Buying 5D mark ii at this point

[Ramji Meena]

I know there may be an announcement of 5D markiii soon.But I need it today and stills are very very important for me .I always work in low lighted caves.I think even today the low light king in VDSLR is markii.Finally I am going to buy the 5D markii body and a 50mm f/1.2L even today.don't have the budget for other lenses will think later.Anyone please suggest the budget decent wide lens.

[Laurence Janus]

Go budget on the normal and spend more on the wide. Buy a 24 1.4, it will be better in caves.

[Ramji Meena]

Yes. You are right but this project is of so much of international importance that canon has promised me to provide 24 1.4, for some time.Thank you so much for the quick response.

[Laurence Janus]

Wow, that's fantastic

[Chris Hurd]

Originally Posted by Ramji Meena

I think even today the low light king in VDSLR is markii

Sorry but no that is incorrect.

The low light king of HD video in D-SLR today
is the EOS 1D Mk. IV, which far exceeds the
low light sensitivity of the 5D Mk. II or any
other current D-SLR for that matter.

[Ramji Meena]

Sorry I forgot to mention the category of camera.I was talking about under $3K segment.1D mark iv is in different class all together but believe me in that class also Nikon D3S outperforms every camera if you talk from low light sensitivity and clean image point of view.Only drawback is its 720p video.

[Spiros Zaharakis]

Originally Posted by Ramji Meena

Sorry I forgot to mention the category of camera.I was talking about under $3K segment.1D mark iv is in different class all together but believe me in that class also Nikon D3S outperforms every camera if you talk from low light sensitivity and clean image point of view.Only drawback is its 720p video.

Correct.

The 1DMkIV is not even half a stop better than the 5DMkII up to ISO2500 (noise levels of 5D @2500 aproximately equal to 1DMkIV @3200). Above that the 1DMkIV is just a bit better because it does not have any banding issues like the 5D has but that's about it.
The good thing with the 1DMkIV (for stills) is that you can shoot at up to ISO10000 and although the image is certainly going to be noisy, it is going to have a very film-like grain, that can be easily be ignored on prints.
I haven't try the 1DMkIV in Video mode (I only tried one at a wedding shooting stills) but I do not expect more than half a stop difference.
For stills, in low light performance the D3S beats every other camera on the planet by at least one stop if not more (I used one for one wedding last year and was amazed with the low light performance).

[Chris Hurd]

Sorry but no, that is not true.

The 1D Mk. IV is far, far superior to the 5D Mk. II in terms of low light sensitivity, due to its expanded ISO range.

This has been reported numerous times by working professionals who are indeed using the camera for HD video recording.

See the report from Vincent Laforet: Lights Out, Camera, Action Vincent Laforet’s Blog

And the report from Patrick Moreau: Side by Side // The Canon 1D MKIV, 5D MKII, and 7D

And our own Charles Papert: http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/show-you...et-papert.html

And Charles again: http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/show-you...on-1dmkiv.html

And once again from Charles:

Originally Posted by Charles Papert

The 1DMKIV's were helpful as we shot in pretty low light levels--as the daylight died outside the large windows seen early in the video, I kept knocking down the overall lighting with scrims and opening up the ISO's (keeping similar apertures) on all cameras to allows us to shoot with visual continuity for several extra takes. I feel that I can shoot the 1D at ISO 1250 no problem; this one may have been 2500 a few times and as noted, one shot at 5000. I don't feel comfortable working the 7D anywhere near that, and I am wary of the tendency of that camera to overheat; I also am not crazy about the uber-shallow DOF of the 5D, forcing me to stop down to be able to give the AC's a chance to pull focus which renders the camera effectively slow. I find the size of the 1D's sensor to be a nice sweet spot inbetween the others and I love the extra speed (aka noise floor).

[Jon Fairhurst]

Whatever the camera, pick up Neat Video noise reduction for high ISO shooting. Vincent Laforet used it on his 1D4 footage to get that smooth look on Nocturne, which was shot with available light.

[Spiros Zaharakis]

Originally Posted by Chris Hurd

Sorry but no, that is not true.

The 1D Mk. IV is far, far superior to the 5D Mk. II in terms of low light sensitivity, due to its expanded ISO range.

This has been reported numerous times by working professionals who are indeed using the camera for HD video recording.

See the report from Vincent Laforet: Lights Out, Camera, Action Vincent Laforet’s Blog

And the report from Patrick Moreau: Side by Side // The Canon 1D MKIV, 5D MKII, and 7D

And our own Charles Papert: http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/show-you...et-papert.html

And Charles again: http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/show-you...on-1dmkiv.html

And once again from Charles:

Chris,

I'm also a working professional myself.

However I'm primarily a photographer and my experience for these cameras reffers to stills performance.

I've shot with the 1DMkIV on one wedding and have also played with it a couple more times.
I find absolutely no difference in noise up to ISO1600, from that point up there is a slight advantage (IMHO approximately 1/3 and not more than 1/2 stop) on the 1D up to 3200 which grows as you go higher simply because the 5DMkII starts showing banding above that.
The noise pattern up to 2500 is almost the same and the main difference above that is the banding on the 5D which I believe is due to the better E.I. shielding of the 1D.

The 1DMkIV is an excelent camera but the expanded ISO range is really a joke. Have you seen what the files look like even at ISO25.600? Try to compare that to a Nikon D3S file. I've shot with both and believe me the difference is huge.
I still stand by my comment, the 1D is only half a stop better in low light in terms of noise levels (actual noise pattern both chrominance and luminance) but can shoot up to 1 and a half stop higer due to the lack of banding. My limit with the 5D is usually ISO3200 but I have shots at ISO6400 with no banding that print beautifully. In fact if I could take a shot at ISO10.000 with the 5D that showed no banding I wouldn't have a problem to print it. It's the banding that ruins the shots and not the noise levels.
With the 1DMkIV I could easily shoot up to ISO5000 and wouldn't hesitate to take a shot at ISO10.000 expecting of course to get a very grainy image.
Above that the files are totaly useless.

And by the way, I'm saying all that as a working professional that has worked with both cameras in real world and is not affiliated or sponsored by Canon.