Canon EOS 70D & EOS 7D Mark II Speculation [CR1]

[drummstikk]

I would wonder if the 7DII would maybe then be a full frame camera at 18mpx?

I'm usually wrong on this stuff, but I really don't understand why Canon would want to put out a "cheap" full frame camera. Even though there had been much griping about the price of the 5DIII, it's spent a lot of time back-ordered at many shops. Why cannibalize sales on a big seller with a cheaper model?

As another has alluded to, I also don't see why they would want to continue to have three tiers of APS-C camera (Rebel, XXD, and XD). I would look for "70D" to take over as the mid-range prosumer model, hopefully restoring the more solid build quality and feel that was compromised in the shift from 50D to 60D. Then (and here's me starting to wish) I'd like to see the 7D market space filled with an APS-H camera. I'd hate to see APS-H end with the 1D MkIV. APS-H doesn't match full-frame for shallow DOF effects, but it is a nice upgrade from APS-C in this area and it gives a little more reach with tele lenses than FF.

[aznable]

So 70D would be just sensor and image processor upgrade?

upgrade from what? with digic V i would expect a bump on real fps, putting it at the same level of 50D; big upgrade for autofocus too if those rumors are true

[Marsu42]

interesting move from Canon...they will move 70D little bit UP in the line and 7Dmk2 even more up closer and closer to the 1D4.

...but sadly also predictable: Canon has raised the price of all follow-up products heavily lately (24-70ii, 5d3, 600rt, ...), and since it seems to work out they'll continue doing it. Maybe they're atm wondering why they didn't sell the 5d3 at $4000 because the people who bought it would have gotten it for any price short of the 1dx price tag :-o

I'm usually wrong on this stuff, but I really don't understand why Canon would want to put out a "cheap" full frame camera. Even though there had been much griping about the price of the 5DIII, it's spent a lot of time back-ordered at many shops. Why cannibalize sales on a big seller with a cheaper model?

Let's pray for more competition: Since it's crippled anyway because people are stuck to their lenses, only strong pressure - pr or sales - from Sony and Nikon will make canon release a 5d2 successor with a comparable price.

[briansquibb]

I was out shooting motorsports with my 7D and 1D4.

The 7D did very well (it was good light) but it was clear on the big prints that the IQ was not up to the 1D4.

The headline improvements sound good for the 7DII - however there are still a lot of things that need to be improved for the 7DII to catch up. I am not of the opinion the DR is the highest priority until better control of the metering happens

For example for sports/moving wildlife/birds:

Metering on the AF point - very important in the summer with high contrast
Ability to shoot in M mode with AutoIso and EC

[whatta]

if 70d is indeed gaining "everything" from 7d except fps, size, weight (basically body) it might be the one for me. Especially interested in the viewfinder and AF.

[Wrathwilde]

I'm not buying these specs. It isn't possible to have the autofocus from the full frame 5D III on an APS-C 7D II.

Good point.  Physically, it's probably possible, in that the 61-point AF sensor array fits within the APS-C frame (see below).  The side points go right to the edge of the frame, which sounds wonderful - but probably too good to be true, as vignetting and distortion will impact AF performance (one reason why there aren't AF points right to the edge of the frame!).

OK, so the sensor size of the D300(s) is slightly larger, but it doesn't seem to have caused too many problems for Nikon.

If they dropped the EF-S lens support for the 7D2... then vignetting and distortion shouldn't be any more of a problem for the AF than it is now on Canon's FF cameras. Alternatively, they could keep compatibility with EF-S lenses and disable the outermost AF points... to keep lens distortion from being an issue.

On another note, regarding the dual Digic 5 processors... I don't see it happening, I betting on a single Digic 5+. No need for the expense of dual processors when one will do the job just fine.

Cheers,
Wrathwilde

[Marine03]

if 70d is indeed gaining "everything" from 7d except fps, size, weight (basically body) it might be the one for me. Especially interested in the viewfinder and AF.

Didn't the rumor the other day suggest that the 7D2 would be closer to 11 or 12 FPS?  Which leaves room for a 70D with new Sensor, Digic 5 1 or 2 of them with 8FPS still  and 19pt AF.   For those who want it there is still an upgrade of 4 FPS and a heck of a lot of AF points. 

[Dylan777]

I'll take 70D - I do need a crop body, but not SUPER FAST as 7D II.   

[whatta]

if 70d is indeed gaining "everything" from 7d except fps, size, weight (basically body) it might be the one for me. Especially interested in the viewfinder and AF.

Didn't the rumor the other day suggest that the 7D2 would be closer to 11 or 12 FPS?  Which leaves room for a 70D with new Sensor, Digic 5 1 or 2 of them with 8FPS still  and 19pt AF.   For those who want it there is still an upgrade of 4 FPS and a heck of a lot of AF points.

Indeed, I think there is more than enough room to differentiate the 70d from 7d2 (and from 60d and 7d) even if they share the sensor like in the current models. Personally I am not interested in fps, so the slower (probably cheaper) the better for the 70d.

[awinphoto]

I'm not buying these specs. It isn't possible to have the autofocus from the full frame 5D III on an APS-C 7D II.

Good point.  Physically, it's probably possible, in that the 61-point AF sensor array fits within the APS-C frame (see below).  The side points go right to the edge of the frame, which sounds wonderful - but probably too good to be true, as vignetting and distortion will impact AF performance (one reason why there aren't AF points right to the edge of the frame!).

What vignetting and distortion? It's not like the lenses project anything different than they do on FF. Yeah maybe a few EF-S or APS-C only lenses might have troubles with the outermost points but they can lock them out, the 5D3 AF allows varying number of points for different lenses so the code is already programmed to be able to take care of that they just assign each EF-S the correct category.

I think he's referring to some of the lenses that natoriously have distortion and vignetting like the 17-40, 16-35, perhaps even the standard ef-s lenses at the wide end and 10-20, etc...  I dont think it would be as bad as some would fear, but what do i know.  If nikon can trickle down one of the top AF to it's D300's, i'm sure canon can do it as well. 

[bbasiaga]

I would wonder if the 7DII would maybe then be a full frame camera at 18mpx?

I'm usually wrong on this stuff, but I really don't understand why Canon would want to put out a "cheap" full frame camera. Even though there had been much griping about the price of the 5DIII, it's spent a lot of time back-ordered at many shops. Why cannibalize sales on a big seller with a cheaper model?

As another has alluded to, I also don't see why they would want to continue to have three tiers of APS-C camera (Rebel, XXD, and XD). I would look for "70D" to take over as the mid-range prosumer model, hopefully restoring the more solid build quality and feel that was compromised in the shift from 50D to 60D. Then (and here's me starting to wish) I'd like to see the 7D market space filled with an APS-H camera. I'd hate to see APS-H end with the 1D MkIV. APS-H doesn't match full-frame for shallow DOF effects, but it is a nice upgrade from APS-C in this area and it gives a little more reach with tele lenses than FF.

Good points, all.  Though, does anyone know the real sales numbers of 5DIIIs?  My local shop was talking about this the other day.  They get 2-3 shipped to them a month, and sell that many easily.  But they aren't selling tons and tons of them.  Leaves the question open whether the supply problem is really one of demand, or one created by Canon due to the very metered release of units. 

The lower cost full frame would be a seller, so I can see room for it.  The 5dII still sells, so would a replacement at the same price point.  It doesn't cannibalize as many sales of the 5DIII as you'd think - its people who can't afford or justify the cost of the 5DIII but still want FF performance who buy this camera (small studios, avid consumers?).   

It'll be very interesting to see what comes of these seires of rumors.  It'll tell what Canon is thinking. 

-Brian

[dlleno]

On another note, regarding the dual Digic 5 processors... I don't see it happening, I betting on a single Digic 5+. No need for the expense of dual processors when one will do the job just fine.

Cheers,
Wrathwilde

it will be interesting to see ---  the 7D architecture itsef is already dual Digic 4, so maybe dual digic 5 is not that far "out there" in terms of feasibility (i.e. depending on Digic 5 architecture, it may drop in nicely to the 7D bus..). 

additional ramblings:

I wonder if single Digic 5+ would differentiate the 7D2 very well from the others, esp since it is dual digic 4 today.  Note that it takes 2 Digic 5+s and a Digic 4 in the 1DX to produce 12fps with an 18mp sensor, although I'm seeing reports of acheiving 14 fps ...  I just wonder if 7D2 might need more than a single Digic 5+  to get above the current 8 fps (A single Digic 5 can produce 10fps in the powershot, but this is only a 12MP sensor).  Dual Digic 5 in the 7D2, with appropriate firmware and throttling of the I/O bus, could easily acheive 10fps,  leaving room for the superior 1DX performance. 

... but I don't know that much about Digic processors, or if a single Digic 5+ could produce 10fps with 18MP, given the right I/O subsystem.  And I'm also assuming that 7D2 will bump up the fps, and that hasn't been verified either. 

[LetTheRightLensIn]

I'm not buying these specs. It isn't possible to have the autofocus from the full frame 5D III on an APS-C 7D II.

Good point.  Physically, it's probably possible, in that the 61-point AF sensor array fits within the APS-C frame (see below).  The side points go right to the edge of the frame, which sounds wonderful - but probably too good to be true, as vignetting and distortion will impact AF performance (one reason why there aren't AF points right to the edge of the frame!).

What vignetting and distortion? It's not like the lenses project anything different than they do on FF. Yeah maybe a few EF-S or APS-C only lenses might have troubles with the outermost points but they can lock them out, the 5D3 AF allows varying number of points for different lenses so the code is already programmed to be able to take care of that they just assign each EF-S the correct category.

I think he's referring to some of the lenses that natoriously have distortion and vignetting like the 17-40, 16-35, perhaps even the standard ef-s lenses at the wide end and 10-20, etc...  I dont think it would be as bad as some would fear, but what do i know.  If nikon can trickle down one of the top AF to it's D300's, i'm sure canon can do it as well.

But they won't do any worse than they would on the 5D3 and the 16-35's are actually among the MOST wide AF capable, being class A, all 61 points optimally. And even the 17-40 is only group C which still allows for all 61 points, all cross as cross, the only thing that loses is all of the center column double precision diagonal cross.

[LetTheRightLensIn]

On another note, regarding the dual Digic 5 processors... I don't see it happening, I betting on a single Digic 5+. No need for the expense of dual processors when one will do the job just fine.

Cheers,
Wrathwilde

it will be interesting to see ---  the 7D architecture itsef is already dual Digic 4, so maybe dual digic 5 is not that far "out there" in terms of feasibility (i.e. depending on Digic 5 architecture, it may drop in nicely to the 7D bus..). 

additional ramblings:

I wonder if single Digic 5+ would differentiate the 7D2 very well from the others, esp since it is dual digic 4 today.  Note that it takes 2 Digic 5+s and a Digic 4 in the 1DX to produce 12fps with an 18mp sensor, although I'm seeing reports of acheiving 14 fps ...  I just wonder if 7D2 might need more than a single Digic 5+  to get above the current 8 fps (A single Digic 5 can produce 10fps in the powershot, but this is only a 12MP sensor).  Dual Digic 5 in the 7D2, with appropriate firmware and throttling of the I/O bus, could easily acheive 10fps,  leaving room for the superior 1DX performance. 

... but I don't know that much about Digic processors, or if a single Digic 5+ could produce 10fps with 18MP, given the right I/O subsystem.  And I'm also assuming that 7D2 will bump up the fps, and that hasn't been verified either.

1DX does 14fps with the mirror up, the processing can handle 14fps, it's the mirror that can't (although i think there is a limit to very high ISO because it can't quite do NR fast enough then)

1DX only uses the two digi 5+ for speed the digic iv has nothing to do with the throughput it is only used to drive the fancy new metering chip and the color/face tracking mode assist for phase detected AF.

[dlleno]

ok good to know.  still, if it takes dual digic5+ to get to 14fps,  what does that say about the the capability of a single digic 5+ to exceed the present 8fps requiring dual digic 4? 

At first glance, and a cursory read on wikipedia, it does appear that 1 digic 5+ would outrun a pair of 4's, but with all the extra noise processing going on I'm not sure how much of the Digic 5 speed actually translates into fps capability

and you're right about the mirror being part of the limitation.  interesting to see what 7D2 does in that regard, i.e. will it offer a mirror-up burst, or what is the practical upper limit when the mirror is operational.