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LensRentals tears down the Panasonic S Pro 70-200mm f/4 OIS to fix autofocus issues

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Announced back in February 2019, the full-frame Panasonic Lumix S Pro 70-200mm f/4 OIS for L mount cameras is a popular lens. This isn’t much of a surprise, as it’s significantly less expensive than the company’s f/2.8 version. They’re popular rental lenses, too, and the folks at LensRentals have a few of them. In fact, they have a couple of them that seem to have developed an autofocus issue.

So, LensRentals did what LensRentals does and tore it to pieces in order to figure out what’s wrong, fixed it and put it back together. Panasonic doesn’t really offer a repair service for this lens, just an exchange service, which is fine but they don’t want to have the item out of stock for weeks. There’s only one little snag. They’ve never taken this lens apart before. The team documented the complete process on the LensRentals blog, but here are some of the highlights.

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How does the 10-year-old Canon 5D Mark III compare with a modern Fuji GFX 100S medium format mirrorless camera?

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The Canon 5D Mark III marks its 10th birthday this year. It doesn’t feel like it’s been anywhere near that long to me. Of course, the last couple of years have all kinda blurred into a single long month for most of us. But nope, 10 years old it is this month, having been released in March 2012. But how does this ancient DSLR stand up to today’s technology?

Well, photographer Zach Sutton at LensRentals decided to find out and see how it compared to a modern medium format mirrorless camera. Specifically, the Fuji GFX 100S. Camera tech has come a long way in the last decade, so you’d think the difference would be pretty big, right? Well, it might be a little more subtle than you think. At least on the web.

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These are Lens Rentals’ top-rented equipment of 2021

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It’s that time of year again and no I don’t mean that weird week between Christmas and New Year when you’re not quite sure what day it is. Nope, it’s when the company Lens Rentals publishes its data of which gear and equipment was the most-rented over the past year! OK, so I might be being a bit cheeky here, but actually, it’s very useful and interesting info with a few surprises here and there. Lensrentals.com are one of the largest camera and video equipment rental companies in the world, and frankly, I’m quite jealous that we have nothing quite like it in the part of the world where I live. So without further ado, let’s unwrap the info!

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These are the most popular new photo and video gear rentals of 2021

It’s always interesting to see what products people are renting for their productions. Probably more so than the gear people are actually buying. Many filmmakers and photographers buy stuff because they want it, not necessarily because they need it. But to justify the cost of a rental, the gear typically has to offer features you do actually need and can justify spending the cash on (because you typically have to justify it to a client, too).

LensRentals just posted the stats for their rentals of gear released in 2021. What’s the most popular? This list of their 18 most popular rentals covers every product type, not just one category like cameras or lenses. It’s kind of a who’s who of fairly high-end gear released in 2021, but there are one or two surprises in the list that placed a little higher or lower than I expected.

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Tearing down the Canon RF 100-500mm f/4.7-7.1L IS USM reveals a very complex design

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This is probably one of the most in-depth lens teardowns I’ve seen from Lensrentals. Their efforts weren’t by choice, though. The lens lied to them. The team recently posted a teardown of the Canon RF 100-500mm f/4.5-7.1L IS USM lens that had a broken element inside it. It appeared as though the element might reside inside the stabilization system, which is relatively easy to remove.

It turned out, though, that the IS system of the lens was simply masking the true location of the broken element. This resulted in the need to pretty much completely dismantle the entire lens, down to almost its core constituent parts, in order to track down exactly where in the optical makeup it was.

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Canon hammered every other brand for gear rentals in 2020

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Although the overall number of photography and video productions has been cut short this year, there have still been many going ahead. Many photographers and filmmakers have taken to working from home, shooting products while other productions have been able to ahead with appropriate safety measures in place. That some shoots have been able to still go ahead, though, means that gear rental is still doing quite well.

LensRentals has posted their annual lists of the most popular rental gear for 2020, and it’s an overwhelming Canon majority in just about every list.  They say they’ve still been able to rent out thousands of items each month for those ongoing productions, and it’s given them a decent sample size to pool data.

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Thermal vision tests suggest Canon may not be able to “fix” the EOS R5’s heat issues

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LensRentals just recently posted their teardown of the Canon EOS R5 and noticed that it has some pretty hefty seals to help protect it from the elements when shooting outdoors in harsh conditions. But they theorised that those seals and the tightly packed components might hamper the EOS R5’s heat dissipation abilities.

Well, now, Roger and the team at LensRentals have pointed a FLIR thermal IR camera at it to see exactly how hot the Canon EOS R5 gets after it’s been on for a while at different parts of the camera body. And some of it… Well, it gets extremely hot!

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Canon EOS R5 teardown shows great weather sealing but few escape routes for heat

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Well, Kolari Vision might’ve been the first to tear apart the Canon EOS R6 and get a good look at the chip that seems to keep time for “overheating” issues, but it looks like Roger and the gang at Lensrentals has beaten them to the punch on cracking open the Canon EOS R5.

They’ve published a complete EOS R5 teardown which offers some good insights into its weather sealing, which looks very impressive. But those seals might be the EOS R5’s downfall when it comes to letting heat escape.

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The $10,000 teardown – Fuji GFX 100 vs saltwater

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Setting the whole DSLR vs mirrorless argument aside for a minute, there’s one thing that’s remained constant amongst all of them. Don’t let it get in contact with saltwater. And if you are going to head out into the ocean with it, make sure to check that you’ve got a reliable dive housing with no leaks!

Lensrentals recently had a Fuji GFX 100 out, which they were told was used in a dive housing and “suddenly died for no reason”. It turns out that there was a reason. Not wanting to risk killing a $10K camera themselves, they spoke to Fuji, who gave them the “repair not possible” line. Well, if Fuji’s told you it can’t be repaired, and the insurance has already paid for a replacement, why not tear it apart and take a peek inside?

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