
– particularly if you’ve shot
RAW. Rather than simply
having a ‘remove noise’
button, you will have
individual sliders for
reducing luminance noise
and colour noise. Typically,
when you open a RAW file, the
software will automatically
apply a small amount of colour
noise reduction, but the
luminance slider will be at zero.
Some software goes
deeper. In Lightroom Classic
for example, you get sliders for
luminance and colour ‘detail’
(which allows you to adjust the
threshold of what the software

detects as noise), luminance
‘contrast’ (which adds more
bite at the expense of less
smooth tonal changes) and
colour ‘smoothness’ (which
can cause some colour
bleeding and remove a little
detail if you go too far).
The key with these
additional options is to use
them sparingly, as you can end
up watering down the noise
reduction effect.
When you apply noise
reduction, make sure you’re
viewing the image at 100%
or higher magnification in
order to be able to judge its
effectiveness. Going to 300%
works for me, as I find this
allows me to spot when to stop
moving the sliders. If you go
too far, then you can end up
losing fine details – particularly

Colour

Adobe Lightroom Classic offers an AI-driven ‘Denoise’ option that can
automatically take care of noise reduction

with the luminance noise
reduction control. As you can
see in the example below, you
can end up with everything
having the texture of butter if
you go to extremes. Lightroom
Classic also offers an
automated ‘Denoise’ option
that is designed to produce a
more refined result using AI.

The result can be a little
‘buttery’ at times, but you do
have the option of reducing the
effect using the ‘Amount’
slider. If you increase detail
in your image using controls
such as sharpness, clarity and
texture, then it’s worth
revisiting the noise reduction
settings to refine the results.

Luminance

School tip Setting the max ISO
How to reduce the ISO sensitivity options
when image quality is paramount
IT CAN be worth putting up with a
bit of noise when you increase the
ISO, if it means that you’re able to
record a picture in low light or freeze
a moment with a fast shutter speed.
But if you’re concerned about image
quality then you might want to avoid
the highest ISO settings on your
The Canon Magazine

camera. You can set the maximum
sensitivity that the camera’s able to
select using Auto ISO for example,
but some cameras also enable you
to reduce the ISO range that’s
available when you’re manually
setting the sensitivity. You’ll find this
option in the red Shooting menu.

PART 33
Next issue:
Indoor photography
setups at home

The Canon EOS 5D Mark IV lets you set the
maximum ISO setting for stills and video

CANONSCHOOL

SOFTWARE
SOLUTIONS
Canon expert Brian explains how to combine multiple images
from different cameras – and even different resolutions

BRIAN WORLEY
CANON PRO
Brian is a freelance photographer
and photo tutor, based in
Oxfordshire. He has unrivalled
EOS camera knowledge as he’s
been working for Canon for over
15 years, and can help you
master all EOS products.
www.p4pictures.com

Mixing multiple exposures
Learn new skills by combining images with the Digital Photo Professional compositing tool
he compositing tool
in Digital Photo
Professional
combines multiple
images to make a new
composite. While many
advanced EOS cameras
have an in-camera
multiple exposure
function, the compositing
tool can replicate that
capability for any EOS

camera and provides
additional control when
combining images. The
compositing tool even
works with images from
different cameras and
different resolutions.
When EOS cameras added
multiple exposure capabilities,
there were options to create
an additive style multiple
exposure, but also averaging

each digital exposure and for
some blending only the lighter
or darker elements of the
subsequent captures. DPP’s
compositing tool provides all
of these plus a weighted
blending. This is where the
photographer decides how
much of the image needs to
blend with a base image.
The compositing tool can
work with both RAW and JPG

images, even a mixture of the
two. The process is to select
the base image and a frame to
composite with it, then choose
the composite method from
the available choices. It is also
possible to change the relative
position of the two composite
images for maximum creative
control. Once you’ve combined
two images, you can then add
additional images.

STEP BY STEP EXPLORE DPP TO CREATE COMPOSITES
Powerful and packed with ﬂexible features, the composite option creates perfect mergers

EXPLORE
MULTIPLE
EXPOSURES
With many advanced EOS
cameras there is a multiple
exposure feature, use live
view on a DSLR and a
mirrorless and you can see
the image build step by step
as you shoot. Save all the
individual frames as well
as the camera generated
composite to give the most
ﬂexibility for post processing
with DPP.

01 PREPARING THE PORTRAITS

02 CREATING TWINS IN PORTRAITS

For this you will need two images of the same
person, ideally in different parts of the frame. You
could ask your subject to change their appearance
for each of the two images to replicate the effect
shown here. Edit the photos in DPP if required then
select the base image and choose the Compositing
tool from the Tools menu.

Select the image to use as the foreground over your
selected image. Choose the composite method to
combine the two frames. These pictures have a
light-coloured background, so darken mode makes
the darker parts of both images show through. If
your pictures are on a black background, use the
lighten method. Save the image as a JPG or TIFF.
www.digitalcameraworld.com

COMPOSITING WITH DPP

03 SILHOUETTES AND NATURAL IMAGES

04 ADDING TEXTURE TO NATURE IMAGES

Capture a silhouette of your subject, and combine it
with textures or even other images. Ideally retain
some information in the silhouette so that the blend
will fit with the subject and show elements of it in
the final result. Use the add composite method to
add the foreground image over the original shot,
shifting the position in X & Y directions if needed.

The weighted method gives control over the amount
of the foreground image that appears over the initial
image. With low values for weight, highly textured
images add their texture without too much of their
colour for a look that is effective for fine art imagery.
You can convert colour textures to monochrome
if required before starting composite processing.

The Canon Magazine

CANONSCHOOL
BRIAN WORLEY
CANON PRO

Our technical guru is here to help. No Canon conundrum is too
big or small. Get in touch today at EOSSOS@futurenet.com

Brian is a freelance photographer
and photo tutor, based in
Oxfordshire. He has unrivalled
EOS camera knowledge, after
working for Canon for over
15 years, and is on hand to
answer all your EOS and
photographic queries

I have an EOS R8, and want to know if
it is normal for the single AF point to
keep moving around the frame when
I recompose my photos?
Will Murray, Great Malvern
BRIAN SAYS… The EOS R8
AF works differently from a
DSLR or even the EOS R5.
When in one shot AF, the
green AF point stays where
you locate it. The default
behaviour with Servo AF is
that the blue single point is
used to locate the primary
subject and then the AF point
moves to track that subject as
you recompose. If you’re
using AI focus then you might
see both behaviours if the
camera determines that the
subject is moving or not, even
if you simply recompose.
You can change this to
make it work like the DSLR

cameras used to. From the
first AF menu, check the
setting for whole subject area
tracking Servo AF, this is on
by default but selecting off will
keep the single AF point in
your chosen position.

Mirrorless camera’s focusing aids and high ISO performance make
them well suited to macro photography in low light situations

Can you suggest an upgrade for my
ageing EOS 7D, I like to shoot insects and
ﬂowers with a Tamron 90mm macro lens,
would a mirrorless EOS be suitable?
James Wilcox, Bracknell

When using Servo AF, whole area tracking detects the subject and
moves the AF point around the frame, tracking it even with 1-point AF

BRIAN SAYS… Technology
has moved forward quite a lot
since the EOS 7D introduction
in 2009. Moving to a new EOS
mirrorless cameras will
provide higher resolution and
for macro the advanced AF
can help if you learn to use it
effectively. Many macro
photographers use manual
focus for very close subjects,
here focus peaking and focus
guides help a lot to ensure
your shots are sharp. Your
Tamron macro lens and any
extension tubes you have can

be used on the EOS R series
cameras by using the EF to
EOS R lens mount adapter.
Consider a mirrorless
camera with in-body IS as
it’s particularly effective for
macro photography where
camera movement tends to
shift left, right, up or down
rather than angular
movement. I’d suggest an
EOS R10 for a budget option,
or an EOS R7 for higher
resolution, in-body IS and
compatibility with any LP-E6
batteries you have.
www.digitalcameraworld.com

EOS S.O.S
WORKING SMARTER

Ask Brian!
Confused with
your Canon camera?
Send your questions
to EOSSOS@
futurenet.com

No back button AF needed, just
simple tracking of the subject
and a fast shutter speed to
freeze the movement

Do you use back button AF?
It is time to rethink how to use modern Canon EOS mirrorless cameras
ack button AF is one of the
polarizing topics that keeps
coming up. I used back button
AF with my DSLR cameras for many
years, but since the launch of the
EOS R, I’ve drifted away to the point of
not using it at all. It is time to look at
how you work with a modern mirrorless
and determine if back button AF is
necessary at all.
Back button AF is where the camera
buttons are reconfigured so that the
half-press of the shutter no longer
initiates focus, but instead the
photographer presses another separate
button to actuate AF. Conventionally
this was a means to avoid switching
from one shot to Servo focus. Set the
camera for Servo AF, then press and
hold the back button to focus and track
a moving subject, press and focus then
release to be able to recompose a bit
like one shot AF. With subject tracking in

The Canon Magazine

mirrorless cameras you can recompose
while tracking a moving subject in the
frame using Servo AF. So maybe back
button AF is redundant.
Since the EOS-1D X and EOS 7D Mark
II it is possible to change AF settings as
well as initiating focus with one or more
of the custom buttons. I know
photographers who use AF-ON for
tracking a moving subject and AE-Lock
for switching to 1-point AF for a
stationary subject or activating eye
tracking and focusing. So, in effect,
it’s become more about using the back
buttons to change the camera’s AF
settings rather than choosing when
it focuses. In this respect simply
reconfigure the AF-ON button as an
AF-OFF button to stop AF whenever it’s
pressed. The surprising part is that
there are a lot of photographers using
mirrorless cameras as they’ve used
DSLRs so they don’t allow the focus

Using one of the back buttons to switch the
shutter speed to capture a panned image of
the same rider on the same corner

technology to help them, which is often
the reason for switching to mirrorless.
The other benefit of not using back
button AF is to customize buttons for
other features that are more useful. To
freeze a car travelling at speed you need
a fast shutter speed, but then it turns a
corner and you press a button to drop
the shutter speed to something for
panning on the same bend. It’s time
to evaluate how to work smarter.

CANONSCHOOL

I can add IPTC
information in
my camera,
what is it?
Stephen Lewis,
Leighton Buzzard
A Canon EOS R10 and RF 100-400mm F5.6-8 IS USM lens is a lightweight
combination that works brilliantly for motorsport photography

I can no longer carry a heavy camera
and lens but love motorsport photography,
which small light Canon EOS camera and
lens would you suggest?
Marcus Hodge, Kidderminster
BRIAN SAYS… Motorsports needs longer lenses and they
come with a weight penalty, though using a monopod does
help. I’ve had great results with the EOS R10, and with its
crop sensor. Plus you get a boost in effective focal length.
The wide ranging RF 18-150mm kit lens is equivalent to a
28-200mm on full-frame, yet is small, lightweight and very
sharp. It’s certainly good for smaller motorsport events
where you get closer to the action. For more reach consider
the RF 100-400mm F5.6-8 IS USM lens which weighs just
over 600g. Used with the EOS R10 you have 160 to 640mm
reach with a combined weight of just over 1.1kg.

When is it necessary to change
exposure compensation for different
skin tones in people pictures?
Catherine Norris, Telford
BRIAN SAYS… The Canon’s EOS camera exposure
meter measures reflected light, a darker subject reflects
less light than a lighter subject. For very pale skin tones,
you might want to overexpose the skin slightly, and for
darker skin a little underexposure
may be needed, though this will also
depend on your metering mode.
It’s also dependent on how much
of the frame is covered by the skin
tone. Larger light sources such as a
cloudy day or large softbox give a
smoother look.
The amount of this scene that includes
skin tone is very small, so no exposure
compensation was needed to account
for the darker skin tone

BRIAN SAYS…
Use EOS Utility to
configure the
information for
standard fields like
captions, location
and more.

My Canon
EOS R6 Mk II
has a digital
teleconverter,
but the menu
is greyed out
so how is it
used?

The Canon RF 50mm F1.8 STM is a compact,
lightweight choice for all kinds of photography

I want to get a prime
lens for my Canon EOS R8,
is the RF 50mm F1.8 STM
a good choice?
Robbie Turner, Fawley
BRIAN SAYS… There’s a lot to
recommend the RF 50mm F1.8 STM
lens, it’s small, lightweight and
inexpensive, and has a fast maximum
aperture. The RF 50mm F1.2L USM is a
lot larger and more expensive yet offers
outstanding optical performance.
Outside of the RF lens range you’ll need
an adapter and that makes a lens larger
and heavier but increases the options.

Peter Linford,
Macclesﬁeld
BRIAN SAYS… The
digital teleconverter
can magnify an
image by 2x or 4x,
but is only possible
to be used when the
camera is set to
capture JPEGs.

Can the pop-up
ﬂash on the
EOS R10 be
used to trigger
a Speedlite
430EX III-RT?
Brenda Rutter,
Little Chalfont
BRIAN SAYS… The
built-in flash on the
EOS R10 does not
work as a sender.
You can however
use the Speedlite
Transmitter ST-E10
on the EOS R10’s
multi-function
accessory shoe.

With maximum clarity selected, the rendering
of feather detail is not so attractive

What is the point of the
clarity setting on the EOS
R5, it seems to make no
difference to my photos?
Lynn Taylor, Ibstock
BRIAN SAYS… Clarity enhances or
reduces the contrast of outlines within
an image. Positive clarity makes the
image appear sharper. You may think
that more clarity is helpful, but it can
make an image overly sharp. Clarity is
applied to images as part of the
in-camera JPEG processing, but not
applied to RAW images. When capturing
RAW images, the value of the clarity
setting is saved in the metadata.
www.digitalcameraworld.com

EOS S.O.S
MANAGE MACRO

RATE MY PHOTO

Extra patience and observation of the environment resulted in this
capture of a butterfly with a 100mm macro lens

Do you have any tips for photographing
butterﬂies in the wild, I’ve tried several
times but they ﬂy out of the way before
I get close enough?
Robert Gibson, Jura
BRIAN SAYS… Butterflies
and a lot of smaller insects are
very good at sensing exactly
when you’ve got the perfect
frame in the viewfinder and
before you can press the
shutter, they are gone. One
suggestion is to photograph
them earlier in the day when
they are colder and less
active. One of the other
problems with butterflies is
that they are often relatively
large and this means that
depth of field is a limiting
factor when working close-up
with a macro lens. A typical
100mm macro lens about
50cm from the subject
provides just over 1cm of
depth of field at f/11. The
combination of limited depth
of field, high aperture values
and the need to freeze a

moving subject requires
faster shutter speeds and
higher ISO settings. Bright
summer mornings with little
wind are not something that
happen all that often either.
With a macro lens, try
pre-focusing manually so the
subject is mostly sharp before
you start AF, or use manual
focus and use focus peaking
to identify the point of focus.
Another way is to shoot
from a much greater distance
using the magnification of a
longer lens. For EF lenses, the
option to add in an extension
tube can be used to increase
magnification and closer
focus distances. But being a
little further back has a
significant value to the depth
of field and is less likely to
cause the subject to fly away.
A 200mm lens at f/5.6
has much the same
depth of field at 1
metre distance as a
100mm lens at 50cm
distance with f/11.
Working from a greater
distance with a 200mm
lens gives more context to
the photo and allows more
open apertures

The Canon Magazine

Get
critiqued!

Lens

Canon RF 100-400mm F5.6-8 IS USM

Exposure

1/125 sec, f/8, ISO1600

Newcomer
VICKIE FELLOW, DUDLEY
SAYS… This is Keshari, a lion
who has recently joined a
lioness at Dudley Zoo. He is
still a little unsure of his
surroundings so remained at
the back of his enclosure
which was in shade. I was
using my new Canon R7 with
100-400 lens for the first
time after switching to
Canon. The photo was taken
from an inside hide, through
glass which created
reflections but putting the
lens up to the glass reduced
them. I’ve cropped the image
as the original photo had the
whole lion visible and the
background was fencing.
Using free software, I also
adjusted the highlights
and shadows.

Email your best
photos to EOSSOS@
futurenet.com with
the subject ‘Rate
My Photo’

BRIAN SAYS… Taking
photos at a zoo is often a
challenge with hiding
distracting background and
avoiding reflections in glass,
by using good techniques
and the tight crop you have
overcome both challenges.
The darker edge around the
lions head makes the photo
look more like artwork, than
a picture at the zoo. Your
image has a striking
expression that makes me
want to look more closely
and imagine the thoughts in
the lion’s mind. The
processing you’ve done has
made the picture appear
painterly, yet kept the sharp
outlines of the whiskers and
bright eyes. I can see your
outline in the catchlights
of his eyes.

SUPERTEST

THE CONTENDERS

Canon RF
14-35mm F4L IS
USM
£1,749/$1,399

Canon RF
15-35mm F2.8L
IS USM
£2,599/$2,199

Canon RF
24-105mm F4L
IS USM
£1,389/$1,299

Canon RF
24-70mm F2.8L
IS USM
£2,519/$2,199

Canon RF
70-200mm F4L
IS USM
£1,769/$1,499

Canon RF
70-200mm F2.8L
IS USM
£2,999/$2,699

Canon RF
100-400mm
F5.6-8 IS USM
£699/$649

Canon RF
100-500mm
F4.5-7.1L IS USM
£2,939/$2,699

www.digitalcameraworld.com

RF ZOOM LENSES

What is the price for superb image quality and
all-round performance? Here are the best Canon
EOS R camera mirrorless zoom lenses upgrades
he latest Canon EOS R-system cameras
are simply epic. The RF mount is leaps
ahead of the older EF mount for DSLRs,
with hugely faster data communication
speed between the camera body and
an attached RF lens. This enables new
features like deep-learned AI autofocus with
intelligent subject recognition and tenacious
tracking abilities. It allows for breakthrough
performance in terms of image stabilization,
especially when optical stabilization works in
tandem with the IBIS (In-Body Image
Stabilization) of recent full-frame EOS R bodies,
as well as the APS-C format EOS R7.
Greater processor power in both R-system
cameras and lenses gives the additional bonus
of highly effective correction for unwanted
aberrations like peripheral illumination,
chromatic aberrations and distortion. In
essence, RF lenses deliver fabulous image
quality and all-round performance.
The question is how much you need to spend
on zoom lenses, and whether more exotic,
top-flight options are worth the extra money.
One thing you can expect to get in range-topping
zooms is a faster aperture, typically f/2.8 for
wide-angle, standard and telephoto zooms,
compared with f/4 for lower-priced alternatives.
However, the less expensive options have
their own benefits, typically being more compact
and lightweight as well as more affordable.
There’s certainly an argument for buying smaller
zooms and adding a prime lens or two for when
you really feel the need for speed, for getting a
tight depth of field and quick shutter speeds
under low lighting conditions. Here’s how the top
options compare for wide-angle, standard,
telephoto and super-telephoto zooms.

The Canon Magazine

SUPERTEST
£1,749/$1,399

FEATURES

CANON RF 14-35mm F4L IS USM

Subwavelength
Structure Coating
and Air Sphere
Coating applied.

Ultra-wide yet super-small for a full-frame lens with stellar stabilization
part from the oddball RF
5.2mm F2.8L Dual Fisheye
for VR creation, the RF
14-35mm gives the widest
viewing angle of any lens in
Canon’s current RF line-up. It also
stretches from 114 degrees at the
short end of the zoom range to
63 degrees, covering off the
classic 35mm focal length often
preferred for street photography.
Weighing in at 540g, it’s easily
manageable for all-day handheld
shooting and is super-slim for a
full-frame ultra-wide zoom, with
DPPÀOWHUWKUHDG
There’s some seriously
up-market glass shoehorned into
this diminutive lens. The total
count of 16 elements includes
three GMo (Glass Moulded)
aspherical elements, two UD
(Ultra-low Dispersion) elements
and one UD aspherical element.
Fluorine coatings are applied to
the front and rear elements to
repel moisture and grease, as well
as making for easier cleaning. It
features extensive weather-seals
and comes complete with a hood.
Autofocus is driven by a Nano
USM motor and features an
‘elastic metal’ body. Typical of the
breed, it’s astonishingly fast for
stills, virtually snapping into
place, while also enabling smooth

HOW WE
TEST
We combine realworld shooting
results with rigorous
lab testing to arrive
at our overall ratings

A third customizable
control ring can be
used for functions.
03

The Nano USM
autofocus works
down to a minimum
distance of 20cm.
04

Switches are
featured for AF/MF
focusing modes and
Stabilizer on/off.

The lens has a full
set of weather-seals
around the mounting
plate and all joints.

SHARPNESS
2500
2000
1500

VERDICT

1000
500

FEATURES

0
f/2.8

f/4

f/5.6

f/8

f/11

f/16

f/22 f/32

BUILD & HANDLING

2500
2000

Edge

The optical image stabilizer
delivers a highly impressive
VWRSEHQHÀWLQLWVRZQULJKW
boosted to 7-stop effectiveness
when combined with IBIS in
recent EOS R system cameras.
Sharpness and contrast are
both excellent but – as is often
the case these days – with recent
lenses designed for mirrorless
cameras, there is a heavy reliance
on automatic in-camera
corrections for distortions
and vignetting.

Centre

Performance

o test real-world
performance, we use
lenses in all sorts of
lighting conditions, for indoor and
outdoor shooting scenarios. We
check build quality and handling,
smooth and precise operation of
all controls, and we test the speed
and accuracy of autofocus.
We typically test full-frame
compatible EF lenses on a range of
full-frame and APS-C format
bodies, whereas EF-S lenses that
are designed specifically for APS-C
format bodies are tested just on

and virtually silent autofocus
transitions for movie capture.

PERFORMANCE

1500
1000

VALUE

500
0
f/2.8

f/4

f/5.6
Short

f/8

f/11
Mid

f/16

f/22 f/32

OVERALL

Long

cameras like the EOS 90D and 7D
Mark II. EF-M, RF and RF-S lenses
are tested on respective EOS M
and EOS R system bodies.
In-camera corrections for
chromatic aberrations, distortion
and peripheral illumination are
disabled to better reveal the true
optical performance of each lens.
We test lenses under controlled
conditions, using the Imatest
Master and DxO Analyser suites.
Photos of test charts are taken
across the range of apertures and
zoom settings then analysed.
www.digitalcameraworld.com

RF ZOOM LENSES

£2,599/$2,199

FEATURES

CANON RF 15-35mm F2.8L IS USM

Canon’s ‘trinity’ wide-angle zoom for EOS R cameras goes a little wider than its EF forebear
ompared with the DSLR
focused Canon EF
16-35mm f/2.8L USM III,
this RF-mount lens is a
millimetre shorter at the wideangle end of its zoom range. As
such, it has a maximum viewing
angle of 110 degrees, outgunning
the 108 degrees of its EF
counterpart. Both lenses have an
identical physical diameter and
PPÀOWHUDWWDFKPHQWWKUHDG
the RF lens being a millimetre
shorter but 50g heavier, at 840g.
The Nano USM autofocus
system is lightning-fast for stills
while enabling smooth transitions
when shooting video. The 5-stop
optical image stabilizer gets a
boost to 7-stop effectiveness when
using EOS R system cameras with
IBIS. There’s a tertiary control
ring which you can customise for
functions like aperture control,
ISO and exposure compensation,
and the optical layout includes
two UD elements, three
aspherical elements and ASC
(Air-Sphere Coating).
Build quality is excellent, with
multiple weather-seals and
ÁXRULQHFRDWLQJVRQWKHIURQWDQG
rear elements. However, it’s
certainly a big, chunky lens and
feels a bit of a mismatch for
slimline EOS R-system bodies.

With its wide viewing
angle and aperture,
the lens has a large
82mm filter thread.
02

The customizable
control ring at the
front doesn’t allow
de-clicked aperture
adjustment.
03

Air-Sphere Coating is
applied to minimise
ghosting and flare.
04

There are switches
for AF/MF and
Stabilizer on/off.
05

Comprehensive
weather-seals
include a rubber
gasket.

SHARPNESS

Performance

While the autofocus and image
stabilization systems are fabulous,
image quality is not absolutely
stellar. It’s not quite as sharp as
the less expensive RF 14-35mm
on test, especially towards the
edges of the image frame at its
shortest focal length. There’s also
slightly more colour fringing
towards the corners of frame than
with the older EF lens at short
focal lengths, where barrel
distortion can be noticeable.
Even so, overall performance
and image quality are very
pleasing but it’s not cheap.

Centre

2500
2000

VERDICT

1500
1000
500
f/2.8

FEATURES
f/4

f/5.6

f/8

f/11

f/16

f/22

BUILD & HANDLING

Edge

2500
2000

PERFORMANCE

1500

VALUE

1000
500
f/2.8

f/4

f/5.6

f/8

f/11

f/16

Mid

f/22

OVERALL

Long

RF
14
-3
5m
m
F4
RF
L
15
-3
5m
m
F2
RF
.8L
24
-10
5m
m
F4
RF
L
24
-70
m
m
F2
RF
.8L
70
-2
00
m
m
RF
F4
70
L
-2
00
m
m
RF
F2
10
.8L
040
0m
m
RF
F5
10
.608
50
0m
m

Short

DISTORTION
Optical distortion is much less of an issue than it used to be
4

The Canon Magazine

1.58

Distortion

s we said at the outset, the advanced processing power
of EOS R-system cameras and lenses enables highly
effective control over distortion. As with other
manufacturers, Canon has designed many of its RF lenses for
mirrorless cameras with compactness in mind, shrinking the
physical size and relying more heavily on in-camera correction
to deal with distortion. Even so, most of the lenses on test
deliver fairly low amounts of barrel or pincushion distortion,
with the exception of the RF 14-35mm, which still gives virtually
distortion-free results straight from the camera.

0.01

1.73

1.94

1.33

1.61

-1.18

-1.26

1.32

1.45

1.20

0
-2.09

–2

-1.94

-1.44

-0.04

–4
–6
-7.24
–8

Negative results show barrel distortion; positive indicates pincushion
distortion. Blue represents zoom’s short end; orange is the long end

SUPERTEST
£1,389/$1,299

FEATURES

CANON RF 24-105mm F4L IS USM

The build is 11mm
shorter and 95g
lighter than the
equivalent EF
L-series lens.

Probably the best ‘kit’ lens Canon has ever made, it punches above its weight
arious EOS R-system
full-frame cameras are
available as a complete kit
with this lens. Typically, it
takes full advantage of the RF
PRXQW·VZLGHÁDQJHDQGFORVH
proximity to the image sensor,
compared with EF lenses for
DSLRs. It’s physically a little
shorter and lighter than the EF
24-105mm f/4L, at 84x107mm
and 700g, making it an ideal
match for slim-line mirrorless
bodies. Typical of L-series lenses
rather than more modest ‘kit’
zooms, it has excellent build
quality with extensive weatherseals and comes with a hood.
Optical highlights include
aspherical and UD elements, a
EODGHGLDSKUDJPDQGÁXRULQH
coatings. As in the more upmarket
RF 24-70mm lens, there’s a 5-stop
image stabilizer that gets a boost
to a whopping 8 stops when
paired with IBIS in compatible
cameras. As with the other lenses
on test, this one has Nano USM
autofocus, which is really rapid
for stills and enables supersmooth focus transitions for
movie capture.
Another similarity is the
customizable control ring. This
time it’s mounted at the front end
of the lens and operates with

The control ring at
the front adds an
extra element of
adjustment.
03

Extensive weatherseals are applied
throughout.
04

The Nano USM
autofocus system is
fast yet smooth.
05

click-stops. Canon has a ‘de-click’
service for videographers who
generally prefer stepless control.

Centre

At short to medium zoom
settings, this lens wins out over its
EF 24-105mm L-series
counterpart for DSLRs in
maintaining impressive sharpness
across the entire image frame.
Centre-sharpness is better
maintained towards the long end,
although both lenses are pretty
equal for corner-sharpness.
The RF lens also keeps tighter
control over barrel distortion
at short zoom settings.

2500
2000

VERDICT

1500
1000
500
f/2.8

FEATURES
f/4

f/5.6

f/8

f/11

f/16

f/22 f/32

BUILD & HANDLING

2500

Edge

Performance

Highly effective
5-stop optical
stabilization lives up
to its billing.

SHARPNESS

2000

PERFORMANCE

1500

VALUE

1000
500
f/2.8

f/4

f/5.6

Short

f/8

f/11

f/16

Mid

f/22 f/32

OVERALL

Long

CANON RF-S 18-45mm F4.5-6.3 IS STM £299/$299
Unfeasibly compact and lightweight, this retractable lens shrinks down really small for stowage
anon currently makes three RF-S zoom
lenses specifically for APS-C format
R-system cameras. There’s also the
RF-S 55-210mm F5-7.1 IS STM (£409/$349)
and the RF-S 18-150mm F3.5-6.3 IS STM
(£449/$499) but the dinky little RF-S 18-45mm
is our go-to favourite. It retracts to just 44mm,
so you can easily pop the camera and attached
lens into your daily bag for carrying it around

and never miss a shot. It’s amazingly lightweight
as well, at a mere 130g.
An agile stepping motor autofocus system
and 4-stop image stabilizer are shoehorned into
the lens, along with two aspherical elements to
enhance image quality. Centre-sharpness is
excellent throughout the zoom range but edge/
corner-sharpness is less impressive.

www.digitalcameraworld.com

RF ZOOM LENSES

£2,519/$2,199

FEATURES

CANON RF 24-70mm F2.8L IS USM

The 82mm filter
thread is the same
as that of the RF
15-35mm F2.8L.

It’s a highly appealing standard zoom, if you can stomach the huge price tag
elatively big and weighty,
compared with the RF
24-105mm lens on test,
this one weighs in at 900g,
and its 89x126mm dimensions
somewhat dwarf most EOS
R-system bodies. It’s not just the
build that’s big either, as the
asking price is far higher than for
Canon’s similarly pro-grade EF
24-70mm zoom for DSLRs and
about double that of the RF
24-105mm on test.
Build quality is exceptional; as
well as feeling rock-solid with
superb handling, it comes
complete with a full set of
weather-seals plus the now usual
ÁXRULQHFRDWLQJRQWKHIURQWDQG
rear elements. The optical path
includes no fewer than three
moulded aspherical elements and
three UD elements, plus Air
Sphere Coating. The additional
customisable control ring is
placed at the front, there’s
super-fast Nano USM autofocus
and 5-stop image stabilization (8
stops with IBIS), all of which are
lacking in the equivalent EF lens.
As well as a ‘de-click’ option for
the control ring, another bonus
for serious videographers is that
there’s virtually no focus
breathing (a small change in focal
length when adjusting the focus

Air Sphere Coating
and fluorine coatings
are featured.
03

Manual focusing is
via a fly-by-wire ring.
04

Typical of STM and
Nano USM
autofocus lenses,
there’s no distance
scale.
05

position). The minimum focus
distance is impressively short at
the minimum focal length,
shrinking to just 0.21m.

Centre

Centre-sharpness is simply
stunning throughout the entire
zoom range, even when shooting
wide-open, edging ahead of the
RF 24-105mm. It easily beats the
older EF 24-70mm f/2.8 in this
respect, as well as giving an
improvement in corner-sharpness.
Colour fringing and distortions
are minimal, even without
in-camera corrections. All in all,
image quality is spectacular.

2500
2000

VERDICT

1500
1000
500
f/2.8

FEATURES
f/4

f/5.6

f/8

f/11

f/16

f/22 f/32

BUILD & HANDLING

2500

Edge

Performance

Switches are on
hand for AF/MF,
Stabilizer on/off and
zoom lock.

SHARPNESS

2000

PERFORMANCE

1500

VALUE

1000
500
f/2.8

f/4

f/5.6

f/8

Short

f/11
Mid

f/16

f/22 f/32

OVERALL

Long

CANON EF 16-35mm f/4L IS USM £1,389/$1,299
This is an easily manageable full-frame compatible lens with sturdy L-series build quality
his was Canon’s first wide-angle
zoom for full-frame DSLRs to feature
optical image stabilization. Having an
f/4 aperture rating, the lens is considerably
smaller and lighter than Canon’s 16-35mm
f/2.8 zoom, and is rather less expensive to
buy. It has premium optics with GMo (Glass
Moulded) aspherical elements, including a
large-diameter one at the front, plus two UD

The Canon Magazine

(Ultra-low Dispersion) elements. Super
Spectra Coating is applied, as well as fluorine
coatings on the front and rear elements.
Centre-sharpness is excellent even when
shooting wide-open at f/4 and remains very
good towards the edges of the frame,
although it drops off noticeably at the
extreme corners.

SUPERTEST
£1,769/$1,499

FEATURES

CANON RF 70-200mm F4L IS USM

The retractable
design enables
a stowage size of
just 84x119mm.

The RF edition of the 70-200mm F4 is so compact thanks to a retractable design
elephoto lenses often won’t
ÀWLQDVPDOOSKRWREDJEXW
amazingly, this 70-200mm
is only about the size of a
can of drink, at least for stowage,
thanks to its retractable design.
That’s great news if you like to
travel light, less so if you fancy
adding an extender, as the
proximity of the rear element to
the mount makes it incompatible.
The classic 70-200mm zoom
range comes complete with a
constant f/4 aperture rating and
5-stop optical image stabilization,
boosted to 7.5-stop stabilization
with cameras that feature IBIS.
That’s great news for beating
camera-shake, which can often be
a problem in telephoto shooting.
The autofocus system is superfast, based on dual Nano USM
motors, adding the usual bonus of
smooth and virtually silent focus
transitions when shooting video.
Despite the lens’s compact and
lightweight nature, it has
typically tough L-series build
quality complete with extensive
weather-seals. As usual with
L-series lenses, it comes with a
hood but more uncommonly for a
70-200mm zoom, there’s no
optional tripod mounting ring.
You could argue that with so
much image stabilization on tap

This lens has a
77mm filter thread,
that’s larger than its
EF counterpart.
03

A control ring at
the front operates
various functions.
04

The lens can focus
down to just 0.6m
and features an AF
range limiter switch.

1500

VERDICT

1000
500
f/2.8

f/4

f/5.6

f/8

f/11

f/16

f/22 f/32

2500

Fringing

FEATURES
BUILD & HANDLING

2000

PERFORMANCE

1500
1000
500
f/2.8

VALUE
f/4

f/5.6

Short

f/8

f/11
Mid

f/16

f/22 f/32

OVERALL

Long

Lower values
represent less
fringing, and
therefore better
performance

Short
Mid

F2
.8
24
L
-10
5m
m
RF
F4
24
L
-7
0m
m
F2
RF
.8
L
70
-2
00
m
RF
m
70
F4
-2
L
00
m
RF
m
F2
10
.8
0L
40
0m
RF
m
10
F5
0.6
50
-8
0m
m
F4
.5
-7.
1L

15
-3
5m
m

F4
L

Long

14
-3
5m
m

very lens in this test group delivers
impressively low amounts of colour
fringing, even out at the extreme edges
and corners of the image frame. With no in-camera
correction applied, the pricier versions of the
standard and telephoto zoom lenses are slightly
better than the more budget-friendly options.
Conversely, the lower-priced wide-angle and
super-telephoto zoom’s control over colour fringing
is more effective than the more expensive options.

2000

In-camera correction is on all test lenses

2500

Centre

The autofocus and stabilization
V\VWHPVZRUNÁDZOHVVO\DQG
image quality is excellent on the
whole. Centre-sharpness is
excellent throughout the entire
zoom range, even when shooting
wide-open at f/4. Edge-sharpness
is more of a moveable feast, being
very good at 100mm and 200mm
focal lengths but comparatively
lacklustre at 70mm and 135mm,
and colour fringing can be seen
when uncorrected in-camera.

The RF edition has a
triple-mode image
stabilizer.

SHARPNESS

Edge

Performance

COLOUR FRINGING
E

and the lens only weighing in at
695g, a tripod ring would be
VXSHUÁXRXVDQ\ZD\

www.digitalcameraworld.com

RF ZOOM LENSES

£2,999/$2,699

FEATURES

CANON RF 70-200mm F2.8L IS USM

Unlike other
70-200mm f/2.8
zooms, this one has
an extending inner
barrel.

Many of Canon’s fast L-series RF lenses are big and heavy, but this one bucks the trend
long with a constant
aperture rating that
UHPDLQVÀ[HGWKURXJKRXW
the zoom range, the
physical length of 70-200mm
IOHQVHVLVDOVRÀ[HG$WOHDVW
that was the case before this new
RF lens came along. Uniquely, it
has a similar telescoping design
as relatively low-budget
70-300mm telephoto zooms,
therefore having an inner barrel
that extends forwards at longer
zoom settings. Some might feel
that the design compromises
quality, not least because air (and
potentially dust and moisture) are
sucked into the barrel every time
you extend the zoom setting.
The plus side is that it’s
remarkably short at the 70mm
zoom setting, making it easy to
stow away, and it’s also relatively
lightweight at just over a
kilogram, making it very travelfriendly for a 70-200mm f/2.8
lens. As it turns out, the RF lens is
about three-quarters the length
and two-thirds the weight of the
EF 70-200mm f/2.8 zoom.
Like the RF 70-200mm F4 and
RF 100-500mm lenses on test,
this one features a triple-mode
optical image stabilizer, with
switchable options for static and
panning shots, plus a mode that

A perforated seal
around the inner
barrel forms part of
the weather-seals.
03

Typical of Nano USM
lenses, there’s no
focus distance scale.
04

There’s a
customizable control
ring at the rear for
various functions.

only applies stabilization during
actual exposures. That makes it
easier to track erratically moving
action subjects.

Centre

There are certainly no minus
points in terms of performance.
7KHÁRDWLQJDXWRIRFXVV\VWHP
based on dual Nano USM motors
is amazingly fast and virtually
silent in operation. The 5-stop
image stabilizer (7.5 stops with
IBIS) works brilliantly well in all
three operating modes, helping to
make the most of the lens’s
inherent sharpness. And
sharpness itself really is excellent.

The tripod mounting
ring is completely
removable.

2500
2000

VERDICT

1500
1000
500
f/1.8 f/2.8 f/4 f/5.6

FEATURES
f/8 f/11

f/16 f/22 f/32

BUILD & HANDLING

2500

Edge

Performance

SHARPNESS

2000

PERFORMANCE

1500

VALUE

1000
500
f/1.8 f/2.8 f/4 f/5.6
Short

f/8 f/11
Mid

f/16 f/22 f/32

OVERALL

Long

CANON EF 24-105mm f/4L IS II USM £1,389/$1,299
The Mark II edition of this lens is a marked improvement over the original
he original version of this lens wasn’t
sharp enough to make it onto the
approved list of lenses for the
high-resolution 5DS and 5DS R. The Mark II
puts that right with a redesigned optical path,
which also gains high-tech ‘Air Sphere
Coating’ for keeping ghosting and flare to a
minimum. Keep-clean fluorine coatings are
added to the front and rear elements, and the

The Canon Magazine

build-quality has been enhanced for greater
resistance to vibration and shock. The image
stabilizer is also improved, rising from
2.5-stop to 4-stop effectiveness.
Bokeh remains smooth when stopping
down a little, helped by a very well-rounded
10-blade diaphragm and there’s much less
short-end barrel distortion.

SUPERTEST
£699/$649

FEATURES

CANON RF 100-400mm F5.6-8 IS USM

Super Spectra
coating minimizes
ghosting and flare.

Canon’s second super-telephoto RF zoom is lightweight and at an excellent price
ess than a quarter of the
price of Canon’s RF
100-500mm lens on test,
the RF 100-400mm is much
more compact and lightweight, as
well as being much more
affordable. Apart from the RF
14-35mm on test, this lens is the
most lightweight in the entire
group, weighing in at just 635g.
All in all, it looks and feels more
like a traditional 70-300mm
telephoto zoom.
Typical of Canon’s non L-series
lenses, the RF 100-400mm
doesn’t have any weather-seals
and the hood is sold separately,
but build quality feels solid and
there are plenty of enticing
features. Unlike both of the RF
70-200mm zooms on test, this
one is compatible with Canon’s RF
1.4x and 2x Extenders. The latter
naturally gives you epic reach
with up to an 800mm focal
length, albeit with a slow f/16
aperture rating.
Autofocus is driven by a Nano
USM motor which is snappy for
stills and smooth for movie
capture. There’s a 5.5-stop optical
stabilizer (6 stops with IBIS) and
the usual additional control ring
which can be assigned various
functions via the camera’s menu
system. Up-market glass includes

The ET-74B lens
hood is sold
separately
for £76/$45.
03

The lens’s third
control ring is placed
at the front.
04

The 5.5-stop optical
image stabilizer only
rises to 6 stops
with IBIS.
05

one UD (Ultra-low Dispersion)
element and one precisionmoulded aspherical element.

Centre

We found that autofocus speed
and stabilization lived up to their
claims, while image quality was
impressive. Sharpness proved
very good in our real-world tests,
throughout the zoom range,
although lab-results from
shooting close-range charts were
comparatively average. Colour
fringing and pincushion
distortion are fairly minimal,
even with in-camera corrections
switched off.

2500
2000

VERDICT

1500
1000
500
f/4-4.5 f/5-6.3

FEATURES
f/8

f/11

f/16

f/22

f/32

BUILD & HANDLING

2500

Edge

Performance

Aperture is
controlled by a
well-rounded
9-blade diaphragm.

SHARPNESS

2000

PERFORMANCE

1500

VALUE

1000
500
f/4-4.5 f/5-6.3

f/8

Short

f/11

f/16
Mid

f/22

f/32

OVERALL

Long

CANON EF 70-200mm f/4L IS II USM £1,629/$1,499
The Mark II version of this lens represents a major revamp but it doesn’t come cheap
hereas the upgrades in Canon’s
similarly recent EF 70-200mm
f/2.8 zoom are slim pickings,
there’s a comparative feast packed into
the second edition of this popular lens,
which was launched around the same
time. Headline updates include a
completely revamped optical path,
a new autofocus system with increased

speed and accuracy, and an upgraded
5-stop image stabilizer with three
operating modes.
The new lens overtakes the previous
edition in all areas of performance. It’s
sharper throughout the zoom range and
across the whole image frame, with less
colour fringing in the edges and corners.

www.digitalcameraworld.com

RF ZOOM LENSES

£2,939/$2,699

FEATURES

CANON RF 100-500mm F4.5-7.1L IS USM
Super-tele zoom for R-system cameras is a major advance from the classic EF 100-400mm
here’s a wealth of super-tele
]RRPVWKDW\RXFDQÀWWRDQ
EOS R-system camera via an
EF-EOS R mount adapter
but, as an RF lens, the
100-500mm is naturally a perfect
ÀW,WWDNHVLWVFXHVIURPWKH
perennially popular EF
100-400mm and is physically
slightly longer but a little lighter.
It adds an extra 100mm of
telephoto reach, albeit with a
slowing in aperture by two-thirds
of an f/stop, to f/7.1. There’s
nothing slow about its autofocus
system however, which is based
on dual Nano USM motors. As
such, it’s blazing-fast and virtually
silent in operation.
The optical path incorporates
no fewer than six UD (Ultra-low
Dispersion) elements and one
Super UD element, while the
image stabilizer is rated 5 stops,
rising to 6 stops with IBIS. As
with both of the RF 70-200mm
lenses on test, this one has a
triple-mode stabilizer with
switchable static, panning and
erratic-movement options.
Handling is enhanced by a similar
torque adjustment ring for
stiffening or loosening the zoom
ring, as featured in the EF
100-400mm lens, along with the
addition of a customisable control

Fluorine coatings are
applied to front and
rear elements.
02

The image stabilizer
gives 5-stop
effectiveness, rising
to 6 stops with IBIS.
03

Dual Nano USM
autofocus is
super-fast for stills
yet smooth and
silent for video.
04

There’s a
mechanism for
adjusting the torque
of the zoom ring.

The autofocus system makes the
most of the advanced tracking
abilities of the latest R-system
cameras, combining with a highly
effective image stabilizer to
deliver an excellent hit rate for
action shots. Sharpness itself is
excellent throughout the entire
zoom range, while colour fringing
and distortions are minimal.

The rear control ring
can be customized
for various functions.

2500

Centre

Performance

SHARPNESS
2000

VERDICT

1500
1000
500
f/4-4.5 f/5-6.3

FEATURES
f/8

f/11

f/16

f/22

f/32

BUILD & HANDLING

2500

Edge

ring for altering the likes of
aperture or ISO setting. High-end
build quality sees the application
of comprehensive weather-seals
DQGÁXRULQHFRDWLQJVRQWKHIURQW
and rear elements.

2000

PERFORMANCE

1500

VALUE

1000
500
f/4-4.5 f/5-6.3

f/8

Short

f/11

f/16
Mid

f/22

f/32

OVERALL

Long

CANON EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM £2,599/$2,399
The second edition of this classic Canon lens adds a twist to the plot
anon’s original 100-400mm IS
USM lens was launched all the
way back in 1998, with film
cameras firmly in mind. Its trombonestyle, push-pull zoom mechanism wasn’t
universally popular but that’s been
changed to a more regular twist-action
zoom ring in the Mark II, along with the
addition of weather-seals. The optical

The Canon Magazine

path includes top-grade fluorite and
Super UD (Ultra-low Dispersion) glass
and high-tech ASC (Air Sphere Coating),
plus fluorine coatings on both the front
and rear elements. Another neat feature
is the triple-mode image stabilizer, rated
at 4 stops, compared with just 1.5-stops
in the original lens.

SUPERTEST
COMPARISON TABLE

NAME

Full-frame
compatible
Angle of view
(full-frame)
Effective zoom
range (APS-C)
Elements/groups
Diaphragm

CANON RF
14-35mm F4L
IS USM

CANON RF 15-35mm
F2.8L IS USM

CANON RF 24-105mm
F4L IS USM

CANON RF 24-70mm
F2.8L IS USM

CANON RF 70-200mm
F4L IS USM

CANON RF 70-200mm
F2.8L IS USM

CANON RF
100-400mm
F5.6-8 IS USM

CANON RF
100-500mm
F4.5-7.1L IS USM

www.canon.co.uk

Yes

114 to 63 degrees

110.5 to 63 degrees

84 to 23.3 degrees

84 to 34 degrees

34 to 12 degrees

24 to 6.2 degrees

24 to 5 degrees

22.4-56mm

24-56mm

112-320mm

160-640mm

160-800mm

16/12

18/14

21/15

16/11

17/13

12/9

20/14

9 blades

5 stops (7.5 with IBIS)
3 modes

5.5 stops (6 with IBIS)

5 stops (6 with IBIS) 3
modes

5.5 stops (7 with IBIS)

5 stops (7 with IBIS)

5 stops (8 with IBIS)

5 stops (7.5 with IBIS)
3 modes

Nano USM

Dual Nano USM

Nano USM

Dual Nano USM

Electronically coupled

Yes

Min focus distance

0.2m

0.28m

0.45m

0.21-0.38m

0.6m

0.7m

0.88m

0.9-1.2m

Max reproduction
ratio

0.38x

0.21x

0.24x

0.3x

0.28x

0.23x

0.41x

0.33x

Yes

Filter size

77mm

82mm

77mm

82mm

77mm

67mm

77mm

Lens hood

EW-83P (included)

EW-88F (included)

EW-83N (included)

EW-88E (included)

ET-83G III (included)

ET-83FW III (included)

ET-74B, £76/$45

ET-83FW III (included)

84x100mm

89x127mm

84x107mm

89x126mm

84x119mm

90x146mm

80x165mm

94x208mm

540g

840g

700g

900g

695g

1,070g

635g

1,530g

£1,749/$1,399

£2,599/$2,199

£1,389/$1,299

£2,519/$2,199

£1,769/$1,499

£2,999/$2,699

£699/$649

£2,939/$2,699

Optical Stabilizer
Autofocus type
Manual focus
override
Additional
control ring

Weather-seals

Dimensions
(dia x length)
Weight
Target price

FEATURES
BUILD & HANDLING
PERFORMANCE
VALUE
OVERALL

THE WINNER IS... CANON RF 14-35mm F4L IS USM
Your favourite will depend on what you shoot, but this RF super wide-angle is our favourite…
our best-buy lens
depends on what you
shoot. If you’re into
landscapes and architecture, a
wide-angle zoom is favourable,
whereas a super-telephoto is
often best for action, sports and
wildlife, and a standard zoom is
ideal for general shooting. That
said, the RF 14-35mm F4L is our
pick of the crop for delivering
the most bang per buck and it’s
only worth spending more on

the RF 15-35mm if you’re
desperate for an f/2.8 rather
than f/4 aperture.
In the standard zoom sector,
the RF 24-70mm F2.8L wins out
for image quality and all-round
performance over the RF
24-105mm F4L, and the same
goes for the RF 70-200mm
F2.8L vs F4L for telephoto
zooms. Even so, the f/4 lenses
are very impressive and much
more affordable. There’s a lot to

be said for sticking with those
and adding, say, an even faster
RF 35mm F1.8 Macro IS USM,
RF 50mm F1.8 USM or RF
85mm F2 Macro IS USM prime.
In super-telephoto territory,
the RF 100-400mm is a great
lens that’s the pick of the whole
crop for value. It’s only worth
spending more on the RF
100-500mm if you demand a
fully pro-grade lens of absolutely
premium L-series quality.
www.digitalcameraworld.com

GET PHOTOPLUS FROM
ONLY £4.24 PER ISSUE!

INSTANT
READING
Access your favourite
Canon magazine on
your digital device
from the comfort of
your own home

This digital edition offer is ONLY available via our online shop at

www.magazinesdirect.com/photoplus-magazine
Available on iOS and Android

What to look for
Canon EOS camera ranges

to a few
With prices ranging from a couple of hundred
ryone,
thousand, Canon has an EOS camera to suit eve
pro…
from the complete beginner to most demanding

DSLR CAMERAS
CANON EOS 4000D

PRICES QUOTED ARE BODY-ONLY UNLESS STATED

TESTED IN ISSUE 140 PRICE: £370/$N/A
CANON has stripped everything down to its bare
essentials for the 4000D, and it’s a great if basic
DSLR for beginners. And at only £370 (body),
it’s the cheapest EOS DSLR. Sadly, it’s let down
by a cheap kit lens that’s tough to tolerate, so
we suggest buying the better IS lens.

CANON EOS 2000D (REBEL T7)

BEGINNER DSLRs

THE 2000D is a better-spec Canon camera than
the 4000D, but comes with a modest step up in
price. It’s arguably worth the extra, but that puts
it in a difficult spot, where another step up in
outlay will get you an EOS 200D, which is
a far better overall DSLR camera.

CANON EOS 250D (REBEL SL3)
THE EOS 250D/Rebel SL3 is not Canon’s
cheapest entry-level DSLR, but we think it’s the
best budget/beginner DSLR with the perfect
blend of power and value. This is the body that will
take people from snapping on their smartphones
to getting into the hobby.

CANON EOS 850D (REBEL T8i)
FOR ENTHUSIASTS looking to take the next
step, the Canon EOS 850D is an impressive,
lightweight yet powerful DSLR that captures
detailed, colourful and sharper images, as well as
4K movies. Featuring iTR Face and Eye Detection
AF, and accurate Auto AF via optical viewfinder,
the 850D is sure to satisfy.

100

Canon splits its EOS range into mirrorless cameras
and DSLRs. Its older DSLR line-up includes beginner,
enthusiast and pro ranges; the EOS 4000D is the
most basic, the 850D for intermediates, the 90D and
full-frame 6D Mk II for advanced enthusiasts, and the
full-frame pro-level 5D and 1D lines. Over the page are
the two EOS mirrorless ranges: Canon’s smaller, older
APS-C EOS M cameras, and Canon’s EOS R System
APS-C and full-frame cameras that offer the very
latest digital technology. The APS-C crop-sensor EOS
R50, R10 and R7 are smaller, affordable entry-level
options. While the EOS R8 up to the R6 Mark II, R5
and flagship R3 are full-frame for serious enthusiasts
to professionals. Canon’s EOS R cameras are packed
with intelligent features and most have IBIS, new AF
tracking for any moving subject you shoot, and 20fps
to 40fps continuous shooting bursts are common
place using the speedy electronic shutter modes.

Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

18MP APS-C CMOS
Pentamirror, 0.8x, 95%
100-6400 (12,800 exp)
9-point (1 cross-type)
2.7-inch 230K dots
3fps
SD/SDHC/SDXC

TESTED IN ISSUE 194 PRICE: £349/$479
Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

24.1MP APS-C CMOS
Pentamirror, 0.8x, 95%
100-6400 (12,800 exp)
9-point (1 cross-type)
3-inch 920K dots
3fps
SD/SDHC/SDXC

TESTED IN ISSUE 194 PRICE: £549/$649
Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

24.1MP APS-C CMOS
Pentamirror, 0.87x, 95%
100-25,600 (51,200 exp)
9-point (1 cross-type)
3-inch vari-angle touchscreen 1040K
5fps
SD/SDHC/SDXC

TESTED IN ISSUE 194 PRICE: £919/$749
Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

24.1MP Dual Pixel APS-C CMOS
Pentamirror, 95% coverage, 0.82x
100-25,600
45 cross-type AF point system
3-inch vari-angle touchscreen 1040K
7fps
SD/SDHC/SDXC

www.digitalcameraworld.com

BUYERS’ GUIDE CAMERAS
CANON EOS 77D

TESTED IN ISSUE 194 PRICE: £710/$550
THE key specs are identical to the 800D, but the
extra top-plate LCD gives at-a-glance access to
vital shooting info, while a rear control wheel
makes dialing in exposure settings much quicker,
promoting it to Canon’s enthusiast range. Super
image quality – even at high ISOs.

CANON EOS 90D

Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

Pentamirror, 0.82x, 95%
100-25,600 (51,200 exp)
45-point (all cross-type)
3-inch vari-angle touchscreen 1040K
6fps (27 Raw/Unlimited JPEG)
SD/SDHC/SDXC

TESTED IN ISSUE 194 PRICE: £1299/$1199

CANON EOS 7D MARK II

Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

32.5MP, APS-C (6960x4640 pixels)
Pentaprism, 0.95x, 100%
100-25,600 (51,200 exp)
45-point (all cross-type)
3-inch vari-angle touchscreen 1040K
10fps (25 Raw/58 JPEG)
SD/SDHC/SDXC

TESTED IN ISSUE 159 PRICE: £1050/$725
HERE’S the king of action-packed APS-C format
EOS cameras. A little long in the tooth now, but it
still has 65-point AF with advanced tracking,
10fps continuous drive, dual DIGIC 6 processors
and GPS, all wrapped up in a tough, weathersealed magnesium alloy shell.

CANON EOS 6D MARK II

Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

20.2MP, APS-C (5472x3648 pixels)
Pentaprism, 1.0x, 100%
100-16,000 (51,200 exp)
65-point (all cross-type)
3-inch 1040K dots
10fps (31 Raw/unlimited JPEG)
CompactFlash + SD/SDHC/SDXC

ENTHUSIAST DSLRs

THE EOS 90D is still Canon’s decathlete cropcamera that comes with a better 32.5MP sensor,
super-quick 10fps continuous shooting and 4K
video, plus improved handling and decent AF.
This camera is an ideal APS-C camera upgrade
for enthusiasts and beyond.

TESTED IN ISSUE 194 PRICE: £1339/$1399
THE world’s smallest full-frame DSLR – with
a vari-angle touchscreen LCD – gets a major
upgrade over the original 6D with improved speed
and performance rather than outright image
quality. It’s a great all-rounder now thanks to an
improved AF system and burst rate.

CANON EOS 5D MARK IV

Sensor

26.2MP, full-frame (6240x4160 pixels)

Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

Optical pentaprism, 98%
100-40,000 (50-102,400 exp)
45-point (all cross-type)
3-inch vari-angle touchscreen 1040K
6.5fps (21 Raw/150 JPEG)
SD/SDHC/SDXC

TESTED IN ISSUE 194 PRICE: £2869/$2699
Sensor

30.4MP, full-frame (6720x4480 pixels)

Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)

Pentaprism, 0.71x, 100%
100-32,000 (50-102,400 exp)
61-point (41 cross-type, 5 dual-cross)
3.2-inch touchscreen 1620K dots
7fps (21 Raw/unlimited JPEG)

Memory card

CANON EOS 5DS (5DS R)
THE world’s first 50MP full-frame DSLR delivers
huge and amazingly detailed hi-res images. The
higher-cost 5DS R adds a low-pass cancellation
filter for marginally sharper shots. As expected
with such a high-res sensor, max ISO and drive
rate are lower than with the 5D Mk IV.

TESTED IN ISSUE 148 PRICE: £2740/$1499
Sensor

50.6MP, full-frame (8688x5792 pixels)

Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)

Pentaprism, 0.71x, 100%
100-6400 (50-12,800 exp)
61-point (41 cross-type, 5 dual-cross)
3.2-inch 1040K dots
5fps (14 Raw/510 JPEG)

Memory card

CANON EOS-1D X MARK III
THE Canon EOS-1D X Mark III is the ultimate hybrid
DSLR/mirrorless machine, with superb low-light
performance up to ISO102,400, expandable to
819,200, Deep Learning AF and 5.5K Raw video.
It can also capture up to 20fps in Live View mode,
making it a dream to shoot any action.

CompactFlash + SD/SDHC/SDXC

TESTED IN ISSUE 194 PRICE: £6999/$6499
Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

20.1MP full-frame (5472x3648 pixels)
Pentaprism, 0.76x, 100% coverage
100-102,400 (exp 50-819,200)
191-point (155 cross-type)
3.2-inch touchscreen 2.1m dots
20fps (1000 Raw/unlimited JPEG)
2xCFexpress 1.0 Type B

101

PROFESSIONAL DSLRs

A SUPERB all-rounder, the pro-level weathersealed full-frame 5D Mk IV combines a stunning
hi-res 30MP sensor with a swift 7fps frame rate.
Its impressive specs list includes 4K video, a
touchscreen LCD, Wi-Fi and NFC connectivity, and
GPS to automatically geotag images.

The Canon Magazine

24.2MP, APS-C (6000x4000 pixels)

BUYERS’
GUIDE

MIRRORLESS CAMERAS

PRICES QUOTED ARE BODY-ONLY UNLESS STATED

TESTED IN ISSUE 194 PRICE with 15-45mm kit lens: £570/$549

CANON EOS M200

CANON’S EOS M200 is aimed at attracting
Instagramers and smartphone upgraders to
Canon’s mirrorless M range, and has an appealing
spec list including its 24MP sensor and plenty of
easy-to-use features for beginners. It shoots 4K
video to seal the deal.

Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

APS-C EOS M

IF YOU’RE coming to the EOS M system afresh,
the EOS M50 Mark II is a compact and capable
camera, taking great stills and 1080p video, ideal
for travel, everyday imaging, plus vlogging and
content creation. But if you need to record 4K,
this isn’t the camera for you.

CANON EOS M6 MARK II

Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

OLED EVF, 2.36 million dots
100-25,600 (exp. to 51,200)
Dual Pixel CMOS AF, 3975 focus positions
3-inch vari-angle touchscreen 1040K dots
10fps
1x SD UHS-I

32.5MP APS-C CMOS
No
100-25,600
143/99-point
3-inch tilting touchscreen 1040K dots
14fps (23 Raws, 54 JPEGs)
SD/SDHC/SDXC and UHS-1

TESTED IN ISSUE 168 PRICE with 15-45mm kit lens: £780/N/A
AS Canon’s flagship mirrorless M camera for
enthusiasts, the EOS M5 really opens up the
DSLR vs CSC debate. It shares much of the tech
as the 80D, but swaps the optical viewfinder for
an electronic version, making this compact
system camera a pocket rocket.

Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

24.2MP APS-C CMOS
OLED EVF, 2.36 million dots
100-25,600
49-point AF
3.2-inch tilting touchscreen 1620k dots
9fps
SD/SDHC/SDXC and UHS-1

TESTED IN ISSUE 206 PRICE with 18-45mm kit lens: £669/$599
THE Canon EOS R100 is effectively the mirrorless
replacement for the 250D and 2000D, aimed at
first-timers looking for better image quality than a
smartphone. It boasts a robust 24.1MP APS-C
sensor, great autofocus and wide-spanning lens
line-up, all without breaking the bank.

BEGINNER EOS R

CANON EOS R50

Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

24.1MP APS-C CMOS
2.36 million dots, 60fps
100-12,800 (25,600 exp)
Dual Pixel CMOS AF II (88% coverage)
3-inch fixed (non-touch) screen 1.04m dots
6.5fps (3.5fps with AF)
1x SD/SDHC/SDXC slot

TESTED IN ISSUE 204 PRICE: £789/$679
UTILIZING the small and compact size of the
M50 yet improving upon its specs in every way,
with the sensor/processor from the R10, the R50
is one of the best pocket-friendly cameras today.
With a 24.2MP APS-C sensor, 4K video, intelligent
AF modes, and 15/12fps continuous shooting, the
R50 is a great beginner camera.

CANON EOS R10

Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

24.2MP APS-C CMOS
0.39 OLED, 2.36 million dots, 120fps
100-12800 (25600 exp)
Dual Pixel CMOS AF II
3-inch vari-angle touchscreen 1.62 dots
15fps electronic, 12fps electronic 1st curtain
1x UHS-I SD

TESTED IN ISSUE 194 PRICE: £899/$979
CANON’S budget, beginner EOS R10 – with
pro-level autofocus and 15fps speed, 4K 60p
imaging and 120p slow motion at 1080p – offers
performance that punches well above its weight.
The lack of in-body image stabilization or the crop
at 4K 60p are the only drawbacks.

102

24.1MP CMOS APS-C

TESTED IN ISSUE 194 PRICE: £799/$849
THE M6 Mk II is Canon’s compact yet powerful
APS-C mirrorless, designed to deliver sharp images
for amateurs on the move. It has the same 32.5MP
APS-C sensor as the Canon 90D DSLR, but it’s
able to shoot in 14fps blasts, and 30fps Raw image
bursts, plus uncropped 4K video.

CANON EOS R100

No
100-25,600 (51,200 exp)
143-point AF
3-inch tilting touchscreen 1040K dots
6.1fps
SD/SDHC/SDXC and UHS-1

TESTED IN ISSUE 194 PRICE: £589/$599

CANON EOS M50 MARK II

CANON EOS M5

24.1MP APS-C CMOS

Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

24.2MP APS-C CMOS
2.36 million dots, 120fps
100-32,000 (51,200 exp)
651 Dual Pixel CMOS AF II divisions
3-inch vari-angle touchscreen 1.04m dots
23fps electronic, 15fps mechanical
1x SD/SDHC/SDXC, UHS-II

www.digitalcameraworld.com

BUYERS’ GUIDE CAMERAS
CANON EOS RP

TESTED IN ISSUE 194 PRICE: £1049/$999
CANON’S RP is ideal for crop-sensor CSC M or
EOS DSLR users looking for a full-frame upgrade
that won’t break the bank. The EOS RP is strong
spec package that’s notably smaller, lighter and
cheaper than almost all its rivals, and ideal as
an entry-level full-frame camera.

Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

CANON EOS R7

0.39-inch EVF, 2.36 million dots
100-40,000 (50-102,400 exp)
4779 Dual Pixel AF positions
3-inch vari-angle touchscreen 1040K
5fps (50 Raw/Unlimited JPEG)
SD/SDHC/SDXC and UHS-ll

TESTED IN ISSUE 194 PRICE: £1349/$1499

CANON EOS R8

Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

32.5MP APS-C CMOS
2.36 million dots, 120fps
100-32,000 (51,200 exp)
651 Dual Pixel CMOS AF II divisions
3-inch vari-angle touchscreen 1.62m dots
30fps electronic, 15fps mechanical
2x SD/SDHC/SDXC, UHS-II

TESTED IN ISSUE 203 PRICE: £1699/$1499
CANON’S R8 is the lightest full-frame EOS R
camera, and can shoot it all, with the same
sensor and processor as the R6 Mk II, latest AF
subject recognition, 24.2MP images, and rapid
40fps shooting. But there’s no joystick or thumb
dial, no IBIS, and smaller batteries.

CANON EOS R

Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

24.2MP full-frame CMOS
0.39 OLED, 2.36 million dots, 120fps
100-25600 (102,400 exp)
Dual Pixel CMOS AF II
3-inch vari-angle touchscreen 1.62 dots
40fps electronic, 6fps electronic 1st curtain
1x UHS-II SD

ENTHUSIAST EOS R

THE Canon EOS R7 is the first mirrorless camera
to reach for if you want the advantages of APS-C
with pro-level 15fps speed, intelligent AF, IBIS, and
big-time image resolution. It’s a fantastic addition
to the EOS R ecosystem and a worthy successor
to the 90D and 7D DSLR lines.

TESTED IN ISSUE 194 PRICE: £1449/$1799
THE first full-frame mirrorless Canon EOS R boasts
the RF mount and fully articulated vari-angle
Dual Pixel AF touchscreen with 5655 AF points.
Equivalent in many specs to the 5D Mark IV DSLR,
it’s now a cheaper EOS R option for those looking
to experience mirrorless photography.

Sensor
Electronic viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

CANON EOS R6 MARK II

30.3MP full-frame CMOS
0.5-inch EVF, 3.69 million dots
100-40,000 (50-102,400 exp)
5655 Dual Pixel AF points
3.2-in vari-angle touchscreen 2.1m dots
Approx. 8fps (47 Raw, 100 JPEG)
1x SD/SDHC/SDXC and UHS-II

TESTED IN ISSUE 200 PRICE: £2779/$3599

CANON EOS R5

Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

24.2MP full-frame CMOS
0.5-inch OLED, 3.69 million dots
100-102,400 (50-204,800 exp)
4897 Dual Pixel AF positions
3-inch vari-angle touchscreen 1.62m dots
12fps mechanical, 40fps electronic
2xUHS-II SD

TESTED IN ISSUE 194 PRICE : £4299/$3899
THE Canon EOS R5 is deserving of the hype: it’s
the perfect amalgamation of the R’s full-frame
form, the 5D’s function, the pro-grade autofocus
of the flagship EOS-1D X Mark III DSLR, plus with
near-medium format resolution, 20fps burst
speeds and mirrorless magic such as IBIS and
amazingly-intelligent Animal AF.

CANON EOS R3

Sensor

45MP full-frame CMOS

Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)

OLED EVF, 5690K dots
100-51,200 (50-102,400 exp)
5940 Dual Pixel CMOS AF II
3.15-in vari-angle touchscreen 2100K dots
12fps mechanical, 20fps electronic

Memory card

CFexpress type B, UHS-II SD/SDHC/SDXC

TESTED IN ISSUE 194 PRICE: £5879/$5999
CANON’S sporty pro mirrorless R3 has clever
AF that’s amazing at detecting vehicles as well as
people and animals, Eye Control AF, faster 30fps,
blackout-free EVF, and it can take 4K 60p video
without overheating, which means the R3
succeeds where the R5 fell short.

Sensor
Viewfinder
ISO
AF
LCD
Max burst (buffer)
Memory card

24.1MP stacked CMOS
0.5-inch EVF, 5.76 million dots
100-102,400 (50-204,800 exp)
4779 Dual Pixel AF positions
3-inch vari-angle touchscreen 4.15m dots
12fps mechanical, 30fps electronic
CFexpress type, SD/SDHC/SDXC

103

PROFESSIONAL EOS R

WHAT can’t this camera do? The R6 Mark II is a
hybrid camera that packs an obscene amount of
firepower, with up to 6K video and 24.2MP stills at
a startling 40fps. Plus updated AF detection for
tracking trains, planes and horses (with the usual
animal, people, vehicles AF detection) for sharp
shots of anything that moves.

The Canon Magazine

26.2MP full-frame CMOS

Choosing lenses
Key factors to watch out for

BUYERS’
GUIDE

The main factors to consider in a lens are
its focal length, maximum aperture, and if it’s full-frame compatible or
not. We’ve categorized lenses by focal length range from wide-angle to
telephoto. The larger a lens’s maximum aperture, the ‘faster’ it is. Zooms are
more flexible than primes, but tend not to have such fast maximum apertures.
Full-frame lenses will also work with ‘crop-sensor’ EOS DSLRs, but crop-sensor
lenses aren’t compatible with full-frame cameras. For Canon EOS R mirrorless
cameras the dedicated Canon RF lenses are best, but using Canon’s Mount
Adapter EF-EOS R enables EF-S and EF lenses to be used on EOS R cameras.
n
io

540g
240g
385g
1180g
540
840
790g
615g
500g
555g
520g
1150g
1150g
940g
440g
1100g
1110g
560g
560g
530g
940g
600g

0.15m
0.22m
0.24m
0.28m
0.20m
0.28m
0.28m
0.28m
0.28m
0.24m
0.24m
0.24m
0.26m
0.28m
0.24m
0.28m
0.28m
0.28m
0.28m
0.25m
0.28m
0.28m

0.34x
0.15x
0.17x
0.16x
0.38x
0.21x
0.22x
0.23x
0.24x
0.13x
0.15x
0.2x
0.19x
0.23x
0.19x
0.2x
0.2x
0.12x
0.12x
0.2x
0.19x
0.21x

None
67mm
77mm
None
77mm
82mm
82mm
77mm
77mm
None
82mm
None
None
77mm
77mm
None
None
77mm
82mm
82mm
82mm
82mm

7
7
6
9
9
9
9
9
7
7
7
9
9
7
7
9
9
9
9
9
9
9

90
203
131
203
203
203
195
203
113
143
176
203
195
113
176
143
176
87
195
116
154

Canon EF-M 55-200mm f/4.5-6.3 IS STM
Canon RF-S 55-210mm F5-7.1 IS STM
Canon EF-S 55-250mm f/4-5.6 IS STM
Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS III USM
Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L USM
Canon EF 70-200mm f/4L IS II USM
Canon EF 70-200mm f/4L IS USM
Canon EF 70-200mm f/4L USM
Canon RF 70-200mm F2.8L IS USM
Canon RF 70-200mm F4L IS USM
Canon EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM

£299/$349
£429/$349
£309/$299
£2149/$2099
£1330/$1250
£1629/$1499
£360/$500 (used)
£589/$599
£2659/$2699
£1699/$1749
£400/$650

No
No
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes

3.6x
3.8x
4.5x
2.9x
2.9x
2.9x
2.9x
2.9x
2.9x
2.9x
4.3x

Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes

f/4.5-6.3
f/5-7.1
f/4-5.6
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/4
f/4
f/4
f/2.8
f/4
f/4-5.6

260g
270g
375g
1480g
1310g
780g
760g
705g
1070g
695g
630g

1.0m
1.0m
0.85m
1.2m
1.5m
1.0m
1.2m
1.2m
0.7m
0.6m
1.5m

0.21x
0.28x
0.29x
0.21x
0.16x
0.27x
0.21x
0.21x
0.23x
0.28x
0.26x

52mm
55mm
58mm
77mm
77mm
72mm
72mm
67mm
77mm
77mm
58mm

7
7
7
8
8
9
8
8
9
9
8

196
209
196
175
64
196
196
163
175
196
123

Canon EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS II USM

£639/$599

Yes

4.3x

Yes

f/4-5.6

710g

1.2m

0.25x

67mm

196

Canon EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6L IS USM
Canon EF 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 DO IS USM
Canon EF 75-300mm f/4-5.6 III
Canon EF 75-300mm f/4-5.6 III USM
Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM

£690/$800 (used)
£1380/$1400
£210/$200
£260/$190
£2529/$2199

Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes

4.3x
4.3x
4.0x
4.0x
4.0x

Yes
Yes
No
No
Yes

f/4-5.6
f/4.5-5.6
f/4-5.6
f/4-5.6
f/4.5-5.6

1050g
720g
480g
480g
1640g

1.2m
1.4m
1.5m
1.5m
0.98m

0.21x
0.19x
0.25x
0.25x
0.31x

67mm
58mm
58mm
58mm
77mm

8
6
7
7
9

196
90
15
70
206

f/4
f/4.5-5.6
f/3.5-4.5
f/4
f/4
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/4
f/4
f/4.5-5.6
f/3.5
f/4
f/2.8
f/2
f/3.5-4.5
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/4
f/2.8
f/4

No
Yes
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
No
No

ti n

1.9x
1.8x
2.2x
2.2x
2.5x
2.3x
2.2x
2.2x
2.4x
2.0x
2.0x
2.0x
0.19x
1.5x
0.19x
2.0x
2.0x
1.8x
1.43x
2.3x
1.8x
2.1x

Yes
No
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
Yes
Yes

£1120/$1250
£249/$299
£500/$650
£3099/$2899
£1749/$1499
£2389/$1999
£2199/$2199
£1389/$1299
£720/$750
£600/$800
£319/$399
£1269/$1239
£1269/$1299
£760/$900
£449/$499
£930/$1100
£1099/$1299
£480/$500
£493/$549
£450/$400
£699/$699
£570/$450

es
e
Is

Canon EF 8-15mm f/4L Fisheye USM
Canon EF-S 10-18mm f/4.5-5.6 IS STM
Canon EF-S 10-22mm f/3.5-4.5 USM
Canon EF 11-24mm f/4L USM
Canon RF 14-35mm F4L IS USM
Canon RF 15-35mm F2.8L IS USM
Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8L III USM
Canon EF 16-35mm f/4L IS USM
Canon EF 17-40mm f/4L USM
Sigma 8-16mm f/4.5-5.6 DC HSM
Sigma 10-20mm f/3.5 EX DC HSM
Sigma 12-24mm f/4 DG HSM A
Sigma 14-24mm f/2.8 DG HSM A
Sigma 24-35mm f/2 DG HSM A
Tamron 10-24mm f/3.5-4.5 Di II VC HLD
Tamron SP 15-30mm f/2.8 Di VC USD
Tamron SP 15-30mm f/2.8 Di VC USD G2
Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8 AT-X PRO DX II
Tokina 11-20mm f/2.8 AT-X PRO DX
Tokina 12-28mm f/4 AT-X Pro DX
Tokina 16-28mm f/2.8 FF
Tokina 17-35mm f/4 AT-X PRO FX

l te

ni
ag
m

fic

st
di
M

t
W
ei

ili
ab
M

e
Im

zo
M

m
ra

Fu
l

WIDE-ANGLE ZOOMS

BEST ON TEST AWARD
l-f

BEST VALUE AWARD

KEY:

ti o

With over 200 lenses we’ve listed for Canon EOS cameras,
picking the right one can be tough. Here’s the lowdown!

•
•
•
•

TELEPHOTO ZOOMS

Canon RF 100-400mm F5.6-8 IS USM

£699/$649

Yes

4.0x

Yes

f/5.6-8

635g

0.88m

0.41x

67mm

206

Canon RF 100-500mm F4.5-7.1L IS USM

£2979/$2899

Yes

f/4.5-7.1

1530g

0.9-1.2m

0.33x

77mm

206

Canon EF 200-400mm f/4L IS USM Extender 1.4x
Sigma 50-100mm f/1.8 DC HSM A
Sigma 50-500mm f/4.5-6.3 DG OS HSM
Sigma 60-600mm f/4.5-6.3 DG OS HSM Sport

£11,209/$10,999
£949/$1099
£1160/$1660
£1699/$1999

Yes
No
Yes
Yes

2.8x
2.0x
10.0x
10.0x

Yes
None
Yes
Yes

f/4
f/1.8
f/4.5-6.3
f/4.5-6.3

3620g
1490g
1970g
2700g

2.0m
0.15x
0.95m
0.15x
0.5-1.8m 0.32x
0.6-2.6m 0.3x

52mm
82mm
95mm
105mm

9
9
9
9

182
175
130
182

Sigma 70-200mm f/2.8 EX DG OS HSM

£900/$1300

Yes

2.9x

Yes

f/2.8

1430g

1.4m

0.13x

77mm

137

Sigma 70-200mm f/2.8 DG OS HSM S

£1179/$1499

Yes

2.9x

Yes

f/2.8

1805g

1.2m

0.21x

82mm

190

Sigma 70-300mm f/4-5.6 DG Macro
Sigma APO 70-300mm f/4-5.6 DG Macro

£130/$140
£180/$180

Yes
Yes

4.3x
4.3x

No
No

f/4-5.6
f/4-5.6

545g
550g

0.95m
0.95m

0.5x
0.5x

58mm
58mm

9
9

123
137

Sigma 100-400mm f/5-6.3 DG OS HSM C

£899/$799

Yes

f/5-6.3

1160g

1.6m

0.26x

67mm

196

Sigma 120-300mm f/2.8 DG OS HSM S
Sigma 150-600mm f/5-6.3 DG OS HSM C

£2699/$3599
£849/$899

Yes
Yes

2.5x
4.0x

Yes
Yes

f/2.8
f/5-6.3

3390g
1930g

1.5-2.5m
2.8m

0.12x
0.2x

105mm
95mm

9
9

175
193

Sigma 150-600mm f/5-6.3 DG OS HSM S

£1279/$1699

Yes

4.0x

Yes

f/5-6.3

2860g

2.6m

0.2x

105mm

206

Tamron SP AF 70-200mm f/2.8 Di LD (IF) Macro £630/$770

Yes

2.9x

f/2.8

1320g

0.95m

0.32x

77mm

137

Tamron SP 70-200mm f/2.8 Di VC USD G2

£1249/$1299

Yes

2.9x

Yes

f/2.8

1500g

0.95m

0.16x

77mm

175

Tamron 70-210mm f/4 DI VC USD
Tamron AF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 Di LD Macro

£549/$599
£130/$145

Yes
Yes

2.9x
4.3x

Yes
No

f/4
f/4-5.6

860g
458g

0.95m
0.95m

0.32x
0.5x

67mm
62mm

9
9

175
137

Tamron SP AF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 Di VC USD

£230/$250 (used)

Yes

4.3x

Yes

f/4-5.6

765g

1.5m

0.25x

62mm

196

Tamron 100-400mm f/4.5-6.3 Di VC USD

£819/$799

Yes

f/4-5.6

1135g

1.5m

0.28x

67mm

196

Tamron SP 150-600mm f/5-6.3 Di VC USD G2

£1299/$1399

Yes

4.0x

Yes

f/5-6.3

2010g

2.2m

0.26x

95mm

206

Tokina SZX Super Tele 400mm F8 Reflex MF

£250/$239

N/A

f/8

355g

1.15m

0.4x

67mm

206

•

•
•
•
••
•
•
•

0.35m
0.35m
0.25m
0.25m
0.35m
0.38m
0.21m
0.38m
0.39m
0.40m
0.45m
0.13m
0.40m
0.20m
0.28m
0.22m
0.28m
0.38m
0.45m
0.29m
0.38m
0.33m

0.21x
0.17x
0.34x
0.36x
0.19x
0.21x
0.30x
0.7x
0.18x
0.3x
0.24x
0.34x
0.24x
0.16x
0.2x
0.36x
0.23x
0.2x
0.22x
0.21x
0.2x
0.26x

72mm
77mm
58mm
58mm
58mm
82mm
82mm
77mm
95mm
77mm
77mm
67mm
77mm
49mm
77mm
72mm
72mm
82mm
82mm
72mm
82mm
67mm

7
7
6
7
7
9
9
9
9
7
10
7
9
7
7
7
9
9
9
7
9
7

207
207
110
207
207
162
162
162
162
127
209
162
207
127
180
90
190
207
142
142
57

Canon EF-S 18-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM
Canon EF-M 18-150mm f/3.5-6.3 IS STM
Canon EF-S 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6 IS
Canon RF 24-240mm F4-6.3 IS USM
Canon RF-S 18-150mm F3.5-6.3 IS STM
Canon EF 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6L IS USM
Sigma 18-200mm f/3.5-6.3 DC Macro OS HSM C

£484/$599
£459/$499
£470/$700
£999/$899
£499/$499
£2479/$2449
£269/$399

No
No
No
Yes
No
Yes
No

7.5x
8.3x
11.1x
10x
8.3x
10.7x
11.1x

Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes

f/3.5-5.6
f/3.5-6.3
f/3.5-5.6
f/4-6.3
f/3.5-6.3
f/3.5-5.6
f/3.5-6.3

515g
300g
595g
750g
310g
1760g
430g

0.39m
0.25-0.45m
0.45m
0.5m
0.17m
0.7m
0.39m

0.28x
0.31x
0.24x
0.26x
0.31x
0.30x
0.33x

67mm
55mm
72mm
72mm
49mm
77mm
62mm

7
7
6
7
7
8
7

209
209
128
209
209
191
172

Sigma 18-250mm f/3.5-6.3 DC Macro OS HSM

575g
645g
200g
205g
210g
805g
900g
600g
1430g
525g
795g
385g
700g
124g
565g
465g
810g
1,020g
885g
570g
905g
510g

f/3.5-5.6
f/2.8
f/3.5-5.6
f/3.5-5.6
f/4.5-6.3
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/4
f/2
f/3.5-5.6
f/4
f/4-7.1
f/4
f/4.5-6.3
f/2.8
f/2.8-4
f/1.8
f/2.8
f/4
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/2.8

Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
No

ti n

5.7x
3.2x
3.1x
3.1x
38.4x
2.9x
2.9x
2.9x
2.9x
4.4x
4.4x
4.4x
4.4x
2.5x
2.9x
4.1x
1.9x
2.9x
4.4x
2.9x
2.9x
2.7x

No
No
No
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes

l te

ze
si

ag
m

£779/$699
£849/$879
£170/$200
£219/$249
£379/$299
£1740/$1599
£2329/2299
£800/$849
£2500/$3200
£579/$599
£998/$1099
£429/$399
£1119/$1099
£339/$299
£330/$370
£350/$399
£650/$800
£1149/$1299
£639/$899
£420/$650
£1250/$1200
£450/$500

W
ei

fic
ni

di
s
cu

t
gh

an
st

re
tu
er
ap

st
Im

zo
M

n
ti o
za
ili
ab

m
ra

Fu
l

Canon EF-S 15-85mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM
Canon EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM
Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS II
Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS STM
Canon RF 24-50mm F4.5-6.3 IS STM
Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II USM
Canon RF 24-70mm F2.8L IS USM
Canon EF 24-70mm f/4L IS USM
Canon RF 28-70mm F2L USM
Canon EF 24-105mm f/3.5-5.6 IS STM
Canon EF 24-105mm f/4L IS II USM
Canon RF 24-105mm F4-7.1 IS STM
Canon RF 24-105mm F4L IS USM
Canon RF-S 18-45mm F4.5-6.3 IS STM
Sigma 17-50mm f/2.8 EX DC OS HSM
Sigma 17-70mm f/2.8-4 DC Macro OS HSM C
Sigma 18-35mm f/1.8 DC HSM A
Sigma 24-70mm f/2.8 DG OS HSM A
Sigma 24-105mm f/4 DG OS HSM A
Tamron SP AF 17-50mm f/2.8 XR Di II VC
Tamron SP AF 24-70mm f/2.8 Di VC USD G2
Tamron SP AF 28-75mm f/2.8 XR Di

•
•

STANDARD ZOOMS

BEST ON TEST AWARD
l-f

BEST VALUE AWARD

KEY:

SUPERZOOMS

13.9x

Yes

f/3.5-6.3

470g

0.35m

0.34x

62mm

16.7x

Yes

f/3.5-6.3

585g

0.39m

0.33x

72mm

191

Tamron 16-300mm f/3.5-6.3 Di II VC PZD Macro
Tamron 18-200mm f/3.5-6.3 Di II VC
Tamron AF 18-270mm f/3.5-6.3 Di II VC PZD
Tamron 18-400mm f/3.5-6.3 Di II VC HLD

£499/$629
£209/$249
£300/$450
£599/$649

No
No
No
No

18.8x
11.1x
15x
22.2x

Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes

f/3.5-6.3
f/3.5-6.3
f/3.5-6.3
f/3.5-6.3

540g
400g
450g
710g

0.39m
0.49m
0.49m
0.45m

0.34x
0.25x
0.26x
0.34x

67mm
62mm
62mm
72mm

7
7
7
7

172
191
128
191

£2000/$2100
£299/$249
£2000/$2150
£450/$540
£229/$249
£1500/$1550
£669/$499
£529/$599
£159/$149
£1690/$1900
£420/$510
£390/$500
£1650/$1650
£499/$499
£539/$599
£609/$650
£574/$675
£250/$215
£290/$290
£240/$260
£379/$399
£360/$470
£899/$999
£330/$360
£480/$470
£680/$760
£489/$499
£700/$900
£700/$900
£600/$600
£1399/$1599
£600/$610
£449/$400
£700/$900
£650/$850
£329/$339
£699/$699
£379/$479
£649/$599
£2330/$2700
£1090/$1395
£1400/$1850
£1270/$1700

Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes

None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None

No
No
No
No
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
Yes
No
No
No
No

f/2.8
f/2.8
f/4
f/2.8
f/2
f/1.4
f/1.8
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/3.5
f/1.8
f/2.8
f/1.4
f/1.8
f/2
f/4
f/2.4
f/3.5
f/2.8
f/3.5
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/2.4
f/2
f/1.4
f/3.5
f/1.4
f/2.8
f/3.5
f/2.8
f/1.8
f/2.8
f/1.4
f/1.4
f/1.4
f/1.4
f/1.4
f/1.4
f/1.8
f/2.8
f/3.5
f/2.8
f/2

645g
165g
820g
405g
105g
650g
270g
280g
125g
780g
310g
260g
760g
305g
335g
790g
685g
400g
630g
435g
590g
530g
791g
590g
680g
680g
660g
470g
400g
475g
1170g
370g
405g
950g
665g
270g
665g
280g
480g
947g
510g
851g
600g

0.2m
0.13m
0.25m
0.25m
0.15m
0.25m
0.14m
0.2m
0.16m
0.21m
0.25m
0.23m
0.28m
0.17m
0.24m
0.28m
0.25m
0.22m
0.3m
0.3m
0.25m
0.2m
0.27m
0.2m
0.25m
0.2m
0.3m
0.14m
0.14m
0.14m
0.27m
0.15m
0.25m
0.28m
0.25m
0.3m
0.3m
0.5m
0.2m
0.25m
0.3m
0.22m
0.25m

0.15x
0.26x
0.14x
0.14x
0.21x
0.17x
0.5x
0.23x
0.27x
0.34x
0.18x
0.2x
0.21x
0.5x
0.24x
0.13
0.11x
0.13x
N/S
N/S
N/S
N/S
0.08x
N/S
N/S
N/S
N/S
0.17x
0.22x
0.11x
0.19x
0.26x
0.1x
0.14x
0.19x
0.14x
0.19x
0.14x
0.4x
0.11x
0.08x
0.2x
0.17x

None
43mm
77mm
72mm
43mm
77mm
24mm
58mm
52mm
82mm
58mm
58mm
72mm
52mm
67mm
None
95mm
None
None
None
None
None
None
77mm
77mm
82mm
77mm
None
None
None
None
None
67mm
77mm
77mm
52mm
67mm
55mm
67mm
95mm
82mm
82mm
67mm

6
7
8
5
7
8
9
7
7
8
7
7
9
9
8
9
9

•
•

SUPERZOOMS

£350/$350

Sigma 18-300mm f/3.5-6.3 DC Macro OS HSM C £369/$579

•

WIDE-ANGLE PRIMES

6
6
7
9
8
8
8
8
6
6
7
9
7
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9

Zeiss Distagon T* 28mm f/2 ZE

£980/$1285

Yes

None

f/2

580g

0.24m

0.21x

58mm

Zeiss Otus 28mm f/1.4 ZE

£3500/$5000

Yes

None

f/1.4

1350g

0.3m

0.2x

95mm

Zeiss Milvus 35mm f/2 ZE

£935/$1120

Yes

None

f/2

702g

0.3m

0.19x

58mm

209
90
114
180

•

209
180
190
67
114
141
202
180

•

167

167
167

90
180
87
87
87
203
44
161
114
114
161
180
202
180
44

141

•
•
•

WIDE-ANGLE PRIMES

Canon EF 14mm f/2.8L II USM
Canon RF 16mm F2.8 STM
Canon TS-E 17mm f/4L (tilt & shift)
Canon EF 20mm f/2.8 USM
Canon EF-M 22mm f/2 STM
Canon EF 24mm f/1.4L II USM
Canon RF 24mm F1.8 Macro IS STM
Canon EF 24mm f/2.8 IS USM
Canon EF-S 24mm f/2.8 STM
Canon TS-E 24mm f/3.5L II (tilt & shift)
Canon EF 28mm f/1.8 USM
Canon EF 28mm f/2.8 IS USM
Canon EF 35mm f/1.4L II USM
Canon RF 35mm F1.8 IS Macro STM
Canon EF 35mm f/2 IS USM
Irix 11mm f/4 Blackstone
Irix 15mm f/2.4 Blackstone
Peleng 8mm f/3.5 Fisheye
Peleng 17mm f/2.8 Fisheye
Samyang 8mm f/3.5 IF MC CSII DH Circular
Samyang 10mm f/2.8 ED AS NCS CS
Samyang 12mm f/2.8 ED AS NCS Diagonal
Samyang XP 14mm f/2.4
Samyang 16mm f/2 ED AS UMC CS
Samyang 24mm f/1.4 ED AS UMC
Samyang T-S 24mm f/3.5 ED AS UMC (tilt & shift)
Samyang 35mm f/1.4 AS UMC AE
Sigma 4.5mm f/2.8 EX DC HSM Circular Fisheye
Sigma 8mm f/3.5 EX DG Circular Fisheye
Sigma 10mm f/2.8 EX DC HSM Diagonal Fisheye
Sigma 14mm f/1.8 DG HSM | A
Sigma 15mm f/2.8 EX DG Diagonal Fisheye
Sigma 16mm f/1.4 DC DN I C
Sigma 20mm f/1.4 DG HSM A
Sigma 24mm f/1.4 DG HSM A
Sigma 30mm f/1.4 DC DN I C
Sigma 35mm f/1.4 DG HSM A
Sigma 56mm f/1.4 DC DN I C
Tamron SP 35mm f/1.8 Di VC USD
Zeiss Milvus 15mm f/2.8 ZE
Zeiss Distagon T* 18mm f/3.5 ZE
Zeiss Milvus 21mm f/2.8 ZE
Zeiss Distagon T* 25mm f/2 ZE

BUYERS’
GUIDE

Contacts

f/1.05
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/1.2
f/1.4
f/1.8
f/1.2
f/1.8
f/1.4
f/1.4
f/1.4
f/1.8
f/1.4
f/1.4
f/1.4
f/1.4

606g
130g
645g
580g
290g
160g
950g
160g
575g
435g
815g
540g
950g
922g
380g
1030g

0.57m
0.3m
0.4m
0.45m
0.45m
0.35m
0.40m
0.30m
0.45m
0.3m
0.4m
0.29m
0.4m
0.45m
0.45m
0.5m

0.13x
0.18x
0.16x
0.15x
0.15x
0.21x
0.15x
0.25x
N/S
0.15x
0.18x
0.29x
0.18x
0.15x
0.15x
0.15x

58mm
52mm
72mm
72mm
58mm
49mm
77mm
43mm
77mm
62mm
77mm
67mm
72mm
67mm
58mm
77mm

13
7
8
8
8
7
10
7
8
9
9
9
9
9
9
9

202
141

£1999/$1999
£1489/$1599
£365/$369
£2869/$2699
£1240/$1400
£410/$500
£940/$1000
£5400/$5700
£700/$750
£5800/$6100
£1140/$1350
£9900/$10,000
£7000/$6900
£1180/$1180
£8400/$9000
£11,350/$11,500
£829/$799
£1099/$899
£11,900/$13,000
£319/$399
£599/$699
£370/$530
£125/$150
£929/$1099
£2600/$3400
£3600/$4400
£4699/$5999
£5000/$6600
£750/$750
£1380/$1800
£1900/$2200

Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes

None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None

No
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
Yes
No
Yes
No
No

f/1.2
f/1.4
f/1.8
f/1.2
f/2.8
f/2
f/2
f/2
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/4
f/2.8
f/4
f/5.6
f/4
f/4
f/11
f/11
f/5.6
f/1.4
f/1.4
f/2
f/6.3
f/1.4
f/2.8
f/4.5
f/4
f/5.6
f/1.8
f/1.4
f/2

1025g
950g
425g
1195g
565g
460g
750g
2520g
765g
2400g
1190g
3850g
2100g
1250g
3190g
3920g
930g
1260g
4500g
730g
485g
830g
705g
TBA
2400g
3150g
TBA
4.9kg
700g
1280g
1123g

0.95m
0.85m
0.85m
0.85m
0.5m
0.9m
0.9m
1.9m
1.5m
2.0m
1.5m
2.7m
3.3m
3.5m
3.7m
4.5m
4.5m
6.0m
6.0m
1.1m
0.9m
0.8m
2.0m
0.85m
2.5m
4.0m
3.5m
7.0m
0.8m
0.8m
0.8m

0.11x
0.12x
0.13x
0.12x
0.29x
0.14x
0.19x
0.12x
0.16x
0.18x
0.24x
0.17x
0.13x
0.12x
0.15x
0.15x
0.14x
0.14x
0.14x
0.09x
0.11x
N/S
N/S
0.12x
0.13x
0.13x
0.15x
0.11x
0.14x
0.14x
0.28x

72mm
77mm
58mm
82mm
58mm
58mm
72mm
52mm
72mm
52mm
77mm
52mm
52mm
77mm
52mm
52mm
82mm
95mm
52mm
72mm
77mm
77mm
95mm
86mm
46mm
46mm
46mm
46mm
67mm
77mm
77mm

8
9
8
9
8
8
8
8
8
9
8
9
9
8
9
9
N/A
N/A
8
8
9
9
0
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9

£309/$299
£379/$349
£399/$350
£980/$1050
£499/$599
£999/$1099
£1330/$1400
£649/$549
£1239/$1199
£449/$495
£569/$499
£499/$499
£449/$569
£359/$569
£780/$1100
£1250/$1700
£350/$525
£350/$500
£649/$649
£800/$740
£464/$429
£1300/$1840

No
No
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes

None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None

Yes
Yes
No
No
No
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
No
Yes
No
No
No

f/3.5
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/3.5
f/2
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/2.8
f.2.8
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/2
f/2.8
f/2.8
f/3.5
f/2.8
f/2

130g
190g
335g
710g
600g
625g
1090g
500g
730g
848g
619g
638-650g
515g
725g
1150g
1640g
350g
400g
610g
985g
540g
843g

0.097m
0.13m
0.20m
0.24m
0.31m
0.3m
0.48m
0.35m
0.3m
0.35m
0.21m
0.25m
0.26m
0.31m
0.38m
0.47m
0.23m
0.29m
0.3m
0.47m
0.3m
0.44m

1.2x
1.0x
1.0x
5.0x
1.0x
1.0x
1.0x
0.5x
1.4x
1.0x
2.0x
2.0x
1.0x
1.0x
1.0x
1.0x
1.0x
1.0x
1.0x
1.0x
1.0x
0.5x

44.8mm
56mm
52mm
58mm
58mm
67mm
72mm
67mm
67mm
77mm
67mm
67mm
49mm
62mm
72mm
86mm
55mm
55mm
62mm
72mm
55mm
67mm

7
7
7
6
8
9
8
9
9
11
13
7-13
9
9
9
9
7
9
9
7
9
9

103
185
202
185
202
166
185
185
148
185

No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
Yes
No
No
No
No

None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None
None

ti n

Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes

£450/$486
£200/$180
£1200/$1400
£1370/$1350
£389/$400
£109/$125
£2389/$2299
£199/$149
£310/$350
£349/$499
£649/$949
£415/$549
£879/$949
£1159/$1199
£560/$725
£2700/$3990

re
e

7Artisans 50mm f/1.05
Canon EF 40mm f/2.8 STM
Canon TS-E 45mm f/2.8 (tilt & shift)
Canon EF 50mm f/1.2L USM
Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM
Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 STM
Canon RF 50mm F1.2L USM
Canon RF 50mm F1.8 STM
Samyang 50mm f/1.4 AS UMC
Sigma 30mm f/1.4 DC HSM A
Sigma 50mm f/1.4 DG HSM A
Tamron SP 45mm f/1.8 Di VC USD
Tokina Opera 50mm f/1.4 FF
Zeiss Milvus 50mm f/1.4 ZF.2
Zeiss Planar T* 50mm f/1.4 ZE
Zeiss Otus 55mm f/1.4

is
Ir

si
Fi

l te

m
M

ni
ag

s
cu
M

t
W
ei

fic

st
di

re
tu
er
ap

n
ti o
za
ili
ab
M

e
Im

zo
M

m
ra

Fu
l

STANDARD PRIMES

BEST ON TEST AWARD
l-f

BEST VALUE AWARD

KEY:

Sigma www.sigma-imaging-uk.com
Tamron www.tamron.co.uk
Tokina www.tokinalens.com
Zeiss www.zeiss.co.uk

Canon www.canon.co.uk
Peleng www.digitaltoyshop.co.uk
Samyang www.samyang-lens.co.uk
Schneider www.linhofstudio.com

•
•

TELEPHOTO PRIMES

Canon EF 85mm f/1.2L II USM
Canon EF 85mm f/1.4L IS USM
Canon EF 85mm f/1.8 USM
Canon RF 85mm F1.2L USM
Canon TS-E 90mm f/2.8 (tilt & shift)
Canon EF 100mm f/2 USM
Canon EF 135mm f/2L USM
Canon EF 200mm f/2L IS USM
Canon EF 200mm f/2.8L II USM
Canon EF 300mm f/2.8L IS II USM
Canon EF 300mm f/4L IS USM
Canon EF 400mm f/2.8L IS II USM
Canon EF 400mm f/4 DO IS II USM
Canon EF 400mm f/5.6L USM
Canon EF 500mm f/4L IS II USM
Canon EF 600mm f/4L IS II USM
Canon RF 600mm F11 IS STM
Canon RF 800mm F11 IS STM
Canon EF 800mm f/5.6L IS USM
Samyang MF 85mm f/1.4 RF
Samyang AF 85mm f/1.4 EF
Samyang 135mm f/2 ED UMC
Samyang 500mm MC IF f/6.3 Mirror
Sigma 85mm f/1.4 DG HSM A
Sigma APO 300mm f/2.8 EX DG HSM
Sigma APO 500mm f/4.5 EX DG HSM
Sigma 500mm f/4 DG OS HSM S
Sigma APO 800mm f/5.6 EX DG HSM
Tamron SP 85mm f/1.8 Di VC USD
Zeiss Milvus 85mm f/1.4 ZE
Zeiss Milvus 135mm f/2 ZE

179
179
159
179

•
•

46
98
98
54
117
54
117

206
196
202
159

179
98
206
21
159

MACRO

Canon EF-M 28mm f/3.5 Macro IS STM
Canon EF-S 35mm f/2.8 Macro IS STM
Canon EF-S 60mm f/2.8 Macro USM
Canon MP-E65mm f/2.8 1-5x Macro
Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 Macro USM
Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM
Canon EF 180mm f/3.5L Macro USM
Canon RF 85mm F2 Macro IS STM
Canon RF 100mm F2.8L Macro IS USM
Irix 150mm f/2.8 Macro 1:1 Dragonfly
Laowa 90mm f/2.8 2X Ultra Macro APO
Laowa 100mm f/2.8 2:1 Ultra Macro APO
Sigma 70mm f/2.8 DG Macro Art
Sigma 105mm f/2.8 EX DG OS HSM Macro
Sigma APO Macro 150mm f/2.8 EX DG OS HSM
Sigma APO Macro 180mm f/2.8 EX DG OS HSM
Tamron SP AF 60mm f/2 Di II LD (IF) Macro
Tamron SP AF 90mm f/2.8 Di Macro
Tamron SP AF 90mm f/2.8 Di VC USD Macro
Tamron SP AF 180mm f/3.5 Di Macro
Tokina 100mm f/2.8 AT-X PRO Macro
Zeiss Milvus Makro Planar 100mm f/2 ZE

177
177
164
50
177
204
69
204
204
204
204
202
204
204
138
102
138
102
184
69
204
50

•
•

NEXT ISSUE

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CANON GUIDE TO
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Take stunning shots of wildlife,
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Adam Bulley hits the streets of
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CAPTURE CRACKING
COASTAL PHOTOS with
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TRAVEL PRO TIPS
Award-winning Canon pro
Jeremy Flint’s top 20 photo tips
• Our Apprentice masters
close-up wildlife photos • In
Canon School, make the most
of the longer summer days •
New Canon EOS R100 could be
the budget-beginner mirrorless
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zooms in the lab • New photo
projects, all with free video
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CANON SHOOTING
CHECKLIST 25 essential
tips for better images • Canon
pro James Abbott teaches our
Apprentice how to shoot slow
motion waterfalls • Travel
tripods on test – the best buys
that won’t break the bank or
your back • We put the new
Canon PowerShot V10 vlogging
cam through its paces • Brian
Worley answers your questions
in EOS SOS • In-depth photo
projects with video guides

LEARN CANON PRO
TECHNIQUES Master your
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helps you set up your camera
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• Our Apprentice learns how to
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Canon’s new EOS R50 tested
• In Canon Skills, from sunburst
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taking creative castle photos,
plus new image-editing tutorials
– all with free videos

NEW SPRING PHOTO
SKILLS Your Canon guide to
better seasonal photos • Canon
R8 budget lightest full-frame
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to utilize the latest technology to
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Canon pro Clive Nichols at RHS
Wisley gardens • Eight great
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photo projects including how to
capture bluebell scenes in your
own local forests • Free videos

RAW IMAGES SKILLS
10 essential Raw image-editing
tips • Our Apprentice spends a
day in the studio with a Canon
pro learning to take close-ups
of reptiles • New budget Canon
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to use cool coloured gels on
flashguns • Top ‘Dogtographer’
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101 GREAT CANON
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• Landscape pro photographer
Justin Minns interviewed • 12 of
the latest photo editors tested
• Canon photographer Andrew
James teaches our PhotoPlus
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New inspiring photo projects
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200 CANON TIPS We’ve
compiled 200 top tips to help
you take better photos of
everything • Canon Gear of the
Year – the best EOS cameras,
lenses and kit • Our Apprentice
learns new cityscape photo
skills in London • David Clapp
risks trench foot in torrential
rain in Vietnam • Canon EOS R6
Mark II in-depth test • In Canon
School we help you master
aperture, shutter speed and
ISO • Projects and videos

10 TIPS FOR BETTER
WINTER LANDSCAPES
From depth of field to mastering
composition • New super-fast
Canon EOS R6 Mark II • We
speak to inspiring new Canon
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Connor • Our Apprentice gets
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Emma Finch, learning how to
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portraits • Great photo projects
with free videos • Free Teach
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MASTER WILDLIFE
PHOTOGRAPHY Learn to
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• Five great Canon gear setups
and photo skills for better shots
from landscapes to wildlife •
Learn simple Canon camera
settings and skills for capturing
better low-light shots • David
Clapp takes a photo trip to the
Dolomites • A4 to A3+ home
photo printers tested to find
the best options to produce
all prints great and small

AUTUMN PHOTO
SKILLS Ten top tips • We
ventured to photogenic Isle of
Skye to take great landscapes •
Chris Fraikin discusses his arty
shots of industrial architecture
• We test eight of the best
photo backpacks • Canon
School helps you improve your
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• Your technical questions
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The Canon Magazine

109

We’d love to hear your thoughts on the magazine and all
things photographic! Email us at photoplus@futurenet.com
Letter of the Month
Thanks for providing a great
magazine, which I have only missed
one early issue before I subscribed.
Since buying a weather-sealed Canon
EOS 90D three years ago I have been
looking for a weather-sealed lens to
replace my Canon EF-S 18-135mm.
These two provide a great ‘Go to’
combination. When I saw the Super
Test in issue 209, Lightweight Lenses,
I was really interested. However, I was
very disappointed to see that none
had weather-seals, they were all
Canon, and mostly EOS R mounts.
Norman Hill, Southampton
You’re right, Norman, none of the
lenses in last issue’s Super Test have
any weather-seals. Canon has never
made any weather-sealed EF-S or
RF-S lenses, even with just a rubber
gasket on the mounting plate. Some
of the early L-series lenses that work
on both APS-C format and full-frame

The month
in numbers

5500K
DSLRs also lack seals, but most
recent lenses are weather-sealed.
The Canon EF 24-105mm f/4L IS II
USM or Sigma 24-70mm f/2.8 DG OS
HSM Art are good weather-sealed
options for your EOS 90D.

Get in touch with
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Canon photographer Russ Tierney
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consistent studio portraits – page 8

inspirational autumn
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colour of this golden
season – Page 28

£73

The extra amount our
columnist David Clapp
was charged for
‘electricity’ on his bill
for his accommodation
during his stay in the
Lake District – Page 42

Five years on, Canon’s EOS R system is
now the ultimate camera platform

Canon teams up with Reuters in a bid to
crack down on AI-generated images

Sponsored: From beginners to pros, stills to
video, and APS-C to full-frame, Canon’s EOS R
cameras and RF mount lenses are unrivalled.
See DigitalCameraWorld.com via our quick
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Since AI has become so advanced, it’s never
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