Need help. Canon 60D for sports--is it better to pony up for the 7D?

If you can trade in the 60D and not lose $$ I would do it.

For sports, the extra FPS and AF will definitely make a difference. Most of the best action occurs in a sub second window. Getting 4 or 5 shots vs 2 or 3 will give you more keepers. My experience is that noise on higher ISO can often be fixed in post, but out of focus shots can't be salvaged - so AF matters.

If the 70D is announced in a couple of weeks (if you can believe the rumor here on this site), the 60D is likely to lose value quickly. The 7D will not drop in value much as it is already at the lower end of it's price curve, and I suspect it will still have advantages over the 70D in AF and FPS, & build, but not in IQ or high ISO noise. It is hard to determine the pricing of the 70D, but Canon's trend has been to price all their new products significantly higher.
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400 mm f/2.8 L Mk I

neuroanatomist said:
charlesa said:
I have an opportunity to sell version 1 of the 400 mm f/2.8 L, at a profit! Not sure whether to go for 400 mm f/2.8 II or 200-400 (but second option entails a wait of n months and a cost of n euro!). Ideas?

Given the choice between a vaporware lens and the 400 II, I'd pick the latter. Unless you require the flexibility of the zoom for framing, the prime will almost certainly offer better IQ and it will be a stop faster, plus you can use a 2x TC if necessary.

Thank you neuro, could possibly wait a bit more and see if that 200-400 mm surfaces any time soon, but last I heard photogs at the Olympics had access and the lenses looked close to a final version... but Olympics are now 8 months old and no news of the lens. It would help with the framing as you say, but in the end, a prime is a prime.
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5D3 vs 7D AND 6D

I have all 3 of those bodies. I would go with the 7D or 5D3 and would not get 2 bodies. The 7D is still a great camera and great for sports/wildlife in so many ways. Of course the focus system on the 5D3 is amazing for that as well though you will not get the reach of the crop and it does cost more. I would go with either of those. The 6D for me lacks in many areas of the body and features although straight picture quality was on par with the 5D3.

I do have a comparison of the 6D and 5D3 if you want to take a look: http://learningcameras.com/reviews/4-dslrs/92-canon-6d-vs-5d-mark-iii

The 7D is amazing for the price for wildlife. You may purchase that while you save for the 5D3 or just get the 5D3 now. You will be happy with either of those. Skip the 6D and 5D2, both which will let you down for what you are shooting.
Canon 6D Vs. 5D Mark III Hands On Review
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Albert and Chelsea bridges from Battersea Park

Taken from the Chelsea Bridge/Battersea Park area, with my 5Diii and trusty 24-105mm lens, following a visit to the (un)affordable art fair at Battersea...


Albert Bridge by RCARCARCA, on Flickr

EXIF: 90mm, ISO 3200, 1/40, f6.3


Chelsea Bridge by RCARCARCA, on Flickr

EXIF: as above except 35mm, 1/30


Battersea Power Station by RCARCARCA, on Flickr

EXIF: 24mm, ISO 6400, 1/13, f6.3

Thanks for stopping by...

Richard

Red light a challenge for band photos. Strategies for red light?

I can only reiterate what others have said. B/W is one way out to some degree. Obviously shoot all manual for more consistent results. And then if you work for a specific band try to point out what the issue is (in a way that drummers or even singers can understand) and see if they let you place a few strobes in a strategic places. If they let you you can even gel them. Or see if they can have at least a bit of white from FOH.

I've actually gone the gelled strobe route once for a band that really didn't have any colored stage lighting. I know that usually strobes and live music are considered a no-no but it's all in the communication. I've been playing as a musician for many years myself we were never concerned with flashes going off really. Certainly less annoying than the sea of cell phone screens at today's shows. Whatever happened to lighters?
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Why does Canon watermark their manuals

Harry Muff said:
I just went on a bit of an expedition around the internet looking to solve this problem.




Basically, you can't.




It's password protected so Acrobat won't re-save it as a Word document or allow you to simply remove the watermark.


All the pdf to Word converters I tried either didn't work or made an almighty mess of the layout.




Oh well...
No need to go on any "expedition", just download any one of the latest free PDF convertors and open the manual with that and you will not have the watermark show up, either on your system or when you print it out.
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Canon 5D Mark 2 or 5D Mark 3??

Robert Welch said:
The other option is the 6D, nobody seems to have mentioned it. I know it's video features aren't quite a good as the 5D3, but the IQ should be about the same (aside for possibly worse moire issues). If the video features of the 6D are adequate for your needs, then it may be worth looking at over the 5D3. It seems to me, many of the advantages the 5D3 offers over the 6D are more for photography rather than video (increased AF points, for instance). So you may be paying extra for features that are of little value to you.

6D has really been getting knocked for moire though

Since it has moire I wonder if it doesn't line skip too? Does it also give you a solid 1.5 stops better SNR than the 5D2 video like the 5D3 or not? I'd think not but then I saw a few vague hints that it does improve SNR over the 5D2 as well.
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"Big White" lens choice

neuroanatomist said:
9VIII said:
...but the 200-400 f4 is in the same price range, and kind of gets you "everything telephoto" in one lens.
I would at least rent the lens and see if you like what it offers.

What is the list price for the 200-400/4, and from whom could one rent it? ::)

The OP did say "this summer", but yes, I am making a few big assumptions. I should have said "if it's available" then it might be worth looking into.
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Macro 100mm F/2.8L IS with Raynox DCR-250 or 1.4 teleconverter or extension tube

Ok, so I have the 100L macro and 25mm extension tubes and the 1.4x. This is a sample image set. One is a 100% crop and the other is the whole picture reduced to 1152 x 768. BTW, no editing has been done...

The image was auto focused using live view - my eyes are not as good as they used to be...

Hope this helps. Sorry my images here are not as pretty as as Mt. S's :)

The resized whole image...


The 100% crop...
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Canon EF 500mm f/4L IS ll USM

garyknrd said:
If you have time I would like to see more with the 1DX. If you have them on another site I would like a link.
Thanks, Gary

Im still learning the 1Dx but I do love it. I have been posting in the http://www.canonrumors.com/forum/index.php?topic=8079.0 "anything shot with a 1Dx. I am still trying to find a proper place to AFMA the lens to my 1Dx as well. Here is one more.

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Canon 6D or 5D Mark III

Played around a little bit with the 5D MIII which I got as CPS loan. A huge step forward from my 40D, especially the AF and low light photos. Focus was amazingly fast indoors. this is the first time I am using a FF camera. The IQ difference is big. Some samples below. In have tried ISO up to 12800(first two images below) and still got decent pictures (better than my 40D at 1600). Have not tried 6D. I assume IQ would be more or less the same, but speed and AF would be something I would really like. Shutter life is another thing I consider as a differentiator, as I plan to keep the camera long term, as long as it works. The debate still continues, need to make a decision before the rebate ends. For now I am leaning towards 5D. I have to really stretch financially to accommodate it, hope I will be able to manage.
Thanks everyone for the valuable inputs.

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crap portraits of me

Sporgon said:
I think these are quite good, especially the first one: it's captured a moment, something only still photography can do.

( + I'm intrigued to know how you didn't bump into the camera on first shot. Did you both jump over it :D
It was 17-40 at 17mm, we landed right in the front of the camera. Dancing practice during last years helped ;D
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5d mark 2 long exposure processing time

jimy444 said:
Hi Guys
i am facing a problem when using my 5d mark 2 during night shots
I am shooting at 5 - 10 - 30 seconds and bulb and it is taking as much time for the picture to display on the screen/finish processing as the exposure time

example if i set the exposure to 30 seconds it takes another 30 seconds for photo to appear
and the buffer is going full and making me wait after couple of shots.
Imagine doing it on long exposures, 100 secs each.. i can only shoot couple of shots and it will make me wait to finish precess before i can even shoot another one.

is this normal ?
are you facing such problems, i tried with a friends 5dmark 2 and it is going much faster. even with a 200 seconds exposure the photo is appearing the second the shutter closes, and it is a big problem as i shoot night skies and scenery to wait that long for each photo...

The increased time is the built-in camera Long Exposure Noise Reduction (LENR). It exposes what is called a Dark Frame after the light frame, and that frame is used to subtract noise (assuming it works...in-camera LENR does not always work.)

If you are doing night sky astrophotography and want low noise results, it is better to handle noise reduction on your own. You can take your own dark frames, as well as bias frames, in addition to light frames, and combine them all with a tool like DeepSkyStacker. DSS will use multiple light frames to maximize SNR, and use a properly combined dark frame and bias frame to subtract the noise.

Light Frames are the full color exposures of the night sky. It is best to have as many of these as you can. A single light frame will be very noise, poor in contrast, low in SNR, and otherwise barely sufficient for a night sky photograph. Stacking two light frames produces better results with higher contrast, but you will still have a low SNR. It is best to shoot at least 20 light frames or more of the same stellar object to maximize SNR.

Dark Frames are exposed the same as light frames, only with the lens cap on. By "the same as light frames", I mean...EVERYTHING has to be the same. Shutter, Aperture, ISO, AND temperature. The temperature matters her because it affects noise. If you are shooting the sky on a very cold night, dark current will be lower than on a normal night, and noise will be lower than on a normal night. You can expose all dark frames after the entire sequence of light frames is done. It is best to have 16-20 dark frames to produce a master dark frame for that particular shoot. If you end up shooting 40, 60, 80 light frames, you still only need to have 16-20 dark frames.

Bias Frames are created at the fastest possible shutter speed, and the same ISO as the light frames. It does not matter what the temperature is. Again, it is best to have 16-20 bias frames to produce a master bias frame for that particular shoot.

Once you have a set of light frames, dark frames, and bias frames, you can stack them with a tool like DSS. Just give it all the files, and it will take care of the rest. It'll produce master dark and bias frames for you from their individual frames. It will then process the light frames...align them, apply the dark and bias frames, then stack them to produce a single, low-noise, high SNR night sky photo. Once you have the initial night sky photo...you are pretty much on your own to tweak the final outcome (which is actually quite a pain with DSS, you might end up better off by exporting the default output for tweaking in another program.)

The results of the above method should be far superior to single-shot exposures of the night sky, with or without in-camera LENR.
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Best SD card that will work in 3 cameras?

Vivid Color said:
I mostly plan to shoot skills, but maybe some limited video. Also, while most of my shots will probably be single shot, some pix may be shot using continuous. Any additional advice on the speed of the cards would be appreciated. Should I just get the 95MB/s cards to be safe?

And, finally advice on the size of cards would be helpful. Is there any image quality differences among the different sizes?
If you shoot a lot of RAW images, then a larger capacity card like a 64GB is the way to go ... since you are going to do a Safari in Tanzania I assume you would want to capture a lot of wildlife and if the wildlife that you plan on shooting happens to be birds or fast moving animals, and you want to shoot RAW, than yes 95/MBs is the way to go. But if you only shoot in jpeg and/or particularly not so fast animals, even a 45 MB/s card will be more than sufficient ... these days the 64GB capacity 45MB/s cards are not very expensive, in fact B&H is having a sale on SanDisk 64GB 45MB/s card till 31 March 2013 - it only costs $65.56 now
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