News and Rumour Thursday: Canon, Fuji, Olympus, Samyang

In this week's summary:

• Canon: The Canon EOS-1D X II receives some positive results in the DPReview studio tests
• Fuji: More leaked images of the Fuji X-T2
• Olympus: Some vague rumours about the E-M1 successor
• Samyang: Have announced two auto-focus lenses (for Sony FE-Mount)

It's been a pretty quiet week.

Canon

DPReview have tested the Canon EOS-1D X II in their studios. Overall, it's a very positive result, but still a mixed bag.

While the EOS-1D X II shows big improvements in base ISO dynamic range relative to previous Canons, high ISO performance remains stagnant, falling behind the Nikon D5, and showing no benefit over the higher resolution Sony a7R II at common viewing size.
This is actually more impressive than it sounds: it's highly commendable that Canon has achieved this level of sensor performance while splitting photodiodes to achieve dual-pixel AF, which enables groundbreaking video autofocus.

It's important to keep these findings in context: the 1D X II produces very pleasing, nearly class-leading Raw and JPEG images for the most part, but it falls slightly behind in certain respects when compared to its best-performing peers.

DPReview: Canon catching up? Canon EOS-1D X II tested in our studio

Note, there are still no concrete rumours on the 5D Mark II, other than it is coming.

Fuji

Some more leaked images of the Fuji X-T2. This time of the battery grip showing it holds two batteries and as a 'Turbo Boost' mode.

Fuji Rumors: Detailed View of the Fujifilm X-T2 Vertical Battery Grip!

Olympus

Some more about the E-M1 replacement - that it will feature a high-res mode and IBIS well ahead of the E-M5 II whilst still targeting the price of the original E-M1.

43Rumors: Some early Olympus E-M1 successor info

Samyang

Samyang have announced two auto-focus lenses for the Sony FE mount, a 500mm f/1.4 and a 14mm f/2.8. The rumoured pricing for the 50mm f/1.4 is around $500USD.

For myself, the 55mm f/1.8 was a huge attraction to the Sony FE system. The 55mm is much smaller and lighter than the Samyang 50mm f/14, and is super sharp wide-open. However, the 50mm Samyang is reportedly quite soft at f/1.4, and only starts to get sharp results at f/2.0.

Given that Sony has recently announced a cheaper 50mm f/1.8, it isn't clear to me what Samyang is bringing to the table.

Via Sony AlphaRumors, some hands-on notes from a pre-production model are:

• 560g. almost double of FE55.8ZA but it’s f1.4. Sigma 50.4 Art is 860g even without adapter.
• Sharpness at 1.4 is not surprising. It improves vastly at f2. There’s some amount of CA from 1.4 to 2. from 2.8, there’s nothing bothering in my eyes.
• AF is good. not fast as 55.8ZA but I guess faster than 50.8. for sure it’s faster and reliable than Sigma 50.4 with MC-11. Wobbling is bigger than Sony lenses. Noise is not big but noticable than Sony.

DPReview: Samyang announces 14mm F2.8 and 50mm F1.4 autofocus FE lenses
SonyAlphaRumours: Samyang 50mm f/1.4 FE autofocus lens will cost less than $600

I do think the new lenses looks very nice.