A few hours with a 5D3

[revup67]

since still no EC in M mode...

I get around this with the 7D (5D MK III should be the same) by using the M-Fn button as the bracketing kicks in. You can make any adjustment you want for EC. Yes, there are 3 photos taken but that's fine with me as I hope one of the 3 shoot be right on the spot.

 

[PhilDrinkwater]

When the 5DII was announced the 1DS3 already left it for dead in terms of an allround camera - yet history will remember the 5DII as the great camera and the 1DS3 as the turkey because it was 'overpriced'. Here we are 4 years on and the 1DS3 still has more advanced features than the 5DIII and in the landscape/studio segment it is still the top dog.

The 5DIII has morphed into a general purpose camera - lets hope history is kind to the 5DIII

It's interesting... the 5d3, I agree, is a general purpose camera. At that it does a good job - if you are a "jobbing" photographer (some weddings, some portraits, some commercial work, some PR work etc..) and you need a camera, it's probably the one to get: it AWBes better, JPEG quality is better, focussing is spot on, 22mp is enough without being too much, FPS is fast enough for most general needs and so on.

And to be fair, there are a lot of these kinds of photographers around that just need a camera to do it's job without pushing DR or printing at A2.

I do wonder how history will regard the 5d3. My take on the 5 line would be:
* 5d1 - first time we had FF for a decent price and beautiful image quality! Was the king of the hill without a doubt.
* 5d2 - pretty much the highest MP around for a while, yet still really good high ISO. Video was revolutionary and took pretty much everyone by surprise..
* 5d3 - the first 5 series which is a good allrounder: jack of all trades but master of none.

The other cameras have been fantastic at a few things but they've had disadvantages in other areas too. Is that enough to put the 5d3 in the hall of fame? While I think it's fantastic for my needs, I suspect not. The PR victory will be to the d800 I suspect.

 

[briansquibb]

Yeah you to manage the metering fairly actively, I bet the 1DX and D800 with the fancier meters might be able to be left to their whims a bit more. For macro with flash the metering on all my Canons has been crazy erratic from 1.5 over to 1.5 under, I might be doing something wrong there, there has to be a way to make it behave better for macro flash.

That sounds like the way you are metering on light and dark spots

 

[revup67]

Not sure if you all caught this on the Fred Miranda site with the D800 and 5D MK3 comparison but I do like the proven workaround feature on the SNR portion of this article which states:

"I know this is disappointing for Canon shooters but on the bright side, there is a workaround if you shoot RAW. Start by overexposing (up to 1 stop) above the correct exposure before taking your shot and then normalize the exposure later in software. This gives you the correct exposure but the shadow detail is much cleaner, just in case you need to push it a stop or two. Alternatively you could use ISO L (50) for low contrast situations whenever lighting and wind conditions allow. However, make sure that there is no clipping in the highlights (blinkies) because essentially when you are using ISO 50, you are already compromising highlight detail by about one stop. I've used this workaround for many years and have been happy with the results."

Link: http://www.fredmiranda.com/5DIII-D800/index_controlled-tests.html

I typically don't pixel peep or crop / zoom at this level and merely take the photo as it is - so this stuff doesn't bother me as much. These zooms are pretty extreme in the examples and at storing 36M images vs. 22MB and sacrificing on the higher ISO side, I'll still take the 5D MK 3 - should be here within a few hours. I can live with this!

 

[LetTheRightLensIn]

@ LetTheRightLensIn 10 posts on one page!!..
now I know how to reach your 1000 posts record.
You must definitely be the best Nikon man on this forum..

Yup because my review didn't save that every single aspect of the 5D3 is the best in any DSLR ever made I am thus a long time Nikon shooter and troll. You got me. You are clever!

 

[briansquibb]

Not sure if you all caught this on the Fred Miranda site with the D800 and 5D MK3 comparison but I do like the proven workaround feature on the SNR portion of this article which states:

"I know this is disappointing for Canon shooters but on the bright side, there is a workaround if you shoot RAW. Start by overexposing (up to 1 stop) above the correct exposure before taking your shot and then normalize the exposure later in software. This gives you the correct exposure but the shadow detail is much cleaner, just in case you need to push it a stop or two. Alternatively you could use ISO L (50) for low contrast situations whenever lighting and wind conditions allow. However, make sure that there is no clipping in the highlights (blinkies) because essentially when you are using ISO 50, you are already compromising highlight detail by about one stop. I've used this workaround for many years and have been happy with the results."

Link: http://www.fredmiranda.com/5DIII-D800/index_controlled-tests.html

I typically don't pixel peep or crop / zoom at this level and merely take the photo as it is - so this stuff doesn't bother me as much. These zooms are pretty extreme in the examples and at storing 36M images vs. 22MB and sacrificing on the higher ISO side, I'll still take the 5D MK 3 - should be here within a few hours. I can live with this!

Metering on the right - a good technique providing it doesn't blow the highlights. Particularly good on an overcast day or indoors.

 

[LetTheRightLensIn]

Not a work around since that just clips off 1 stop of highlights, if you care more about the shadows, yeah do it, but it doesn't increase DR any and your highlights that you want to protect should already be right at peaking to being with when trying to maximize DR.

Not sure if you all caught this on the Fred Miranda site with the D800 and 5D MK3 comparison but I do like the proven workaround feature on the SNR portion of this article which states:

"I know this is disappointing for Canon shooters but on the bright side, there is a workaround if you shoot RAW. Start by overexposing (up to 1 stop) above the correct exposure before taking your shot and then normalize the exposure later in software. This gives you the correct exposure but the shadow detail is much cleaner, just in case you need to push it a stop or two. Alternatively you could use ISO L (50) for low contrast situations whenever lighting and wind conditions allow. However, make sure that there is no clipping in the highlights (blinkies) because essentially when you are using ISO 50, you are already compromising highlight detail by about one stop. I've used this workaround for many years and have been happy with the results."

Link: http://www.fredmiranda.com/5DIII-D800/index_controlled-tests.html

I typically don't pixel peep or crop / zoom at this level and merely take the photo as it is - so this stuff doesn't bother me as much. These zooms are pretty extreme in the examples and at storing 36M images vs. 22MB and sacrificing on the higher ISO side, I'll still take the 5D MK 3 - should be here within a few hours. I can live with this!

 

[LetTheRightLensIn]

One nice new thing is that Custom C1-C3 now can be set to constantly update to your current settings instead of reverting each time the camera times out. Nice to not have to hassle with re-registering non-stop. Often conditions change as you shoot and you say quickly flip to C1 for some video and it may have timed out to something no good at all for the current condition and then you flip to C2 for stills action and it's timed out to wrong thing and then to C3 for alternate type stills and it's wrong. Now you can tell it to lock it in as you change and not need to worry about that at all. Nice.