5d Mark III or 6d or stick with 7d

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MarcPool

Sep 12, 2012
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#1
Hi,
I currently own a 7d. And I am pretty happy with it overall. The only thing that really bugs me is the amount of noise and losing lock in Servo trying to track fast moving objects.

Lens wise I think I’m ok to take the next step. I already own a 50 1.4, 24-105 L, 100 L and the 70-300 L. I don’t think I will miss the pop-up flash, probably used it less than 10 times in a year and a half.

Is the 6d the next logical step or should I go for the 5d Mark III. Both are within budget.
 
#2
MarcPool said:
The only thing that really bugs me is the amount of noise and losing lock in Servo trying to track fast moving objects.

Is the 6d the next logical step or should I go for the 5d Mark III.
Click to expand...

Both FF options will give you much better high ISO performance (at least 1.5 stops). The 6D will be a step down for servo performance, the 5DIII will be a step up. So....the 5DIII is the logical step for your listed needs.
 
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#3
I made the move from 7D to 5Dmk3 at beginning of 2013 and am very happy. The ISO performance is much better, love the focusing on the 5Dmk3 - I am often still amazed how quick the 5Dmk3 will pull focus where the 7D would just hunt (especially in low light). In general, the raw files from the 5Dmk3 offer more room to play- lighten shadow details and clean up noise. Rent a body from lensrentals.com and play with it for week to see to how it fits with your shooting style, that made up my mind.
 
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#6
I had a chance to play with a 5DIII this weekend.

The low light performance is impressive. ISO6400 looks a lot better (less noise) than 1600 on my 7D, although being able to shoot moving subjects at a faster shutter speed also helped.

The amount of control over focus and tracking with the 5DIII looks good, although I know I need more than two days to figure everything out. There were definitely cases where the focus did not track as well as my 7D, but I've been shooting with the 7D since it came out and am familiar with the way it works and the way I have it configured. I'm pretty sure that with more time on the 5DIII that would change.

It was also nice to play with autofocus at f/8 (300/4 with 2x teleconverter). There was plenty of light, but it worked well and is fast (center focus point only).

Adjusting from crop to full frame was no big deal. The larger viewfinder was nice, but I doesn't matter that much to me.

The one thing I found lacking was the drive. Dropping down from 8fps to 6fps was a bit of a disappointment. I preordered the 7D when I found out it would have 8fps and I've taken advantage of that ever since. I found that I was missing key "moments" with the 5DIII. This is partially because I am specifically trying to get a sequence of shots - it's not that I'm just pointing and spraying. If I just try to anticipate the moment and get one shot, the 5DIII was good.

The 6fps of the 5DIII actually gave me something I haven't seen before (and don't necessarily want). I was shooting running cheetahs and the 6fps synced perfectly with one of them (on two different runs). I have 9 shots in a row of two similar alternating poses - both with all legs off the ground. Not a single shot in those sequences showing the cheetah touching the ground.

The other issue, related to the drive, is the buffer size. I found the buffer size of 13 raw shots to be limiting, especially now that I'm used to the 23 raw 7D buffer. I know I can switch to jpeg to essentially eliminate any issue, but I want to stick with raw.

Overall, I liked shooting with the 5DIII but I'm not going to buy one right now. Maybe if refurbs at $23xx show up again. But, until then the fps will prevent me from replacing the 7D with a 5DIII. If anything "pushes" me to get a 6D or 5DIII, it will be the low-light performance.
 
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#7
Etienne said:
Just a friendly warning:

Once you shoot with a full frame you may never be fully satisfied with IQ from the crop cameras again.
Click to expand...

That may be true (see my post above), but improved image quality isn't the only thing. I won't switch from a 7D to a 5DIII or 6D exclusively because I don't want the drop in fps.

The low-light improvement is very nice. I'm ok with the 7D at lower ISOs.
 
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#9
MarcPool said:
Hi,
I currently own a 7d. And I am pretty happy with it overall. The only thing that really bugs me is the amount of noise and losing lock in Servo trying to track fast moving objects.

Lens wise I think I’m ok to take the next step. I already own a 50 1.4, 24-105 L, 100 L and the 70-300 L. I don’t think I will miss the pop-up flash, probably used it less than 10 times in a year and a half.

Is the 6d the next logical step or should I go for the 5d Mark III. Both are within budget.
Click to expand...


Coming from the 7D's autofocus and at times having it "lose lock" for you in servo mode, definitely do not buy the 6D. The 5D3 or 1DX are your only choice as of now. The 7D2 will very likely have superior phase-AF to the 7D, as well (but probably won't quite match the 5D3). But the 7D2 is 9 months or more off...and certainly will not have the noise performance of a 5D3...or let you make use of full frame lenses the way a full frame can.

I own the 6D as my only DSLR body right now, and am happy with it. But I don't shoot sports professionally. I can make its servo AF work for me, but if my life depended on it, I would use a 1DX. The 5D3 is kind of like an older Boxster, where the 1DX is closer to a 991. The 5D3 delivers the goods at a fairer price and slower speed. The 6D is more like a molded plastic copy of a 458, with no engine other than a golf cart motor with batteries in need of charge. It looks great (or what comes out of it does), but is not fast...My hopes for the 1DX replacement, would put it closer to a 991 GT3. Sorry for the car analogies if you don't care for them...!
 
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#11
For fast tracking and sports photos in low light, do not get the 6D. For anything else you can take your time with 6D is the way to go, if that's the type of photography you do. 7D is my old camera and did me very well with landscape and daylight sports, but when you start pushing the ISO in dark, it's lousy with noise compared to 5D III or 6D. 5D III sounds like your camera if that's what you want.

You can see the performance I was getting with 6D and a ways back on 7D with landscape photos. Good luck with what you do!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/1and0hound/9487832321/#

Mario
 
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#12
Etienne said:
Just a friendly warning:

Once you shoot with a full frame you may never be fully satisfied with IQ from the crop cameras again.
Click to expand...

That's true for me up to a point (kept my 50D after getting a 6D). But when I nail exposure on a shorebird or zoo animal with the 50D + 100-400 at ISO <800, filling the frame with the subject and not needing to crop or deal with vignetting, I'm still very happy with it and the images it produces.

I do grumble more during post-processing, though, when I need to add NR to ISO 200-400 images and correct that minor magenta cast from the 50D. I barely have to touch photos in post with the 6D, unless I'm trying to salvage a shot taken in poor light or ISO is 1600+. That's a very stark difference between APS-C and FF that I still marvel at.

So despite the improvements you would definitely get with a FF camera, there's value in a 2-format kit if you can swing it.
 
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#14
i went from a 7D to a 5dmk3 about 6 months ago. i was never happy with the amount of noise of the 7D, i really think i might have had a bad copy.. it seemed high even for a 7D. if you can afford a 5d mk 3, i couldnt be more happy. autofocus is amazing, low light/high iso is very good. its an expensive camera, but worth the investment if you do low light or need fast autofocus of moving subjects
 
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#16
I was pretty happy with my 7D, too, until I bought my 5Diii. The differences between the two cameras are substantial.

The 5Diii's IQ is just way superior to that produced by the 7D. It is a much less noisy camera -- much less noisy -- than the 7D. I primarily consider myself a nature photographer. With the 5Diii I can get excellent quality images at ISO 1600. I find that the cutoff for the 7D is about ISO 400. I find the images produced by the 5Diii to be denser, richer, and more saturated looking than with the 7D.

The 5Diii also has a much superior autofocus than that of the 7D. I primarily shoot using only the center point and I find that the 5Diii locks onto a subject much more quickly and much more accurately than does the 7D.

Finally, I find that the 5Diii's dynamic range is much superior to that of the 7D. I get more detail in highlights and shadows with 5Diii than I ever did with the 7D.
 
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#18
steven kessel said:
I was pretty happy with my 7D, too, until I bought my 5Diii. The differences between the two cameras are substantial.

The 5Diii's IQ is just way superior to that produced by the 7D. It is a much less noisy camera -- much less noisy -- than the 7D. I primarily consider myself a nature photographer. With the 5Diii I can get excellent quality images at ISO 1600. I find that the cutoff for the 7D is about ISO 400. I find the images produced by the 5Diii to be denser, richer, and more saturated looking than with the 7D.

The 5Diii also has a much superior autofocus than that of the 7D. I primarily shoot using only the center point and I find that the 5Diii locks onto a subject much more quickly and much more accurately than does the 7D.

Finally, I find that the 5Diii's dynamic range is much superior to that of the 7D. I get more detail in highlights and shadows with 5Diii than I ever did with the 7D.
Click to expand...

I consider the 7D when it first came out, I really wanted the AF, FPS, etc, but I went for the 5dII at that time and never regretted it. Now with the 5DIII I have the best of both worlds. The 5DIII provides noticeably better IQ over the 5DII in every way, much more than the modest megapickle boost would suggest. The AF of course is great, but there's more to it than that.

The 5DIII is worth the extra $$
 
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#19
steven kessel said:
The 5Diii also has a much superior autofocus than that of the 7D. I primarily shoot using only the center point and I find that the 5Diii locks onto a subject much more quickly and much more accurately than does the 7D.
Click to expand...

Can you track rapidly moving objects that are changing direction with just the center point? When I played with a 5DIII this past weekend, I found the autofocus on static or slowly-moving objects to be very good, both with the center point and other points. I also found that it was pretty cool to autofocus with the center point at f/8.

But, I had some difficulty getting the focus to track accurately on rapid but inconsistently moving objects, especially running toward me. The lighting was very bright/harsh and there was some difficulty due to the fact that I was shooting through a fence, but overall it wasn't much better than my 7D and in some cases was worse.

Now, I've had years to work with the 7D and am pretty familiar with what I can do with it and I only had two days with the 5DIII so expect I can explain the difficulty as lack of experience. Overall, I was very impressed with the camera (except for the slow 6fps) and I expect the focusing would be better with more tweaking and more experience.
 
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#20
schill said:
But, I had some difficulty getting the focus to track accurately on rapid but inconsistently moving objects, especially running toward me. The lighting was very bright/harsh and there was some difficulty due to the fact that I was shooting through a fence, but overall it wasn't much better than my 7D and in some cases was worse.
Click to expand...

Did you try different AF cases? With proper settings, I haven't yet found a situation where my 7D would have outperformed my 1D X.
 
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