Carl Zeiss to manufacture Canon's EF mount-compatible lenses

Leonard Goh | Sep 15, 2008

Picture credit: Carl Zeiss

Ever since Carl Zeiss put up its teaser ad on its site for a new lens mount, concerned photographers and rumormongers had been speculating over the past few weeks as to which brand the firm will make next. We placed our bets on the Micro Four Thirds format, but now we'll just go hungry for the next few weeks--the German optics manufacturer has just announced two lenses for Canon's EF mount.

The Planar T 50mm F1.4 and Planar T 85mm F1.4 are already up on the company's Web site, and it's been mentioned that they will retail for approximately US$830 and US$1,425, respectively. Word on the street has it that there will be a Distagon 21mm F2.8 glass which is estimated to sell for about US$1,995 coming later this year.

The lenses are all manual-focused, but have been engineered to work with EOS cameras produced since 1987. Functions such as program, shutter priority, aperture priority and manual exposure control will work well with the optics as there are electrical contacts to facilitate the transfer of information.

Much as Carl Zeiss is a heritage brand with a long legacy of producing some of the world's finest optics, we don't think consumers will flock to the new lenses due to their steep cost. And besides, the Japanese firm has a greater variety of glasses to suit different shutterbugs.

We are trying to find out if these lenses will be available in Asia, so check back with us soon.

Filed under: Digital Cameras
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ronniejacob

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ronniejacob says...
I have been following this news ever since it broke on proimaging.blogspot.com I am sure a lot of photogs were hoping and praying that it was going to be Canon

Sep 15, 2008 22:37