The New EOS [CR3]

[Bob Howland]

An 18MP FF camera has the same pixel size as a 10.6MP APS-H camera or roughly what an 1D3 was. A FF sports camera with "enough" pixels allows loose framing, a real benefit when photographing activities where the action is unpredictable, such as rugby and football (both American and international).

Sports Illustrated has run 2-page spreads from 4MP images. They looked fine.

 

[bchernicoff]

And what if it is a 18mp full-frame Foveon type sensor with no AA filter? IQ would be better than the 21mp current sensor.

UPDATE: the more I think about it, this is the only way an 18mp spec would make sense. We've seen that Canon has a patent for a Foveon-style, full-color at each pixel sensor. If they ditched Bayer, went full-color at each pixel, ditched the anti-alias filter, image quality should be much better than the Bayer 21mp sensor. This could be great news.

 

[unfocused]

I'm still very skeptical. I just cannot imagine Canon releasing a camera that drops in MPs as their new flagship.

I cringe thinking of the reaction we'll get from people like MacFly who actually buy and use these cameras for work.

If this is correct (and I will believe it when I see it), I can only see this as a "Lord of Darkness" camera with incredible low light sensitivity and dynamic range -- a completely new camera rather than a replacement for the ID or IDs.

As far as sports and wildlife shooters go, I think Canon may feel that there is so little difference between the image quality of the next generation of 1.6 sensors and the 1.3 sensor that they will quietly move this market over to the APS-C line, perhaps with a full-fledged professional model above the 7D.

On the other hand, there's the possibility that all of this is wrong and the real announcement next week is for the new version the Calculator Mouse.

 

[Shnookums]

Sorry folks, I'm just not seeing the market stomach the range topping camera droping 3mpx after three years progress.... Sure ok, I can see the 1Ds being 18mpx full frame, even considering the cost involved in development of a new full frame sensor, but with a 24mpx Sony full frame sensor out there, the 24mpx APS-C also, talk of 36mpx at Nikon, I'm smelling lots of brown stuff here and if this proves to be true in terms of a 1Ds suspect a 1D being out soon after with a big jump or some kind of change to the 1D range where the sensor is upgradable, in the same way as the medium frame cameras - a data back solution.

If the 1D line truly merge, I would expect to see things like 18mp @ 12 fps... But! I would also expect that you can switch to 5 or 6 fps and gain resolution. Trade resolution for speed. Im no good at calculating stuff but what kind of data moving around are we talking about with 18 mp @ 12 fps? And what would be the resolution if the same amount of data per secs was moved @ 6 fps?

That to me would be the real merge of the 1D line.

 

[nikkito]

18 mp?

 

[digishooter]

IF that is what they are announcing, it's not what their customers are wanting.

I know 1dIV buyers are going to be pretty ticked off for one thing, since this would be the camera the 1dIV SHOULD have been, and the replacement cycle is pretty short.

A 5d3 or 1DsIV would make more sense. But, Canon hasn't made sense before.

 

[Ricku]

I dont understand what all the instant naysayers are whining about. Its all like "noo please dont take my megapixels blabla".

Stop and think. What if this camera has "supernatural" low light performance and almost zero noise at ISO 6400? That might be the reason to why Canon decided to go with 18MP, and if that is the the case then = Camera of the year 2012!

Imagine being able to use ISO 1600 - 2000 as base ISO, because it looks just as good as ISO 100.

 

[Loswr]

Camera just needs to be better than current Nikon D3s

Canon needs to do better than beating a 2 year old camera - they need to be competitive with whatever Nikon brings forth to replace the D3s.

 

[Polansky]

Sports photographers (Pros) use their 1D MK IV cameras along with their 400mm f/2.8 lenses.

All of a sudden, they will need a 520mm f/2.8 lens to get the same field of view, or crop to a 10MP image rather than the 16mp image they now have once again to get the same field of view.

I'd say that would be less useful for them.

Who cares about the handfull of sports photographers while most professionals are wedding photographers, portrait photographers and photographers for editorial stuff.

The count is easy.
For every sports photographer there are at least 10 other pro's that rather prefer to have a full frame camera then a crop camera.

I bet Canon would like to see all those pro's that now choose the 5D above the 1Ds to come back to the 1 series and this is the way to reach that goal. Especially when it turns out that this 18MP camera is actually a foveon sensor like camera...

Its what all others pro photographers except for those handfull sports photographers have been hoping for.

 

[Bob Howland]

I dont understand what all the instant naysayers are whining about. Its all like "noo please dont take my megapixels blabla".

Stop and think. What if this camera has "supernatural" low light performance and almost zero noise at ISO 6400? That might be the reason to why Canon decided to go with 18MP, and if that is the the case then = Camera of the year 2012!

Imagine being able to use ISO 1600 - 2000 as base ISO, because it looks just as good as ISO 100.

Unless, of course, the Nikon D4 is just as good.

 

[benem]

Who cares about the handfull of sports photographers while most professionals are wedding photographers, portrait photographers and photographers for editorial stuff.

The count is easy.
For every sports photographer there are at least 10 other pro's that rather prefer to have a full frame camera then a crop camera.

I bet Canon would like to see all those pro's that now choose the 5D above the 1Ds to come back to the 1 series and this is the way to reach that goal. Especially when it turns out that this 18MP camera is actually a foveon sensor like camera...

Its what all others pro photographers except for those handfull sports photographers have been hoping for.

The 12fps let me think that it is also destinated to sports photographers.

 

[fifowarehouse]

I wonder....what is the PRICE TAG for this camera?

 

[NormanBates]

this is either foveon-like, or simething I truly don't understand

if b), it better have some amazing selling point in other areas, otherwise it may sell a lot less than they'd want

 

[zimmy1]

Unless your goal is huge enlargements of exhibition/museum quality, 18mp is plenty of info. I have personally seen and made 16in and 20in enlargements that are crazy good from 12 to 18mp cameras. Most books, magazines, newspapers and the like, certainly don't need or even want these enormous file sizes. It's overkill. Portraiture, weddings etc.. have been done on far less megapixels for years! So most money making photography needs will be fullfilled with ease. Those who need more camera, simply buy more camera.

High dynamic range, noise/ISO performance, color accuracy, FPS, focus speed, accuracy and tracking, ease of use, user customization, durability, reliability are all far more important than megapixels alone. I think we may all be in for a real treat if they do in fact produce such a camera!

 

[Polansky]

Unless, of course, the Nikon D4 is just as good.

If its 'as good' then you must expect sort of the same pixelcount as well.
No reason to think Nikon has found the holy grail to get spectacular better results out of the camera with more megapixels and to have less noise and better ISO performances.

They are sort of on par with eachother and I have no reason to believe Canon lost all of its know-how.

 

[Tinnunculus]

Yes, I also guess its going to be foveon-type 18MPix...and maybe thats why nikon has to jump to a 36 MPix bayer-pattern sensor in the expected D800-to match the foveon in terms of resolution. It would be an interesting comparison/test between these two...

 

[Ziggy]

Looks good, like to know the flash sync speed. Hopefully higher then 1/250th

 

[Picsfor]

OK, let's take this rumour as spot on.

18mp - i think is spot on for portraits and weddings, as well as sports and wildlife.

61point focusing - 2 x digic 5 would allow them to make this second to none as well. We must remember that Canon still haven't fully recovered from the 1D3 focusing debacle.

12 fps. Yep, this covers just about all bases - lending to this being an all in one camera (Nikon style)

ISO and Dynamic Range - given what has been sacrificed, i would expect 104k iso as standard and DR to be top of the tree.

1D build quality and weather proofing, dual memory card slots with independent write to a given, hopefully along with wireless flash operation and Geotagging - all feasible with all that system capability going spare.

Video, definitely, and i suspect with auto focus and auto iso. 2 Digic 5's doing what only 1 is needed for...

I would definitely start saving up for this if it was a March release. 2nd 5D2 body going on sale once release confirms the facts...

 

[Tarrum]

Unless your goal is huge enlargements of exhibition/museum quality, 18mp is plenty of info. I have personally seen and made 16in and 20in enlargements that are crazy good from 12 to 18mp cameras. Most books, magazines, newspapers and the like, certainly don't need or even want these enormous file sizes. It's overkill. Portraiture, weddings etc.. have been done on far less megapixels for years! So most money making photography needs will be fullfilled with ease. Those who need more camera, simply buy more camera.

High dynamic range, noise/ISO performance, color accuracy, FPS, focus speed, accuracy and tracking, ease of use, user customization, durability, reliability are all far more important than megapixels alone. I think we may all be in for a real treat if they do in fact produce such a camera!

It's actually not the megapixels that confuse us...It's how Canon has decided to do this. It's not their way to decrease them, especially in a flagship camera. This camera seems brilliant on paper, but Nikon already did that sort of, s let's wait for more. A foveon like sensor makes sense, perhaps Nikon will do the same, but it's still not the upgrade you'd expect from them.

 

[Loswr]

Yes, I also guess its going to be foveon-type 18MPix...and maybe thats why nikon has to jump to a 36 MPix bayer-pattern sensor in the expected D800-to match the foveon in terms of resolution.

What makes you think an 18 MP Foveon-type sensor will match a 36 MP traditional sensor in terms of resolution? 18 MP is half of 36 MP, so an 18 MP Foveon-type sensor will have half the spatial resolution of a 36 MP sensor. The Foveon technology means that no color interpolation is required, but color interpolation does not reduce spatial resolution.