Photo Reviews: Professional photographers and serious camera enthusiasts will enjoy these new rugged, high-powered toys at a breakthrough price.Canon made several product announcements Monday, but the most exciting for "prosumers" involved two new highly anticipated cameras, the EOS-5D and the EOS-1DIIN.
The 5D is Canon Inc.'s first full-frame 13-megapixel camera, with a smaller form factor than Canon's current professional 1DsII model and a price tag half that of the 1DsII.
Priced at $3,200, with a new body design that adopts the ergonomics of the popular 20D, the 5D is the first under-$5,000 model from any manufacturer to offer an imager with the full standard 24x36mm film size.
The other exciting prosumer camera announced today, the 1DIIn, improves upon Canon's workhorse 1DII camera with a larger 2.5-inch screen and a lower $3,999 price point.
Canon also previewed two new L-series stabilized full-frame lenses: the 24-105 F4.0 standard zoom and the 70-300 F4-F5.6 L IS USM. These are high quality optics, suitable for use with the whole Canon range, including the new full-frame D5 and the 1DsII.
Canon also updated its Raw conversion software DPP to Version 2.0, making it compatible with the new models and extending the feature set.
Read more here about Canon's recent announcements.
During the Paris press conference, this writer had a short hands-on with the 5D. I was allowed only a cursory examination, but I did note that the viewfinder is superb.
From my first glance in low light, I would rate it as comparable to or better than my own 1DsII; I mounted the same lens on both bodies to check. A large 2.5-inch LCD at the back of the unit displays menus that seemed markedly more readable than those on my own 1DsII.
The 5D is a breakthrough product with a greatly enhanced sensor size, but it looks like a 20D on steroids. The 5D's magnesium body is weather-sealed, but at 2 pounds, including the battery, it is only slightly heavier than the D20. The battery system is compatible with the D20, and one BP 511 Li-ion battery is rated at 800 shots.
Unlike the D20, there is no flip-up flash on the D5. Various interchangeable focusing screens, including a grid, are available as options. For added convenience or endurance, Canon markets a new vertical screw-on grip, the BG-E4, which can house two supplementary BP 511 battery units, or 6 alkaline AA cells.
The physical characteristics of the 5D would appear to designate it as a pro studio unit, or as a travel camera for an advanced amateur. Although the 5D is clearly rugged, it does not aspire to the rock-like sturdiness of the EOS-1 series models, which has proved key to the acceptance of the pro units for location work.
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The 5D introduces a new sensor, a new autofocus system and image styles. The 12.8-megapixel sensor is CMOS, like all other present Canon SLR sensors, and measures 23.9 by 35.8 mm.
By using a sensor with exactly the same size as a 35mm film image, Canon allows prosumers to employ all of their existing EF series lenses at their rated focal length. Thus, Canon is supplying a camera with no crop factor at a reasonable price point, a feature which has been oft-requested by pro photographers and consumers.
The cell size of the imager is 8.2 microns, larger than that of the 1DsII, so the Hi-ISO behavior of this camera should be superb. The camera's equivalent sensitivity ranges from ISO rating 100 through 1600, with 50 and 3200 enabled by a special selection, resulting, one assumes, in reduced quality at those extreme settings.
The 5D's innovative autofocus system displays 9 user-selectable focus points, with an additional six hidden points that assist in tracking moving objects. The novel image styles are adjustments that are applied to images as the camera generates the corresponding JPEG files. These styles are intended to determine the rendition of an image in much the same way as the choice of emulsion would affect an analog image.
The built-in tailored styles supplied by Canon with the 5D include a black and white mode and dedicated portrait and landscape modes. Six styles are supplied as standard, and users can create or download their own custom styles.
The 5D is also compatible with Canon's WFTE1 Wi-Fi unit, allowing remote triggering as well as wireless image transmission. It has a video output for displaying the captured images on a TV monitor, a feature useful for studio use.
The new stabilized Canon 24-105 L IS USM F4.0 zoom has been eagerly awaited by pros and amateurs alike; it is clearly presented as a high-performance standard lens for the EOS 5D, and can be expected to partially supersede the non-stabilized 24-70 lenses that are often employed for reporting and location work such as marriage photography.
Canon indicates that the optical stabilizer should supply a three-stop advantage, allowing an eightfold slower shutter speed to be used, compared to an unstabilized lens.
This lens has a constant aperture of F4 throughout its zoom range. It is weather-sealed, and carries an O-ring at the lens mount to prevent dust from intruding into the camera body. This writer does not have a final U.S. price for the 24-105 F4 IS L, but the European price is set at Euro 1279, which should translate to about $1,200.
Canon also announced a new hot-shoe clip-on flash unit, the Speedlite 430EX. This unit is capable of adjusting its angle of coverage automatically, depending on the crop factor of the camera it is mounted on and the lens employed.
And Canon's proprietary Raw converter, DPP (free for buyers of the 5D), has again been improved—it is now compatible with all Canon cameras starting from the D30, and can apply image styles at conversion time.
