Three 5DmkII questions
 

Picked up my 5DmkII several months ago and finally got around to taking it on a few shoots. Primarily I do wedding/event video and occasionally a corporate piece here and there. However I'm shooting my first music video in May and decided to try and tackle it completely with the mkII.

Because I've been shooting with it more often and doing some tests here are some questions I have:

1. Overly crushed blacks. I find that my blacks are a bit too strong coming out of the camera. I even have the in-camera "contrast" turned down to it's lowest setting. Is this universal with the cam or glass dependent. I have two lenses- a 24-70 2.8L, and an 85 1.8. Both seem to exhibit the same amount of crushed blacks and loss of shadow detail.

2. Red Saturation Off the Charts. My reds seem to easily over saturate. Even with my in-camera color setting lowered two notches my reds are off the charts on the vector scope. If I reduce the saturation globally I lose skin tones. Again- is THIS universal as well or glass dependent?

3. Non-Standard HDMI Out? I'm exploring external monitoring solutions for the mkII but quickly found that it does NOT use a standard HDMI. I also heard that if you connect it to an external monitor it will not display correctly (ie not fill the screen)- is this true? Any work arounds? Also where can you even buy a mini-HDMI to standard HDMI cord?

Thanks all in advance!

Crushed Blacks - What version of Quicktime are you using? The old one crushed the blacks to death. Note that the latest version doesn't kill the blacks, but boosts the mids. Give Cineform NeoScene a try. It's a free 1-week trial. It's fast, clean and gets the colors right.

Reds - Not sure. Could be related to the old codec.

HDMI - Radio Shack has a $10 mini-HDMI adapter. I'd only use it in a pinch though. It's too heavy/bulky for the little camera connector. You can order cables for about $20 through the big web bookseller - or pay well over $50 at the national brick and mortar chain.

Playback through HDMI is about the only thing that's correct. When recording, it's just 480i. For a focus monitor, I recommend an analog 4x3 monitor, rather than a digital 16x9. Having a larger 1080p playback monitor to double check your shots is nice though. You can get the 23-inch 1080p ACER with HDMI for just over $200 for reviewing your work.

I guess I am with Jon on this. With my first response, didn't realize he had covered all the same ground, anyway, I concluded the same..

1. Crushed blacks: This may be a codec issue. We saw issues with crushed black when camera first came out. If you are on PC, try updating your QT codec to latest version, you may see a differenc. I have seen a difference with Cineform in decoding.

2. Reds might be same issue.

3. I shot a promo using the HDMI to a 19 inch monitor, and it wasn't that great for shooting, play back okay as Jon says...