brainiac wrote:
Yeah - awesome - all I need to do now is sell my two 5D's, buy two 7D's... no wait scrap that since my lenses are full-frame focal lengths... all I need to do now is wait until Canon releases a 5D successor with shadow noise handling like that in the excellent 500D and 7D. Seriously, it's great that Canon is addressing this problem, but it's a shame there isn't a competitive and affordable FULL-FRAME Canon body which doesn't suck at patterned shadow noise. (No, the classic 5D isn't competitive with A900 or D700.)
in some ways the 5D2 was like a year too late or a year too early
thedigitalbean wrote:
5. How does it compare to a 5D2? Only compared the images briefly, but sadly the laws of physics still apply. The 5D2 has less noise at virtually all ISOs, however the difference isn't as huge as it was comparing the 5D2 to the 50D.
Can you put a number on that? IOW the 5DII is cleaner by how many stops?
Yohan Pamudji wrote:
It's a bit roundabout, but if you go to the reviews for each camera you can typically see the full suite of samples including with NR off. Yeah, would be nice if you could select those from the Comparometer.
Yep, that's what I did and I selected NR Off and NR Low just to try and see what it's doing. My conclusion is that I like what I see and I'm buying.
I've seen this sort of painful agony before in high-end audio. People will agonize over what is better and never reach a point where they are happy and the entire "hobby" ends up being a point of stress. I enjoy doing all of the research and knowing the "whys" as well but eventually ya gotta say "screw it", buy it and go drink a beer. If you don't like it you can sell it and buy something else.
M Vers wrote:
Can you put a number on that? IOW the 5DII is cleaner by how many stops?
Using the Imaging Resource files, I compared ISOs 400 & 800 on the 7D vs ISO-800 on the 5DII.
To my eyes, the 5DII at ISO-800 is cleaner than the 7D at ISO-800 but noisier than 7D at ISO-400.
So, less that a step advantage at ISO 800 and NR=off.
M Vers wrote:
Can you put a number on that? IOW the 5DII is cleaner by how many stops?
I have been scrutnizing the files to try to find an answer to this myself but its hard to say. Comparing the 5D2 @ ISO 6400 vs. the 7D @ ISO 3200, the 7D is definitely cleaner, so the advantage to the 5D2 is definitely < 1 stop.
The difference becomes minimal at lower ISOs however. My guess would be the 5D2 is cleaner by 1/3 to 2/3 stops (maximum) depending on ISO. Most of the difference I see is in the highlights (which I find very odd). What is making the comparisons difficult for me is that the difference in color and contrast (which is most likely because the 7D hasn't been fully calibrated yet in my ACR beta, and they probably used different lenses). Whats interesting is comparing both at ISO 12800, though the 7D has more noise in the highlights, it has virtually no pattern noise, where as the 5D2 has distinct pattern noise.
veroman wrote:
>...I want to see a Canon crop camera that will let me shoot at f/13-16.
Reply by Braniac:
>.....Holy crap - I didn't know those apertures were disabled. They never mention the limitations in the press releases. Do you think a firmware hack might re-enable f13-16?
My 50D Canon crop camera is able to shoot at f13-16 +, What's this all about? Do some of the Canon crops really not shoot at these aps? My 50D is pretty new.
ckoffend wrote:
veroman wrote:
>...I want to see a Canon crop camera that will let me shoot at f/13-16.
Reply by Braniac:
>.....Holy crap - I didn't know those apertures were disabled. They never mention the limitations in the press releases. Do you think a firmware hack might re-enable f13-16?
My 50D Canon crop camera is able to shoot at f13-16 +, What's this all about? Do some of the Canon crops really not shoot at these aps? My 50D is pretty new.
They're talking about diffraction limitation... the camera's not limited but the image quality is certainly degraded stopped down that much.
thedigitalbean wrote:
I have been scrutnizing the files to try to find an answer to this myself but its hard to say. Comparing the 5D2 @ ISO 6400 vs. the 7D @ ISO 3200, the 7D is definitely cleaner, so the advantage to the 5D2 is definitely < 1 stop.
The difference becomes minimal at lower ISOs however. My guess would be the 5D2 is cleaner by 1/3 to 2/3 stops (maximum) depending on ISO. Most of the difference I see is in the highlights (which I find very odd). What is making the comparisons difficult for me is that the difference in color and contrast (which is most likely because the 7D hasn't been fully calibrated yet in my ACR beta, and they probably used different lenses). Whats interesting is comparing both at ISO 12800, though the 7D has more noise in the highlights, it has virtually no pattern noise, where as the 5D2 has distinct pattern noise....Show more →
You're absolutely right- I don't see any of that ugly banding noise in the 7D samples so far- it seems the banding noise is prevalent in the 5D2 shadows at all ISOs....
thedigitalbean wrote:
I have been scrutnizing the files to try to find an answer to this myself but its hard to say. Comparing the 5D2 @ ISO 6400 vs. the 7D @ ISO 3200, the 7D is definitely cleaner, so the advantage to the 5D2 is definitely < 1 stop.
The difference becomes minimal at lower ISOs however. My guess would be the 5D2 is cleaner by 1/3 to 2/3 stops (maximum) depending on ISO. Most of the difference I see is in the highlights (which I find very odd). What is making the comparisons difficult for me is that the difference in color and contrast (which is most likely because the 7D hasn't been fully calibrated yet in my ACR beta, and they probably used different lenses). Whats interesting is comparing both at ISO 12800, though the 7D has more noise in the highlights, it has virtually no pattern noise, where as the 5D2 has distinct pattern noise....Show more →
Aravind, thanks for taking the time to work this out. Great info. But now you have me wondering about a 7D vs MkIII comparison. I was expecting the 1D to be much better than the 7D at high ISO (3200+), but the 7D being so close to the 5DMkII would suggest that may not be the case. Would you agree?
I just compared the 7D RAW files to the D300 NEFs (they don't have D300s files yet) and to my pleasant surprise, the 7D is on par at lower ISOs and cleaner at higher ISOs on a per pixel level.
msalvetti wrote:
Aravind, thanks for taking the time to work this out. Great info. But now you have me wondering about a 7D vs MkIII comparison. I was expecting the 1D to be much better than the 7D at high ISO (3200+), but the 7D being so close to the 5DMkII would suggest that may not be the case. Would you agree?
Mark
Mark,
I dislike speculating without being to able to a side by side (Imaging Resource doesn't have RAW files for download for the 1D3). However based on my experience using a 1D3 and how the images compare to the 1Ds3 and 5D2, my guess is that any difference between the 1D3 and 7D is going to be minimal, with the edge maybe even going to the 7D on large prints due to its higher resolution (which shouldn't be surprising, we are talking about 2 1/2 years of development here).
I personally am now satisfied the high ISO image quality of the 7D will be ok. Dynamic range and color fidelity is still a question. However the biggest question for me is how well the AF will perform. I guess I'll have to wait until I have one in my hands before evaluating that.
thedigitalbean wrote:
I personally am now satisfied the high ISO image quality of the 7D will be ok. Dynamic range and color fidelity is still a question. However the biggest question for me is how well the AF will perform. I guess I'll have to wait until I have one in my hands before evaluating that.
+100 on the AF performance. I'm REALLY waiting for the first field tests which address this. I'm hoping for more than just an incremental improvement there.
I dislike speculating without being to able to a side by side (Imaging Resource doesn't have RAW files for download for the 1D3). However based on my experience using a 1D3 and how the images compare to the 1Ds3 and 5D2, my guess is that any difference between the 1D3 and 7D is going to be minimal, with the edge maybe even going to the 7D on large prints due to its higher resolution (which shouldn't be surprising, we are talking about 2 1/2 years of development here).
Thanks for the careful reply. Should be a very interesting fall! Looking forward to a new camera for the upcoming youth and high school hockey seasons. Just need to pick between a used MkIII and a new 7D. It may come down to the AF.
If you don't like it you can sell it and buy something else.