Summary: Canon's EOS-1D-Mark-II -Best Performer of the Decade.....
This mini-review will give some initial impressions with the first 3 months of use and testing. I was one of the early users of the DCS-560 Canon/Kodak camera, which was a great camera for its time however at $25,000 a copy. Now nearly 10 years later we have a product that is greatly enhanced and at a price 80% below that initial 6,000,000 pixel version.
Looking at this new Mark-II with its feature set, pixel count, image quality, color accuracy, speed, in camera processing parameters, 8+ fps.... the list goes on and on... what a performer. This digital camera has almost everything for a broad range of uses. With an 8.2MP sensor and using LizardTech's PrintPro to up-size the image 200%-300%, it produces huge images which would challenge the best medium format digital backs. Images out of the camera are pure, clean, crisp, and accurate. If you're a RAW shooter the included software will give all the post-imaging adjusting one can imagine. Many of my assignments have consistent or controlled lighting therefore I'm quite happy with Canon's in-camera processing caspabilities. I go with +1 or +2 ticks on the sharpening, and +1 towards yellow on the color selector, so skin tones are more towards tan. This heavy duty camera, literally heavy, is such a wonderful piece to work with, its worth the extra size and weight. When one combines this camera with Canon's line of "L" series lenses, it gives the user an incredible feeling of confidence when on assignment, whether taking pictures of products, food, science, fashion, engineering, construction, or action sports events. This camera also re-defines quality low-light imaging. Shooting at an ISO of 1600 produces images with very, very good results, and images at 3200 are surprisingly sharp, which until today was unheard of. A portion of the Mark II's ISO range of 50 through 1250 produce clean noise-free, or near-noise-free beautiful images.
A comment on image file sizes: I shoot using the highest quality JPEG setting of 10, rather than the default value of 8, which value is what Canon uses to estimate the 40 frame buffer capacity. At JPEG value of 10 the image sizes are from 5.5MB to 7.0MB each. So sell those half-gig cards and stock up on 2GB high speed cards, like Sandisk's Ultra-II with speeds of 10MB/Sec, which will hold approximately 330+ images. In the future, here's a wish-list of several items Canon could work on to improve this already beautiful masterpiece:
1. Use a full 24mmx36mm imager
2. Increase pixel dimensions to 3600x5400 pixels
3. Increase near-noiseless ISO's to 6400
4. Decrease camera weight by 10%
5. Change battery system to Lithium-Ion.
6. Provide an extra-bright 3" diagonal LDC display.
7. Oh why not, ...lets ask for 12 fps.
James L Wilson, Prof., Principles.of.Digital.Photography and.Post.Image.Processing Florida.Atlantic.University Boca.Raton.Campus Operating.Entity.BocaDigital.LLC. Quality.Digital.Imaging Post.Office.Box.520 Boca.Raton.Florida.USA.33429 Internet.E.Mail.Address For.Faculty.and.Students.mail.use: FAU@bellsouth.net For.Other.Business.mail.please.use: BocaDigital@bellsouth.net Desk.561.416.1100 SecureFax.561.892.2681
Problems
It is important to read the included documentation so that one can utilize (at least some of) the large feature-set. Its worth the effort since the extensive features provided, solve allmost all of a photographer's requirements.
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