I would also like to thank Graham for the wonderful pictures and very useful/informative real-world review.
I'm new to this forum (this is my first post
) and the point I would like to raise, begins like this...
Against a lot of opinions I have been reading in various sites (including CanonRumors), I went ahead and replaced my wonderful 5d mk2 with a Canon 6d. Being just an enthusiast not earning any money from photography, I took advantage of the US Christmas offers together with the favorable Euro/Dollar exchange rate in order to perform this swap at basically no cost. I also bought the 40mm pancake lens and I'm having a hard time taking it off the mount... It is sharp, silent and it will focus just about anywhere you point the camera to.
At some point I would like to post my opinions about the 5d mk2 -> 6d transition, but right now I have very few clicks with the 6d. So I can only write about the things I'm sure of:
- I have no regrets
- Easier to carry around due to the smaller size/weight
- The (silent) shutter sound is ... pardon me ... orgasmic LOL. I just want to click, click and click some more! Silent is even better and that is my default setting
- Auto-ISO allows you to take snaps without much thinking
- High-ISO is worlds apart from the 5d, especially after ISO-3200. People shots taken indoors, with dim tungsten light at ISO 12800 look great. Just like that.
- A bit more responsive in general
- AF gives you more confidence, especially the center point
After I realized that ISO-12800 is not bad for me, I decided to try out that famous center point. -3EV and all. I don't really know how dark that is supposed to be. I picked the easiest setup I could find: my kitchen in near darkness and aiming at one of those largish wooden cooking spoons (i.e. little contrast if any). Equipped with the 40mm, the 6d nailed focus very fast indeed. 85mm f/1.8 no problem as well. Same story with the 50mm f/1.4 (this one surprised me actually). I would have slept better that night if I had not tried my 24-105 f/4L IS and 70-200 f/4L IS... They could not focus at all.
These dark pictures, were of course, crap. This made me think what meaningful picture would require the -3EV offered by the 6d. I don't know, so I would like to ask you this question. Can anybody submit a nice picture that did require this -3EV capability?
Finally, if I may deviate slightly from the original post, could anyone suggest a compact case just for the 6d and the 40mm pancake? The smallest case I have is a ThinkTank Digital Holster 20 v2.0 and it is just too large for this particular combination...
George.