Some of you may remember my previous post requesting Canon to come with something revolutionary in thei next dSLR. And they’ve done exactly that, killing the competition with the newly announced Canon 5D Mark II. With a resolution of 21.1 Megapixels, maximum ISO of 25,600 and full HD movie recording, Canon has just proved to everyone why they are the leader of the camera market with the 5D Mark II.
And the features mentioned above are just the start of the story. It sports the newly introduced Digic IV processor which can process the full 1080p HD video at 30fps and also allows one to shoot still images while the video is being taken without any interruption. It also has audio at a decent quality of 16-bit PCM at 44KHz along with a provision for an external stereo mic. The burst speed is probably a bit slow at 3.9 fps but it still can shoot 310 frames non stop.
It has the much touted 3.0″ Clear View LCD screen with a viewing angle of 170° which can automatically adjust brightness to suit viewing conditions and Live View with 3 different modes of autofocus, similar to the 50D.
In the area of ISO, Nikon was winning with its first full frame camera which had an ISO of 25,600, until today. Canon has trumped the D3 which only had 12 Megapixels with the 5D Mark II, which along with having 21.1 Megapixels of resolution, also has an ISO range of 50 – 25,600 which is the largest range of any dSLR to date.
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The 5D Mark - II in all its glory.
It has a 9 point autofocus sensor which doesnt sound too fabulous when compared to the D3’s 51-point autofocus but it is also assisted by 6 additional invisible autofocus points present inside the spot-metering circle which, now, only covers 3.5% of the frame.
No surprises about the introduction of sensor cleaning, it has the standard EOS Integrated Sensor Cleaning System, but with an addition of a new Fluorine coating on the low-pass filter.
Additional improvements include a minor increase in viewfinder coverage from 96% to 98%, three levels of noise reduction which will kick in when shooting at ISOs higher than 800 and larger battery capacity.
Along with the camera, Canon has also announced a 24mm f/1.4 L II lens for wide angle shots in low light, featuring several new technologies.
The only reason one would buy a Canon 1Ds Mark – III is for the slightly faster burst rate, build quality, more autofocus points and its higher shutter durability.
Now that Sony has entered the 20 Megapixel camera race with the A900, we can only wait and see what Nikon has to offer.
The Canon 5D Mark – II will ship in November with a price tag of US: $2,699, EU: €2,499, UK: £2,299 for the body only. I cannot wait to see some sample videos and photos from this masterpiece.
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