Ebrahim Saadawi said:
But just another point, remember that this is a 20 thousand dollars camera. So the sensor technology and performance and accuracy will probably be ahead from the sensor technology put on a 3K DSLR. Just a though. Even the C100 MKII, a 6000$ cinema camera doesn't get these sensor technology upgrades, so more likely to see 15 stops of DR and noise levels of a C300II in a 1DxII rather than a 5D MK IV?
The C300 mk ii is a US$16K camera. Which is a similar amount + inflation to where the C300 mk i launched, like the C100ii is not far off where the C100 launched price-wise. And like the mk i has been and will continue to be until 4K is the main broadcast format (which is a long way off) it will probably be a staple for broadcast work where that is a relatively small outlay.
And compared to the C100ii, the C300ii has a boatload of features (4K, slo-motion, etc), whereas the mki's were differentiated by recording media (CF/SD), codec (XF/AVCHD) and EVF quality.
Unless I'm reading wrong, the white paper also suggests that the C300ii will allow 4K RAW output via 3G-SDI, which I might have missed before now, and previously was the main difference between the C300/500 (as in the C500 did this and C300 didn't).
Its probably worth noting that the 8-bit C300/100 have 12 stops of dynamic range - slightly more than the 1DX/5Dmiii's 11.8/11.7 14-bit stills, which is achieved by using C-LOG. We can probably expect something similar with the C300ii and any increased in DR with similar tech in a linear 1DXii/5Div, especially given that the C300ii is using 2xDigic DV5s to drive the processing. But then it's spitting out 4K at 30fps...
Reading the white paper I'm not sure if the expected use of DPAF tech to increase dynamic range is what we're seeing here. It's also interesting to compare the situation of where the dynamic range sits with the C300 mki/ii - two of the the extra three stops are below 18% grey.
Ebrahim Saadawi said:
now I know why the C100/300 HD images look better than any other 1080p image out there that are just reading a 1920x1080p pixels and debayering. I always saw it clearly being MUCH superior to all HD cameras but didn't understand until now.
I eagerly await the day that 1080p quality comes to sub 3000$ canons. The closest I've got now is the generation one C100 at 2900$ but the lack of any slowmotion and useless EVF put me off entirely, the C100 MKII is perfect 1080p and ergonomics wise, but out of my range.
C100 mki can do slo-motion if you shoot 60i and then conform to 24p. Using Avid's timewarp effect (both fields/interlaced source/progressive output/adaptive deinterlace) looks great. If you want really slow footage - say 120 frames per second, then you're out of luck in-camera, but depending on the amount of control you have over the light you can often do a decent job using something like twixtor. The EVF is unfortunately crap. Your best option there would probably be to use the zacuto c100 z-finder.
To be honest, even if the 5Div has better dynamic range, 4K and gets CLOG2 and proper monitoring without Magic Lantern I'd still rather use a C100 for most things I'd do, where the built in XLRs, NDs, and ergonomics and handling just make it a far better overall package where the image quality is still plenty good enough (especially when shooting DNxHD/Prores onto an atomos external recorder). But then the 5Div will almost certainly also be a great stills camera...