Messages

1

Lenses / Re: Adorama or BH

« on: September 19, 2012, 02:09:36 PM »

The leadership team of B&H is fairly religious and they only open for a few business days during September. Between the two, Adorama is a bit more reliable in the fall.

2

EOS Bodies / Re: When will Amazon start shipping the 5DM3?

« on: May 07, 2012, 05:07:14 PM »

Out of curiosity, what ETA did they give you Justin?

May 17, 2012 - June 19, 2012 was my original ETA.

patrickyandoc, I'm guessing yours will be in next week's batch

3

EOS Bodies / Re: When will Amazon start shipping the 5DM3?

« on: May 07, 2012, 12:04:31 PM »

A batch looks to be shipping today. A Prime order for body-only that I made on 4/12 is shipping today (5/7) with estimated arrival on Wednesday.

4

EOS Bodies / Re: LR4.1 RC to blame. Check this out!

« on: May 02, 2012, 12:04:15 AM »

What were the shot parameters in terms of sharpening and NR? DPP applies these automatically, so when the photo was processed and saved as TIFF/bitmap, this is effectively similar to applying NR in LR and exporting a TIFF back into the catalog before playing with it. Right? Don't mean to be pessimistic, just want to make sure I have the facts straight.

I cancelled my D800 order after seeing the low light video samples. Would love to see the 5DM3 excel at stills as well, but I'm cautious.

5

EOS Bodies - For Stills / Re: Advice: On buying 5D3.

« on: April 25, 2012, 12:20:13 PM »

The D800 is an amazing camera. We'll be seeing threads on this forum about it for a long time. Given your lens assortment and your shooting target, I'm gonna side with dswatson83 on this one. With the D800, you're looking at the expense of replacing your lens lineup and the expense of more storage space (assuming you're shooting more than one wedding this summer and shooting raws in a multi-shot mode). Lightroom 4.1 RC1 supports the 5D Mark III files pretty well and the official release should be out soon. You *will* be impressed coming from the 7D and if you're selling your 7D, selling the fisheye will also help with costs.

I don't think you'd regret spending the time and money to switch to the Nikon system, but I think you can easily justify the purchase of the 5D Mark III—and have no regrets there either.

And if you're having a really hard time deciding, rent and find out which one you like better!

6

EOS Bodies / Re: 5D Mark III - Amazon availability?

« on: April 13, 2012, 12:35:38 AM »

Ordered today, 04/11/2012, after cancelling a D800 order.
Expected delivery: Thursday May 17, 2012 - Tuesday June 19, 2012

7

EOS Bodies - For Video / Re: CANON U.S.A. INTRODUCES EOS-1D C DIGITAL SLR CAMERA FEATURING 4K HIGH-RESOLUTION VIDEO CAPTURE

« on: April 12, 2012, 10:41:53 AM »

I'd buy one if I could afford it. It's priced close to the Red Scarlet-X's Canon mount package and the high-ISO performance is bound to be best-in-class.

8

EOS Bodies / Re: Will you tweak your new 5D MARK III ???

« on: April 11, 2012, 04:54:17 PM »

Trying to recalibrate your camera's autofocus would be a pain. This kind of mod is somewhat more advantageous to the article's author as he's a manual-focus live mode video shooter. Also, consider having to add more glass to your optical path to add in an IR (and he doesn't mention UV) filter, losing some of that sharpness you've gained.

9

EOS Bodies - For Video / Re: Gizmodo D800 and 5D Mark III Comparison

« on: March 28, 2012, 12:38:24 PM »

Man, in the low light footage, the D800 looks pathetic ISO1600+. How can it look so good at still and so bad at video?

10

EOS Bodies - For Video / Gizmodo D800 and 5D Mark III Comparison

« on: March 28, 2012, 12:30:05 PM »

Finally someone got their hands on both bodies:
http://gizmodo.com/5897098/d800-vs-5d-mark-iii-which-shoots-better-video/
Summary: Nothing too new. 5D Mark III is better in low light. D800 has significantly more detail, but crappy moire.

11

Lenses / Re: Ultra Wide Angle with Full Frame

« on: March 25, 2012, 11:51:10 PM »

The extra 5 mm of Sigma 12-24 is very intriguing and I wish I could get my hands on that one to try it out!

It was intriguing to me too, but I think you made the right choice given what you said your focus was. After getting one (the first Sigma EX version) and shooting a lot of landscape/HDR with it on a 5DmkII, my favorite photos coming out of it were in the 17-24mm range by EXIF's reckoning, so it's possible those shots could have looked prettier coming from a Canon L-series. I don't regret it though, it never looked soft to me, even at the edges. I would use LR3's default sharpness level, default lens profile or no lens correction at all. The chromatic aberration on my copy seemed almost non-existent
Samps:
18 mm, F/10
12 mm [but I cropped off the boring bits], F/22
20mm, F/5.6


I will also say that while the 12mm length was almost too wide for my landscapery, it was perfect for "capturing the room" or shooting an event chopper-style (folding up tripod, setting camera timer, holding high).
12mm, F/7.1
12mm, F/5
If you'd said you mostly shot condo and apartment real estate, I'd be recommending it in a heartbeat.

12

Third Party Manufacturers / Re: D800/E pre-order thread

« on: March 17, 2012, 08:17:35 PM »

After having pre-ordered a 5D Mark III and searching through Amazon for the accessories, Amazon decided to make the Nikon D800 one of my gold box quick pick deals (taking an additional $150 off). This was a final straw for me. After comparing the raw samples at 25600 and noticing poorer color reproduction in shadows for the 5D Mark III (greens & purples, as if it lacked anti-aliasing), I was already a little apprehensive. Nikon's uncompressed HDMI out and built-in AF assist are also super-cool. I cancelled my 5D Mark III pre-order and nabbed the D800, slated for arrival on the 21st for me. This means selling a 24-70mm F2.8L and a Sigma 12-24mm EX for me—really no biggie. It feels a little dirty, but maybe I'll be on this forum around the same time next year looking to switch back to Canon.

13

EOS Bodies / Re: HUGE difference between the 5d Mark 3 and D800 RAWs... I mean... HUUGEE

« on: March 15, 2012, 03:00:51 PM »

I've been doing some comparison at 25600 ISO, as I'm targeting nightlife photography in my purchase decision. For me, with noise reductions all the way down, and down-scaling the D800 sample, I can barely tell a difference between the two—that's with taking the raws, processing with the Adobe libs and not applying any luminance NR, color NR, sharpening, or tone adjustment. The white wall was a little noisier on the D800, but that could easily be from a slightly darker capture. This comparison is the first two attachments.

Strangely, applying Lightroom 4's color noise reduction at level 25 to either yields significantly better neutral darks for me on the D800 sample. The latter 2 attached examples are taken from the raws processed with LR4, clean/linear settings except for color NR 25. You can see a bit of purple/green separation on the 5D Mark III sample. Do any of you know why LR's NR would be better on the D800's sample? Was there simply less noise to deal with? Maybe related to the extra MP? This comparison is the latter 2 attachments.

14

Speedlites, Printers, Accessories / 3rd-party AF assist for the 5D Mark III

« on: March 13, 2012, 03:14:35 PM »

I'm new to the world of flashes and transmitters and was thinking about grabbing the 600EX for the 5D Mark III, but mainly for the AF assist light. So I wanted to ask, do 3rd parties ever produce alternate AF assist lights? I've seen a few knock-offs of the ST-E2, but couldn't tell if they had AF assist or not.

I'm assuming the Canon ST-E2 itself is not an option as the 61-point AF is bound to have points at different places from the pattern in that unit.

It's been suggested that creating a matrix of NIR LEDs will do the trick, is this comparable to a patterned beam made for the camera's AF?

Thanks!

15

EOS Bodies / Re: 1DX or 5D Mark III at this year's SXSW?

« on: March 12, 2012, 06:32:08 PM »

How much does it cost to get into the trade show?

The trade show is free as long as you've got any of the five badge types; it's effectively paid for by the vendors peddling their wares. You just walk in and they'll look at your lanyard as you pass. If you don't have a badge, the cheapest one is a Film badge for $595 at the walk-up rate (ouch, I know).

If you're an Austinite or are in town for the free/unofficial stuff, you might be able to find an attendee finishing out their Interactive week tomorrow (March 13th) who's willing to part with their badge on the cheap before they head home. Caveat: using someone else's badge like this may technically break the rules—I'm not sure.

The trade show ends on Thursday and the hours are:
Monday, March 12 - 11:00-18:00 CDT
Tuesday, March 13 - 11:00-18:00 CDT
Wednesday, March 14 - 11:00-18:00 CDT
Thursday, March 15 11:00-16:00 CDT

I don't know the Canon booth's specific hours but given their target audience is filmmakers this year, there's a good chance they'll be up for the bulk of the trade show. The Film conference doesn't end until the 17th.