Can someone who has (or had at the same time) both tell me which one is louder?
I sold my 5d a couple of years ago and have not tried the GF1; now I am contemplating between the two and the sound is important for what I will be using it on.
thanks a bunch
George.
The GF1 is not quiet like most rangefinders. It's got a more metallic sounding noise than the 5D. I don't think it's any louder, but it might be slightly more noticeable.
Out of curiosity, what will you be using it for?
For ultimate quietude, there are DSLR enclosures that block all the sound. People often use these when shooting on movie sets.
I just shot both side by side. The 5D has that big mirror and thus sort of a big clunk, though not really loud (my quietest Canon ever I think was the 10D), but the GF1 is a higher click sound--its quite different, but still certainly not quiet like a rangefinder.
Thank you both.
I am hoping to be allowed to photograph a series on certain buddist functions, namely ceremonies and meditation. Picnic, which one would you say is more obtrusive in a quiet room? I can cover either in cloth, or something to dampen the sound a bit as I will not be rushing the shoot, but will want to use WA and get close to the subject.
I characterize the GF1's shutter as sounding like a polite sneeze due to it's electronic-sounding nature. It is very odd since it's actually closing, then opening, then closing again, then opening. The really strange thing is that the faster the shutter speed the "slower" it sounds. Always throws me for a loop. You can ear the shutter a little bit on this video:
It's not loud, but it's not silent. It will startle my son if he's sleeping and I take a photo close to him.
Also, you have to worry about high iso noise since you will be shooting handheld in a dark temple with no flash.
I just shot some shots inside some temples in Bangkok with my 1ds3 and 17 TS-E handheld and I needed to shoot mostly at iso 1600. I would think that the FF 5d would be much better at these high iso than the 2x crop GF1.
The 10D was an amazingly quiet camera considering it had a mirror to slap around during shutter actuation. In my short testing of the 7D, I felt it was roughly equivalent to the 10D. Side by side one might prove to be more silent than the other, but it's safe to say these two cameras are both among Canon's quietest shutter actuations.
I don't know why they got rid of the beautiful 10D shutter. I don't know why they brought it back, randomly, with the 7D. But I'm glad to see it back. If they don't migrate that smooth quiet mirror slap to their real cameras (5DMKIII, 1DsMIV, or whatever) then it will be quite the disappointment.
brainiac wrote:
With recent Canons you can make them very quiet with judicious use of liveview.
Yes and no. For a sleeping baby it would be a good tool. For sensitive street photography or a nervous bride you would only draw more attention to yourself by holding an slr in the air while you fiddle with the lcd to get correct focus.
Most situations calling for a silent shutter also need you to be quick and indiscreet about framing. Live-view hurts that more than helps.
Michael Tyler wrote:
Yes and no. For a sleeping baby it would be a good tool. For sensitive street photography or a nervous bride you would only draw more attention to yourself by holding an slr in the air while you fiddle with the lcd to get correct focus.
Most situations calling for a silent shutter also need you to be quick and indiscreet about framing.
I am always indiscreet about framing. I take off my trousers, paint my arse red, and shout obscenities while I am doing it. It helps to distract people from the noise of my shutter.
Michael Tyler wrote:
Most situations calling for a silent shutter also need you to be quick and indiscreet about framing. Live-view hurts that more than helps.
The nice thing about the GF1 in relation to dSLR is that it has a contrast detection AF system that actually works. Its Face Detection AF mode is uncannily accurate. If you're good with framing from the hip, you could turn the monitor off entirely, rely on Face Detection and get surprisingly good AF accuracy in many situations.
Michael Tyler wrote:
The 10D was an amazingly quiet camera considering it had a mirror to slap around during shutter actuation. In my short testing of the 7D, I felt it was roughly equivalent to the 10D. Side by side one might prove to be more silent than the other, but it's safe to say these two cameras are both among Canon's quietest shutter actuations.
I don't know why they got rid of the beautiful 10D shutter. I don't know why they brought it back, randomly, with the 7D. But I'm glad to see it back. If they don't migrate that smooth quiet mirror slap to their real cameras (5DMKIII, 1DsMIV, or whatever) then it will be quite the disappointment. ...Show more →
I read in the tech article for the 7d on the european canon site that they dampened the 7d mirror slap in order to reduce any camera shaking blur introduced by the mirror slap when shooting at 8 fps. I am sure they will do this in the new 1d4 and 1ds4 too.
wayne seltzer wrote:
I read in the tech article for the 7d on the european canon site that they dampened the 7d mirror slap in order to reduce any camera shaking blur introduced by the mirror slap when shooting at 8 fps. I am sure they will do this in the new 1d4 and 1ds4 too.
One would think so... But they followed the 10D with the faster better 20D, which sounded like shopping bags being dropped on concrete every time you tripped the shutter.
I hope you're right though. Canon just doesn't have a good record of upholding their improvements, and they only seem motivated to improve when competing with Nikon. (Nikon not being concerned with silent shutters at this time.)
brainiac wrote:
I am always indiscreet about framing. I take off my trousers, paint my arse red, and shout obscenities while I am doing it. It helps to distract people from the noise of my shutter.
Yeah, that one will hold up very well in a buddist temple!
I'll take advice #2 and go with the quieter shutter!
