Will the suggested 5d III specs satisfy your photograpy needs?

[Ellen Schmidtee]

I'll be perfectly happy with 22MP, and would welcome an improvement in the AF system & ISO performance. Dual card slots would be nice.

The price caused me a slight sticker shock. I hope the street price will be lower and/or that it's the price for a kit which includes a lens.

[caruser]

Suppose Canon changed absolutely nothing else about the 5d2--including the much-maligned autofocus. If the 5d3 featured an honest (RAW) two-stop increase in dynamic range, I'd rob a bank yesterday to come up with the MSRP.

Same here, although it would be more fun with at least some AF improvements!

However without BSI there's no chance whatsoevery for anything even remotely close to such an improvement...

[STPhotos]

Ha. Canon's gonna pull an Apple on us. It's gonna be 38mp, 5fps , 45pt AF with better low light sensitivity, higher iso, dual CF card slots, weathersealing, crop mode, D1X video and a steal at $2800.

That's my wishful thinking at least.

[nigelc]

At 22MP.... sorry, no go.  Totally uninterested, and will likely go medium format.

+1

[AndreeOnline]

Image quality is great with the 5D mkII, but newer models from other makers, even relatively inexpensive ones, are coming close or surpassing it.

The 5D mkIII will need to increase its dynamic range from the current 11.9 stops to about 14 to stay current.
It will need to improve ISO performance with about two true stops (i.e. ISO 6400 will be as good as current 1600)

That almost takes care of the stills side. Stills are already top notch with the mkII.

Now, I know that video is not everyone's game. But put aside personal needs on this one if you are not into it yourself.

Everyone knows that the mkII started everything video wise. The market is huge now, and video is, and will increasingly become, a really important factor for many photographers.

Video on the mkII was partly really great, but it is, to a large extent broken. It has moiré and aliasing that limit it severely. Fixing this will be huge.

Stronger processing (CPU) performance might eliminate the need for line skipping and up the video resolution quite a bit. This combined with a mostly artifact free image will be important for the mkIII.

Perhaps they even throw the new ALL-I codec in there, if they don't feel it needs to be 1DX exclusive. But I do think that Canon knows the 5D mkIII needs to be at the very top video wise.

To all of this we can add wireless flash capability, modern AF-system and higer FPS.

When all of these bits fall into place it will be a really nice upgrade. Bring it on!!

[daveswan]

ATM I use a 5D for stills and a 550D for video, and been looking at a GH2 to hack as a replacement for the 550D.

If Canon can get the video on the 5DIII (Or 5Dx whatever) up to scratch, ie true 1080p res, 12+ stops DR in video and a robust gradeable codec, then I'll gladly take 22 Mp (All I really need), sell my 5D and 550D and have one camera to do both, and with FF goodness for video as well as stills.

Just hope I can aford it when it comes out, the 1Dx (Never mind the C-300) is way out of my budget, the likely C-DSLR probably will be too, unless it comes in under £3000

[nigelc]

At 22MP.... sorry, no go.  Totally uninterested, and will likely go medium format.

+1

On second thoughts, if it comes even close to MFD level, D800E body is less than one third of the cost of Pentax 645D, the cheapest MFD on offer - lens costs similiar.

It just goes to show what a small proportion of sales the architectural/landscape/still life segment is. I think these specs will be fine for wedding/social/portrait/video.

My wish list was:

40MP
14 stop dynamic range and "no" noise from ISO25 to 800
effective weathersealing
effective focus confirmation for MF in LV and through OVF - focus peaking?
possibly micropism/split image focussing screen with gridlines
one press mirror lock-up
AEB +/- 5 stops
not costing more than 5D2

Why are people so worked up about the size of files from D800? - 35mm scanned transparencies (at 4000dpi) are at least 60MB and my 6x7 scans can be over 300MB so this is not something new.

 

[AndreeOnline]

Many are writing about how they crop a great deal, and that it's important.

Where does this come from?

Do you intentionally frame loosely/quickly, or is it more like:

"I wish I had that 300mm lens now that I haven't bought, but I'll crop my 85mm instead"

Sure, ability to crop is good sometimes, but it's not like it's a substitute for equipment or proper photography. and fewer, larger photo sites allow for better image quality in most cases.

[neuroanatomist]

Many are writing about how they crop a great deal, and that it's important.

Where does this come from?

Do you intentionally frame loosely/quickly, or is it more like:

"I wish I had that 300mm lens now that I haven't bought, but I'll crop my 85mm instead"

Sure, ability to crop is good sometimes, but it's not like it's a substitute for equipment or proper photography. and fewer, larger photo sites allow for better image quality in most cases.

Some of each.  For birds, I shoot at 400mm on a 7D, equivalent to 640mm on FF.  Going over 420mm while keeping AF is >$5K, cropping is cost-effective. 

Orientation change is another use.  Crop a 36 MP landscape-oriented photo to portrait, you have a 16 MP file.  Frame in portrait in the first place? Ok, maybe. But sometimes it's not your decision - with a fashion photo, the editor may want that change on the image she likes best.  Or, from a recent experience of mine - portraits of two young kids together.  It's a rare thing to catch both with a good expression, and common to get a great expression on one while the other has a finger up the nose.  Cropping (and Photoshop to remove part of the other one's hand) can salvage shots like that. 

[AprilForever]

Many are writing about how they crop a great deal, and that it's important.

Where does this come from?

Do you intentionally frame loosely/quickly, or is it more like:

"I wish I had that 300mm lens now that I haven't bought, but I'll crop my 85mm instead"

Sure, ability to crop is good sometimes, but it's not like it's a substitute for equipment or proper photography. and fewer, larger photo sites allow for better image quality in most cases.

It's more like: I wish I had an 800 5.6, but since all I can afford is a 300 2.8 + 2x TC, I may have to crop sometimes.

[KeithR]

Where does this come from?

Ever heard of bird photography?

Every bird 'tog I know - including many professionals - has to crop: there's no such thing as a bird photographer who is never focal-length limited.

Add to that the fact that we have no control over our subject matter, and frequently need to crop for compositional reasons.

fewer, larger photo sites allow for better image quality in most cases.

Simply not true.

[RedEye]

At 22MP.... sorry, no go.  Totally uninterested, and will likely go medium format.

+1

On second thoughts, if it comes even close to MFD level, D800E body is less than one third of the cost of Pentax 645D, the cheapest MFD on offer - lens costs similiar.

It just goes to show what a small proportion of sales the architectural/landscape/still life segment is. I think these specs will be fine for wedding/social/portrait/video.

My wish list was:

40MP
14 stop dynamic range and "no" noise from ISO25 to 800
effective weathersealing
effective focus confirmation for MF in LV and through OVF - focus peaking?
possibly micropism/split image focussing screen with gridlines
one press mirror lock-up
AEB +/- 5 stops
not costing more than 5D2

Why are people so worked up about the size of files from D800? - 35mm scanned transparencies (at 4000dpi) are at least 60MB and my 6x7 scans can be over 300MB so this is not something new.

I'm on board with your spec list.  As per the file size I have no idea, I have a i7 970 chip in my computer and I'm not sure if it will notice the difference in file size.  From a professional side of things, I'm thinking the new server hardware and a $39 copy of Microsoft home server will surprise people with its capacities for mass storage.  For apple people, of which I'm included, I can understand the gripe, but on the other hand, I can't wait to see it on my apple display. 

[Bobster]

Yes

[Picsfor]

in a word, yes.

The reasons are as follows:

My only gripes with the 5D2 are its AF and lack of dual card slots.

These specs fix both of those concerns.

My other 'gripe' was only discovered wen trying out the 1DX, and that is the lack of joystick duplication for when using the camera in portrait mode. Didn't miss what you hadn't had so to speak. But again, this looks like it might be fixed with the new BG.

I've lost a card at the end of a shoot, and thankfully it was only a tfp shoot - and i was lucky enough to recover some images via software. So dual card slotg is essential in my mind.

Also, i'm not a centre point focus person, so having usable outside AF points become a necessity to me.

[marekjoz]

No. Human's nature makes us never satisfied enough.