bent-ove wrote:
I'm still not getting this.
I do understand that there are people having problems with their 1DIII, but I find it hard to imagine all of those going hard on the camera actually have one.
I also find it hard to understand how one mans test, and shooting style should affect everyones view on the camera.
He's just reflecting what many of us have been experiencing with the camera to varying degrees. I've experienced everything in his article to a much greater degree and not just in bright light and warm temperatures. I've shot over a dozen basketball games with it so far and I've been getting less than 25% usable shots. A shot that focused on what I wanted happens rarely more than 10%. This is beyond the average Mark III complaint so mine is on its way to Irvine with a long written explanation of my testing and experiences. I've been shooting with 1D cameras since the original first came out and never had focusing problems like this. I've tried every recommendation and had very little success.
But those rare in-focus shots are enough to make me go down with the ship for this camera. My noisy Mark IIn shots at ISO 1600 look dim and shadowy on these courts compared to the Mark III's ISO 3200 shots. I never thought I would use ISO 6400, but when a fire sprinkler destroyed my "bright" court and I found myself on a court slightly brighter than a parking lot at night, I set ISO to "H" and hoped for the best.
The image quality completely surprised me. It was actually better than my Mark IIn at ISO 1600. I have no doubt that the D3's ISO 6400 is cleaner but the Mark III's ISO 6400 is most definitely a usable setting in these conditions. I really hope there's something extraordinarily wrong with my Mark III and Irvine can fix it.
The only complaint I have about Rob's evaluation is that he said the camera works very well for indoor basketball and volleyball. I noticed that in these conditions he was shooting under strobes at f7.1 -- not an option for me. Don't you think that if he had shot everything at f7.1 the camera would have rated an A for everything? Yes, my Mark III is much quicker at locking initial focus on a subject but I've found this focus is not accurate enough for f2.8. It probably would be at f7.1, however that doesn't help me.
patconva wrote: Rampai65 wrote:
If we question RGs method of shooting would we also not be questioning the Canon Engineers who went along with him for the tests ?
Not necessarily. According to RG, they were there to observe the tests, bring back data and provide calibrated lenses. They weren't conducting the tests. Additionally, their presence does not infer their endorsement of the test procedures.
In view of this, it wasn't surprising that the Canon reps didn't want their names mentioned.
As a matter of fact, the Canon folks were merely identified as "Canon representatives" "Canon staffers" and "Canon people". Nowhere does he claim they were Canon engineers.
DavidP wrote:
And, for Jeff, I own TWO of these 1D3's
You sad, sad man
In the dark the camera is great. In good light it's great. My experience shooting pj type work in direct sun is that it sucks. Even on cold days.
The files are very nice. Just not in focus.
I haven't used the camera since Sept. when it messed up a big assignment. The joy of trying to fix oof shots in photoshop is not something I want to repeat. I purchased the camera in May and have about 1K shots. Most of which are tests.
In the fast runner 1, because of the buffer differences the IIN sequence has the runner starting and finishing much closer than the III sequence. How hard can it be to place the cameras side by side and shoot the same sprint? Granted there may be minor differences because of parallax, but I can tell more from that comparison than I can from different sprints on different parts of the track.
....
I don't own this body, but have been following this topic closely and first thing I noticed during the test video at the RG website is that he is using a monopod while crouching. Is he testing the capability of this camera or his ability to hold it steady? For this very reason I have trouble accepting his test method as valid. Yes it replicates actual use, but it does not isolate the camera from the operator in tests which are supposed to determine if the camera is fixed, not the operator.
....
I really hope that RG gives the D3 the same kind of scrutiny and critical examination of the focus system as he has given the Mark III
I do think more standardized, repeatable test procedures are in order, now that it's come to this level of scrutiny. Even shooting moving cars from a highway overpass is more repeatable from day to day than a track meet or volleyball game.
Always start with the simplest test and increase the level of difficulty if only if it passes. At least with the car coming toward you there's not much scope for user error. But at some point we need to know how it will behave with realistic and tricky situations. The 1D II is there as the baseline. I'd be building up a large database of results based on many weeks of testing swapping between the cameras and with multiple users to minimise systematic user error. Eventually you'll have enough data to do a serious statistical analysis of the data and say with confidence whether the 1D III does perform worse or better or the same as the 1D II.
RG though has been through an extensive number of cameras and I think his results would stand up pretty well. He did have Canon by his side for the final testing. I would love to be a fly on the wall at the engineering departments progress meeting seeing the new data with their hand picked machines. They must be worried.
DavidP wrote:
The one thing that does concern me, though, is what Jeff pointed out in another thread he started. Some of the soft-shots almost look like there's some sort of weird "motion blur" (but not really, I think he called it "ghosting").
The ghosting is something that I have seen before with my 1DS2 and a 16-35 L II. Would you agree that this is a similar effect?....
At first it looks like motion blur or perhaps a shift in focus, but this was shot AF off, 1/1000 sec, tripod mounted, mirror lockup and shutter delayed. It's not even a corner crop, as it comes from the middle-top of frame.
Now here is a crop from the center of the very same image......
Not a bit of ghosting to be seen and proves that the ghosting above has NOT been created by camera movement.
I ended up thinking that the lens was a dud, as the cam performs flawlessly with all my other lenses.
What does this mean in relation to RG's images? Probably nothing, but it is interesting that a VERY similar effect can be seen in an image where AF tracking was not even involved.
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