do crop sensors really add reach?

[PackLight]

While I agree about the 7D photos looking a bit drab right out of the camera, I wouldn't go so far as to blame canon directly for explicitly making it so.

Who would we blame other than Canon. I blame Canon, they are responsible for all of our camera woe's.
It is about product placement, if you owned a camera company wouldn't you have a staff that combed over your newest bodies IQ to make sure it fit in its slot and didn't outperform the cameras above it?

But there are so many other ways the 1D-series bodies outperform. Canon doesn't NEED to "protect" their flagship line like people seem to think they do. It is a matter of workmanship. If you want the supreme, creme of the crop, hand-picked, hand-crafted quality, you have to pay for it, no which way about it. I would offer that the 7D is largely automated in manufacture, where as all of Canon's highly expensive products, like the 1D series bodies and all of their high end L-series telephoto lenses (as well as many of their other telephoto lenses, like the TS-E line) are meticulously hand crafted and hand tested. That's why there are so few of them on the market...they are CRAFTED, rather than simply MANUFACTURED. You get what you pay for. If the choice is between $7000 or $1300, of course the $7000 camera is going to outperform on every level, in significant and nuanced ways. That doesn't mean the $1300 camera can't or won't do some things better, though.

You are half right, the super telephoto lenses are hand crafted by master craftsmen in japan. They have to be because of the nature of the process.

However the 1D bodies do not have to be hand crafted by expert craftsman. They are not custom fitted and individually made. They are a collection of pre made parts that can be assembled by several pre-teens working 16 hours a day on an assembly line. If you go to Canon's corporate's website they list an Affiliate that assembles their camera for them.
No doubt they have a higher level of QC on the 1D X, it is not hand crafted. One of the reasons it is better is the firmware, it has 2 main processors rather than 1. Two processors you can pack in twice as much work for your firmware.

[natureshots]

The aps-c sensors do not give you more reach but they do have a much higher pixel density than most full frame cameras.  Pixel density= crop factor x MP of the sensor. If you are cropping all the time and have atleast some decent glass you're going to get better results with the sensor with the most pixel density assuming decent light. When you are cropping RAW pics this way (JPEG is a completely different story) you will get virtually the same result of a cropped pic with any of the canon sensors (in a bunch of earlier FFs worse results) so you might as well get a 7d, t2i, t3i, t4i, 60D etc... and put some more megapixels on your image. Yeah the focus sucks but that's why if you go to Bosque to watch the profesional bird photographers there will be some guys out there who know that and will be out there with 7Ds on 800 f5.6 's or 600 f4 + 1.4x TCs. You'd see a hell of a lot more of them if canon released a crop body with decent  f8 autofocus. Taping pins is a crappy workaround. One camera seems like it might be rendering everything I just said invalid: the 1dx now that they upgraded the firmware. Bastards at canon should have told me they would do that before I picked up a used 1d MkIV.

[PackLight]

The aps-c sensors do not give you more reach but they do have a much higher pixel density than most full frame cameras.  Pixel density= crop factor x MP of the sensor. If you are cropping all the time and have atleast some decent glass you're going to get better results with the sensor with the most pixel density assuming decent light. When you are cropping RAW pics this way (JPEG is a completely different story) you will get virtually the same result of a cropped pic with any of the canon sensors (in a bunch of earlier FFs worse results) so you might as well get a 7d, t2i, t3i, t4i, 60D etc... and put some more megapixels on your image. Yeah the focus sucks but that's why if you go to Bosque to watch the profesional bird photographers there will be some guys out there who know that and will be out there with 7Ds on 800 f5.6 's or 600 f4 + 1.4x TCs. You'd see a hell of a lot more of them if canon released a crop body with decent  f8 autofocus. Taping pins is a crappy workaround. One camera seems like it might be rendering everything I just said invalid: the 1dx now that they upgraded the firmware. Bastards at canon should have told me they would do that before I picked up a used 1d MkIV.

You could swap and trade up to the 1D X.
When you do Canon will announce a 7D II with the same AF system as the 1D X's and a new super improved crop sensor, and you will regret upgrading. It is...a never ending cycle.

[natureshots]

So the basic question -

Is the FF with some crop applied, as good, the same, or better than a 1.6 crop body shooting whole sensor.....

I think you'll find that a 5Dmk2 cropped, will be much better than your T2i.  Not tested the same, but just having a feel for cropping with my own 5Dmk2.

Having said that - Profeel.com has 5Dmk2 for $1750 - not totally bad price.  And they have the 7D for $1229 - which I just got from them.  Both are "with shipping".  They shipped my 7d the same day.

I plan on using the  7D as my crop body - mostly for the focusing and FPS, not so much for the reach.  I chose it because it control layout closely matches the 5Dmk2 and because the battery is the same (and I'd have two chargers the same, to charge up a pair of batteries at once).  Maybe less than spectacular reasons...  but it will work for me.  I didn't really want to bank on the any replacement having a totally different control layout.  It matters to me that things are almost fluidly integrated, no thought to use one or the other.

I've compared my t2i crops to a bird photographer I bump into a lot with a 5d II. My t2i usually wins if I can get the damn thing in focus and find the bird with my lens which is much easier with the FOV of the 5d II. 7d gets the same results on the crop but you wont be jumping off a bridge trying to get the rare warbler in the bush in focus. I got a 1d MkIV and now he's jealous.

[natureshots]

The aps-c sensors do not give you more reach but they do have a much higher pixel density than most full frame cameras.  Pixel density= crop factor x MP of the sensor. If you are cropping all the time and have atleast some decent glass you're going to get better results with the sensor with the most pixel density assuming decent light. When you are cropping RAW pics this way (JPEG is a completely different story) you will get virtually the same result of a cropped pic with any of the canon sensors (in a bunch of earlier FFs worse results) so you might as well get a 7d, t2i, t3i, t4i, 60D etc... and put some more megapixels on your image. Yeah the focus sucks but that's why if you go to Bosque to watch the profesional bird photographers there will be some guys out there who know that and will be out there with 7Ds on 800 f5.6 's or 600 f4 + 1.4x TCs. You'd see a hell of a lot more of them if canon released a crop body with decent  f8 autofocus. Taping pins is a crappy workaround. One camera seems like it might be rendering everything I just said invalid: the 1dx now that they upgraded the firmware. Bastards at canon should have told me they would do that before I picked up a used 1d MkIV.

You could swap and trade up to the 1D X.
When you do Canon will announce a 7D II with the same AF system as the 1D X's and a new super improved crop sensor, and you will regret upgrading. It is...a never ending cycle.

Yeah, that ship has sailed already. I refuse to waste more money on cameras. Some people are focal length limited but I am bank account limited and pissed off wife limited. Next thing I know I will be trading the 1dx for a 7d II or a 1dS, canon will be rich, I will be poor, divorced and lacking testes. Now to start bothering her about the glass instead of enduring beatings about trading camera bodies. She's reading what I'm writing and isn't so happy.  TTYL.

[neuroanatomist]

1D X vs. 7D?  No contest.  ISO 12800 on the 7D = a speckled, noisy mess.  ISO 12800 on the 1D X = a usable image.  Comes in very handy with an f/5.6 or f/8 lens or TC combo.

[jrista]

You could swap and trade up to the 1D X.
When you do Canon will announce a 7D II with the same AF system as the 1D X's and a new super improved crop sensor, and you will regret upgrading. It is...a never ending cycle.

Yeah, that ship has sailed already. I refuse to waste more money on cameras. Some people are focal length limited but I am bank account limited and pissed off wife limited. Next thing I know I will be trading the 1dx for a 7d II or a 1dS, canon will be rich, I will be poor, divorced and lacking testes. Now to start bothering her about the glass instead of enduring beatings about trading camera bodies. She's reading what I'm writing and isn't so happy.  TTYL.

Err... 

[jrista]

1D X vs. 7D?  No contest.  ISO 12800 on the 7D = a speckled, noisy mess.  ISO 12800 on the 1D X = a usable image.  Comes in very handy with an f/5.6 or f/8 lens or TC combo.

Even in the case of upscaling, the 1D X would hold up very well to the 7D, and at twice the ISO or more. Definitely no contest.

[PackLight]

1D X vs. 7D?  No contest.  ISO 12800 on the 7D = a speckled, noisy mess.  ISO 12800 on the 1D X = a usable image.  Comes in very handy with an f/5.6 or f/8 lens or TC combo.

Well if we apply some good old DxO type summary evaluation (meaning it will have little to do with reality)

The 1D X processors are 4 times faster than the one in the 7D, and the 1D X has 2 of them. So that would be 8 x better.
But then you take the faster frame rate the 1D X is 1.5 x better than the 7D.
Then take the improved ISO, definitly 3 stops so 3 x better.
And finally take back the the 2.58 pixel density of the 7D.

So 8x1.5x3/2.58=13.95 The 1D X is 13.95 times better than the 7D.

Does it make sense? As much as if you think  you would see a full 2.21 times increase in resolution using the 7D vs the 5D II.

[natureshots]

I'm confused about most the comments here.
Comparing a REBEL and a 7D to 5D II or 1DX is just not happening.

That's the problem, you never compared. When cropping a rebel or 7D (same sensor) on the same glass/FOV it beats the 5D II any day. 5D III crops are a bit better at high ISO situations but when you have a ton of light most people will like the rebel crops assuming identical FOV/glass. Either way the differences aren't huge but this is a great place to kill time and argue. The 7D/rebel crops will even beat the 1dx in some weird super crop/large print situations with lots of light and a lower contrast subject. You pretty much have to engineer those situations.

[mb66energy]

My 2 ct:

Crop sensors can add more reach:

      18 MPixel Crop x 1,6 x 1,6 = 46 MPixel FF  equiv

IF

  - the lens is capable to feed the high pixel density sensors
  - the collected number of electrons per pixel is high enough (enough light)
  - motion blurr (camera shake, object/subject movement) is not limiting

BUT

under normal conditions I don't see a large advantage
of the 18MP of my 600D over the 10MP of my 40D --
except some situations where fine detail is recorded
with the lens and helpful for the image.

One point about higher pixel densities -- i have to check
it by a direct comparison between 40D and 600D:
Monochrome light sources (like lasers or especially LEDs
and some rare objects with narrow spectral properties)
suffer from bad detail/artifacts due to the Bayer pattern
of the sensors. Here a factor 2 in pixel number should
help to make these artifacts less visible. So in these special
cases a higher pixel density might help to suppress these
artifacts/increase the percepted sharpness/fidelity of an
image.

The best solution would be a 48MPixel FF body and a
RAW processor which allows to store the RAWs afterwards
as 48, 24 or 12 MPixel RAW according to the image type/
post crop factors to reduce computer storage consumption.
A further step into a "one-camera-for-nearly-all-stuff-aproach".

[neuroanatomist]

1D X vs. 7D?  No contest.  ISO 12800 on the 7D = a speckled, noisy mess.  ISO 12800 on the 1D X = a usable image.  Comes in very handy with an f/5.6 or f/8 lens or TC combo.

Well if we apply some good old DxO type summary evaluation (meaning it will have little to do with reality)

The 1D X processors are 4 times faster than the one in the 7D, and the 1D X has 2 of them. So that would be 8 x better.
But then you take the faster frame rate the 1D X is 1.5 x better than the 7D.
Then take the improved ISO, definitly 3 stops so 3 x better.
And finally take back the the 2.58 pixel density of the 7D.

So 8x1.5x3/2.58=13.95 The 1D X is 13.95 times better than the 7D.

Does it make sense? As much as if you think  you would see a full 2.21 times increase in resolution using the 7D vs the 5D II.

The 7D has dual Digic 4, not one. Your normalization is flawed and I don't believe your Scores have validity.   

[PackLight]

1D X vs. 7D?  No contest.  ISO 12800 on the 7D = a speckled, noisy mess.  ISO 12800 on the 1D X = a usable image.  Comes in very handy with an f/5.6 or f/8 lens or TC combo.

Well if we apply some good old DxO type summary evaluation (meaning it will have little to do with reality)

The 1D X processors are 4 times faster than the one in the 7D, and the 1D X has 2 of them. So that would be 8 x better.
But then you take the faster frame rate the 1D X is 1.5 x better than the 7D.
Then take the improved ISO, definitly 3 stops so 3 x better.
And finally take back the the 2.58 pixel density of the 7D.

So 8x1.5x3/2.58=13.95 The 1D X is 13.95 times better than the 7D.

Does it make sense? As much as if you think  you would see a full 2.21 times increase in resolution using the 7D vs the 5D II.

The 7D has dual Digic 4, not one. Your normalization is flawed and I don't believe your Scores have validity.   

  Oh no, it does have an error there are two processors. It would only be 7 times as good.


 

[jrista]

1D X vs. 7D?  No contest.  ISO 12800 on the 7D = a speckled, noisy mess.  ISO 12800 on the 1D X = a usable image.  Comes in very handy with an f/5.6 or f/8 lens or TC combo.

Well if we apply some good old DxO type summary evaluation (meaning it will have little to do with reality)

The 1D X processors are 4 times faster than the one in the 7D, and the 1D X has 2 of them. So that would be 8 x better.
But then you take the faster frame rate the 1D X is 1.5 x better than the 7D.
Then take the improved ISO, definitly 3 stops so 3 x better.
And finally take back the the 2.58 pixel density of the 7D.

So 8x1.5x3/2.58=13.95 The 1D X is 13.95 times better than the 7D.

Does it make sense? As much as if you think  you would see a full 2.21 times increase in resolution using the 7D vs the 5D II.

LOL. Good one.

Humor aside, resolution is resolution. It is a rather simple spatial construct. Assuming you did not take care to address the *needs* of the 7D, sure, it is highly unlikely you'll realize the full 2.21x resolution benefit the 7D has to offer. However, that does not change the fact that the 7D DOES offer that benefit, and when you use a good lens, with solid 4-stop IS, and/or a stable tripod, the chances of realizing a close approach to that 2.21x resolution benefit are very good. If we take the moon as an example, I always set up my tripod as low as it will go, with legs out wide for maximum stability, on windless nights whenever possible, and I use a wireless shutter release with mirror lockup to actually take the photo. Assuming I photograph the moon high in the sky on dry nights when it is center of the lens, I believe I can easily realize around 2x of that 2.21x reach benefit.

If you don't think you can, or don't care to, properly utilize the tools in hand, you should probably be using different tools. It is definitely easier to get "sharp" photos with a FF sensor that has larger pixels. That just follows the line of reasoning regarding pixel size, the diffraction limit of the sensor, and the effects of camera shake.

[PackLight]

LOL. Good one.

Humor aside, resolution is resolution. It is a rather simple spatial construct. Assuming you did not take care to address the *needs* of the 7D, sure, it is highly unlikely you'll realize the full 2.21x resolution benefit the 7D has to offer. However, that does not change the fact that the 7D DOES offer that benefit, and when you use a good lens, with solid 4-stop IS, and/or a stable tripod, the chances of realizing a close approach to that 2.21x resolution benefit are very good. If we take the moon as an example, I always set up my tripod as low as it will go, with legs out wide for maximum stability, on windless nights whenever possible, and I use a wireless shutter release with mirror lockup to actually take the photo. Assuming I photograph the moon high in the sky on dry nights when it is center of the lens, I believe I can easily realize around 2x of that 2.21x reach benefit.

If you don't think you can, or don't care to, properly utilize the tools in hand, you should probably be using different tools. It is definitely easier to get "sharp" photos with a FF sensor that has larger pixels. That just follows the line of reasoning regarding pixel size, the diffraction limit of the sensor, and the effects of camera shake.

What you just described is a better description of landscape photography than wildlife photography. Really it is, it is moonscape photography. Actually the only time I did use the 7D after I bought the 1D IV was for taking pictures of the moon.

Remember we are talking wildlife photography. If you are setting up posed pictures on posed roosts at your back yard bird feeder you can incorporate some of what you say. Probably you will not be using mirror up or a wireless release but you might. But there are other levels of wildlife photography. Wildlife photography photographs wild things, they do not always cooperate in such a clinical manner. There are times a person might be shooting off a tripod, times when they might be shooting hand held at BIF or shooting in low light situations. Now, were any of those methods "not properly utilizing the tool in hand"?  The resolution benefit decreases in real life situations, and the other benefits that the 7D offer the wildlife photographers are far greater than this one. But, how does one really quantify how much better, I just think if we base our opinions on the actual numbers we know (1.6x or 2.21x) we deceive ourselves.

I was thinking about this as well, if the 5D III AF system is as accurate as the 1D series bodies it would be a far better choice. The 7D and 5D II AF systems are not as accurate and precise as the 1D x or IV. You can have all the sensor resolution you want, if the AF system is more accurate it will give you better resolution because it is more precise in its focus.  I haven't had the opportunity to try the 5D III yet, it would be fun to compare.