Messages

1

Lenses / Re: DSLR Video: Canon 24mm 1.4L II vs 24mm 2.8 IS

« on: May 19, 2012, 09:13:49 AM »

At least 24-105 mm 4L IS has significant impact for video stability at 24 mm, I recommend IS even for wide lens if intentions is to shoot ever handheld.

Without IS handheld is unusable without rig, with IS I have shot many useful clips. IS does not help for major shake, but it removes "micro-shake" completely. This "micro-shake" is visible on all clips even if they are very wide and to some like me it is almost as annoying and unprofessional looking than the horrible moire or even more so. Without IS I would not use without a rig or a high quality tripod. Especially because 24 mm on crop sensor camera is not that wide actually. My tripod is Manfrotto CXPRO3 with MVH502AH fluid head and is smooth enough in panning for shooting with a lens without IS (been using 50 mm 1.4 Sigma with it) and is also as a carbon tripod is light enough to be reasonable to carry around (the fluid head weights the same as the whole tripod without the head). For moving the camera (without IS), you can of course use steadicam (e.g. Glidecam HD-2000), all the micro and macro shake is gone. The Glidecam HD-2000 is also reasonable to carry around without vest and arm. Muscles in the hand ache after using it for a day but for a more athletic person it should be no big deal. Of course you can't pull focus on manual focus lens while moving around with glidecam because that imbalances your setup unless you have electronic focus puller that can be remotely controlled by somebody else than the glidecam operator herself.

The 1.4 is nice when the lens is on tripod. I would choose the 1.4 over the IS for video. 1.4 short focus is awesome.

2

EOS Bodies - For Stills / Re: 5D Mark III Reviews

« on: March 23, 2012, 07:51:22 AM »

Same thing with the video, it can probably record at 1080 4:2:2 ..but, since it can't output that (like a D800 can, or like many other pro camcorders can), it relies on what Canon's codec outputs. The results are videos with fewer lines that look a little softer. Sometimes that is a good thing, for the right effect (interviews, things with people)...sometimes its not (architecture, nature, etc)

Codec has almost nothing to do with sharpness. Panasonic GH2 is sharp despite it has very poor bit rate codec. The better codec and higher bitrate only reduces artifacting, and has not really much to do with recorded sharpness.

Simple experiment:
Shoot a video with RED Scarlet/Epic.
Shoot the same video with the 5D mark II or mark III
and shoot the same video with the 7D and finally 1D mark IV.

Now scale all videos to the same resolution, 1920x1080 (in other words you need to only scale the RED from 4K to 1080p). Then drop the bit rate of the resulting video lower than the lowest denominator of these, e.g. lower than the Canon's bit rate. Now compare the actual resolution of the images.
What you can see very easily is that:
1. RED is very sharp
2. 5D mark III is next
3. 5D mark II is next
4. 7D is second last
5. 1D mark IV is the very last of this group.

When you compare 1, 2 already you get a feeling that anything less than the mentioned 1 is crap. If you look sharpness a bit through fingers, then you can add 2 and 3 to the acceptable category. If you are irritated with moire, you can drop everything below 2 (in other words, mk II, 7D and 1D are unacceptable).

I am excited for the Zacuto 2012 camera test to prove this this year. I already knew the results, but want to see it done "properly" so that it is easier to point out to people who do not understand that the number of pixels in the file do not equal to the resolved row & line resolution of the camera. It is like comparing Canon L glass with some cheap plastic lens and say that both have same magnification. Indeed yes if you don't care about quality.

3

EOS Bodies / Re: Videographers happy with 5D Mark III?

« on: March 02, 2012, 06:54:37 PM »

I am highly interested to see 1:1 video samples and frame grabs.
Theoretically the pixel count and the higher speed of the Digic 5+ should result in the aliasing/moire being finally fixed. The moire makes the 5D mark II footage to be at times unusable, therefore there is a chance that the 5D mark III will be a huge bump in video quality over any video DSLR on the market.

Interesting to follow people's reactions:
- first people cry about moire (this is a true flaw of any DSLR on the market, except Panasonic GH2)
- then they get a camera that has moire fixed and it does it in a way that everyone should be happy (5D mark III)
- but people aren't happy, they hardly notice that the biggest flaw just got fixed with enormous efforts, then they cry that why it did not have more megapixels
- doesn't it occur that it is because it has moire fixed (to avoid line skipping)?

When I was shooting 30p happily on my 5D mark II, everyone was crying that why it does not do 24p. I continued shooting at 30p because I wanted to avoid stutter. At the time there were cameras that were able to do 60p already and I was kinda looking that maybe this would be good, who needs 24p or 25p in the first place. Now the 5D mark II and 5D mark III does 24 p, 25, and 30p and everyone cries that nobody wants to use 24p, 25p or 30p, but they want 60p.

So what do you really want? Because it could be that from technical perspective it is a tradeoff:
- You can have moire fixed
or
- You can have more megapixels and continue living with poor video quality

Or you can get a video camera that has 60p but it has more moire than the worst moire offender of all Canon models I have encountered, the terrific 60D.

To my understanding people were hoping for video optimized DSLR which would be great in low light and would have very nice AF. 5D mark III has all that, and more. It even has high quality codec for video. Not clean HDMI out though since Canon does not want to cannibalize its own C300 and rather wants to competitors to cannibalize its camcorder department.

If Nikon would have had pixel perfect 1080p video in the D4 or D800, it would have been quite understandable that everyone would have ran screamingly to Nikon. Now that this is not the case, and 5D possibly does better video, somehow it goes without anyone paying attention and people jump the ship to next moire h*ll.

Maybe most of the DSLR video customers have eyes made of wood and they can not tell moire from real details and people who actually know what they want are so rare that it is not really profitable for Canon. Internet, forums and ever reviews are full of totally clueless people. Instead these products are sold based on those confused people's images about the product that have no slightest idea what they are wanting, why they are wanting it, how they are going to use that feature nor what they are talking about or how they should use their camera in the first place to shoot great movies. Soon Youtube will be full of 5D mark III tests where people are panning, zooming, camera going to all directions, motion blur making people sick and then more these sheeples (that immediately start calling themselves film makers, directors and DPs, like just owning a camera would make them such) come and say it is not any better than a 550D.... 
 
I will not judge back or forth before I see full size samples of 5D mark III with milder than web compression, but based on the only sample I have seen so far on youtube at higher res than on Canon's site (here:

http://youtu.be/WrDHEi3z-sY?hd=1
	Small | Large

), it looks promising so far (be sure to click 1080p because the link above defaults to 720p). I can not see any moire on the brick walls or the ground on this video while I can see moire everywhere on the footage what I shoot with my 5D II. The difference based on this vague example alone is so substantial that it is like between night and day.

I would so much love to see a comparison where there are resolution charts shot with both RED Scarlet and the 5D mark III. If Canon has done the image resizing properly, it should not be so much worse than the RED. It could be very close to RED 4k downsampled to 1080p. In theory anyway without knowing the details how Canon has done the technical details.

EDIT: In fact, based on the only sample video I have seen: it could be that the 5D mark III does now the best video quality of any DSLR. It is likely that 5D mark III has less moire than 1DX because the sensor pixel size is better on 5D mark III than 1DX for the binning algorithm. On 1DX reducing the size is heavier operation, and it could be that the 1DX still does some line skipping. It could be that 5D mark III does not do line skipping at all and it is the "Jesus-camera" we have been waiting for so long.

EDIT2: I would not have space for storing all my footage in uncompressed format. I already have 10 terabytes of hard disks for storing the 5D mark II footage. It therefore is ok for me most of the time to shoot compressed video. I only would need uncompressed 4:4:4 video when I shoot green screen. And moire will ruin green screen much earlier than the compression. And the moire also harms the effective compression. Fixed moire, and all problems are solved.

EDIT3: Forgot to add: those clothes that the actors have on, maybe are intentionally chosen such that they will cause horrible moire on cameras that skip lines. It is quite possible that 5D mark II would have made unusable footage from those patterns. The 5D mark III footage is clean.

4

EOS Bodies / Re: The Next 5D on February 27/28, 2012 [CR3]

« on: February 24, 2012, 06:31:06 AM »

If 5D3 only implements aliasing/moire free video and more resolution on video, I will be more happy to upgrade to 5D3. Even if this was the only improvement on the 5D3 over 5D2, it would be worth every cent.

The other thing I always of course would like to be improved, the dynamic range. It is more important than low light performance. I have been happy with the 5D2 dynamic range since it is much better on it than some other Canon DSLRs, but I would be really happy if it was pushed even greater since I always shoot RAW and edit every picture. That would make amazing possibilities for post-production for the kind of photography I typically do.

If thats all you want then look at the anti aliasing filter from http://www.mosaicengineering.com/

This plus a 5dmkii would be much cheaper! Id hope for other improvements such as rolling shutter, maybe 60fps 1080p, improved codec etc from the next model.

And suddenly by adding a antialiasing filter that blurs the already blurry video quality the footage starts to look
like RED right? sarcasm: "Oh wow so convinced".

Mosaic engineering antialiasing filter will help but it will not restore the video resolution nowhere near the 1080p because the 5D2 is not resolving more than something between SD and 720p and the crop sensor Canons are even worse. Mosaic engineering filter can make the video look like good moire-free SD, but not like FullHD. I have been seriously considering getting this filter because a moire free SD is better than the moire h*ll of the DSLR footage.

Video resolution has absolutely nothing to do with the codec, 60p or anything like that. The difference between greatly resolving camera and poorly resolving camera is like day and night even if the codec was really poor and if there was web compression also applied. Poorly resolving uncompressed 4444 12 bit raw looks like crap if compared to a camera that has a poor codec of 8 bit h264 in comparison, but that resolves every pixel of the 1920x1080 frame. This is why Panasonic GH2 even without the hack looks much more sharp than the 5D mark II or any other Canon DSLR despite it has really weak codec with very low bit rate (without the hack). The reduced compression will reduce artefacts on the image, but will never ever not make a blurry video look sharp.

People seem to almost religiously believe that lack of compression will solve the problems. This is not the case. Resolution does not come from nowhere if it did not exist in the first place.

You can do this experiement if you like:
- Make a jpeg image with your 5D mark II and scale it to 1920x1080p. Then save it with compression setting that is relative to the compression of the h264. Now take a video of the same subject. Take a still out of the video. Edit both pictures in image editing program like Aperture and match the colors of these two. Now do a blind test between these. Which one is which. Surprise surprise: equally compressed jpeg will look awesome compared to the frame grab from the video. If the 5D3 will resolve perfect 1920x1080 video, then each frame of that video will be as good as this jpeg scaled to 1920x1080.
- I purchased my 5D2 in the early days after it go launched and I thought that it would be great for video. I was greatly disappointed by the lack of resolution after I did the above test myself.

5

EOS Bodies / Re: The Next 5D on February 27/28, 2012 [CR3]

« on: February 24, 2012, 05:22:12 AM »

If 5D3 only implements aliasing/moire free video and more resolution on video, I will be more happy to upgrade to 5D3. Even if this was the only improvement on the 5D3 over 5D2, it would be worth every cent.

The other thing I always of course would like to be improved, the dynamic range. It is more important than low light performance. I have been happy with the 5D2 dynamic range since it is much better on it than some other Canon DSLRs, but I would be really happy if it was pushed even greater since I always shoot RAW and edit every picture. That would make amazing possibilities for post-production for the kind of photography I typically do.

6

EOS Bodies / Re: What Are Your Custom Modes Set To?

« on: December 22, 2011, 06:18:09 PM »

None of the C-modes in use. I dial to M instead (for video):
Shutter 1/50.
ISO based on the need to correctly expose
f-stop based on the needed in-focus area and to properly expose
ND filter as needed
Picture styles:
- Cinema with default settings or possibly contrast a bit reduced or
- Technicolor with contrast set to middle or one below middle, and the reduced saturation dialed in the middle or
- Sometimes neutral with different settings (in contrast for example) or
- Depending on situation and how I can properly expose on each style
- I don't keep the "super flat" technicolor super flat if it will not properly expose that way (histogram peaking in the middle and nothing on the bottom and top ends helps no-one but just causes block artifacts, aim is always to properly expose and use all the bits there are).

To shoot stills, I increase the shutter speed as 1/50 is a bit too slow and adjust other values accordingly.
Because I shoot always RAW, I don't need to go to change the picture style back to a less flat style than I use for video as for RAW it does not matter.

I shoot the stills almost with identical settings than the video because I don't have time to switch mode (even with the C-dial). Sometimes I shoot stills with the 1/50 shutter and don't care that the motion blur will be extreme.

7

Lenses / Re: Sigma 50mm f1.4 EX DG HSM....are they any good?

« on: December 22, 2011, 06:04:27 AM »

I have Sigma 50 mm 1.4 EX DG with 5D mark II.

- It is a good lens (I am going to keep it)
- However, it is not perfect:
- All Sigmas have a bit less neutral color balance compared to Canon L. The 50 mm Sigma is no exception. It must be lens coating or something, but similarly than 12-24 EX DG, this 50 mm has a slight tint into yellowish.
- There is some chromatic aberration on out of focus areas, more than for example in Canon 70-200 2.8 L IS USM.

I have sort of stated to love the neutral (non-tinted) look of Canon L, and I think the only lens I would possibly trade this Sigma would be Canon 50 mm 1.2L. It is very expensive so not going to happen anytime soon.

I love the 50 mm on full frame since it is useful as general purpose lens. On crop sensor I could find hardly use for the lens except for maybe portraits. I can do even landscapes with this on full frame.

I have tried the lens on 60D but I was dissatisfied with the field of view.

For crop sensor a good alternative lens for giving 50 mm field of view is Samyang 35 mm F1.4. It has similar performance than the Sigma and has the best manual focus ring of the lenses I have used. It has also build quality and robustness comparable to a big Canon L. I don't think the 50 mm Sigma is a good choice for crop sensor unless you are looking 75 mm field of view (which incidentally I get out of my 70-200 on full frame which has more neutral color balance IMHO).

8

EOS Bodies / Re: any flaws in the canon 60d?

« on: December 19, 2011, 08:11:46 AM »

You probably already know that the Rebels lack quite a few features (no big dial at the back of the camera, max shutter speed limited to 1/4000, more shutter lag, slower burst rate, only one cross-type sensor, smaller pentamirror VF, worse battery life, etc...) but the 650D will most probably have the same 18MP sensor which means basically identical image and video quality,

Video is going to be far from identical: DIGIC 4 does line skipping. DIGIC 5 hopefully adds the lines up and results less aliasing in video, at least reading between the lines this is to be expected from 1DX.

This results not identical video to 60D on any model that uses DIGIC V, but massively better video quality than 60D. All the lack of resolution and detail in the DSLR video is because of line skipping, it has about nothing to do with video compression, 8 bit color space and 4:2:0 coding, instead it is crippled down by reading only few lines from the sensor and that results aliasing that results false detail that results poor real detail and horrible moire.

Unless of course Canon has implemented line skipping for the low end models to justify purchasing top of the line 1 DX. However, someone was claiming that a DIGIC V power shot is making video with less aliasing than any of the DIGIC IV models, so extrapolating from that, if that is true, there should be a massively huge difference in video quality between 60D and 650D, meaning that 60D will be piece of crap for video whereas 650D might be useful. Assuming of course, that the reports about the image scaling algorithm used for video in DIGIC V are truthful.

Regardless of this, it is expected that the quality will not be identical no matter what is the case since DIGIC V does better scaling anyway most likely even if it would be still skipping lines to some extent.

If a DIGIC V camera is going to be released anytime soon, and one has a target to shoot video, it would be a good idea to wait a little. Or if it is important to start shooting now, then the best choice today is 5D mark II which makes the best video out of the Canon cameras currently on market (greatest detail, greatest latitude, least aliasing and moire of the Canon DSLRs currently on market) (C300 does not count because it is not really available yet and it is in a completely different price category). 

9

EOS Bodies / Re: Earthshatteringly Disappointed With 7D

« on: December 09, 2011, 09:13:40 AM »

Ok - here's one that has just received minor sharpening (what I would do for any shot coming in at ISO 200)

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7011/6480510009_df4a26af47_o.jpg

And here's another that I've tried my hardest to "fixup" with sharpening and NR:

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7006/6480518429_3cd975c2a1_o.jpg

I'm with the others that suggest seeing if you can try out another 7D. 

I have a 60D and I just don't see noise like this in daylight pictures as you've seen here.

Me too. My 60D sucks in many ways compared to my 5D mark II.
In same lighting conditions one picture taken with 5D and another with 60D and the difference is huge when I edit it on Aperture. The 5D picture (in addition to video) is much better in terms of noise, detail and latitude. I can push the 5D RAW images much further than the 60D RAW images ever. And it is not about the lenses either, I can use the same L-lens in both and the results with 5D are just from another planet than with the 60D.

Many reviews were stating that 60D would have had identical video and comparable still image quality, but after purchasing the second body I saw the truth by myself. It is not about the picture styles either. The latitude simply can not be found from the 60D. 60D images may look at first sight more "shiny, vivid and saturated" at low resolution (not 1:1 resolution because 60D images at that resolution have lots of camera phone like noise on it which really annoys me) when taken out of the camera than the 5D images, but after processing, the truth is that 60D images are crap and the 5D images have so much information that it is almost unbelievable at times. And the 5D mk II is many years old camera.

And yeah, the video: 60D video is so crappy and aliasing and latitude and detail lacking (even in good lighting conditions, with studio lights and all) that it almost hurts my eye while I find the 5D mk II video usable.

When 5D mark III comes, I will probably sell my 60D and use the mk II as second body.

10

EOS Bodies / Re: 5D Mark III Information [CR1]

« on: December 05, 2011, 06:37:07 AM »

I want to see 18-21 Mpx sensor in 5D-isch body with 7D AF - Ill buy it. I really dont care much about video features as I am a stills guy. But sadly, there is no camera without video and I think there will be no camera without video in the future. I think many of us need/want better DR and noise in trade off for less video features. If you wants to shoot video you need to invest even more in good rigs for camera and lenses to make it at least a bit professional (not look of you shooting but look of captured video).

Why are all (well not all, but many canonrumors readers) stills people expecting that better DR and noise is not needed for video? Because these are specifically needed for the video. And also inclusion of a video feature will not be away from any still feature because with the computer chips the cameras have nowadays in them it comes for almost free. In fact, it would be really stupid to not include the video because there would be absolutely no benefits on not including it.

Ideally a video-DSLR (actually it needs to be mirrorless to do that) will produce a still image sequence at speed of 25 frames per second at full sensor resolution like it produces stills today.  That would be truly revolutionary. And this still sequence could be directly ingested to Blender3D and it could be composited with CGI without any transcoding in between. That would be awesome workflow that most of the video guys do not have any slightest idea about and still guys don't know where they would need 25 fps still shooting. But I can tell you that would change the fundamentals of photography as there would be no division between stills and motion, motion would be just a sequence of stills in a steady rapid pace. I am quite sure this is the way of the future if this is not ruined by ignorant product managers who have no idea what they are going to do and what customers might want tomorrow but they only base on their assumptions what is there today and what the consumers are used to today. Video by definition (separated from stills) is so 1980s thing. For stills guys this high fps would produce huge advantage to take exactly the right moment and judge that afterwards the capture has been done instead of being lucky capturing exactly the right moment as it would be captured anyway in the frames in the between. If you don't need all the frames, you could just discard those which you don't need and keep the still that you want while the video people can keep the motion as it is. Photography and videography suddently will be the very same thing and it is not a bad thing, but a good thing. This would be very ideal for myself if I shoot for example airplanes. I can keep it rolling motion all the time and then I can later find the perfect shot from the frames of motion and it will be as perfect as a still.

25 fps is achievable with foreseeable technology. It will require next generation processors to do 60-120 fps at that resolution with low battery consumption but that will be the way of the future, no matter if Canon or someone else does it first. The super high capture rate would come with an advantage for not needing to use motion blur for the captured images to keep the motion smooth (in other words fast shutter speed can be used) and that would enable better still captures from the motion frames. The large amount of frames could be also alternatively combined in camera or in post production to reduce noise and create better dynamic range and it could be reduced to either still images or to lower fps video.

11

EOS Bodies / Re: “Revealing” Canon C300 Test Video

« on: December 01, 2011, 10:33:25 AM »

One thing that I found surprising was that I did not see the resolution to be any better than my 5D mark II on this video. It looks like the moire/aliasing is mostly gone, but in this specific scene where it was compared to a HDSLR (possibly to 5D mark II as the moire resembles more the 5D than that of 60D on that scene).

I would be fine with this quality of image, but at that price, I would have expected similar fine detail as RED. For comparison clip from Scarlet posted by somebody:

http://vimeo.com/32843511
	Small | Large

Looking the comments, it looks like it is not even 1080p but it still looks more detailed than 5D mk II or the C300, and actually in the executive scene the HDSLR looks more detailed than the C300 except for the horrible moire it has (and these details are not false details created by the aliasing because the aliasing false details show up mainly as horizontal lines (and combinations of them that cause rainbows because aliasing occurs before de-bauer) that should not be there.

Based on the examples from C300, I am leaning towards a conclusion that it might be possible to achieve similar image with 5D mark II by installing the Mosaic Engineering anti-moire filter on it. The anti-moire filter costs 300 which is not so big investment over the 5D mark II compared to the out-of-indie/prosumer-reach price of the C300.

I am waiting for 5D mark III, maybe it will offer some resolution improvements over the current HDSLRs *and* may fix the moire issue (if we are lucky). If that would happen, then the 5D3 will be a dream coming true and it will find its place on my "must-have" gadgets purchase backlog and will then receive higher priority than a new Mac. I hope Canon comes out with the 5D3 before Apple comes up with the next iMac refresh. Algorithmically reducing image size from 18Mpix sensor to 2K will result sharp images if no line skipping is used, but rather the pixels are calculated together. The image will be without moire and aliasing if it is done right and does not require any optical antialiasing filter. It requires lots of horse power for the ASIC that does the conversion, but I am hoping that this will be the case with DIGIC 5.

12

EOS Bodies / Re: 5D Mark III Information [CR1]

« on: November 30, 2011, 06:08:30 AM »

Pmovie mode w/optional:
  - auto 180 degree shutter (change shutter - visible frame rate indicator adjusts)
  - auto WB that doesn't change after hitting record.
  - auto iso - adjusts at variable rate depending on how dramatic the shift, staying constant whenever possible.
  - follow focus preset marks
     - you could even set approximate marks, while in record a half shutter press begins the rack...it stops once the object in that approximate location gets focus confirmed.

The follow focus is more a pipe dream.

Well if I was working for Canon as a product owner (assuming they are not living still at stone age with waterfall process, project and program management and all the unnecessary work which does not help the consumer to get the products on time the consumers want), I would surely try to include these features. Lockable follow focus to an object is in software perspective feasible. It would not be very easy feature to implement, but it would be something that would make the camera to do something revolutionary instead of evolutionary. There are plenty of other things that could be done for the picture as well, which currently nobody is doing. However, the case is that I am not working for Canon.

Sounds like features like this would be more likely to come from one Cupertino company if they would ever venture to SLR cameras.

They aren't supposed to know.

Sometimes I wonder the product decisions made by companies. Sometimes they seem to do so dumb decisions that it is incredible how they can survive such fiascos. Instead of answering to a market need or creating a new market breakthrough, they companies tend to do evolutionary products without inventing anything new innovative. And then they sell that crap to customers because customers are expected to be sheeple and not care about what they buy. Maybe at the Internet age a change might eventually happen that selling crap over and over again will not work anymore and consumers, prosumers and professionals are more aware on what they want and what they will buy. Here would be a incredible chance for some small startup to come up with a total Canon/Nikon killer that would run circles with their products at a price that would completely kill the market for the traditional camera companies. Technically it could be done but it would require some serious venture capital and investors who have some vision rather than just looking the next quarter.

13

EOS Bodies / Re: 5D Mark III Information [CR1]

« on: November 30, 2011, 05:54:08 AM »

My guess for 5D Mark III:

How did you guess these because these do not make much sense.

1. Single DIGIC 5+ supporting up to max 6 raw pictures in sec. (+1 for JPG)
2. Very usable ISO 6400 for stills, max ISO for video 12800, camera max ex. ISO 51200

How would you have a camera with different ISO for stills and video while 5D mark II can do 25600 ISO for video. Where did you come up that with better sensor + bigger pixels + better DIGIC it is going to be worse than 5D mark II? This does not make slightest sense. I have been shooting some night scenes at 25600 despite it admittedly sucks especially now that I have couple of hot pixels which become visible at high ISO video.

I am expecting ISO 102400 at least and it would be usable for both stills and video. 18 mpix sensor + full frame + more sensitive sensor than previous generation + better processing in DIGIC V your prediction sounds low.

I am expecting ISO 25600 to be still usable (comparable to 5D2 ISO 6400) based on assumptions on improvements on sensor technology, pixel size and DIGIC.

3. AF for video

Unlikely, if it follows the lead of the 1Dx. And for the HDSLR people this is much less priority item than a aliasing free image that really is 1920x1080 pixel by pixel sharp.

4. Audio control - same as 1Dx

This has been already in 5D2. Having that in 5D3 would be no news. Of course the new audio meters of 1Dx are nice.

5. Articulated LCD screen (trust me, this is very usable in real life situations)
6. Double CF slot (same as 1Dx)
7. Weather sealed body (slightly different than 1Dx)
8. Improved AF in 19 points for stills (better than 7D)
9. Price range - from 2.990,00$ - 3.490,00$ body only.

With these I could agree. However, how did you came up with these? Wish list/speculation?
I am looking forward to seeing more than CR0 level information about spec list.

14

EOS Bodies / Re: 5D Mark III Information [CR1]

« on: November 30, 2011, 03:15:50 AM »

This might be exactly what I want/need:
- a full frame SLR form factor camera that does very high quality video (with excellent low light capability) without moire/aliasing with quality comparable to series of 1920x1080 still images. Video compression is ok if the bit rate is in the realm >=50 Mbit/s. If the moire is absent, the encoder will be more efficient and the false details do not need to get encoded and the overall quality will be much higher even if the bit rate did not increase at all over 5D2.
- and does also stills with excellent dynamic range and excellent low light capability (I am still looking for a camera that can take good pictures of my black cat)
- one that accepts my L-lens collection and possibly/preferably is compatible with electronic follow focus
- camera price in the realm of 5D2 or maximum ~1000 more (5000 would be already too much to justify purchase - as priorities are lenses first and body second)
- body preferably smaller than 1DX
- autofocus is not highly important, as in many cases I manual focus. Would be nice though. But I will take video without aliasing rather than any autofocus any day.
- extreme still speed is not highly important (would be nice though, but not absolutely mandatory), as I am not expecting a sports camera as I am not a sports photographer
- audio / XLRs etc. are not important, I am recording audio separately anyway with dedicated audio recorder and mics and I don't plan going back to internally recorded audio as my audio recorder lives its own upgrade path now.
- I have rigs, steadicams etc. and I don't need any video handles in the camera. As clean and simple as possible is better. That would be also easier to balance to the steadicam.

The Cinema* models from Canon would have been far beyond my budget (as nobody pays me at the moment anything for the video content I create because my job/income is in a different industry), but if this 5D3 is really finally coming, then this probably is my next camera. After that my 5D2 becomes the B-cam or mainly still cam (as my eyes are now so trained to see moire that I nowadays see it everywhere, even where others can't see it, e.g. even in scenes that do not contain any straight horizontal lines and it bugs me like a broken tweeter (which distorts) in a loudspeaker).

So this is the most promising rumor to the date about future Canon models. The previous announcements have been disappointing. The crowd is waiting for a 5D mark III and not a hyper expensive Cinema camera that costs more than RED. A big part of the video DSLR revolution was the price-value ratio of the camera and also the versatility to use the same camera for stills and video. If either of these are absent, it is no longer revolutionary and just a yet another (potentially inferior unless only reliability is the criteria) competitor (with questionable price-value ratio) for cameras like RED Scarlet and Arri Alexa. Canon should put out the 5D mark III fast because this is what I and I believe so many others have been so long waiting for for very good reasons. I hope the 5D3 will live up to its expectations and also I hope that Canon comes up with it fast. 5D3 is needed soonish (January/February 2012 at the latest) and not a year from now.

15

EOS Bodies / Re: EOS-1D X Canon USA Press Release

« on: October 18, 2011, 07:33:54 AM »

How far away are we from an autofocus video canon dslr?  I was really hoping for that on this camera... but it looks like no.

Continuous autofocus is quite unnecessary unless you like amateurish focus-pumping action like on consumer camcorders (and maybe you also like to pan the picture so much that your viewers will need to take pills to not vomit or have to look actively elsewhere). There is no continuous autofocus in PL-mount cameras either, because there are no electrical connections to the lens at all. Professional cinema and video production is done with manual focus.

I would be happy with 1D X if I would have over 6 k to put into one. However, that's a quite a lot of money. Waiting  for 5D mark III or 6D with hopefully the same video features.