...Still waiting for someone to confirm or deny that in a side-by-side comparison, their mk3 hesitates to confirm focus in low light, One-Shot, Spot / Point AF, compared to the mk2... ANYBODY?????
=Matt=
Deny. Tested against a 5D2. When in "One-Shot, Spot / Point AF" as described the 5D3 is snappy as all get out.
Deny. Tested against a 5D2. When in "One-Shot, Spot / Point AF" as described the 5D3 is snappy as all get out.
Thank you!!! Out of curiosity, (not to start a flame war) ...have you by any chance ever compared the mk2 / mk3 with a D700, as well? (That is the test I keep performing in the studio lately, with the same results...)
Thank you!!! Out of curiosity, (not to start a flame war) ...have you by any chance ever compared the mk2 / mk3 with a D700, as well? (That is the test I keep performing in the studio lately, with the same results...)
=Matt=
I have. I shot a D700 for 2 years before switching to the superior 5D Mark II. And now superior 5D Mark III. And by superior I mean it allows me to create better looking images of things I make a living shooting (e.g., not lens caps or lens charts, or kids soccer). I put 15k clicks on a 5D2 at a marathon last year. Single spot AF worked just fine with the 70-200 II at f/4. Now is the 5D3 better? Yes, but the 5D2 was still better than the D700 when it comes to creating gorgeous medium JPG's that I would tag and upload straight out of camera.
Crazy fact: I got 7890 clicks out of ONE battery in the 5D2 on that marathon shoot. No chimping, all of those shots over a 2 hour period.
5D3 rebates, with a ton of lenses begins the 29th of April in the US. Rebates double with lens purchases. Looks like my turn is coming up sooner vs. later. Eeek.
My Smugmug
"You miss 100% of the shots you don't take" - Wayne Gretzky
5D3 rebates, with a ton of lenses begins the 29th of April in the US. Rebates double with lens purchases. Looks like my turn is coming up sooner vs. later. Eeek.
hope t's a big rebate, I need a big discount from that 5D3 price tag
The 5D3 is my first FF so I don't have a base line for comparison.
First of all it seems to focus much faster than my 7D. It also AF seems to work in much lower light.
A number of people have mentioned that in general FF does a much nicer job on colors. I don't claim to have as good an eye for color as most you probably do, but in general they seem clean and, don't know what to call it, smoother. The azeleas below look positively "feathery".
I haven't really gone into understading all the settings yet. I took this while I was just "testing out the buttons":D This is just a single focus point, AWB and AF with a 720 II, hand held. Processed with DPP with default settings plus lens correction. Even the hairs on the fly are there in detail.
I'm really glad I got this camera.
The copy I got has the light leak fix in it... so if it's really dark tonight I'm sure I'll be able to get some outstanding lens cap images
For shots like this you may wanna try "Highlight tone priority", which essentially, trades (packs) shadows for highlights details. I call it "eskimo" mode (since they are known to have hundreds of different words for what the rest of the world calls "snow" :-)
On that note, Nik, can any of you current 5D iii owners comment on:
1. Highlight Tone Priority - always on/specific situations for use?
2. Auto Lighting Optimizer - disable/low/standard/high???
3. Lens Aberration correction - I assume there is no reason not to enable it even if I don't plan to use DPP on every image
4. Which AF mode are you using most - standard portraits of 4 and 6 year old - mostly still. Boy is now playing flag football. Girl does gymnastics (but not rhythmic )
5. AI servo 1st/2nd image priority - I think I'm going with 'equal' on both
Appreciate your recommendations
Thanks Nikolai. I'm going to try it out tomorrow. But after reading the manual I'm not clear as to how it works. I understand it ups them minimum ISO to 200. Does it make a difference if I'm shooting raw? What I don't see what it is doing in terms of how/if it affect what the sensor captures.
For shots like this you may wanna try "Highlight tone priority", which essentially, trades (packs) shadows for highlights details. I call it "eskimo" mode (since they are known to have hundreds of different words for what the rest of the world calls "snow" :-)
On that note, Nik, can any of you current 5D iii owners comment on:
1. Highlight Tone Priority - always on/specific situations for use?
2. Auto Lighting Optimizer - disable/low/standard/high???
3. Lens Aberration correction - I assume there is no reason not to enable it even if I don't plan to use DPP on every image
4. Which AF mode are you using most - standard portraits of 4 and 6 year old - mostly still. Boy is now playing flag football. Girl does gymnastics (but not rhythmic )
5. AI servo 1st/2nd image priority - I think I'm going with 'equal' on both
Appreciate your recommendations
1. HTP: I only see the benefits when dealing in "pseudo HK" scenarios: weddings (getting details of the dress), flowers (example above), snow. Mine's typically off, as I rarely shoot either.
2. ALO: it's JPEG/DPP only deal. I keep mine on STD just for the sake of it, but since I process anything important in RAW (and all studio stuff is manual anyway) it really doesn't matter much for me.
3. LAC - on, doesn't hurt. BTW, new ACR is amazing re: correcting image by lens profile.
After poking around a little bit... on the Canon Learning site it says the HTP is applied to jpeg, but for raw is applied by DPP.
From some other sites it looks like internally the ISO is shot at 100 less than what you select. Then a proprietary algorithm is applied get the results back to the ISO you selected. The lower ISO will grab more detail in the highlights but loose detail in the shadow, as Nikolai said. The algorithm raises the brightness, but more for the shadow and less for the highlights, so the highlights are not blown out or squished together.
Thanks Nikolai. I'm going to try it out tomorrow. But after reading the manual I'm not clear as to how it works. I understand it ups them minimum ISO to 200. Does it make a difference if I'm shooting raw? What I don't see what it is doing in terms of how/if it affect what the sensor captures.
On that note, Nik, can any of you current 5D iii owners comment on:
1. Highlight Tone Priority - always on/specific situations for use?
2. Auto Lighting Optimizer - disable/low/standard/high???
3. Lens Aberration correction - I assume there is no reason not to enable it even if I don't plan to use DPP on every image
4. Which AF mode are you using most - standard portraits of 4 and 6 year old - mostly still. Boy is now playing flag football. Girl does gymnastics (but not rhythmic )
5. AI servo 1st/2nd image priority - I think I'm going with 'equal' on both
Appreciate your recommendations
1. I just haven't felt a need to even play around with it, ymmv. I leave it off. I've read that it can increase shadow noise. Which makes sense if you think about it - if it didn't ever hurt the image at all, they wouldn't need to call it a "priority", and it would just be on all the time.
2. Low or standard works well, I leave it on low. Keep in mind whatever you set it to in-camera, that the image will default to that value in DPP. You can change it there, of course.
3. On.
4. For non-action, single point. I try to place the AF point appropriately to minimize recomposing, but sometimes I can't do that fast enough and will focus with the center point and recompose. For tracking action, I use single point with 8 point expansion. The big thing here is to enable the orientation linked AF point, on the fourth page of the AF menu. I love this.
5. Honestly I hadn't even looked in to this until you asked, but I've felt for years that when shooting a burst or sequence with my 1D2N, 7D, 5D2, and now 5D3, if the first shot isn't in focus, it takes quite a few shots before the focus locks in, if ever. So just now I set the 1st image priority to focus (vs release). 2nd image priority I left at equal (fps speed vs. focus)
freaking remarkable machine, eh?
-Jack
An "accurate" reproduction of a scene and a good photograph are often two different things.
This 2.5 x 2 x 2 foot package was on my bed as I arrived home from work at 1am. My first 24 hours has now begun....
First impressions:
* Smells new.
* Much heavier, especially with the 24-105, than I envisioned. And I haven't installed the L-bracket yet, which will make it heavier still. Hmmm. Going to take a while getting used to that.
* I don't like the lens pouch.
* Not the dreaded xxxxx1xxxxx or 2 serial number.
* Oops. I forgot to order a Tamron 77mm lens cap for the 24-105 (I don't like Canon lens caps)
* I haven't been able to get the cam to display images from the SD card. How is that done?
* Displaying thumbs is a PITA. I have the magnify button programmed to jump to 8x, and for some reason it takes something like a dozen clicks of the front control dial to zoom back to thumbs.
My Smugmug
"You miss 100% of the shots you don't take" - Wayne Gretzky
On that note, Nik, can any of you current 5D iii owners comment on:
4. Which AF mode are you using most - standard portraits of 4 and 6 year old - mostly still. Boy is now playing flag football. Girl does gymnastics (but not rhythmic )
For AF modes, I can report that the 5-point or 9-point clusters BLOW AWAY the single-point focus when shooting in nearl-black dance floor lighting at weddings. Very accurate, roughly on par or better than the "focus point cluster" system that I have been using on Nikon. Oh, and AI-Servo instead of One-Shot. AI-Servo was borderline useless in low light on the mk2, now with the focus point clusters on the mk3, AI-Servo is once again an option in fact the best option for extremely low light action.
This 2.5 x 2 x 2 foot package was on my bed as I arrived home from work at 1am. Haven't opened it yet as I post this. My first 24 hours has now begun....
My first 24
Got the camera yesterday around 4pm. Immediately set about playing with settings and customizing based on input from here and elsewhere. Put two cards in - one set for RAW; other for JPG and enabled ALO, etc to see how the two compared.
Moving from the 50D and EF-S 17-55 to the 5D iii and EF 24-105 is a huge jump. I had ISO set to Auto last night with a max of 12800 and min shutter of 1/125 and got some quick grab shots of the kids getting ready for bed. I was confused about focus initially as the default does not flash a red light over the focus point when focus is achieved. I heard the soft beep but was still confused about whether the camera had locked. Put on the old 50/1.8 and got the old motor sound to reassure me and a bit of a lag to the beep so I knew how the focus now worked. Grabbed a shot of my daughter in her room lit only by the hallway light (1/20 f/1.8 iso 12800) - minimal noise reduction and it looked as good as (if not better than) iso 800 from the 50D. Silent shutter was cool too once I found it.
Today we had fog and I went out to get some landscapes. Again shot with RAW to CF and JPG to SD. Postprocessed the first image to compare the output and the RAW beat the JPG hands-down (using LR 4.1 RC 2). That includes lens correction, etc and I had a tough scene in regards to CA.
Overall, I'm thrilled with the camera. Only nits are the video I shot today looked quite soft - but I didn't even read the manual and just hit record while out shooting waves. Also, some images needed an additional 0.5 EV boost in post despite shooting at +2/3 to 1EV in evaluative mode and seeing the histogram pushed to the right.
Causeway - f/11 1/160 iso 640 [can't believe I'm shooting good quality landscapes at iso 640]
Pier
ICM
Castle Rock
Castle Rock - 2
Video - Tv at 1/60 - camera auto selected Aperture of f/22 and iso was high is all I remember. Seemed soft when looking in LR - opened in iMovie 11 to add a slight panning movement. Couldn't find a way to sharpen it. Exported to 720p
<iframe frameborder="0" scrolling="no" width="640" height="360" src="http://api.smugmug.com/services/embed/1850552534_GGpVfq5?width=640&height=360"></iframe>
Nice! Love that sound as the waves recede over the pebbles. Yeah, the weather has not been cooperating with new camera fever!! Pretty sure if you have ALO on in the camera, that it will be applied to the jpegs it writes.
Dude - give DPP another try. DLO should be a boon for landscapes.
-Jack
An "accurate" reproduction of a scene and a good photograph are often two different things.
Now I'm frustrated - seven dust spots on a new sensor???
I had noticed some spots that I thought might have been birds in my shots this morning.
Just shot the sky at f/32 and I can see 7 dust spots. This is after an auto clean cycle and blowing with a rocket blower.
The spots can be seen down to f/16
Tempted to call Canon and have them clean it but hate to part with the camera...
That sucks! Know anyone with a dust and moisture filtered air compressor? They are amazing for cleaning all but the nastiest welded dirt off of camera gear!
Err... I used to work in that industry. I would NOT recommend this unless it is something on the level of an auto body paint spraying system or a medical system. Compressed air comes out of your typical compressor very moist, and OILY. It takes several expensive devices after the compressor to get that stuff out.
-Jack
An "accurate" reproduction of a scene and a good photograph are often two different things.
Err... I used to work in that industry. I would NOT recommend this unless it is something on the level of an auto body paint spraying system or a medical system. Compressed air comes out of your typical compressor very moist, and OILY. It takes several expensive devices after the compressor to get that stuff out.
You were in the compressor industry?
And sorry, I was way too vague in specifying. I've been around clean paint system compressors my whole life so I've gotten used to seeing them as normal compressors. I did tests for residue/moisture a couple of times and nothing came out, so its worked really well for more extreme measures.
Being too vague can be deadly for some... I'll remove that post now... lol
Matthew SavilleRegistered Users, Retired ModPosts: 3,352Major grins
edited May 16, 2012
Our studio got their 2nd 5D mk3 in today; does that mean I get a second chance at a first 24 hr review?
Okay seriously, I'm definitely looking forward to testing the autofocus thoroughly, and seeing if there is any of the same focus confirmation hesitation in one-shot mode. Hopefully it is just as snappy and accurate as my Nikons. :-)
Comments
Deny. Tested against a 5D2. When in "One-Shot, Spot / Point AF" as described the 5D3 is snappy as all get out.
Thank you!!! Out of curiosity, (not to start a flame war) ...have you by any chance ever compared the mk2 / mk3 with a D700, as well? (That is the test I keep performing in the studio lately, with the same results...)
=Matt=
My SmugMug Portfolio • My Astro-Landscape Photo Blog • Dgrin Weddings Forum
I have. I shot a D700 for 2 years before switching to the superior 5D Mark II.
Crazy fact: I got 7890 clicks out of ONE battery in the 5D2 on that marathon shoot. No chimping, all of those shots over a 2 hour period.
"You miss 100% of the shots you don't take" - Wayne Gretzky
hope t's a big rebate, I need a big discount from that 5D3 price tag
It is for lenses and accessories, but rebates double if you also buy a camera at the same time.
"You miss 100% of the shots you don't take" - Wayne Gretzky
Cuong
The 5D3 is my first FF so I don't have a base line for comparison.
First of all it seems to focus much faster than my 7D. It also AF seems to work in much lower light.
A number of people have mentioned that in general FF does a much nicer job on colors. I don't claim to have as good an eye for color as most you probably do, but in general they seem clean and, don't know what to call it, smoother. The azeleas below look positively "feathery".
I haven't really gone into understading all the settings yet. I took this while I was just "testing out the buttons":D This is just a single focus point, AWB and AF with a 720 II, hand held. Processed with DPP with default settings plus lens correction. Even the hairs on the fly are there in detail.
I'm really glad I got this camera.
The copy I got has the light leak fix in it... so if it's really dark tonight I'm sure I'll be able to get some outstanding lens cap images
http://www.danalphotos.com/Other/An-Album/9934277_93BsrP#!i=1841685071&k=3KJ2qZn&lb=1&s=A
http://www.danalphotos.com
http://www.pluralsight.com
http://twitter.com/d114
That's more than a photo per second for 2 hours
1. Highlight Tone Priority - always on/specific situations for use?
2. Auto Lighting Optimizer - disable/low/standard/high???
3. Lens Aberration correction - I assume there is no reason not to enable it even if I don't plan to use DPP on every image
4. Which AF mode are you using most - standard portraits of 4 and 6 year old - mostly still. Boy is now playing flag football. Girl does gymnastics (but not rhythmic
5. AI servo 1st/2nd image priority - I think I'm going with 'equal' on both
Appreciate your recommendations
My site | Non-MHD Landscapes |Google+ | Twitter | Facebook | Smugmug photos
http://www.danalphotos.com
http://www.pluralsight.com
http://twitter.com/d114
1. HTP: I only see the benefits when dealing in "pseudo HK" scenarios: weddings (getting details of the dress), flowers (example above), snow. Mine's typically off, as I rarely shoot either.
2. ALO: it's JPEG/DPP only deal. I keep mine on STD just for the sake of it, but since I process anything important in RAW (and all studio stuff is manual anyway) it really doesn't matter much for me.
3. LAC - on, doesn't hurt. BTW, new ACR is amazing re: correcting image by lens profile.
From some other sites it looks like internally the ISO is shot at 100 less than what you select. Then a proprietary algorithm is applied get the results back to the ISO you selected. The lower ISO will grab more detail in the highlights but loose detail in the shadow, as Nikolai said. The algorithm raises the brightness, but more for the shadow and less for the highlights, so the highlights are not blown out or squished together.
But looks liek HTP works only for jpeg or DPP.
http://www.danalphotos.com
http://www.pluralsight.com
http://twitter.com/d114
1. I just haven't felt a need to even play around with it, ymmv. I leave it off. I've read that it can increase shadow noise. Which makes sense if you think about it - if it didn't ever hurt the image at all, they wouldn't need to call it a "priority", and it would just be on all the time.
2. Low or standard works well, I leave it on low. Keep in mind whatever you set it to in-camera, that the image will default to that value in DPP. You can change it there, of course.
3. On.
4. For non-action, single point. I try to place the AF point appropriately to minimize recomposing, but sometimes I can't do that fast enough and will focus with the center point and recompose. For tracking action, I use single point with 8 point expansion. The big thing here is to enable the orientation linked AF point, on the fourth page of the AF menu. I love this.
5. Honestly I hadn't even looked in to this until you asked, but I've felt for years that when shooting a burst or sequence with my 1D2N, 7D, 5D2, and now 5D3, if the first shot isn't in focus, it takes quite a few shots before the focus locks in, if ever. So just now I set the 1st image priority to focus (vs release). 2nd image priority I left at equal (fps speed vs. focus)
freaking remarkable machine, eh?
An "accurate" reproduction of a scene and a good photograph are often two different things.
First impressions:
* Smells new.
* Much heavier, especially with the 24-105, than I envisioned. And I haven't installed the L-bracket yet, which will make it heavier still. Hmmm. Going to take a while getting used to that.
* I don't like the lens pouch.
* Not the dreaded xxxxx1xxxxx or 2 serial number.
* Oops. I forgot to order a Tamron 77mm lens cap for the 24-105 (I don't like Canon lens caps)
* I haven't been able to get the cam to display images from the SD card. How is that done?
* Displaying thumbs is a PITA. I have the magnify button programmed to jump to 8x, and for some reason it takes something like a dozen clicks of the front control dial to zoom back to thumbs.
"You miss 100% of the shots you don't take" - Wayne Gretzky
Congratulations on the new camera.
Moderator of the Cameras and Accessories forums
For AF modes, I can report that the 5-point or 9-point clusters BLOW AWAY the single-point focus when shooting in nearl-black dance floor lighting at weddings. Very accurate, roughly on par or better than the "focus point cluster" system that I have been using on Nikon. Oh, and AI-Servo instead of One-Shot. AI-Servo was borderline useless in low light on the mk2, now with the focus point clusters on the mk3, AI-Servo is once again an option in fact the best option for extremely low light action.
=Matt=
My SmugMug Portfolio • My Astro-Landscape Photo Blog • Dgrin Weddings Forum
ISO 5000:
In-cam HDR:
An "accurate" reproduction of a scene and a good photograph are often two different things.
Got the camera yesterday around 4pm. Immediately set about playing with settings and customizing based on input from here and elsewhere. Put two cards in - one set for RAW; other for JPG and enabled ALO, etc to see how the two compared.
Moving from the 50D and EF-S 17-55 to the 5D iii and EF 24-105 is a huge jump. I had ISO set to Auto last night with a max of 12800 and min shutter of 1/125 and got some quick grab shots of the kids getting ready for bed. I was confused about focus initially as the default does not flash a red light over the focus point when focus is achieved. I heard the soft beep but was still confused about whether the camera had locked. Put on the old 50/1.8 and got the old motor sound to reassure me and a bit of a lag to the beep so I knew how the focus now worked. Grabbed a shot of my daughter in her room lit only by the hallway light (1/20 f/1.8 iso 12800) - minimal noise reduction and it looked as good as (if not better than) iso 800 from the 50D. Silent shutter was cool too once I found it.
Today we had fog and I went out to get some landscapes. Again shot with RAW to CF and JPG to SD. Postprocessed the first image to compare the output and the RAW beat the JPG hands-down (using LR 4.1 RC 2). That includes lens correction, etc and I had a tough scene in regards to CA.
Overall, I'm thrilled with the camera. Only nits are the video I shot today looked quite soft - but I didn't even read the manual and just hit record while out shooting waves. Also, some images needed an additional 0.5 EV boost in post despite shooting at +2/3 to 1EV in evaluative mode and seeing the histogram pushed to the right.
Causeway - f/11 1/160 iso 640 [can't believe I'm shooting good quality landscapes at iso 640
Pier
ICM
Castle Rock
Castle Rock - 2
Video - Tv at 1/60 - camera auto selected Aperture of f/22 and iso was high is all I remember. Seemed soft when looking in LR - opened in iMovie 11 to add a slight panning movement. Couldn't find a way to sharpen it. Exported to 720p
<iframe frameborder="0" scrolling="no" width="640" height="360" src="http://api.smugmug.com/services/embed/1850552534_GGpVfq5?width=640&height=360"></iframe>
My site | Non-MHD Landscapes |Google+ | Twitter | Facebook | Smugmug photos
Dude - give DPP another try. DLO should be a boon for landscapes.
An "accurate" reproduction of a scene and a good photograph are often two different things.
My site | Non-MHD Landscapes |Google+ | Twitter | Facebook | Smugmug photos
I had noticed some spots that I thought might have been birds in my shots this morning.
Just shot the sky at f/32 and I can see 7 dust spots. This is after an auto clean cycle and blowing with a rocket blower.
The spots can be seen down to f/16
Tempted to call Canon and have them clean it but hate to part with the camera...
My site | Non-MHD Landscapes |Google+ | Twitter | Facebook | Smugmug photos
Err... I used to work in that industry. I would NOT recommend this unless it is something on the level of an auto body paint spraying system or a medical system. Compressed air comes out of your typical compressor very moist, and OILY. It takes several expensive devices after the compressor to get that stuff out.
An "accurate" reproduction of a scene and a good photograph are often two different things.
My site | Non-MHD Landscapes |Google+ | Twitter | Facebook | Smugmug photos
My site | Non-MHD Landscapes |Google+ | Twitter | Facebook | Smugmug photos
You were in the compressor industry?
And sorry, I was way too vague in specifying. I've been around clean paint system compressors my whole life so I've gotten used to seeing them as normal compressors. I did tests for residue/moisture a couple of times and nothing came out, so its worked really well for more extreme measures.
Being too vague can be deadly for some... I'll remove that post now... lol
My site | Non-MHD Landscapes |Google+ | Twitter | Facebook | Smugmug photos
Okay seriously, I'm definitely looking forward to testing the autofocus thoroughly, and seeing if there is any of the same focus confirmation hesitation in one-shot mode. Hopefully it is just as snappy and accurate as my Nikons. :-)
My SmugMug Portfolio • My Astro-Landscape Photo Blog • Dgrin Weddings Forum