Canon 5D/40D comparison and ergonomics

NikonsandVstroms

And I thought preaching Olympus with the username was bad, but today I held a Canon 40 D and it actually fit, so it's good to keep an open mind, even for a Canon

This is a big deal since it's looking more and more like I'm going to be stuck with the wrist braces for a very long time making ergonomics my number one concern in my next purchase.

So I'm thinking the 40 D and 5D might be other options for me aside from the Olympus E3. So just a few questions about them. First about the ergonomics in the 5 D is the protruding grip narrower than the shutter area like on the 40 D. (and more importantly is it as narrow as the 40 D's)?

And what are the strengths of both of these systems? How do they compare to one another? And how is there color reproduction? And out of camera JPEG's?

High iso performance isn't very important to me since I so 400 is really high, but some extra latitude is always nice so little input on that would also be good.


Finally what advantages other than iso performance and frames per second with these cameras have over the E3 and vice versa?

(uses for the camera will be landscapes, city life, and macro)

ziggy53

Wow, the Olympus E3, Canon 5D and Canon 40D are about as different as it gets in many ways.

Ergonomics is such a unique experience for everyone that I think you really must handle each camera to see what works for you.

As far as comparative dimensions and weights, and everything else, look here:

http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/compare_post.asp?method=sidebyside&cameras=oly_e3%2Ccanon_eos5d%2Ccanon_eos40d&show=all

Check out the "In Depth Reviews" at the top of each column.

Each of these cameras is a completely different format:

Olympus E-3, 4/3rds system. Often called a crop 2x sensor.
Canon 5D, full-frame digital, same as 35mm film.
Canon 40D, crop 1.6x.

Each has advantages and disadvantages and each could take volumes to describe, which is why I posted the links.

The Canon 40D can accept both Canon, and compatible, EF (full-frame) lenses as well as Canon, and compatible, EF-S (digital crop) lenses.

The Canon 5D is only compatible with full-frame Canon EF, and compatible, lenses.

The Olympus is compatible with the Olympus 4/3rds system lenses and some Panasonic 4/3rds system lenses. I think some system features are lens specific but I don't understand the ramifications.

The Olympus camera has built-in, chip based, image stabilization. Canon (and Nikon for that matter) use lens based stabilization only on particular lenses.

The Olympus E-3 and Canon 40D would seem very responsive compared to the Canon 5D. The 5D has the unique advantage of full-frame which means a visibly smoother image for many subjects. Full-frame lenses tend to be bigger and heavier than equivalent FOV lenses for the other 2 cameras.

You can get fantastic lenses for each of these cameras and each camera can also delivery extremely high quality images.

NikonsandVstroms

Yup these ergonomic issues make for some interesting choices, just four months ago I had to pick a point-and-shoot camera based on the ones where the zoom buttons were on the back of the body instead of that little dial under the shutter release because back then my finger couldn't rest that high on a camera, luckily they found a medication that makes it so I can actually use a DSLR now well actually just the e420 for ergonomics and weight currently. The hope is that I will get enough strength by the end of the year to hold one of these cameras up at least with the braces on.

As for my questions the big concern is the image quality of the cameras, I've learned tons about the 4/3 system with my experience with the E420 (and the great ZD glass ) But I've never really used or had much experience with canon digital cameras (I have a little EOS 650 & T70 sitting around with their kit lenses and that's my total canon experience) either system would not be too difficult to set up for my needs in terms of lenses. So my big concerns are about the out of camera JPEG since postprocessing was speech recognition is not fun so I like to keep that to a minimum. So going off this with color and white balance are very important. And the difference between the 5 D. And 40 D. in these fields. And how they compare in the situations I mentioned above.

The comparison with the E3 mostly is about feature sets. With my current Olympus I have a really good idea of the kind of output it will make, which I'm happy with. But now that they're is another option I'm trying to find out everything I can