Praises to the original 7D
JonaBeth Russell
Registered Users Posts: 1,065 Major grins
I thought it would be fun to give a little report on the 7D and how it survived the Grand Canyon trip. To recap, the trip was 19 days, covering 280 miles of river, a few side canyon hikes / swims, and a metric poop-ton of sand...ultra fine, wind blown sand.
During the trip, the camera stayed out of the pelican case most of the time. The only time it was NOT allowed out of the case was when there was a chance of swimming a rapid. Other than that, the camera was out often. Total shutter actuations = 3700+, along with a few videos, several minutes each.
Of those images, many were shot in windy, sandy environments. I remember a few times shooting, then having the lens get foggy only to find that water / sand / grime had blown onto the lens, and onto the camera body. Lens changes were certainly few and far between. Sometimes, the camera would get splashed by the waves of smaller rapids as I wore it around my neck through the run, but I put my faith in the weather sealing.
For 3 days it rained, and I shot photos anyway. On these days, I exclusively used the EF-S 18-135 IS lens, which isn't weather sealed (none of mine are), but has a nice rubber ring around the lens mount area at the rear glass. A lot of the rain pics turned out kinda cruddy because of the rain and fog, but some were awesome. Once, during the trip on a not-so-dry day, I even dropped it in the sand!
At the end of the trip, I expected the inside of the 7D to be filthy. When I spun the rear dial, I could hear sand grinding. After spending about 15 minutes cleaning the outside of it, blowing sand out of every crack and crevice, I gently removed the lens, half cringing at what might be inside. I opened the battery and memory card doors with the same feelings. To my surprise, there was NOTHING inside! The battery door had maybe 2 grains of sand and the memory card door had maybe 3 grains of sand. No moisture, residue, etc.
Tomorrow we have an engagement shoot, so I figured I should go ahead and give it the deepest cleaning I can, including the sensor. I found a little bit of residue on the mirror from when I tried to wipe some condensation out with my shirt during the canyon trip. There were a couple shirt fuzzies on the lower viewfinder glass. After cleaning those, I flipped up the mirror to access the sensor and guess what...NO VISIBLE RESIDUE OR DIRT!!!
All of the controls now operate smoothly, the images it's shooting are spotless, and everything seems to be just as good as before the trip. This was a real seller for me on the weather sealing Canon uses on their cameras. Additionally, the magnesium body was a real bonus while clunking around climbing slot canyon walls and such.
So there ya' have it, my personal experience with the 7D in a fairly treacherous environment.
Cheers!
During the trip, the camera stayed out of the pelican case most of the time. The only time it was NOT allowed out of the case was when there was a chance of swimming a rapid. Other than that, the camera was out often. Total shutter actuations = 3700+, along with a few videos, several minutes each.
Of those images, many were shot in windy, sandy environments. I remember a few times shooting, then having the lens get foggy only to find that water / sand / grime had blown onto the lens, and onto the camera body. Lens changes were certainly few and far between. Sometimes, the camera would get splashed by the waves of smaller rapids as I wore it around my neck through the run, but I put my faith in the weather sealing.
For 3 days it rained, and I shot photos anyway. On these days, I exclusively used the EF-S 18-135 IS lens, which isn't weather sealed (none of mine are), but has a nice rubber ring around the lens mount area at the rear glass. A lot of the rain pics turned out kinda cruddy because of the rain and fog, but some were awesome. Once, during the trip on a not-so-dry day, I even dropped it in the sand!
At the end of the trip, I expected the inside of the 7D to be filthy. When I spun the rear dial, I could hear sand grinding. After spending about 15 minutes cleaning the outside of it, blowing sand out of every crack and crevice, I gently removed the lens, half cringing at what might be inside. I opened the battery and memory card doors with the same feelings. To my surprise, there was NOTHING inside! The battery door had maybe 2 grains of sand and the memory card door had maybe 3 grains of sand. No moisture, residue, etc.
Tomorrow we have an engagement shoot, so I figured I should go ahead and give it the deepest cleaning I can, including the sensor. I found a little bit of residue on the mirror from when I tried to wipe some condensation out with my shirt during the canyon trip. There were a couple shirt fuzzies on the lower viewfinder glass. After cleaning those, I flipped up the mirror to access the sensor and guess what...NO VISIBLE RESIDUE OR DIRT!!!
All of the controls now operate smoothly, the images it's shooting are spotless, and everything seems to be just as good as before the trip. This was a real seller for me on the weather sealing Canon uses on their cameras. Additionally, the magnesium body was a real bonus while clunking around climbing slot canyon walls and such.
So there ya' have it, my personal experience with the 7D in a fairly treacherous environment.
Cheers!
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the old 7D can take a licking and keep on ticking