Imaging Resource: Canon Q&A @ CP+ 2015

[Canon Rumors]

Contrary to my previous post, Imaging Resource has posted what is a very good interview with Yasuhiko Shiomi (Senior General Manager, ICP Development Center 2), Yoshiyuki Mizoguchi (Group Executive, ICP Group 3) and Naoya Kaneda (Senior General Manager, ICP Development Center 1), all from the Image Communication Products Operations division at Canon Inc.</p>
<p>They cover an array of topics, such as autofocus, mirrorless, the video performance of the new EOS 5Ds, & EOS 5Ds R as well as their commitment to lens development.</p>
<p><strong>This could be good news for 5D Mark IV development for videographers…

</strong></p>
<blockquote>
<p class="spacer"><strong>DE: </strong>Okay. Switching to the EOS 5DS and 5DS R, the EOS 5D Mark III is the best SLR we’ve ever seen when it comes to avoiding moiré in video. Will the new full-frame 5DS and 5DS R have the same pixel re-sampling technology as the 5D III, or are there just too many pixels to cope with to do that, even with dual DIGIC 6 processors?</p>
<p><strong>YS</strong><strong>:</strong> The method is a little bit different. Essentially, as you know, the pixel count is higher in the cameras <em>[than in the video stream]</em>. So for that reason we wanted to improve the resolving performance in the videos that these cameras are capable of taking. For that reason, we went with a method that was more appropriate for those needs. So with 5D Mark III, in terms of resolving power resolution, it’s not quite where we wanted it to be, or where we thought it should be. So to kind of resolve that issue, we took steps to address that in the new cameras.</p>
<p><strong>DE:</strong> Ah, right. And so for video resolution, the 5D III is very good at anti-aliasing and no moiré, but you felt it could be sharper.</p>
<p><strong>YS</strong><strong>:</strong> Yeah. We were confident that the moiré would be suppressed. However, we felt the clarity, or the resolution maybe wasn’t where it could have been.</p></blockquote>
<p><strong><a href="http://www.imaging-resource.com/news/2015/02/16/canon-interview-cp-plus-2015-autofocus-full-frame-mirrorless-5ds-video" target="_blank">Read the full interview at Imaging Resource</a></strong></p>
<p><strong><span style="color: #ff0000;">c</span>r</strong></p>

 

[unfocused]

I think Thom Hogan's "interview" was more informative.

 

[andrewflo]

It's good to know they recognize this weakness. The 5DIII and pretty much any of their DSLRs' video look incredibly soft. Compared to the GH4 or a7s' 1080p it has a lot of room for improvement.

As a photo and video shooter, I'd really love 4K in the 5DIV, but if I had to choose between 4K + 1080p of the current video quality, or just 1080p of SHARP video quality, I'd easily go with the latter.

 

[hendrik-sg]

There were no substantial or tough questions at all. No word about how long the outdated 500nm prozess will remain, why they have so much more readout noise than Exmor etc and nothing about any week points. The journalist fears to no be invited anymore, and gave a Marketing platform for the executive or was just to week personality to ask more tough, just allowed the executive to hide behind politeness.

And to be unpolite, the 5ds and 5dsr are in no way revolutionary, not even evolutionary, just more megapixel. That is what we see since the beginning of digital. They just catch up with the processing power of the 1dx, which is towards the end of life. This proofes that Digic 6 is no real improvement or that there is another bottleneck in the dataflow.

We can be sure, there is no improvement in DR, they would have mentioned it, even if there would be a developpment on the way. We can be sure, we will get no better sensor in the 5d4, and of course not in the 1dx successor, which is more about high iso and fastness.

Lets invest in some more expensive glass, and lets hope for the 5dsii

 

[jonjt]

There were no substantial or tough questions at all. No word about how long the outdated 500nm prozess will remain, why they have so much more readout noise than Exmor etc and nothing about any week points. The journalist fears to no be invited anymore, and gave a Marketing platform for the executive or was just to week personality to ask more tough, just allowed the executive to hide behind politeness.

And to be unpolite, the 5ds and 5dsr are in no way revolutionary, not even evolutionary, just more megapixel. That is what we see since the beginning of digital. They just catch up with the processing power of the 1dx, which is towards the end of life. This proofes that Digic 6 is no real improvement or that there is another bottleneck in the dataflow.

We can be sure, there is no improvement in DR, they would have mentioned it, even if there would be a developpment on the way. We can be sure, we will get no better sensor in the 5d4, and of course not in the 1dx successor, which is more about high iso and fastness.

Lets invest in some more expensive glass, and lets hope for the 5dsii

I was holding out for the 5D4, just to see what, if any, improvements they make in architecture or design. But, with the release of these two cameras, I'm not so confident that any significant improvements in sensor architecture is going to happen. What I may do instead is wait until the 5D4 is announced, and then pick up a lightly used 5D3 for under 2K. It would be a significant improvement upon my 7D, regardless.

 

[mackguyver]

I sure would have asked different questions, but alas, it is what it is. I love the comments below the article (mostly) ripping Canon for a lack of innovation. I didn't see those coming

 

[gsealy]

There were no substantial or tough questions at all. No word about how long the outdated 500nm prozess will remain, why they have so much more readout noise than Exmor etc and nothing about any week points. The journalist fears to no be invited anymore, and gave a Marketing platform for the executive or was just to week personality to ask more tough, just allowed the executive to hide behind politeness.

And to be unpolite, the 5ds and 5dsr are in no way revolutionary, not even evolutionary, just more megapixel. That is what we see since the beginning of digital. They just catch up with the processing power of the 1dx, which is towards the end of life. This proofes that Digic 6 is no real improvement or that there is another bottleneck in the dataflow.

We can be sure, there is no improvement in DR, they would have mentioned it, even if there would be a developpment on the way. We can be sure, we will get no better sensor in the 5d4, and of course not in the 1dx successor, which is more about high iso and fastness.

Lets invest in some more expensive glass, and lets hope for the 5dsii

I agree with the investment in better glass. The light hits the lens first and it has to be as good as possible when it comes out of there. Then the camera can do something with it. Some people spend a lot of money on a camera and then stick a crappy lens on the front of it. Then they complain about the camera. The great thing about spending money on a truly quality lens is that the lens can be used on lots of cameras making each one of them better, and the lens can transcend versions of cameras. Go with the glass first.

 

[LetTheRightLensIn]

Too bad he didn't bring up DR and the 500nm and so on as he actually seemed to be getting some real answers from Canon for once.

It's odd that they implied the moire would still be OK for 5Ds video and that it would finally have better resolution than the rather sub-1080P that Canon had been delivering.... and yet the Canon marketing people keep going on about how the video on the 5Ds is poor and not as good as the 5D3 and that there was no point to giving it clean HDMI out or zebras or focus peaking etc. etc. because it was too poor to bother. So.... something ain't adding up.

Maybe it could produce good video so marketing had them leave out clean hdmi, zebras, focusing aids, 4k, etc. to not compete with Cxx and 1DC too much??

 

[9VIII]

Well I loved the questions about the 400DOII, at least he got a bit insistent there. That was the highlight for me and hearing that the IS is so good on that lens is certainly making my wallet nervous.
I probably should get the 100-400f5.6 first though, I would use the close focus a lot, and after seeing the build quality I'm much more optimistic about the value of that lens.

 

[LetTheRightLensIn]

It's good to know they recognize this weakness. The 5DIII and pretty much any of their DSLRs' video look incredibly soft. Compared to the GH4 or a7s' 1080p it has a lot of room for improvement.

As a photo and video shooter, I'd really love 4K in the 5DIV, but if I had to choose between 4K + 1080p of the current video quality, or just 1080p of SHARP video quality, I'd easily go with the latter.

It's interesting that when the 5D3 was released, Canon and C.W. kept going on about how the 5D3 delivered perfectly crisp 1080P and that there was no softness at all. Yet internally, their engineers at least clearly knew the real deal.

It's also interesting that ML RAW gets nicely detailed 1080P out of the 5D3 HW and yet the Canon firmware delivers waxy, soft mush. So was it DIGIC? Marketing insisting they go for a consumer waxy look because that is what consumers supposedly want? Marketing insisting they give it a waxy look to protect 1DC and Cxx?

5D3 with ML gives some pretty nice 1080p if you can deal with RAW shooting, about the nicest direct 1080P from the DSLR. RAW does eat up space like made though. But it sure is nice to play with 10+ bit 4:4:4 files in post, a million times nicer than 4:2:0 8bit and get decent sharpness (also without much aliasing or moire still).