5DMK3 Question

[Jon Fairhurst]

The 5D2 does 720p60. It's not the 1080p60 that we would like, but it's better than the 30p limitation of the Mark II.

[Charles W. Hull]

Originally Posted by Jon Fairhurst

Charles, I paid $2,699 USD in early December, 2008. As I recall, that was the original price. For an additional $800, it included the kit lens.

The price of the 5D3 is a bit higher than I had expected or hoped.

Yep, I went back and checked what I paid; $2,699 on 12/2/2008.

And then I found someone who didn't want the kit lens they bought, and I got a nice discount on that.

[Nigel Barker]

Originally Posted by Bob Drummond

Do we know if the MkIII will avoid the overheating problem? My T2i overheats after about 45 minutes of constant recording. But my T3i has not overheated yet. I know some speculate that the rotating screen of the T3i may factor in to that.

The 5DII was never prone to overheating. we have owned two of them for over three years & I have seen the warning once when it was left on a tripod in full sun in 35C/100F summer heat in the South of France, The T2i/550D is notorious for overheating & to a lesser extent the 7D.

[Nigel Barker]

Originally Posted by Bob Drummond

I had budgeted to get a 1Dx this year, but will now get two 5DM3's instead.

Until the 5DIII was announced I was dead set on getting a 1DX but now it appears that all of the great new features on the 1DX (better CODEC, electronic level, 720p, no moire or aliasing etc) are all appearing on the 5DIII at half the price. The 1DX is supposed to have even better low light performance & does have dual CF slots rather than the CF+SD arrangement of the 5DIII. The 1DX is even more rugged & weatherproofed. I am struggling to find any more differentiating features that would matter for video.

[Jon Fairhurst]

*Possible* 1DX advantages:
- lower noise (from the higher-end sensor)
- less rolling shutter skew (from the dual channel readout and dual chips)

5D3 advantage:
- headphone jack.
- lower price

[Greg Fiske]

Nigel,
One advantage of having the dual card slot with the sd is that you can use the wifi sd cards to tether to an ipad. Its a slick setup for photographers.
D8000 vs mark III reports are that the canon's image quality is better than the nikon with a variable 91Mbit. From everything I've read the uncompressed video doesn't look to really be uncompressed, just a marketing gimmick. But time will tell.
I think most video guys eventually get a monitor, so having a swivel screen is best left up to manufacturers that can do it right, with scopes and focus peeking features, etc.

[Tony Davies-Patrick]

I found it strange that the Canon 1DX does not have a headphone jack, yet the 'cheaper' Mark III does.

On the subject of over-heating, I've never had a 5D Mk2 body overheat during a variety of expeditions worldwide in different extreme environments.

I was also hoping to see a DX & FX framing option in the Mark III similar to the D4 and D800 bodies. The option to quickly increase the pull on a telephoto lens for long-distance filming without having to change lenses or carry extra-heavy optics, is a big plus factor.

[Buba Kastorski]

Originally Posted by Tariq Peter

I am really now unsure on which way to go 5DMK2 or 5DMK3 or just save like mad for C300. What puts me off the 5DMK2 is the fact that it needs CF Cards which are £55+ each and you always need about 10.

I don't know what you're filming , but I have 5 x 32Gb CF cards and it's over 8 Hrs of footage, do you really need more than that?
I am also not sure which way to go, 5DIII is a slight disappointmet to me, i wanted 1080 60p, flip monitor, clean HDMI, so I guess for me it'll be FS100, or maybe FS300 after NAB, I don't know;
Tariq, if you even consider C300 as an option and ready to invest over $15K into your camera , do some research around RED scarlet, but I want to tell you, it's not a video camera as we know it "by any stretch of imagination" like one public person used to say :),
it is a real cinema tool.

[Les Wilson]

Originally Posted by Daniel Weber

Sorry Les, but I think that you are wrong on this point. The M3 now does HD output via HDMI (though not a clean signal) when recording. This is a big fix on the M3.

I thought my post was clear I was talking about the built-in LCD screen and not an attached HDMI field monitor. Are you saying the M3 LCD stays in HD mode while recording?

[Steve Nelson]

Originally Posted by Greg Fiske

Nigel,
One advantage of having the dual card slot with the sd is that you can use the wifi sd cards to tether to an ipad. Its a slick setup for photographers.
D8000 vs mark III reports are that the canon's image quality is better than the nikon with a variable 91Mbit. From everything I've read the uncompressed video doesn't look to really be uncompressed, just a marketing gimmick. But time will tell.
I think most video guys eventually get a monitor, so having a swivel screen is best left up to manufacturers that can do it right, with scopes and focus peeking features, etc.

I haven't seen any testing comparing the two yet. Do you have some links you can share?

[Tariq Peter]

I have an XHA1 that I would like to sell and use the money for a 5DMK3 or 2. I have 5 weddings in April so really would like one before then.

SD Card, Audio Levels, Headphone Jack, and better in low light is that enough? It's so hard to call. The price of CF Cards scares me as I already own 16 SD Cards for my t3i. Please help me decide! I can just about afford the 5DMK3 if I sell the XHA1.

[Ken Diewert]

Originally Posted by Tariq Peter

I have an XHA1 that I would like to sell and use the money for a 5DMK3 or 2. I have 5 weddings in April so really would like one before then.

SD Card, Audio Levels, Headphone Jack, and better in low light is that enough? It's so hard to call. The price of CF Cards scares me as I already own 16 SD Cards for my t3i. Please help me decide! I can just about afford the 5DMK3 if I sell the XHA1.

Tariq... If you've got your workflow set, and the cost of CF cards is an issue, I'd wait till after April to switch. What's the rush?

[Charles W. Hull]

Originally Posted by Jon Fairhurst

The 5D2 does 720p60. It's not the 1080p60 that we would like, but it's better than the 30p limitation of the Mark II.

I've tried upconverting 720p60 from my Canon XF100 to 1080p60 with virtualdub and the plugin from from Infognition. Sort of a poor man's 1080p60. It actually works pretty well - not like the sharp native 1080 from XF cameras, but definately better than 720. I'd compare it to about what you get native from a 5DII.

I've tried this with 720p60 from my GoPro, and there is really no improvement from 720. So my conclusion had been that you need very high quality 720p60 to successfully upconvert, and when I noticed the 5DIII has 720p60 I've wondered if this would work.

If you're interested used the virtualdub plugin What is super-resolution. DON'T use their stand along Video Enhancer product - at least I couldn't get it to do a decent job with 720 to 1080.

[Greg Fiske]

Originally Posted by Steve Nelson

I haven't seen any testing comparing the two yet. Do you have some links you can share?

Steve, doing more research looks like its still up in the air.

"At this stage all I know is that the signal is a 1080i one that supposedly outputs at 8 bit at 4:2:2. "
DSLR News Shooter | Nikon D4

"The Ninja implements Apple ProRes in hardware to give you real-time, 10-bit recording anytime, anywhere."
Press Release - February 2012

Nothing confirmed about moire or jello or resolution.

[Colin Rowe]

Originally Posted by Tariq Peter

I have an XHA1 that I would like to sell and use the money for a 5DMK3 or 2. I have 5 weddings in April so really would like one before then.

SD Card, Audio Levels, Headphone Jack, and better in low light is that enough? It's so hard to call. The price of CF Cards scares me as I already own 16 SD Cards for my t3i. Please help me decide! I can just about afford the 5DMK3 if I sell the XHA1.

If you have 5 weddings in one month, you could afford to buy 2 Mk3s. But do you need it, or just want it ?? Personally, I would stick with the equipment you have, If you are getting the work, and everyone is happy, why change ? So many in this game have to have the latest and greatest, waiting from the moment they purchase a camera for its "supposed" upgrade to come along. Its what the whole electronics industry depends on. Any camera I have ever purchased spends a minimum of 3 years working for me. If we were all to rush out and buy the latest cams, there would be no profit at the end of the year. The XHA1 is still a very useable camera, capable of producing stunning footage.