Got my 5D + full res sample

I just picked up my 5D from Campkins in Cambridge, who gave me a very
resaonable part-exchange on my 10D (a lot more confidence-inspiring than
selling it on eBay). Apparently it was the first one that they'd sold
through their main shops, although they'd sold one earlier today through
their professional outlet.

Initial impressions - *loveley* viewfinder. The AF selection mechanism is a
vast, vast improvement over the 10D. I like the new RAW conversion software
as well. Had a brief play with AI-servo - it seems to be a lot cleverer
about tracking the real object.

The spot meter is nice and precise, and seems to correspond very well with
the focus point in the viewfinder. Ergonomically, the camera feels a lot
like the 10D, but there are several obvious improvements, and one
disappointment. First the improvements - the viewfinder and focus point
selection I've already mentioned. In addition to being bigger and brighter,
the finder is a lot better for manual focus as well. ISO display in the
viewfinder is nice. The LCD is *huge* and bright.

This thing is *fast* too. Startup is instant, image replay, zooming and
panning are smooth and fast. Very nice.

The disappointment is a bit obscure - they've taken the function key away,
which I kept for FEL, and replaced it with a pointless "direct print"
button (is this an IXUS? I don't think so). As far as I can tell, this
now makes it impossible to use FEL and EL simultaneously, or use FEL at
all with the focus assigned to the * button. This is a shame, as it was
one of the really handy things about the 10D. :-(

Anyway, on to the sample. It's here (caution, 3 megabyte JPEG, dialup users
beware):

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/narcissus/5D_Rose.jpg

Image details - EOS 5D with Canon 50mm f/1.4 EF USM. 1/100 sec, f/8, 100
ISO, shot RAW and converted with the software that came with the camera.
Some levels and contrast adjustment, and a bit of USM in Photoshop.

As for the lens performance, some of the threads here recently would have us
believe that this camera is bound to be a complete lemon unless you use
lenses with the magic "digital" word on them, or gold-plated L lenses. Well,
this was shot with the decidedly non-designed-for-digital 50mm f/1.4, and
oh, my eyes! It hurts my eyes! Seriously though, the's a tiny bit of
chromatic abberation visible in the budding rose in the top right corner,
and a little bit on the other flower at the far left. Pretty insignificant
though, and easilly fixed in Photoshop, once the 5D is supported.

As for print quality - I did an A3 print of that image. It looks like the
10D does at A4, and while it's clearly not as sharp as a similar sized print
from my Mamiya 7 (6*7 medium format slides), it's not shamed by it in the
same way that 6MP digital and 35mm are.

 

Is it just me or does the bud appear to be in sharp focus compared to
the blossomed rose? And the blossomed rose appears over-exposed
compared to the well-balanced rose bud?

I don't mean to be critical of your shooting since I know you haven't
presented this image for critical evaluation but I noticed from the
EXIF info that the camera was set to auto exposure. So does this say
something about how the camera handles exposure? Which AF point was lit
when you hit the shutter?


- Siddhartha

 

Automatic exposure just means that the camera isn't in M mode. FWIW, I
generally don't let my cameras make those sort of decisions, and this shot
was no exception. Both the choice of focus and exposure in that shot are
entirely manual - the camera didn't make any decisions. I spot metered in Av
mode with exposure compensation set, and used focus lock. Any blown
highlights etc. are entirely my fault and not the camera's.

Having just looked at the raw file again, the highlights aren't actually
blown - there's plenty of headroom there. The detail went in my levels
adjustment.

 

This aside, does anyone have any comparison of the viewfinder view from
the Canon 300D, 20D, 5D and 1Ds with images of view thru the
viewfinders side-by-side?

- Siddhartha

 

I just tried to take some with an old P&S digicam, but it didn't work so
well.

 

Chris Brown wrote:
[]

Is it just me, or is that image surprising noisy in the shadow areas
(considering it was taken at ISO 100)?

[Good to hear Campkins is still around - I bought a lot of Nikon stuff
there 30+ years ago!]

David

 

It's similar on a per-pixel bases to what I was used to with the 10D. Lower
overall because of the increased pizel count.

What I have noticed is that some of the CA is made worse by interpolation
artifacts. Look on the small rosebud and you can see a sort of red staircase
around the edge. I remember that Canon's raw convertors have always seemed
to suffer from this problem, and I hope Adobe gets support in their DNG
convertor soon.

Without them I'd probably have to go all the way to London and back to get
my MF and LF film...

 

Now that you mention it, I compared the photo to photos from my 300D
and what you say seems to be true!!

- Siddhartha