Augie Chang Photography: My take on the Canon 5D Mark 2

Wednesday, September 17, 2008

My take on the Canon 5D Mark 2

So the new 5D finally arrived late last night. Jason pinged me in the middle of the night as I editing a few weddings. I was truly excited about this new camera, but now, I am not really sure where I stand.

I am shooting with the 5D in the last 2.5 years and have been extremely happy with it except the following:

  1. The camera body is not up to par for a professional photographer. We use and abuse these cameras so the body has to be able to withhold the test.
  2. The dial on the side is annoying to me because I always accidentally switch it to a mode that I don't want.
  3. The 5D does not have a sensor cleaner so I always get dust in the camera, especially shooting in a dusty location like Nestldown!
  4. I shoot RAW, and I tend to set my camera on continuous shooting mode. I noticed many times that my camera "slows down" when I shoot too many frames at one time. I have to sit there, wait for the camera to "catch up".
So having said all that, what I was hoping Canon would do is to put this camera in a better body with a whole different function layout. This will address my #1 and #2 above. #3 is now being addressed in the new 5DM2 and I *THINK* #4 is being addressed as well.

Now, many friends and students have been sending me emails today and asked if I will upgrade. My answer is yes, but maybe not immediately. What I am concerned about with this new camera is the following:
  1. New battery, new charger, now we need a whole new set of batteries (including backup) to support it.
  2. The new RAW file size is gynormous. It is 21MP, so my file size is around 20-24MB. This is nuts! especially, I shoot around 2000 pictures per wedding. Imagin what the storage would need to be?
  3. What about the shutter? has it been upgraded to a more "industrial strength" shutter? I broke my 5D shutter once and Canon replaced it at a pretty hefty cost. We shoot so much that a consumer based shutter is just not going to cut it.
Like I said, I WILL eventually upgrade to this camera, but I am just not as excited as I would have been if Canon upgraded the overall body to the more industrial strength one (similar to the 1 series). But one thing that REALLY excites me is the ISO 25600. This means I can pretty much throw my flashes away! ;)

Nevertheless, this is still a GREAT camera. I am sure people who are using 30Ds or 40Ds are more than happy to upgrade to this new kid on the block.

8 comments:

Alice Trieu said...

Nice review Augie! Yes, 21MP? Do we really need that?! and the ISO, is that for real?! 25600??

Events by Evonne, LLC said...

Wow, ISO 25600? Holy Cow... I better not be picking my nose in the dark if you take a photo of me with this Canon! =)

Lilia Ahner said...

Great thoughts on the upcoming 5D Mark II. Regarding the huge file size, I read that they are making different RAW sizes available, so you can have 10 or 11MB files instead of the full 21MB. I'm a big fan of your work, and also just wanted to say hi!

Anonymous said...

Augie, how about updating the firmware? Maybe this slow down was fixed in the updates software?

Jenny Lee Photography said...

i like the video function it has and the sensor cleaner....cuz i'm a dirty girl with dirty cam.

Anonymous said...

Hey Augie, great seeing you last night. To answer your RAW question, it does come with a couple of smaller RAW settings, one that creates a 10MP Raw image vs the full size 21MP for us wedding folk.

Daniel Saravia said...

This is very helpful as I am looking to purchase a professional camera to archive my creations. Beautiful photography by the way =)

Unknown said...

hi there.

stumbled onto your website here. as a pro wedding photog. did you have problems shooting with your old 5d?

since the m2's af system wasnt changed we can pretty much expect the same af performance (well logically), did you experience anything different with the af?

thanks