I know that nobody has a crystal ball, but what do you think the prospects are that Nikon will extend their PF lens range to 600mm and/or release a new, lighter 600mm f4 to better compete with Canon's much lighter 600 f4?
Nikon prime telephoto lenses
- Thread starter Abinoone
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My guess is that it depends on how hard the engineering is. If they do I expect it will be Z mount and not F. Thee isn’t one on the lens roadmap and why is unknown. If the engineering to convert it from F to Z was easy I think it would be on the roadmap...since it isn’t there my guess is it’s essentially a redesign or new design...and they’re working on the Z zooms first. Personally...a 600/f4 isn’t in my budget but a 500PFZ could be. Given their financial issues and the ‘concentrating on mirrorless’ announcement recently, I think a more affordable lens like the 500PF would be a higher priority than a much more $$ one since they will sell fewer of the latter.
Speaking for myself, if I owned a company that produced such a successful relatively new tech such as the 300mm PF and 500mm PF I can see no reason for not extending that to more and more focal lengths. Of course, I can't speak for Nikon so who knows? What I also think is they are now committed to the mirrorless camera technology so would they design more F-mount PF lenses or would it make more sense to produce PF lenses in the Z-mount? Personally I can't see Nikon continuing to keep the F-mount DSLR technology alive in the long term.
I expect the upcoming 400 f/2.8 for the Z lineup to provide an indication of what Nikon is doing with fast telephoto lenses - like the f/4 super-teles. That lens will likely be lighter than current versions, but will it be much smaller with a PF lens, or a different direction?
I'm increasingly using telephoto lens and teleconverter combinations on my Z camera that worked poorly on a D850. I could see Nikon delivering a super-tele that is f/5.6 or even f/8 wide open. How about an 800mm f/8 PF?
I think it's somewhat pointless to have a 500 PF and a 600 PF with similar designs. That's not enough difference to justify owning both. The 500 f/4 and 600 f/4 lenses are very different in terms of size and use, but few people have both (not to mention they would be $24,000 for the pair).
Demodave
Active member
I think a 600PF in a Z mount would sell like crazy. I'd buy one today! If Nikon wants to push the mirrorless, then give us telephotos under 5K