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Archive 2010 · Mark IV hands-on only thread

rscheffler
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p.25 #1 · Mark IV hands-on only thread

MSC wrote:
Anyone using AF right-left expansion for moving subjects? I've been using single point no expansion for 1D bodies for about four years...seemed to work the best for sports. But this option seems new?

I just tried it for a running race and it seemed to work pretty well. I also used left/right expansion with the III and liked it for football, etc., so I will probably experiment with it some more. When I first got the IV I did a number of tests on street traffic and in that situation single point w/o expansion seemed to be a bit better. As a result I initially decided to use only single point but will probably use either left/right or III-8-2 for field sports where subject movement can be unpredictable.

FWIW, I was initially unhappy with my IV tracking results, particularly with the 600 IS, so I sent both to Canon for calibration. I don't think they did much with the IV because certain lenses still need similar MFA, but the 600 has most certainly improved. They had to realign the optics. I'm now getting nicely sharp images and generally well focused sequences (based so far on results from the running race). Prior to the repair it seemed no matter what MFA I set for the 600, the focus was always a touch off.

And just to touch on the battery consumption question from a page or so ago, I shot about 1700 images with the IV during the race in a variety of situations, and the battery was only down to the 70s. It's possible the poorer battery performance I've experienced with the IV was not only due to specific situations, but also dependent on the battery used. Other than the one that came with the IV, the rest are from summer or fall of 2007. Even though the camera rates all of the older batteries as being in excellent condition (three green squares), I suspect they're not holding up as well as the brand new battery, which was in the IV during the race.

Ron

Mar 31, 2010 at 10:48 PM

csm
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p.25 #2 · Mark IV hands-on only thread

Excellent info Ron...and thanks for the experience with the 600. Will keep that in mind.

Mar 31, 2010 at 11:19 PM

ruhikant
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p.25 #3 · Mark IV hands-on only thread

Apr 02, 2010 at 10:32 PM

thedigitalbean
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p.25 #4 · Mark IV hands-on only thread

ruhikant wrote:
Having shot about 10K frames (mostly birds), I still prefer L&R AF expansion since this setting works in most situation including busy BG. Another thing, I just found out is the tracking speed/sensitivity at default or med fast (rather than med slow) resulted more keepers/sharp images in case of small birds such as Swallows with unpredictable flight path.

[images snipped]

Nice images of a very erratic subject there. I am finding exactly what you are describing. For tracking, I get great keepers by keeping the tracking speed/sensitivity at around the default. For the Mk3 I have to dial it down to med slow or slow.

Apr 02, 2010 at 10:48 PM

M Vers
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p.25 #5 · Mark IV hands-on only thread

Anyone doing any low light shooting, specifically event work? If so, hows it been?

Apr 04, 2010 at 08:03 PM

J Rabin
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p.25 #6 · Mark IV hands-on only thread

Sold my wonderful trusty low miles 1D III to happy FM member and bought LN 1D IV on FM from another happy member. Took it out for a spin on some snapshots.
Have to say, this is finest camera, of any type, I ever owned. Every thing is refined and mature.
Image quality is just stunningly natural. Skin tones are natural and pure. Best I've ever experienced from Canon. And I thought the 1DIII was best, because it offered special image quality. Plant colors are pure. We read all kinds of 'noise' on the forum, but when even casual snaps sing, it is time to appreciate.

Can't see skin tones in this image, and JPG compression wrecks uniform tones, but gun smoke is so real, and detailed, you can smell black powder sulfur.
http://postit.rutgers.edu/uploads/Musket%5FFiring%5F1D%5FIV.JPG

At ease, musket is a small part of frame. [Even at f/5, obvious lens if front focusing. Have to work on that.]
http://postit.rutgers.edu/uploads/Musket%5FAtEase%5FFullFrame.JPG
100% crop of the above. There is so much relaxed detail and natural tones. Nothing forced
http://postit.rutgers.edu/uploads/Musket%5FAtEase%5F100%25Crop.jpg

16-35mm L (v.I) @35mm plus 12mm Extension tube, f/4, hand held. I know, funky. But I like doing thing in their environment close ups. Can't afford 24mm TS-E.
http://postit.rutgers.edu/uploads/16%2D35mm%5Fat35mm%5F12mmTube%5FFullFrame.JPG
I wanted to trial 1D IV AI SERVO II, which detects fore-aft movement at macro distances (one of reasons I bought camera), but I think I discovered Servo II-macro only works with macro lenses where it can 'read' distance. IV did some darn good AF attempts in Single Shot with this radical WA tube set.

Weeds poke up everywhere. Here full frame of f/2.8 shot. My 16-35 v.1 remains one of my spot-on out-of-box lenses. Must have gotten a good one. Scared to trade-up for v.II with all the variation stories...
http://postit.rutgers.edu/uploads/Weed%5Ffrom%5FWall%5FFullFrame.JPG
A 100% crop, @f/2.8, from close, but small part of frame. I am amazed at how much detail is captured, with such natural color, with no effort.
http://postit.rutgers.edu/uploads/Weed%5Ffrom%5FWall%5FCrop.jpg

What else do I like so far?
1. Quickly setting Custom WB, on-the-fly, by pressing Func. button under Rear LCD panel, selecting which of 5 CWBs to use, then just shoot the target. Done. Repeat as needed as light changes. Next photos are auto recorded with that WB. Makes it MUCH easier to shoot good JPGs, speeds processing in DPP. I hope LR reads CWB tags, but have not checked. Faster, with less computer time, is better.
2. Hitting the info button to bring up shooting settings, then hitting ISO, or other buttons to bring up there sub-menus on LCD. Who knew this would be so usable and slick in changing environments?
3. Hi ISO clean SHADOW detail. I do not see much difference at high exposure end quality from 1D III, but it is clear major advance in quality of low luminance dark/shadow details. Photos come out beautiful at any rational (or irrational just 6 years ago) ISO. I hope they withstand post-processing abuse like 1D III images.

Features not sure about:
1. Battery life! 1D III ran for days. Image after image in the thousands before charge. This baby burns battery life. One afternoon ran it down. Looks like I'll need a spare.
2. Distortion correction causes weakening of image structure and sharpness.
3. ALO does not seem to do much, but have not tried it on severely back-lit under flashed image. Better to carry a flash, and not do that kind of photography.

Enough rant. The image quality is just stunning. A real engineering achievement. Jack

Edited on Apr 05, 2010 at 06:07 AM · View previous versions

Apr 04, 2010 at 10:54 PM

J Rabin
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p.25 #7 · Mark IV hands-on only thread

M Vers wrote:
Anyone doing any low light shooting, specifically event work? If so, hows it been?
Image quality, or focusing?
Image quality is simply a no brainer. Best low light, or any light, natural image quality ever.
Focusing? You read stories about the this XXD or that XD being better at sometimes locking focus than a 1D Mk camera in extremely low EV light. These experiences are...TRUE. Chuck Westfall had an article about this way back in 2004. The AF sensors on the 1Ds are small. There are a lot of them, and they are superior precision, but they are small. Even an old 20D, or newer 5D, with only 9, but larger AF sensors, can sometimes achieve a focus lock where a 1D may not. So, there are uncommon instances in low light. That is why you stick a flash on, Disable C.fn. II-7, and Enable C.fn. III-15. Jack

Apr 04, 2010 at 11:09 PM

rscheffler
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p.25 #8 · Mark IV hands-on only thread

M Vers wrote:
Anyone doing any low light shooting, specifically event work? If so, hows it been?

Generally happy with it. I don't hesitate to use it at ISO 1600 for most situations and 3200 is also nice. It still holds up well at 6400 though it takes a bit more work to clean up the chroma noise (I don't care as much about luminance noise because I like a bit of graininess). The only concern so far has been in situations where the ambient reflective light level on subjects is below EV0. In such cases the AF has the tendency to become very slow and often will not lock. Interestingly, live view AF below EV0 is very usable. Medium to low contrast subjects that the IV has trouble focusing on with 'regular' AF at such light levels is rarely a problem for live view AF.

J Rabin wrote:
What else do I like so far?
1. Quickly setting Custom WB, on-the-fly, by pressing Func. button under Rear LCD panel, selecting which of 5 CWBs to use, then just shoot the target. Done. Repeat as needed as light changes. Next photos are auto recorded with that WB. Makes it MUCH easier to shoot good JPGs, speeds processing in DPP. I hope LR reads CWB tags, but have not checked. Faster, with less computer time, is better.
2. Hitting the info button to bring up shooting settings, then hitting ISO, or other buttons to bring up there sub-menus on LCD....Show more →

I believe points 1 and 2 of your likes list were also possible with the Mark III. I agree with your point #3, shadows are quite clean. Perhaps Canon has taken a bit from Nikon's approach in this regard.

From your 'dislikes' I agree that it goes through batteries faster, but I have found it depends a lot on shooting style. RAW appears to consume more power than shooting JPEG. Also, if shooting fast consecutive sequences with minimal LCD review, battery life can be quite good. Still not as good as the III, but close.

Distortion correction (I assume you mean in the DPP software) has always degraded image quality. If anything, I think the higher rez file from the IV gives the software more to work with, though there is still quality loss.

ALO does its own thing. It's not a fixed degree of adjustment, rather it appears to analyze each image and makes adjustments accordingly. I've played with it in DPP and have noticed that for some images it will make subtle changes whereas for others, the same ALO intensity setting will result in significant adjustments. In this respect I find it a bit too unpredictable. If I was shooting just JPEGs in challenging lighting situations, then I would experiment with it, but as primarily a RAW shooter, I'll leave it for post production. The 'danger' of ALO and peripheral illumination correction is that with both on, there can be a lot of post capture adjustments made that don't accurately represent the actual RAW data when making evaluations in-camera, i.e. checking the histogram. The only way to really know what one has in the RAW file is to turn off the in-camera adjustments. Of course if one is shooting JPEGs, then this doesn't matter as much.

Ron

Apr 05, 2010 at 12:35 AM

M Vers
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p.25 #9 · Mark IV hands-on only thread

J Rabin wrote:
Image quality, or focusing?
Image quality is simply a no brainer. Best low light, or any light, natural image quality ever.
Focusing? You read stories about the this XXD or that XD being better at sometimes locking focus than a 1D Mk camera in extremely low EV light. These experiences are...TRUE. Chuck Westfall had an article about this way back in 2004. The AF sensors on the 1Ds are small. There are a lot of them, and they are superior precision, but they are small. Even an old 20D, or newer 5D, with only 9, but larger AF sensors, can...Show more →

Thanks, Jack--I should have specified 'AF'. As for xxD and xD cameras being better low light focusers, in general, over 1D's I don't buy, since my MKIII is vastly superior to any xxD or xD camera I've used in these conditions (especially when using peripheral points). I have heard of issues with the MKIV in low light, which boggles my mind considering the fact that the MKIII had done so well in this area.

Apr 05, 2010 at 09:37 AM

M Vers
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p.25 #10 · Mark IV hands-on only thread

rscheffler wrote:
The only concern so far has been in situations where the ambient reflective light level on subjects is below EV0. In such cases the AF has the tendency to become very slow and often will not lock. Interestingly, live view AF below EV0 is very usable. Medium to low contrast subjects that the IV has trouble focusing on with 'regular' AF at such light levels is rarely a problem for live view AF.

Ron, how has your mkIII performed in comparison?

Apr 05, 2010 at 09:39 AM

J Rabin
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p.25 #11 · Mark IV hands-on only thread

M Vers wrote:
Jack--I should have specified 'AF'. As for xxD and xD cameras being better low light focusers, in general, over 1D's I don't buy, since my MKIII is vastly superior to any xxD or xD camera I've used in these conditions (especially when using peripheral points). I have heard of issues with the MKIV in low light, which boggles my mind considering the fact that the MKIII had done so well in this area.
I agree with you. My 1D III was superb. 1D IV is superb also. I do not stand in pitch black rooms and experiment with AF hunting. And, if I do, I stand there with 580EX with IR AF Assist on. If not, manual focus.
With that said, an AF IS a CMOS sensor, and 1D AF 45 point pixel sizes ARE smaller, less light gathering individually, than, say Center point of a 5D or 40D.
My posting point was more toward user experience threads I read, hinting they are discovering 1D Mk III/IV low light AF lock weaknesses. They are not discovering anything. These are engineering design choices, was my point. The user knows this. It's published.

I have a sneaky suspicion this 1D Mark IV is best camera I've ever owned, and one I will not need to upgrade for a decade. I am hoping (fingers crossed) constant technologies/features upgrading is over for 7-10 years. After 3 days of use, I just can't see how I would ever need anything better in image quality or functionality. Macro photography with this is sheer pleasure. Jack

Apr 05, 2010 at 09:52 AM

M Vers
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p.25 #12 · Mark IV hands-on only thread

J Rabin wrote:
I agree with you. My 1D III was superb. 1D IV is superb also. I do not stand in pitch black rooms and experiment with AF hunting. And, if I do, I stand there with 580EX with IR AF Assist on. If not, manual focus.
With that said, an AF IS a CMOS sensor, and 1D AF 45 point pixel sizes ARE smaller, less light gathering individually, than, say Center point of a 5D or 40D.
My posting point was more toward user experience threads I read, hinting they are discovering 1D Mk III/IV low light AF lock weaknesses. They...Show more →

For me, low light focusing ability is a huge factor, even though, like you, I will be using the camera for types of photography, such as macro and wildlife, where its not all that important (16mp being a major reason I'm not going for another MKIII). Where it will factor in is when shooting events, which I will be doing a lot more of this year. I've gotta say I've grown concerned with user experience in regards to the low light AF performance of the 1DIV. Even though I still plan to pick up a 1DIV, I'm just trying to get a general idea of how much 'worse' it is compared to the MKIII.

Apr 05, 2010 at 10:40 AM

csm
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p.25 #13 · Mark IV hands-on only thread

The shot above of the flower, that was in near darkness, offcenter AF single point selection on the white flower with a 24-70...it locked instantly and confidently. It was as fast as I've seen, no hunting, very pleased with that. And it did it over and over shooting servo, handheld, and snapshots, no setting up or any of that.

Apr 05, 2010 at 11:07 AM

rscheffler
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p.25 #14 · Mark IV hands-on only thread

M Vers wrote:
Ron, how has your mkIII performed in comparison?

In controlled tests the III and IV performed similarly, meaning they both had difficulty focusing at about the same low light threshold on the same subject. However, based on on-the-job use I was initially caught a bit off guard by the IV refusing to lock AF in very dark conditions. It didn't happen a lot, but it happened. My impression at the time was that the III didn't typically do this, but then I did the controlled tests and found that the cameras behave fairly similarly. Maybe I just hadn't run into such dark conditions in the few years I shot with the IIIs. The reflective brightness of the subject and contrast will be a significant factor. Obviously someone wearing zebra stripes (a ref, etc.) at an incident light value of EV0 will allow better AF lock than someone wearing a plain black outfit. So far at 'regular' events, where ambient might be ISO 1600 1/125 f/2.8 or a bit lower, the IV has not been a problem for AF lock. It is in extreme darkness where it can be an issue. I think it's important to keep that in mind and IMO other improvements in the IV over previous 1 series cameras make it a worthwhile purchase.

Ron

Apr 05, 2010 at 11:16 AM

rscheffler
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p.25 #15 · Mark IV hands-on only thread

MSC wrote:
The shot above of the flower, that was in near darkness, offcenter AF single point selection on the white flower with a 24-70...it locked instantly and confidently. It was as fast as I've seen, no hunting, very pleased with that. And it did it over and over shooting servo, handheld, and snapshots, no setting up or any of that.

That's one of the things I like about the IV. The peripheral AF points are generally the best yet in a 1 series. The III was the first camera where I would regularly use peripheral points, and the IV is better.

According to the exif info, the exposure was at a light level of about EV6. It's not until below about EV0 that the IV has AF lock issues. It's literally at candlelight levels where problems will become apparent.

Apr 05, 2010 at 11:23 AM

Yakim Peled
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p.25 #16 · Mark IV hands-on only thread

rscheffler wrote:
The III was the first camera where I would regularly use peripheral points, and the IV is better.

While I don't shoot sports much, I did find the peripheral points of the 40D and 7D to perform rather well. Have you tried them?

Happy shooting,
Yakim.

Apr 07, 2010 at 03:26 AM

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