DPReview: Review of the Canon EOS R5

[Deleted member 384473]

Usability (similar to many other non-functions) does not have a definite objective meaning and a unique way of measurement. In product development, it is defined by an agreement between the producer and the targetted users. It seems that many users based on their understanding of usability for their workflow have found the R5 body and features usable and are happy with it.
But for some, it may not be usable due to their understanding and expectations. If R5 is not usable for someone, luckily, she/he has a choice to not purchase it. Simple.
Unfortunately some people hide behind the overloaded term "serious video user" and say that R5 is not for serious video work. True, Canon has a product-line for serious users and it is called Cinema line.
The YouTube hype attracts the "pretend serious video users" who want a Go-Pro style camera to set it and forget it for 2-3 hours and shoot 8K and be as cheep as possible. Neither R5 nor Cinema line of Canon is for this group. They do not have a choice either, because no other manufacturer offers what they want (8K format, sub $4K price, 2-3 hours continuous shooting) right now.

I agree, usability is subjective. I rather dislike pro talk this and serious user that. I don’t think anyone here is talking go pros, could be wrong. I want to record 4kHQ on and off with no potential overheating. I don’t have confidence in the R5 but this could change once I get my hands on one and I’d gladly change my opinion. An Atomos could most likely allow me to achieve my needs at 4KHQ according to *************’s test but I would like to test myself... but also, I could just invest in another cine camera. As far as I’m concerned, there’s no usable 8K camera sub $4k worth relying on. Again, this is subjective.

 

[Kit.]

If the sensor was overheating airflow over the sensor would quickly bring it back down to usable temps.

Can you please calculate how quickly that would happen?

(I wonder why people use radiators when they want to dissipate heat by airflow. Should be totally unnecessary, right?)

This basically leaves DIGIC as the point of thermal overload.

Have you tried to swap the magnesium frame?

If the DIGIC processor was properly heat piped to the body you would expect the body...or part of it...to be very hot to the touch after overheating.

Not if you touch it in the area where it's covered by a low thermal conductivity plastic. Your fingers would just rapidly cool it (the exterior of the plastic) down.

Touching bare metal parts would be another story.

 

[davidhfe]

How do you know that Canon "forgot to heatsink the DIGIC chip?" It's absurd to think that you can make that judgement. Are you an engineer on this type of product? Have you opened up and examined the camera?

This product is everything that Canon said it would be. The outrage is phony outrage stoked by some Youtubers who may as well work for Sony.

Yeah read that one and thought "citation needed"

The thermals on the R5/6 seem to be weird. Hard to tell what the bottleneck is, seems oddly insensitive to ambient temperatures. I'm still surprised that the external recorder makes that big of a difference. Would really love somebody aim a FLIR cam at one while it's shooting 4K120, coupled with some temperature reads from the CF card or inside the battery compartment.

It does seem to be more of a cooling down issue rather than a raw transfer of heat off the component problem though.

 

[mppix]

I am not sure anyone is standing by Canon 100% we are just being realistic. Keep in mind if you want to shoot 8k raw video you get about 13 minutes of record time with a 256gb card. 1tb gets you less than one hour. 1tb per hour is going to generate a lot of heat, and require massive storage requirements. It seems all of a sudden everyone wants to go out and film terabytes of data daily, and are now pitching fit that they can't. If I wanted to go out and film for two hours, that would be approximately 3 Tb's of data. What are you going to record all of this to? Are you going to change out memory cards every 15 to 20 minutes, or will you be using an external recorder? If the latter then you can keep recording. Either the camera works for you or it doesn't.

I have my issues with Canon myself mainly right now my 1dx3 is getting the crap kicked out of it(not really but kinda) by the r6 at less than 1/2 the price. I am hoping for some firmware updates for the mk3 for use in live view

Realistically, Canon is behind Sony in heat dissipation. The internals of both cameras can heat up to about similar temperatures of something in the neighborhood of 80C (maybe up to 105C if pushed). However, Sony's will dissipate its internal heat buildup in 10s of minutes, Canon R5/6 will take hours.
Very likely Canon has a solution but that either was not economically viable or could not be produced at scale at launch time.
In the future, we will likely see different bodies, e.g. frames milled form a solid block of aluminium.
I think mkii can resolve this.

PS. I say this as a 100% Canon shooter and don't particularly car for Sony.

 

[Aussie shooter]

Sounds like the wildlife camera I want. Pity it costs 7k

 

[Jonathan Thill]

Yeah read that one and thought "citation needed"

The thermals on the R5/6 seem to be weird. Hard to tell what the bottleneck is, seems oddly insensitive to ambient temperatures. I'm still surprised that the external recorder makes that big of a difference. Would really love somebody aim a FLIR cam at one while it's shooting 4K120, coupled with some temperature reads from the CF card or inside the battery compartment.

It does seem to be more of a cooling down issue rather than a raw transfer of heat off the component problem though.

I am planning to do this, I might head into office Monday and see what one of our thermal cameras is showing.

 

[davidhfe]

Yes, but that is not what the "flames" are about. They are about 4K30HQ and 4K60 overheating and once it does it takes 2h to fully recover [in a camera that promised 8K30 and was preannounced and announced as top level stills AND video tool...]
People were (IMHO understandably) expecting a S1H and A7s3 competitor + that Canon produced a competitive hybrid body. It's not. This is what the 5Div was to its competition at the time - a top of the line stills camera that does some video.

I'm splitting hairs here, but The 5D4 comparison is a little rough. The 5D4's video really did feel like an afterthought: Deep crop, MJPEG, poor rolling shutter performance, useless HDMI out. The R5 is a much more competitive package overall, not just adjusted for 4 years of progress. It is better at video than anything else with a 36+ MP sensor in a sealed body. Who knows what sony will throw into a A7R5, but the 4 is less than a year old. The Z7S does not appear to have big video spec bumps slated. I would expect the R5 to hold its ground here for a year or more.

 

[davidhfe]

I am planning to do this, I might head into office Monday and see what one of our thermal cameras is showing.

Swear to god you could rack up 50K views on YouTube. Would love to see what the bottom plate reads at—not sure why folks are trying to cool the plastic behind the sensor when there's a metal bottom plate that's, like, actually thermally conductive?

 

[scyrene]

Merely making an observation. It is what it is.

It undermines your otherwise fairly balanced reasoning, but whatever.

 

[privatebydesign]

Yes, but that is not what the "flames" are about. They are about 4K30HQ and 4K60 overheating and once it does it takes 2h to fully recover [in a camera that promised 8K30 and was preannounced and announced as top level stills AND video tool...]
People were (IMHO understandably) expecting a S1H and A7s3 competitor + that Canon produced a competitive hybrid body. It's not. This is what the 5Div was to its competition at the time - a top of the line stills camera that does some video.

Don’t be disingenuous , 4k30HQ is 8k, 4k60 with AF, that’s three options from many. You can shoot full frame 4K 30 with AF permanently even AFTER the camera stops you shooting in the higher modes.

Why would anybody with a brain compare the R5 to the A7S III? Canon do not offer a camera in the A7SIII space compare the R5 to the A7R IV, compare the R6 to the A7 III.

 

[Random Orbits]

Of all the camera launches the R has to be one of the weirdest. Enormous hype beforehand, mass joy on official announcement and now disappointment over over heating. I know nothing of video but even I expected a small camera to heat up if its doing 8K or high frame rate 4K. I'm not sure if people were expecting miracles. I can't even figure what people are going to be doing with the camera for it to overheat. Just like bad photographers blame their tools it seems like videographers suffer from the same thing. There are very few long sequences in any film or tv program nowadays. If you can't afford a proper 8K camera you have to live with the limitations and be creative around it. Canon has made a mess with the camera launch as its over emphasised the video element. I'm sure alot of buyers might want 8K but very few will use it and most won't be able to process it anyway. They won't even have the memory space for it. Canon needs to remember that most of its buyers are photographers. By pausing on the supply of the R5 to correct 8K video overheating they've left early buyers with a potentially inferior camera to what ever changes they will make. They would have been better off delivering only 4K but they couldn't resist the marketing value of being the first consumer 8K camera (even if it did overheat).
I think the lesson for me in this whole debacle is that camera improvements from now on are marginal and being technically better or more creative is far more important having more FPS or focusing system or 8K video. If you can't make an interesting video in HD, 8K won't be much use to you.

They could have only delivered 4K with a camera with ~45 MP? With that many pixels, you have to process the output to get it to 4K. The Sony A7S3 is designed around 4K and has 12 MP. Sony chose video for A7S3. Canon chose stills. The R5's competitor isn't the A7S3, it's the A7R4. 45 vs. 61 MP, and what can the A7R4 do video-wise? 4K at 30 fps at 8 bit. 8 bit not 10 bit like the Canon, and only up to 30 fps whereas the Canon can do 120 fps. Yes, the R5 has 8K if the USER wants to USE it and has better 4K modes than the A7R4 if the USER wants to USE it at the risk of overheating (where is the A7R4's 4K60 or 4K120?). It won't overheat at regular 4K30. The R6 is better equipped to handle thermal issues than the R5 because it has to do less processing from a 20 MP sensor, but it's still more than the video-optimized A7S3.

Personally, I'd rather have a 45 MP R5 rather than a 12 MP R5 to compete with the Sony A7S3. And I don't think the rumor that Canon is pausing delivery due to heat issues is true, whereas you are asserting it as fact. Canon knew the R5/R6 will overheat, which is why they produced estimated run runs for the different resolutions and rates. That was not a mistake; it was by design. Sony users worked around Sony overheat issues, and I think people that need video will either use a different product, or use external recorders/fans to extend run times.

 

[Jethro]

What I was primarily interested in was the view on the IBIS, including in conjunction with EF lenses, and the verdict seems to be 'best in class' (6 - 8 stops). And autofocus, and low-light, which seems to be similar. In that sense I couldn't be happier with the DPR review. If I suddenly come by lots of money, this would be basically my dream camera.

Having no interest in video (let alone professional productions) I'm less interested in how far the video innovations can be pushed. Apparently the resulting video is (again) fabulous quality, but with strict limitations on the time available to shoot. I don't know, maybe I just missed all the marketing that apparently said this was going to provide unlimited FF 8k (and the higher 4k modes) - and just noticed that it was the ONLY camera in this class offering any 8K at all, after initial responses (on here and elsewhere) to the rumoured specs rubbished that idea because ... wait for it ... it was impossible to achieve FF 8K at all in this sized camera because it would immediately overheat.

 

[mppix]

If the sensor was overheating airflow over the sensor would quickly bring it back down to usable temps. Fans on the sensor after a HQ take do not work, so it's not the sensor.
If it was the battery, card, or card writer interface then swapping those out would immediately restore some recording time. Swapping them out does nothing.

This basically leaves DIGIC as the point of thermal overload. If the DIGIC processor was properly heat piped to the body you would expect the body...or part of it...to be very hot to the touch after overheating. But people are reporting it's not. You would also expect airflow over the body or ice packs on the body to dramatically reduce cool down times, but they don't seem to. Another wrinkle is that in hot sunlight the R5's recording times don't change much while other cameras take a big hit. (Of course those cameras cool relatively quickly and can be used again while the R5 sits there.) This all points to DIGIC being thermally isolated from the body and the environment.
....
Spare me the ad hominem attacks. Reviewers investigating this want to love this camera. There is so much to love. But it doesn't matter because the camera can't shed heat fast enough.
If you go back through my comments on this topic you'll find in the beginning I was on the other side. "Of course there are record limits...every fan-less hybrid has them...laws of physics...if you need 2 hour takes you need a dedicated cine camera with a fan...etc." I flipped when the data made it clear that the camera could not cool down and therefore would be unusable in typical hybrid scenarios, much less cinema productions. I also speculated, based on stills cutting into record times, that thermal issues would become apparent even while stills shooting, and those reports are starting to trickle in.
There's a problem. Either DIGIC doesn't have a proper heatsink/heat pipe, or it does but the materials are out of spec, or everything is fine there but the body is covered in Owens Corning R25.

Agree, this is likely what is happening: they reused what were the DSLR cooling solutions (https://www.lensrentals.com/blog/2016/09/lensrentals-canon-5d-mk-iv-teardown/) + the body itself may not have the heat conductivity needed.
Mirrorless likely need a heatpipe/heatspreader.

 

[Jonathan Thill]

Realistically, Canon is behind Sony in heat dissipation. The internals of both cameras can heat up to about similar temperatures of something in the neighborhood of 80C (maybe up to 105C if pushed). However, Sony's will dissipate its internal heat buildup in 10s of minutes, Canon R5/6 will take hours.
Very likely Canon has a solution but that either was not economically viable or could not be produced at scale at launch time.
In the future, we will likely see different bodies, e.g. frames milled form a solid block of aluminium.
I think mkii can resolve this.

PS. I say this as a 100% Canon shooter and don't particularly car for Sony.

I think the Sony is a paper cup and the Canon is a thermos. Hold a paper cup with hot water and you feel it in your hand right away, hold a thermos and you do not.

The Canon is less affected by conditions outside of the sealed internals were the Sony is more impacted.

This allows the Sony to release the internal heat much faster but is also quicker to be affected by the Sun beating down on it. The Sony also recovers faster because once the internal oven is off it starts to cool down right away. The Fuji seems to have a similar design based off Tony's testing.

I think this "thermos" design decision from Canon is driven more by the cold then by heat.

The sealed POE external Cameras I work with do not have fans for the heat but we tend to give them bigger bodies for increased surface area. We do however rate them as POE+ because we have to include heaters for when it gets cold, the cold plays all kinds of havic on PTZ motors, shutters as well as creates fog on the sealed domes.

I think Canon expects that the R5 will see duty in the cold as a Camera and wanted to ensure the shutter can still work. I am merely speculating so take it for what that is worth but I think the design was intentional.

As a hardware tester that has tested hundreds of products over the past 22 years there is no way Canon did not know it would hit thermal limits when pushed. They should have limited the 8K to 5mins and the 4k 120 to 3 mins and 4K 60 to 20mins. People would be pissed but they would have controlled the narrative.

Shame really cause the Camera is perfect for "me"

 

[mppix]

Don’t be disingenuous , 4k30HQ is 8k, 4k60 with AF, that’s three options from many. You can shoot full frame 4K 30 with AF permanently even AFTER the camera stops you shooting in the higher modes.

Why would anybody with a brain compare the R5 to the A7S III? Canon do not offer a camera in the A7SIII space compare the R5 to the A7R IV, compare the R6 to the A7 III.

I strongly agree with the second part so I respectfully return the favor. Don't be disingenuous, this camera should not have marketed as top-level video tool but as a competitor of these cameras. This would have saved us from the comparisons with S1H and A7siii.
Of course if it is a fully capable video tool, its value is $4k (S1H), if it is a primary stills tool, its value is $3k (A7riv, Z7) in the current market.

 

[scyrene]

Yeah read that one and thought "citation needed"

The thermals on the R5/6 seem to be weird. Hard to tell what the bottleneck is, seems oddly insensitive to ambient temperatures. I'm still surprised that the external recorder makes that big of a difference. Would really love somebody aim a FLIR cam at one while it's shooting 4K120, coupled with some temperature reads from the CF card or inside the battery compartment.

It does seem to be more of a cooling down issue rather than a raw transfer of heat off the component problem though.

I have a FLIR camera. You buy me an R5 and I'll do the test, deal?

 

[scyrene]

Average Joe Consumer doesn't read Canon telling them the R5 shoots 8K and assume this means "18 minutes, then a 2-hour cooldown," and Canon knows this as well as any of us.

Also: Would those who read this post and say, "but the R5 does what Canon said it would! Technically, it shoots 8K!" also be satisfied with a spouse who *technically* doesn't cheat, but still comes home with lipstick on their collar nightly?

This is a poor metaphor.

Nobody believed 8K would be unlimited, did they? As I keep reminding people, back when the rumour emerged, pretty much nobody believed it would be real, usable 8K. It's more than what people thought, even if it's not what people spun themselves into believing it could be subsequently. Get some perpective - no competitor offers this feature.

Overheating in the R6 and in some other modes is more of an issue - if it's as bad as some people claim. Let's see. But for 8K are you honestly expecting more? Let alone the memory required, the computing power to process it, and the lack of 8K monitors or tvs...

 

[Jonathan Thill]

Canon patents an awful lot of pretty bonkers stuff. Not a whole lot makes it into production, so I wouldn't read *too* much into the adaptor. All these manufacturers have had issues with thermals in these tiny bodies and are getting creative about how to work around it.

We patent everything we can think of, all part of the game.

 

[davidhfe]

I have a FLIR camera. You buy me an R5 and I'll do the test, deal?

Yeah about that. Need to get one in *my* hands first. Definitely should have pulled the trigger on that preorder faster!

Looks like I'm going to be spending some quality time with my old 60D for the next month or... four.

 

[navastronia]

This is a poor metaphor.

Nobody believed 8K would be unlimited, did they? As I keep reminding people, back when the rumour emerged, pretty much nobody believed it would be real, usable 8K. It's more than what people thought, even if it's not what people spun themselves into believing it could be subsequently. Get some perpective - no competitor offers this feature.

Overheating in the R6 and in some other modes is more of an issue - if it's as bad as some people claim. Let's see. But for 8K are you honestly expecting more? Let alone the memory required, the computing power to process it, and the lack of 8K monitors or tvs...

Expecting? I didn't market it, Canon did.