Canon EOS 5D Mark 11 camera review

On a recent trip to Melbourne (Australia), I decided to upgrade my Canon 5D DSLR to a Canon EOS 5D Mark 11. Not that I was unhappy with the Canon 5D camera, which is now being used by my delighted partner. The image quality of both 5D camera’s remains excellent!

It’s just that I could see several advantages to justify the upgrade including:

• The sensor now having 21.1 megapixels, matching Canon’s flagship EOS 1Ds Mark III at a fraction of the price. Extremely useful if you’re anything like myself and tend to crop a lot of photo’s tightly for greater impact. This is particularly useful for macro and animal photographers. Now we can crop to our hearts content, yet still be able to print the resulting image in very large sizes.
  
  
• Video recording in Full HD 1080p format. Now I don’t need to pack both my DSLR and video camera on trips away. Obviously a person can only hold one piece of technology at any given time. Now I can easily switch between taking still photographs or video at will.Click here to view example high quality videos shot with a 5D Mark 11 DSLR camera.
• A larger and more detailed 3 inch VGA screen. This is particularly useful for zooming in and checking the sharpness of the image on location.
• Live view, for those who like it.
• Maximum ISO of 25,600. 3 stops higher than the 5D.I found on a recent trip to Sydney Aquarium that I could up the ISO to 3200 for low light, hand hold the camera, yet still end up with printable photographs as shown in the examples below.
  
  Click on each photograph for a larger view

  
  
  

  This night shot of Darling Harbour, displayed below, was also photographed with an ISO of 3200 and hand held.

  

Faster 3.9fps for continuous shooting. Useful for photographing children, animals, cars etc on the move.

I won’t go into other 5D Mark 11 technical specifications, as they are already listed on the Canon website at: http://www.canon.com.au/products/cameras/digital_slr/eos5dmkII.aspx

However, I can tell you this, one month on and I’m not about to upgrade again any time soon. The 21.1 megapixel sensor, the increase in ISO including the image quality all the way up to 3200, and the addition of Full HD 1080p DSLR video recording, is more than enough to keep me recommending this camera for many years to come.

Do I think it was worth updating my original Canon 5D camera to the Canon 5D Mark 11 EOS? You betcha

SLR Photography Guide recommends purchasing your camera equipment from Amazon:

Canon EOS 5D Mark II Video

More and more digital SLRs are now being built with a movie recording mode. The Canon EOS 5D Mark II is one of the highest spec models offering full HD at 1920x1080p. After viewing a couple of dozen video’s taken with a Canon EOS 5D Mark 11, I can honestly say it rivals the quality of high end movie recording equipment. But don’t take my word for it, check out some of the links below and see for yourself.

The EOScars

EOScars offers some of the highest quality video’s I’ve seen, taken with a Canon EOS 5D Mark 11. They scour the latest movies posted on the web and publish only those where it is clear the filmaker has put in the effort to create a complete package. View the sample below then visit http://theeoscars.com/5dblog/ to enjoy many others.

Images Of Karijini National Park from Michael Fletcher on Vimeo.

Reverie

Reverie is a sample EOS 5D Mark 11 video by photographer Vincent Laforet. It’s a beautiful short video about one mans dream. You can see Reverie at Canon Digital Learning Center Sample Video or watch how they produced the EOS 5D Mark 11 video at: Behind the scenes with Vincent.

Flickr Group – Canon 5D MK 11 Videos

One of our favorite hangouts now has a group for videographers who shoot with a Canon 5D Mark 11. It’s a relatively new group that already boasts 360 members. It’s also a great place to discuss video techniques, or for beginners to help each other out. For more information, head on over to: http://www.flickr.com/groups/canon5dii-videos/

Nature / Wildlife video

Visit http://www.vimeo.com/1858950 and you’ll see a bird watching video taken with 5D Mark II + Canon EF 400mm f/2.8 IS L
Lens + 2x Teleconverter, effectively providing for an 800mm focal
length with f/5.6 aperture @ISO 3200. This is a good video to show the 5D Mark 11 capabilities in extreme ISO and teleconverter settings. Notice the video is still of very high quality.

Canon 5D Mark II Underwater Video Review

To really test the capabilities of Canon 5D Mark 11, Berkley White took it to the depths of the ocean to video sharks and dolphins in Monterey. Watch the video at: http://www.backscatter.com/5d2/

When I first heard about the Canon 5D Mark 11 video capabilities, my intitial reaction was similar to many others, ‘Why would I want video capabilities, I’m a photographer?’. Now that I think about it, I do often take both my Digital SLR camera and Sony video camera, on trips away. Therefore, it does make sense to only carry one piece of equipment that does the job of two.

SLR Photography Guide recommends purchasing your camera equipment from Amazon:

Canon 17-40mm f4 L lens Review: from a personal photographers perspective

After doing much research on the Internet, I decided to purchase my first Canon L lens. For those new to SLR photography, L lenses are regarded as the professional end of Canon’s range for glass. As it’s turned out, I wasn’t dissapointed in my choice. In fact, it’s now my all time favorite lens. This review will demonstrate by example the reasons why.

The Canon 17-40mm f4 L lens is an extremely sharp wide angle lens, perfect in particular for landscape photography, as you’ll see by the photo examples displayed below. However, is also useful for indoor shots of museums and exhibitions, or anywhere that you have limited space but still need to capture a wide area.

If you’ve found this review while looking for technical specifications, you can already read this on the Canon website, so I won’t rehash this too much here as well: Technical Specifications for Canon 17-40 f4 L lens

Instead, I’ll be explaining what it is that I love about this lens by example.

Examples of photographs taken with Canon 17-40 f4 L lens:

1. Manly Beach in Sydney Australia

As you can see by viewing this image of Manly Beach in Sydney Australia, the Canon 17-40mm f4 L is a very efficient wide angle lens, perfect for landscapes and outdoor shots. Even though this particular photograph was hand held (ie no tripod) it still resulted in a really sharp image. I find the lens auto-focuses quickly and the colors are brilliant.

Camera: Canon 5D
Exposure: 0.004 sec (1/250)
Aperture: f/11
Focal Length: 17 mm
ISO Speed: 100
Exposure Mode: Manual

2. Another example of the wide angle viewpoint for this lens. This time taken at Lake Jindabyne, Snowy Mountains Australia.

You have to love the feeling of depth this lens gives. It’s also important to note that these images have been taken with a Canon EOS 5D. You may also use the lens on a non full frame camera, for instance a Canon 400D. However, you may find the results come up a little shorter width wise, as in how much of the landscape you can fit into the shot. Although I’m only talking very minor differences here.

Camera: Canon EOS 5D
Exposure: 0.001 sec (1/800)
Aperture: f/11
Focal Length: 17 mm
ISO Speed: 400
Exposure Mode: Manual

3. The Canon 17-40mm f4 L lens also helps you to purposely create some interesting looking perspectives

You need to keep this in mind when taking close up shots of people with this lens set at 17mm, as they could end up looking like bobbleheads. When photographing people, it’s best to keep the lens length at 30-40 mm to avoid this.

Camera: Canon EOS 5D
Exposure: 0.001 sec (1/800)
Aperture: f/11
Focal Length: 17 mm
Exposure Mode: Manual

4. It’s a really useful lens for times when you want to get in as much of the scenery as possible in one frame, without physically moving yourself too far back from the subject.

Take this photograph of the National War Memorial in Australia for example. The large columns behind the people in the image are very tall. This lens was able to capture the whole scene without me having to physically move myself back too far from the main subjects. Therefore the Canon 17-40mm f4 L lens is fantastic glass for times when you have limited space to move, yet still need to photograph large area’s. Other places I find this useful is when photographing museums, shopping malls, hotel rooms etc as shown in the examples below.

In the photograph above, taken at the National Museum in Canberrra Australia, the Canon 17-40mm f4 L lens was put to good use to capture as much of the floor space as possible in a single shot.

And again in the example above, the camera was rotated to portrait mode, which enabled me to capture the majority of the scene as possible, vertically. The image above was taken on a recent trip to Sydney where we stayed at the Novotel Hotel at Darling Harbour.

The photograph shown above of Queen Victoria Building in Sydney Australia, was one of the first images I shot with this lens. It was at this time I noticed how fast the image stabalisation focusses and the sharpness of the images. As you would expect from any Canon L brand lens.

Any Cons or Disadvantages?

The only disadvantage I’ve come across with the Canon 17-40mm f4 L lens is that you need to remember it does only zoom to 40 mm. There has been times that I’ve wanted to zoom
in closer to objects, for example with the gorgeous statues seen above the Queen Victoria Building in Sydney, Australia. It would have been great to be able to fill the frame with the actual statue.

Having said that, if the image is for personal or website use, you can simply crop the area that you wanted from the photographs largest size, as in the example shown below.

As you can see from the example above, this lens will still result in a very detailed and sharp image, even from the largest of crops.

SLR Photography Guide recommends purchasing this lens from Amazon: Canon EF 17-40mm f/4L USM Ultra Wide Angle Zoom Lens for Canon SLR Cameras

Nikon D300 digital SLR camera review

The Nikon D300 is a semi-professional SLR camera for the serious amateur. The quality and price range is somewhere between the cheap entry level camera’s (Nikon D40x) and the more expensive professional models like D2Hs or D2Xs. For a Nikon D300 you can expect to pay around $1800 for the body only.

If you’re after key features and specifications, you can already find this information on the Nikon website (and hundreds of other review sites) so I won’t rehash that information again: Nikon D300 features and specifications.

What are photographers saying about the Nikon D300?

As you’d expect from a semi-professional SLR camera, comments concerning the Nikon D300 are all positive. Here are a few comments made from those who have purchased the camera:

• The Nikon D300 feels solid to hold. This is often a gripe by those who have purchased an entry level camera, is that they don’t feel solid enough.
• Many like how the camera has access to all the main settings through buttons found on the back and top. Therefore, you don’t have to scroll through menu’s (after you find the correct ones) to get to the main settings.
• The Nikon D300 allows you to frame and compose your shot by looking at the LCD screen at the back of the camera (similar to compact camera’s). This is currently not an option on the cheaper entry level SLR camera’s, were you need to look into the viewfinder to compose the shot.
• Even though the D300 features a 12.3 effective megapixel DX-format CMOS image sensor, the image quality is still similar to that of a 10 megapixel camera. Therefore, don’t purchase the Nikon D300 if you are wanting sharper images. For that purpose, buy a better lens. However, if you’re after a better camera, as in options and specifications, then the D300 is your camera, as you’ll see by watching the video below.

Nikon D300 Video Review by Camera Labs