Are These The EOS 7D Mark II Specifications?

[DominoDude]

I hope the 7D2 has interchangeable focus screen like 1DX & 6D.

I'm quite convinced that KatzEye (http://www.katzeyeoptics.com/) will have something cooking to fix it if it doesn't come that way out of the box.

 

[sagittariansrock]

Particularly like the built-in RT function... damn, I want it...

The more recent rumor update suggested that the -RT master would not be a feature, it'll be optical master only.

Oh, I don't really care about the 7D II.
All I want is a compact RT master built-in. Almost caved in and got the 90EX for $ 42 today, but remembered how crappy forum members had admitted it was, and how it's GN is worse than a pop up flash.
Maybe the 6D II will have an RT master? Or a 280EX-RT?

 

[Stu_bert]

Too many replies for me to browse through. I just registered in order to comment.

Very simple: If these are truly the Specs, then this camera should have been released 2 years ago. Why the secrecy for such Specs?

Nowadays I shoot mostly birds and use ONLY the centre focusing point. My main upgrade requirement would be for more pixels to define the tiny subjects. Second upgrade requirement would be faster focusing speed. Subjects are extremely flighty.

I broke my 7D to unrepairable condition and ignored the service department's offer to allow me to purchase a replacement body for a price greater than local stores were charging. Instead I purchased a 70D and it gives me more pixels on the subjects and focuses faster than the 7D. One feature I would like is GPS. If there isn't a built-in GPS, then I shall not purchase an add-on, but instead do a time-synch to a portable GPS and use Lightroom's feature to add GPS data to Exif data.

A camera with these Specs just is insufficient to bother with an "upgrade". Very disappointing. I may pick up a Nikon 7100 and obtain lens conversions for the long lens.

I think the DPAF feature took a while to develop....

 

[Stu_bert]

I think a lot sports photographers are taking pictures and focusing on the sport. Big agencies have runners who grab the cards, while the photographer flips to the other card and continues. Transferring GB of data over wifi? I doubt this would be quicker for the qty that a Pro photographer shoots....

That may be true for the few at the upper end of the profession but the pros I've met are paid garbage and often do it as a second job or as part of other journalistic duties. They certainly don't have assistants at beck and call. Transferring an entire card's worth of data? Probably not a good idea, no, but that one rad shot/series of that amazing play? Sure, preview shot->upload to editing desk->publish->done. That would be amazing and in this day and age its gonna start being a lot more common.

My question, that I've asked others and still haven't got an answer to, is why should wifi be specifically excluded? It would cost nothing to the end user and it would have use to some percentage of photographers. In fact, a well implemented, fully integrated wifi would be a godsend for many. The opposition just sounds, to me, like curmudgeonly old men complaining about kids these days with their idroids and googlefaces.

It's going to be a mini 1DX with extra reach, but not as good high iso quality and not the same frame rate, otherwise it eats too much into the high end range. That for me is sound economics, not so much marketing.

e: I keep seeing people say that they understand Canon purposely limiting the burst rate because of marketing. So, another question: who here that owns a 1DX would sell it off for a 7DII, spec'd as listed, if it shot 12fps and pocket the extra cash? Who here would purchase a 7DII, spec'd as listed, that shot 12fps over a 1DX if money were not the limiting factor? I sure as heck wouldn't!

How many Pro's want a 2nd body when they do events? Heck, I'm not a pro, but I take 2 bodies everywhere I go. Now, if you can get a cheap variant which will do 90% of your Pro body, would you? What about if it only did 50%?

If you were looking into becoming a Pro, which would you buy? The MK II or the 1DX? And surely value for money is an important factor for most Pro's - whatever the invest they need to recoup, so money is rarely no object.

If you could afford a 60K Porsche, and then they bought out a better spec'd model for 30K, just how ecstatic would you be?

Sometime cannibalization of your high end kit works. Again, I'd like to think that Canon know their audience (1DX owners) better than we do, and therefore what their reaction would be like.

Back to the wifi - I've not seen the implementation in the 6D or other Canons personally but I thought the implementation was not so clever (in terms of the SW). Canon, Nikon and others are indeed poor when it comes to an integrated system and understanding the benefits of good workflow and expandability. Another reason why smartphones are so popular. And I don't think they should go away and do their own thing, i think integration into smartphones is easiest - be part of that ecosystem, allow simple transfer so the phone can edit and publish. I think trying to get your dSLR to log in with credentials to your blog or website, name it something, allow you to put some caption and then make it ready for publication is just too much right now. In fact I think that boat has gone. No, integrate with your phone, hence why maybe BT would be better in that respect.

Would I like wifi in every Canon body & GPS? Yes please. Until then I use a camranger and either Iphone gps logging or an external GPS. I previously used eye-fi for the same purpose.


@Jrista - you shoot with a 7D. You've shown that you can take good pictures with it. I get your frustration with Canon's release schedule. Who knows the exact reason. But as a complete solution, if you can get better elsewhere then you would have moved. Is a 70D sensor really that bad? Based on it's target market, I think the MK II will do well. Even with a tweaked 70D sensor.

 

[MichaelHodges]

y.

High ISO? In the DPReview and IR studio comparisons the 70D looks pretty much the same as the D7100 (for example). I would shoot either to 6400 if need be.

I put the camera away at ISO 1250. And I own it.

Color? Canon seems to have nailed that one. Other people complain and profile their sensors to try and match Canon color.

Big fan of Canon color.

 

[dtaylor]

y.

High ISO? In the DPReview and IR studio comparisons the 70D looks pretty much the same as the D7100 (for example). I would shoot either to 6400 if need be.

I put the camera away at ISO 1250. And I own it.

I guess you would be putting any APS-C away then. Makes sense if you want 24-36" prints. Not so much if you're posting online or printing to 8x10.

The 7D could make a nice ISO 3200 8x10, with noise that looked like tight film grain from a low speed portrait film, as long as you nailed exposure.

 

[Don Haines]

y.

High ISO? In the DPReview and IR studio comparisons the 70D looks pretty much the same as the D7100 (for example). I would shoot either to 6400 if need be.

I put the camera away at ISO 1250. And I own it.

I guess you would be putting any APS-C away then. Makes sense if you want 24-36" prints. Not so much if you're posting online or printing to 8x10.

The 7D could make a nice ISO 3200 8x10, with noise that looked like tight film grain from a low speed portrait film, as long as you nailed exposure.

ISO 12800 and 1/30th second at F2.8 on a 60D with a 100F2.8L. This was taken in a venue where flash was not allowed.... and before anyone jumps on me for not using a FF camera under such conditions, this was a test of the camera pushed to it's limits... and I had a 5D2 sitting on the table in front of me.

Processing was minimal.... white balance and top noise slider in Lightroom.

What is scary is that the Sony A7S can do this at ISO204,800!

 

[jrista]

I'm still bummed that Canon has STILL not demonstrated they are getting competitive again on the sensor front...re-purposing the 70D sensor in the 7D II just smells really sloppy and cheap....

The 70D sensor is competitive. So what would you like them to do?

Resolution? Better be north of 40 MP to see a real difference, and that's only for those of us who regularly make large prints of finely detailed subject matter (i.e. landscapes shot from a tripod at optimum apertures). Not even Sony can pull that off in APS-C right now and retain high ISO/DR.

Total DR? The 70D is 1/3 stop behind Exmor.

Shadow latitude (noise)? You yourself showed how ridiculously small the difference is when NR is intelligently applied. When I first saw a Canon v Exmor pushed shadow test I thought the tester was purposely lying because I had never seen noise that bad...because I never turn off default NR when pushing shadows hard. In fact I apply more! I routinely push shadows 2-3 stops even with the old, noisy, 7D sensor. The thing I run into pushing shadows is not noise, but a tonality/fine detail/microcontrast wall, and you hit the same wall on Sony.

High ISO? In the DPReview and IR studio comparisons the 70D looks pretty much the same as the D7100 (for example). I would shoot either to 6400 if need be.

Color? Canon seems to have nailed that one. Other people complain and profile their sensors to try and match Canon color.

The next major jumps are going to involve 16-bit designs, multilayer sensors, or some other technology twist. We are well into diminishing returns given the state of sensor fabrication right now.

The only thing "wrong" with Canon's sensors is they score poorly over at DxO relative to Exmor. So do Hasselblad medium format sensors! Only Hasselblad fans are sophisticated enough to know DxO is a joke. I doubt any of their users are silly enough to jump on a forum and say "If Hasselblad doesn't do something about these sensors I'm buying a D810!"

I hope Canon makes a major jump in the 7D2 sensor by applying NR in camera even to RAWs and therefore gaming DxO to get a higher score ;D

Well, your just plain wrong about the DR. Your using IR's "total DR" number, which is irrelevant, as it doesn't take into account noise. This doesn't even refer to DXO's numbers (which are all based on the Print DR number that I loath)....across the board, whoever's measured DR on Canon sensors, from the noise floor to the FWC, regardless of whether they get 9.5 stops and 12 stops, or 11 stops and 13.2 stops, or 12 stops and 14.4 stops, it doesn't really matter. Even IR's results where they don't completely ignore noise even jive, and IR ALSO gets approximately a two-stop difference between Canon sensors and Exmors.

You are correct that some careful NR can close the gap. Thing is, if you actually look at my sample images I recently posted, there is still a gap. And, it was extra work to do the NR on the 5D III image. The real kicker is the gap is growing. Other manufacturers are not sitting still. Today, were still capped at 14 stops. I don't think we'll be stuck with 14-bit ADC units for long...technology is moving far too fast for that. There are already some sensors in the astrophotography world that get anywhere from 97-150dB worth of dynamic range. That is 16.2 to 25 stops of dynamic range! Those astro cameras use...yup, Sony, Aptina, etc. sensors.

It isn't just about DR either. As others have stated, 4k video recording is starting to become a more common feature among competitors, and the quality of that video is higher than you can get with a Canon. DIGIC 6 may change that, but at the moment, the video processing in competitors like the A7s or GH4 is superior, and the video quality is supreme.

I've also been getting more and more into astrophotography equipment. I've purchased some equipment lately that uses sensors from Sony and Aptina. I'll be getting a high end CCD camera that uses a Kodak (now TrueSense Imaging, since Kodak went bankrupt) sensor. Every single sensor I'm encountering these days, even slightly older CCD sensors (which are pretty much just a matrix of CCDs with shift registers or global readout, but otherwise none of the additional processing that CMOS sensors have) that have been paired with newer supporting circuitry, is better than Canon's sensors.

Some of these things are RADICALLY superior to what Canon has to offer. I have a QHY5L-II camera which uses an Aptina CMOS sensor. This thing has 74% Q.E. thanks to high grade silicon, it has exceptionally low dark current, and it has extremely low read noise. This sensor sees deeper into the universe than I thought possible. (And, annoyingly enough, Sony STILL has a better sensor than this one! Their new ICX line, the 674, 694, and 814, all have even lower dark current and 77% Q.E.!! Freakin Sony...wherever there is a damn good sensor, they seem to have a better one...)

I've been reading every bit of sensor news that comes out lately. The sensor market keeps finding new niches. The latest one is the automative rear view sensor market. There are already some incredible innovations for that. Interestingly enough, the whole "Magic Lantern Dual ISO" thing? Other companies are now actually patenting designs for sensors that use a "dual-gain" technique for high speed, high dynamic range video supported directly in the hardware (for when your rear view is directly illuminated by the sun or something like that.) My QHY sensor? That sucker has 120dB worth of dynamic range. That is TWENTY FREAKIN STOPS!! The thing has a 20-bit readout mode to fully support that many stops as well.

A year ago, I wouldn't have said Canon was that far behind. I DID say Canon was not that far behind. But in the last year or so, things have really changed. Companies aren't just innovating and filing for patents. They are putting the technology those patents describe to use, very quickly. Canon's sensor technology is like a fossil compared to the technology that is just coming out now, and will be like fossilized bone fragments when the next generation of technology hits within the next year.

So, the 70D? It doesn't sell because of it's sensor. It sells because of the other features. The 7D II will sell for the same reason...it's other features. Those other features, though...they aren't going to keep holding Canon up forever. At some point, Canon's sensor technology, if they don't do something about it within the next DSLR release or two, is going to be so radically behind the competition...and not just Sony, but every other sensor manufacturer out there...that it will be hard for anyone to ignore the difference. What happens when Sony drops a LITERAL 16-stop sensor on the market? What happens when they figure out how to extract 120dB (20 stops) worth of DR from Exmor III? What happens if Aptina decides to enter the larger form factor market, bringing all of their high dynamic range technology to those sensors as well? Omnivision and Si Onyx are out there with cameras that use black silicon that seem to have achieved nearly 100% Q.E. They can shoot high speed video in nothing but starlight and a thin crescent moon.

When you take in the whole "Big Picture" of the current CMOS Image Sensor market, Canon is a dinosaur. They may not be fossilized yet, but given all the technology I have now for astrophotography, and given all the technology that is invented or implemented in a product every single MONTH, it won't be long before Canon's sensor technology is completely and utterly irrelevant. (Assuming they continue to do absolutely nothing with it.) Layered sensors will only keep Canon afloat for so long if they don't get control of their noise problems. To get control of their noise problems, they are going to have to stop manufacturing ADCs they way they have been manufacturing ADCs for over a decade now...that either means doing something radically new with DIGIC, or better, do what everyone else is doing...move them onto the sensor. To move the ADCs onto the sensor, without having problems with thermal signatures or anything like that, they are going to need to have a die shrink, use smaller transistors just to get it all to fit without costing them too much wafer space, and preferably, use a more modern transistor design that supports lower power usage.

I do not believe Canon can produce a low noise layered sensor on a 500nm process. They would lose so much in terms of fill factor...SO much die space would have to be dedicated to pixel activate and readout logic, the photodiodes would end up extremely tiny.

Oh, and BTW, Hasselblad? They DID do something about their sensors. All of the medium format players did. They all use Sony 50mp Medium Format Exmor sensors, and they all have the same low ISO DR and high ISO noise quality (which is admittedly not any better than Canon's, but now MFD cameras are pushing ISO 6400, when most stopped at around ISO 800 at most before...some never even had selectable ISO, and just had ISO 80 or ISO 100) that every other Exmor sensor has. However, they also still have the total sensor area advantage (which is the sole reason they still performed well before despite not having more DR...when downsampled (i.e. Print DR), all those extra pixels packed into additional sensor area were a huge bonus...they counteracted, on a normalized basis, the weaknesses of their older sensors....the same weaknesses that Canon sensors STILL HAVE!)

 

[dgatwood]

Back to the wifi - I've not seen the implementation in the 6D or other Canons personally but I thought the implementation was not so clever (in terms of the SW). Canon, Nikon and others are indeed poor when it comes to an integrated system and understanding the benefits of good workflow and expandability. Another reason why smartphones are so popular. And I don't think they should go away and do their own thing, i think integration into smartphones is easiest - be part of that ecosystem, allow simple transfer so the phone can edit and publish. I think trying to get your dSLR to log in with credentials to your blog or website, name it something, allow you to put some caption and then make it ready for publication is just too much right now. In fact I think that boat has gone. No, integrate with your phone, hence why maybe BT would be better in that respect.

Maybe Bluetooth LE. If you do full-power Bluetooth, you'll never be able to feasibly support it with iOS unless you use the iOS-specific MFI protocol, in which case you'll have headaches on Android.

Wi-Fi works moderately well for that, though. You just set the camera up as an AP, turn Wi-Fi on, run the appropriate app to copy pictures from the camera to your phone, shut the camera's Wi-Fi back off (so your networking works again), and do something with the pictures. Is it ideal? No. Does it work? Yes.

 

[Zv]

I think I get the no WiFi thing from Canon's point of view -

"If you want WiFi in a FF body - buy the 6D
If you want WiFi in a crop body - buy the 70D"

Leave the top end bodies for specialized use (7D2, 5D3, 1DX). Works fine for the 1 series and 5 series, why not 7?

Just a thought. I would love to see WiFi in everything, or bluetooth or NFC or something!

 

[dtaylor]

Well, your just plain wrong about the DR. Your using IR's "total DR" number, which is irrelevant,

It is the ONLY relevant number. The definition of DR is not up for debate.

How hard you can push shadows due to noise (i.e. grain) is LATITUDE.

Even IR's results where they don't completely ignore noise even jive, and IR ALSO gets approximately a two-stop difference between Canon sensors and Exmors.

Guess what would happen if you fed Imatest or DxO the D800 and 5D3+NR file you posted? They would report nearly identical DR. But applying NR to the D800 will not reveal any more detail or bump its score the same, at least not with Imatest. (DxO thinks blacker blacks with no detail still = more DR, so maybe their score would go up. But it would also be useless.)

Picking an arbitrary noise/processing threshold and arguing about it is worthless for this very reason.

You are correct that some careful NR can close the gap. Thing is, if you actually look at my sample images I recently posted, there is still a gap.

Yes. You might even spot it on a 36" print with the D800 print sitting next to it :

And, it was extra work to do the NR on the 5D III image.

Usually the "extra work" involves moving sliders in ACR. I generally tailor my NR selections based on the image in front of me any way, regardless of sensor, unless it's base ISO and I won't be pushing shadows at all because they're all solid there.

If you don't want to do any work, then you probably aren't converting a RAW in the first place. For those people there are automatic 3 shot HDR modes.

The real kicker is the gap is growing.

No it's not. It's about the same today as it was when the D7000 came out against the 7D. Both sensor series have improved over time by small increments.

I don't think we'll be stuck with 14-bit ADC units for long...technology is moving far too fast for that.

Someone has to be able to fabricate a sensor that can produce useful bits >14 first. If someone does that at Photokina while Canon ships a 70D sensor variant, then Canon has a problem. But even Sony's 12 MP FF sensor isn't doing that yet so I kind of doubt it.

As others have stated, 4k video recording is starting to become a more common feature among competitors, and the quality of that video is higher than you can get with a Canon.

I'll give you that one. As a stills guy I don't personally care, but Canon needs to start shipping 4k as well as some of the other features of ML.

I've also been getting more and more into astrophotography equipment...Some of these things are RADICALLY superior to what Canon has to offer.

But these are also niche tools, are they not? In terms of general purpose cameras, I'll grant that a Sony Exmor is a better choice for astro, but it's not like you can't do good astro with a 5D2/3 or 6D. Flickr is full of those shots.

That is TWENTY FREAKIN STOPS!! The thing has a 20-bit readout mode to fully support that many stops as well.

But we don't see that in any general purpose, high resolution ILC gear. So what's the trade off? If it doesn't arrive in our cameras for two years, and Canon does the same thing at the same time or shortly after Sony (for example), then they're not way behind. They would be way behind if Sony's current FF sensors had 20 stops.

So, the 70D? It doesn't sell because of it's sensor.

The 70D has an excellent sensor that is competitive now. If Sony brings out a 20 stop ISO 25,600 APS-C monster tomorrow, that will change. But you're reading about all this new stuff that no one has yet in a general purpose ILC line. Which means there is a trade off...maybe as simple as fab yields...that everyone is experiencing.

What happens when Sony drops a LITERAL 16-stop sensor on the market?

Canon will respond. Even if it means buying the sensor from Sony, if their market is threatened they will respond. But my guess is that 16-stop sensor is not coming as soon as you imagine, nor is Canon's that far behind. Plus, I see a lot of patents coming from Canon for RGB multilayer sensors. Foveon shot themselves in the foot by overstating the advantage, but the advantage is significant. Anyone else doing any R&D here?

To get control of their noise problems, they are going to have to stop manufacturing ADCs they way they have been manufacturing ADCs for over a decade now...

When it affects their market share I'm sure they will. They're still #1, and the smart company pockets profits but has tech ready to go when they need it. I know that sucks when you want to see rapid innovation, but it's typical behavior. If you're the underdog you innovate wildly...and often lose money...trying to get at the top dog. If you're the top dog, you protect your position.

 

[x-vision]

It is the ONLY relevant number. The definition of DR is not up for debate.

How hard you can push shadows due to noise (i.e. grain) is LATITUDE.

Look, man, call it anything you want. Here's the deal, though:

FF cameras have less noise than crop cameras. No one argues about that.
With ... ahem ... LATITUDE, it's the exact same thing: you have less noise in the shadows.

But in both cases, it's all about having less noise.

And it's very silly to argue that with some extra noise reduction, things get equalized. No, they don't.
By the same token, you can clean up an image from a crop camera and proclaim that crop is better than FF.
Would anyone take you seriously if you do that?

So, why are you doing it for DR ??

Having more DR (what you call latitude) gives you images with cleaner shadows - just like a FF camera gives you cleaner images overall.
And having cleaner shadows/images is a clear advantage. Why are you downplaying it?
What you are doing is the same as downplaying the noise advantage of FF vs crop.

It seems to me that you just can't accept that Canon, your home team, is not winning in this particular instance.

 

[Zv]

Are there really that many indie movie makers that are shooting in 4K nowadays or is this just all baloney?

4K is the future-proof format. That's why it's important even now, when 4K TVs are still not the norm.

+1

Ever shoot a picture and crop it? Same thing.... only with movies...

It also allows post processing image stabilization.

I know very little about video, sorry. That was why I was asking. OK I see the advantages now.

 

[jrista]

Well, your just plain wrong about the DR. Your using IR's "total DR" number, which is irrelevant,

It is the ONLY relevant number. The definition of DR is not up for debate.

How hard you can push shadows due to noise (i.e. grain) is LATITUDE.

I'm debating your definition of DR. You cannot simply shut that down at will. Your definition is flat out wrong. Simple as that. The debate is raised, the burden of proof is now on you to clearly demonstrate how Photographic DR is more appropriate or more accurate. (In my experience, "Photographic DR" is far more arbitrary, as everyone seems to define it or calculate it in a different way...there is no consistency, therefor it is near impossible to gauge it's accuracy or even relevance. Besides...the industry itself uses a different but consistent definition for dynamic range, one that is repeatable and consistent and comparable.)

Increased native dynamic range in the RAW file CAN ALLOW FOR increased editing latitude. It isn't guaranteed to, but it can. Specifically, an increase in dynamic range that is gained by reducing read noise can significantly increase editing latitude. A simple reduction in noise, however, say by an increase in Q.E., is not going to offer as much of an increase in editing latitude.

Even IR's results where they don't completely ignore noise even jive, and IR ALSO gets approximately a two-stop difference between Canon sensors and Exmors.

Guess what would happen if you fed Imatest or DxO the D800 and 5D3+NR file you posted? They would report nearly identical DR. But applying NR to the D800 will not reveal any more detail or bump its score the same, at least not with Imatest. (DxO thinks blacker blacks with no detail still = more DR, so maybe their score would go up. But it would also be useless.)

Picking an arbitrary noise/processing threshold and arguing about it is worthless for this very reason.

Not from what I understand about what IR is doing. They are feeding Imatest processed images...images that have had NR applied. Therefor, they are not actually calculating the real DR, they are calculating one potential amount of DR assuming a given amount of NR has been applied.

Regarding the noise threshold, it is not arbitrary. It is very well defined: It's the read noise of the whole system. Every sensor has a given read noise, and that read noise is usually dependent on the ISO setting. At ISO 100, the Canon 1D X has 38e- RN, the 5D III has 35e-, the 7D has 8e-, the 70D has 13.5e- while the Nikon D4 has 18e-, the D800 has 3e-, the D810 has 4.5e-. These values are fixed. That's the read noise of those cameras at ISO 100. That is also the noise threshold for each of those cameras. Those cameras also have a saturation point or full well capacity at ISO 100: 1DX 90367e-, 5D III 67531e-, 7D 20187e-, 70D 26726e-, and the D4 has 117813e-, the D800 has 44972e-, the D810 has 49601e-.

You compute DR the exact same way for every one of those cameras: 20*log(FWC/RN)/6. That formula results in the following DR for each camera:

1DX: 11.25
5DIII: 10.95
7D: 11.33
70D: 11
D4: 12.72
D800: 13.91
D810: 13.47

This isn't rocket science. It isn't arbitrary. This is what the INDUSTRY uses to compute dynamic range. Measured read noise values may vary slightly from documented read noise values, so DR numbers computed from measurements are usually going to deviate from DR numbers computed from official documentation for any given sensor...but overall, as you can see, Canon cameras over around 11 stops, Nikon cameras hover between 13-14 stops. There is nothing DXO-esque here....I'm not doing anything "extra", I'm not claiming that the hardware itself is capable of doing more than what it's really capable of because I chose some arbitrary downsampling point. This is simple, strait forward, industry standard dynamic range.

You are correct that some careful NR can close the gap. Thing is, if you actually look at my sample images I recently posted, there is still a gap.

Yes. You might even spot it on a 36" print with the D800 print sitting next to it :

Eh, what?

The real kicker is the gap is growing.

No it's not. It's about the same today as it was when the D7000 came out against the 7D. Both sensor series have improved over time by small increments.

Again, your basing that on invalid information. Canon sensors have not changed since before the 7D. Nikon, Pentax, and a number of other cameras have changed dramatically over the same timeframe. Now, it was understandable that the 1D X and 5D III improved in other areas. Canon's customers asked them to improve in those areas.

However it's been about two years now. Canon's customers have been demanding they improve in a different area, in the area of sensor IQ. If these 7D II specs are real, they herald an era of...no change for Canon sensor IQ.

I don't think we'll be stuck with 14-bit ADC units for long...technology is moving far too fast for that.

Someone has to be able to fabricate a sensor that can produce useful bits >14 first. If someone does that at Photokina while Canon ships a 70D sensor variant, then Canon has a problem. But even Sony's 12 MP FF sensor isn't doing that yet so I kind of doubt it.

Sony's sensors are getting very close to the limits allowed by 14-bit ADC. If what their BionzX chip in the A7s can do is real, they are feeding a 16-bit image processing pipeline 14-bit data, and that 14-bit data has extremely low noise. If Sony continues to make progress at the same rate they have been (and, if they stop gimping their own technology with a wickedly crappy RAW image format), the will be capable of using 15-bits very soon.

I've also been getting more and more into astrophotography equipment...Some of these things are RADICALLY superior to what Canon has to offer.

But these are also niche tools, are they not? In terms of general purpose cameras, I'll grant that a Sony Exmor is a better choice for astro, but it's not like you can't do good astro with a 5D2/3 or 6D. Flickr is full of those shots.

I use a 5D III for astro. In my experience, it's actually worse than the 7D. By a lot, really. The read noise on the 5D III is ~35e- ISO 100, whereas it is 8e- ISO 100 on the 7D. At ISO 400 (the ideal ISO setting for Canon cameras for astro), the 5D III still has 4.4e-, where as the 7D has about 3e-. Chroma noise on the 5D III is FAR worse than on the 7D. It is so bad that it actually makes it very difficult to get good results.

Now, the 6D is a different story. I don't know why Canon did not do with the 5D III whatever they did with the 6D, but the 6D has some of the lowest and cleanest high ISO noise I've ever seen. It's quickly becoming a popular astro modded DSLR for those not willing to spend $4-5k for a proper cooled CCD.

The benefits of the 6D are still having to compete with Exmor based cameras, though. Those things have a flat read noise curve. It's ~3e- at every ISO setting. The 6D has a slight advantage at very high ISO, however you lose so much DR at those ISO settings that stars clip. Now that someone has cracked the Nikon/Sony black point clipping problem (which used to be the reason those cameras were called "star eaters"), Nikon cameras are rapidly growing in popularity as not only viable options for astro, but better options. They can be used at ISO 100 instead of ISO 400, which gives you even more headroom to avoid clipping stars, which gives you even more room within which to stretch and otherwise process the images.

When it comes to astrophotography in general, it's a booming hobby. Thousands more people are able to do it today than used to. Most are using modded Canon DSLRs, usually T3s and T3is, although newer models, including the 60D/Da, and now the 6D, are also often used. However the DSLR is only one part of the story. You still need to guide. The thousands of people who are now able to do astrophotography because equipment and software for it is cheaper and more accessible, they are buying guide cameras. Those include guide cameras that make use of Aptina and Sony sensors. Many of those beginners go on to use Atik CCD cameras, which are cheaper than the likes of SBIG, QSI, FLI. The most popular Atik cameras are the ones that use ultra high sensitivity Sony sensors.

Planetary, lunar, and solar imagers are also picking up high speed video cameras, like my QHY5L-II, or similar cameras from ASI or Starlight Xpress. Planetary imaging is probably even more popular than DSO imaging, as it's easier to do, doesn't require as accurate of tracking, and can often be done when seeing is too terrible for DSO imaging because of the use of superresolution and lucky imaging in planetary/

It may have been an extremely niche market, however these days it is a growing market. A rapidly growing market. And who has a vice-like grip on that market? Canon? No. Actually, their grip on that market from the DSLR front is waning...again, because their sensors are no longer competitive. Sony and Aptina in particular have the best sensors on the market for astro right now. Nikon cameras with Exmors are becoming more popular, largely thanks to the recent work of Nikon hackers to remove the black point clipping.

I've also had the opportunity to work with some stacked image data from people who use Nikon Exmor cameras and even Sony CCD cameras, who needed help with image processing. Their data was without question superior to my own that I gathered with the 5D III. My 7D data was about as good...however most of my 7D data was gathered when average outdoor temperatures were -8°C.

That is TWENTY FREAKIN STOPS!! The thing has a 20-bit readout mode to fully support that many stops as well.

But we don't see that in any general purpose, high resolution ILC gear. So what's the trade off? If it doesn't arrive in our cameras for two years, and Canon does the same thing at the same time or shortly after Sony (for example), then they're not way behind. They would be way behind if Sony's current FF sensors had 20 stops.

If Sony released a sensor with 20 stops, I truly don't believe Canon would be competing. Not any time soon. It could be another thing like with the 7D...where it takes five years total for them to actually get something onto the market that can compete on the same level. I don't suspect Sony will release a 20-stop sensor. Not within the next couple of years. Not in a larger form factor anyway (they already have sensors that top 16 stops for the astro stuff.) However, I could see Sony kicking out a new Exmor II with on-die 16-bit CP-ADC very soon.

So, the 70D? It doesn't sell because of it's sensor.

The 70D has an excellent sensor that is competitive now. If Sony brings out a 20 stop ISO 25,600 APS-C monster tomorrow, that will change. But you're reading about all this new stuff that no one has yet in a general purpose ILC line. Which means there is a trade off...maybe as simple as fab yields...that everyone is experiencing.

Again, this boils down to your rather arbitrary definition of dynamic range. This is the definition of dynamic range that the entire market for sensors uses to compute dynamic range in decibels:

20*log(FWC/RN)

And to get stops:

(20*log(FWC/RN))/6

By this definition, Canon is behind by two stops of DR, or about 12dB.

What happens when Sony drops a LITERAL 16-stop sensor on the market?

Canon will respond. Even if it means buying the sensor from Sony, if their market is threatened they will respond. But my guess is that 16-stop sensor is not coming as soon as you imagine, nor is Canon's that far behind. Plus, I see a lot of patents coming from Canon for RGB multilayer sensors. Foveon shot themselves in the foot by overstating the advantage, but the advantage is significant. Anyone else doing any R&D here?

WILL THEY RESPOND? I mean, that's the question here. If these specs are true, and given the preliminaries last time around when they released the 1D X, 5D III, and 6D....I highly suspect they are...then Canon hasn't responded yet to the competition. And not just Sony. Toshiba is up there now as well, making APS-C sensors with nearly 13 stops of DR.

Regarding Canon patents. We've been seeing patents and prototypes out of Canon since before the 1D IV. I am pretty darn sure Canon already has a CP-ADC patent capable of reading 120mp out at 9.5fps. We've been seeing multi-layered sensor patents out of Canon for years. Those technologies haven't made their way into any cameras yet. Why? Well...if Canon is still using a 500nm process...that's why. They can't pack so much electronics into each pixel with transistors that large, and still have good noise quality. Their sensor fill factor has to be plummeting with the layered sensors (they say as much themselves in a couple of the older layered sensor patents, and one of them seems dedicated to improving sensitivity because photodiode area for each color is so small.) If Canon released a layered sensor in their next camera with a 500nm process, I highly doubt it would be as good as Foveon, let alone Exmor.

Canon desperately needs a process shrink.

To get control of their noise problems, they are going to have to stop manufacturing ADCs they way they have been manufacturing ADCs for over a decade now...

When it affects their market share I'm sure they will. They're still #1, and the smart company pockets profits but has tech ready to go when they need it. I know that sucks when you want to see rapid innovation, but it's typical behavior. If you're the underdog you innovate wildly...and often lose money...trying to get at the top dog. If you're the top dog, you protect your position.

Sure, they are still #1...at the moment. But that's also what worries me. How many companies that were #1 throughout the last three decades or so, who just sat and rode the waves of their past success without competing head-to-head with their rivals in a highly competitive market...are still around, or if they are around, are they still relevant in new modern markets? Kodak was king. Kodak was king for decades. Kodak even had a portfolio of patents for CCD and CMOS sensor technology....they just never implemented it. Kodak had to sell it's patent library, and they are a shadow of their former selves. They tried to ride the film wave too long, and sat on all their digital technology (or simply didn't know how to employ it properly.) Microsoft? They still dominate the desktop...but they are practically irrelevant in the new computing markets: Phones, Phablets, Tablets. Mobile computing. I still love Microsoft products, I think they are excellent...but it was too little too late. They now face a massive, steeply uphill, and extremely expensive battle to gain market share from the more agile and competitive companies that actually employed the technology in their patents. There are plenty of other technology companies that either stuck with failing technology and refused to switch to successful ones and died, did not innovate at all and died, or was too slow to respond to heavy competition and died.

There are a lot of parallels that can be drawn between Canon and many of these companies. I'm not saying Canon IS these companies yet...just that there are a lot of similarities. From a competitive standpoint, Canon shouldn't just be working their past success to continue selling mildly improved camera models year after year. It's going to rapidly turn around and bite them in the proverbial rear end at some point...if they don't have a game changer already in the works when that happens, their #1 spot could instantly become #3, then #5, then #10. Sony is improving their game on other fronts as well. While the reviewer called it "new technology", it is pretty much the same thing as Canon's 61pt AF system, but Sony now has a high end, high density reticulated AF system that can compete head-to-head with Canon and Nikon AF systems. At some point, they are going to start pushing the frame rate envelope, and if they stick with electronic shutters (and better, global shutters), they could race right past Canon's 12/14fps (not that that is necessarily a good thing...there is a point of diminishing returns there, and possibly even negative returns once you end up with far too many frames for a short one-two second burst...but still, it's another front of competition.)

The world isn't standing still. If Canon does stand still...

 

[jrista]

@Jrista - you shoot with a 7D. You've shown that you can take good pictures with it. I get your frustration with Canon's release schedule. Who knows the exact reason. But as a complete solution, if you can get better elsewhere then you would have moved. Is a 70D sensor really that bad? Based on it's target market, I think the MK II will do well. Even with a tweaked 70D sensor.

I do shoot with a 7D. I also shoot with a 5D III. However...generally, nearly all of my work is shot at high ISO. At high ISO, the differences between any camera on the market with similar sensor sizes is trivial. The full frame definitely does better...not surprising, it gathers more total light for any given identically frames subject. The 7D suffers at really high ISO, it does pretty well between ISO 400 and 1600, and there have been times when It's done quite well at ISO 3200. The 5D III does excellent up through ISO 12800.

However, at ISO 100? Both of them still have banding problems. You have a few stops of editing latitude...and actually, a bit more with the 7D in my experience than with the 5D III. I can denoise them pretty effetively with Topaz DeNoise 5....the debanding works pretty well, although again...it seems to work better on the 7D. The 7D has a pretty strict 8-pixel wide banding, so all I have to do is set the band size to 8 in DeNoise 5, and 7D banding is usually cleaned right up. Now that I have a 5D III, I've found it is a lot more difficult to clean up. The banding seems more random, and it still often occurs in both horizontal and vertical. To fully clean up banding on an ISO 100 5D III image, I usually have to sacrifice some detail. I can get really good results for downsampled images. I'd say they rival D800 downsampled images, and I'm quite happy with that. Any print smaller than 13x19 (7D) or 16x20 (5D III) usually looks as good as any D800 image I've printed. However if I want to print my landscapes, and I like to print them really large...? Exmor wins. There is just no denying it. It's got cleaner noise that is very random. Detail is crisper in the deep shadows. There isn't a hint of any kind of noise artifact.

I can take Canon files very far with Topaz Denoise. It's a wonderful tool. It can eat away at detail like a champ if you let it, so moderation is key. But when you really get down to it....Exmor is just better:

D800 (from Fred Miranda's review):

5D III (Topaz Denoise 5 w/ Debanding and DR Recovery):

5D III (Original shadow pull):

My DeNoised 5D III is just not as good. It's better...but still not as good. I used to be happy with that...but...I dunno. I no longer am. Maybe getting into astrophotography, and playing around with equipment that uses sensors from different manufacturers, seeing how much more sensitive they are and how much more dynamic range they have....maybe all that has changed my opinions. I just don't feel like sitting around anymore WAITING. I waited for years for Canon to release the 5D III. Even back then, I really hoped it would have a big DR increase. That was the age of the Nikon D7000 and the Pentax K-5, both of which had demonstrably better DR than Canon cameras. The K-5 was better than the D7000, it was a shadow-pulling powerhouse (still is today, even...it's SNR is still one of the best of the best.) I waited before the 5D III. I've been waiting since the 5D III. It looks like I'll be waiting after the 7D II.

As a Canon user...I wait. I WAIT. I WAIT and WAIT and WAIT. I even stopped waiting...I picked up a 5D III. It's better than my 7D at high ISO, no question. The 5D III is actually PHENOMENAL at high ISO....but, so is every other modern full frame camera, including the lowly 6D and the vaunted D800/810 and A7s. It's the bigger frame. But ISO 100? I was surprised to find that, from an editing latitude standpoint...my 7D does better. I do landscapes, I'll be using the 5D III for landscapes...but, it's worse than my 7D...

So...I'm WAITING...again. I'm so sick of waiting for Canon to do some thing about sensor IQ. Really, really am. I know what's possible now. I know that DSLR sensors will eventually achieve SIGNIFICANTLY more than they do today. Having nearly 14 stops of DR is just the beginning...I have no doubt now that the day will come when I could put a DSLR with 20 stops of DR in my hands. I don't think it would be a Canon DSLR at this point, though....AND THAT'S THE PROBLEM! :

 

[crashpc]

jrista: Who do you think will read your essay? :-D
We should talk about particular things and specific products, but when there is compression and even DENOISE applied right into RAW files (let´s say Fuji, and we know it´s many more brands and products now) how dare do you say that Canon processed image measurement is unfair? Your statements doesn´t seem to be valid to me. And there is even more...

 

[sagittariansrock]

ISO 12800 and 1/30th second at F2.8 on a 60D with a 100F2.8L. This was taken in a venue where flash was not allowed.... and before anyone jumps on me for not using a FF camera under such conditions, this was a test of the camera pushed to it's limits... and I had a 5D2 sitting on the table in front of me.

Processing was minimal.... white balance and top noise slider in Lightroom.

What is scary is that the Sony A7S can do this at ISO204,800!

I wouldn't be happy with this level of noise reduction. Looks too smoothed for my taste.
Of course, I noticed it only when I opened the full sized image. Looks fine within the thread.

 

[dtaylor]

I'm debating your definition of DR. You cannot simply shut that down at will.

Yes I can. It is not "my" definition. It is the definition that has been in use since Ansel Adams and Fred Archer developed the Zone System (at least). The first zone above black does not even have any texture or detail, just a tone lighter then black. And it is not dependent on grain/noise.

Your definition is flat out wrong. Simple as that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_range - Photographers use "dynamic range" for the luminance range of a scene being photographed, or the limits of luminance range that a given digital camera or film can capture, [32] or the opacity range of developed film images, or the reflectance range of images on photographic papers.

Luminance range. NOT detail that has "Sony Exmor" amount of noise or less.

Please also see:

Basic Photographic Materials and Processes, Third Edition - chapters 2 and 5.

http://photo.net/learn/making-photographs/film

http://www.amazon.com/Negative-Ansel-Adams-Photography-Book/dp/0821221868

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zone_System#Exposure_zones

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/zone_system.shtml

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/dynamic-range.htm

http://www.stouffer.net/TransPage.htm

http://cameras.about.com/od/technologies/a/What-Is-Dynamic-Range.htm

Shall I go on?

(In my experience, "Photographic DR" is far more arbitrary, as everyone seems to define it or calculate it in a different way...

The definition and method of calculation is taught to every single person who earns a degree in photography in the country. A very large number of printers and scientists know it as well. It is not arbitrary.

Not from what I understand about what IR is doing. They are feeding Imatest processed images...images that have had NR applied.

I don't know how many times I have to say it: if you photograph a step wedge and apply NR or scale it down, black squares do not magically become gray. Total DR does not change with NR.

You compute DR the exact same way for every one of those cameras: 20*log(FWC/RN)/6. That formula results in the following DR for each camera:

1DX: 11.25
5DIII: 10.95
7D: 11.33
70D: 11
D4: 12.72
D800: 13.91
D810: 13.47

Shoot a transmission step wedge with a 70D, 5D3, or 1DX. (7D value actually looks about right.) When you see with your own two eyes that more then 11 stops worth of steps are gray, you will know that your theories are false. Then we can continue and discuss why.

You want T4110 (41 steps in 1/3 stop increments): http://www.stouffer.net/TransPage.htm

Canon sensors have not changed since before the 7D.

Anyone who has shot a 7D and 70D, or 7D and M, or 5D2 and 5D3 or 1DX, can tell you otherwise. Improvements are small, but that's no different from the evolution of Exmor (i.e. D7000 to latest Nikon bodies).

 

[dtaylor]

You are correct that some careful NR can close the gap. Thing is, if you actually look at my sample images I recently posted, there is still a gap.

Yes. You might even spot it on a 36" print with the D800 print sitting next to it :

Eh, what?

???

Print the full image to 36", both the D800 file and your 5D3 NR processed file. See how many people can spot the difference without it being pointed out to them.

On a 96 ppi monitor you could also just put the two crops side by side and view at 50% in PS. My monitor is calibrated with a Colorvision Spyder that has me set brightness as part of the calibration, and I see very little difference between them. I can still pick out the 5D3 crop, but just barely. If your monitor's brightness is set too high it becomes easier.

But a landscape shot that included shadows pushed and processed like that and shown to people I know? Yeah...no one would notice.

So...honest question...how often do you blow your exposure, push shadows by that many stops, and print 36"? ;D

Side rant: you may be someone who just needs to get an Exmor camera for whatever you're doing with astro. I don't know. 99% of people who complain about this are complaining because they don't have bragging rights and that's all. Too much pixel peeping and not enough viewing/printing real photos.

 

[Stu_bert]

@Jrista - you shoot with a 7D. You've shown that you can take good pictures with it. I get your frustration with Canon's release schedule. Who knows the exact reason. But as a complete solution, if you can get better elsewhere then you would have moved. Is a 70D sensor really that bad? Based on it's target market, I think the MK II will do well. Even with a tweaked 70D sensor.

I do shoot with a 7D. I also shoot with a 5D III. However...generally, nearly all of my work is shot at high ISO. At high ISO, the differences between any camera on the market with similar sensor sizes is trivial. The full frame definitely does better...not surprising, it gathers more total light for any given identically frames subject. The 7D suffers at really high ISO, it does pretty well between ISO 400 and 1600, and there have been times when It's done quite well at ISO 3200. The 5D III does excellent up through ISO 12800.

Jrista - Most of your pictures are taken at high iso, where there is no problem. For Astro work, ok, clearly Canon is way behind there. Where you feel you need the extra DR/low noise is on landscapes on those occasions where you shoot awkward scenes (ie range greater than 11 stops), and you don't/can't use filters or HDR?

If those extra 2 stops and the greater latitude that you can get from Nikon are critical for you, and all other things balance themselves out, then you have your answer...

But, people have been taking amazing shots for decades, and printing them large, without problems. I get the fact of your frustration. I get the fact that sometimes when you have to lift shadows there is more work than would be with a Nikon or Sony. But, how many of your pictures which are up to selling

1) Are ruined because of the Canon sensor limitations?
2) Are noticeable by your average purchaser?

I think we all strive for perfection, getting the picture as much correct in the camera rather than post. But when you boil it down, how much of a problem is the Canon sensors (bar the Astro point which is well made)? Each and everyone of us has a different threshold. And whether we complain because wifi should be included, or whether we want a 100-400mm MK II or indeed a better sensor (i for one would love to get ISO 12 and ISO 25 which I used to get in film), it's good to provide the feedback for Canon, it's good to sometimes vent out our frustration.

But it's also good to put it in context - both from our perspective, and Canon. They're out to get best shareholder return. We're out to make the best pictures possible. Nothing holds us to each other - if we don't like it, then we can move. If we're a Pro, then we factor that into our business case to move. If we're amateurs, then I think the average one only has a couple of lenses and can move easily. Those with 4 or 5, not as easy, but still possible.

In my "photographic lifetime", the biggest impact to my photography has been having the time do it, and traveling to some amazing places - that's been the biggest improvement. Practice. Technically, live view, the 1D series of AF and the L lenses have improved my shots, the 1Ds MK III allowed me to take some great shots, but so did the 5D. Everyone's mileage is different...