Wildlife Photography across the Water: Canon7D

Tuesday, 22 February 2011

Canon 7D v 5Dmk2 - a bit of pixel peeping

Just over a week ago while I was at Slimbridge I was in one of the hides on my own and so was lucky enough to have the beautiful Common Buzzard that is the subject of today's blog all to myself, in beautiful sunlight.

It hung around for quite a while as it was intently study a vole in the field ahead of it, which it subsequently caught and flew off with. This gave me the chance to change around body, lens and converter compositions to see how things looked and how the crop worked.

The first two images are full frame in terms of crop, and then I will do some 100% pixel blow ups. (Click on the image to see it larger)

5Dmk2, 500f4, 1.4EFTC, 100% of the image

7D, 500f4 (no TC) 100% of the image

Summary - the 1.4 on the 5D nearly makes up for the 1.6 crop factor on the 7D. Both images are within 1 kelvin on the colour temperature, but the 7D is warmer due to it being shot about 20 minutes earlier, and the sun was brighter.

5Dmk2, 500f4, plus 1.4EFTC, crop at 100% pixel enlargement - Unsharpened!!

7D, 500f4, crop at 100% pixel enlargement - Unsharpened as well!!

I am pretty happy with this as neither has been sharpened. The 5D was at ISO400 and the 7D at 125 (for some reason! - should have been at 100 as I only usually use whole stops, but maybe should have it at 400 for a truer comparison)

5D, 500 + 1.4 - cropped for presentation and sharpened

7D 500, cropped for presentation and sharpened as a direct comparison with the the previous one.

As can be seen from the first two images as the full originals, to get to a useable crop there has been pretty big crops.

Now if we put the 1.4 EFTC on the 500 and 7D, then the subject is much better sized in the frame (obviously) but does mean a lot less pixels are thrown away in the resizing process.

7D, 500f4, 1.4 EFTC, 100% of the image, no crop

And given that the light was good I also added the 2x EFTC, and again at full size, we now have an image that we need to throw away virtually nothing and retain all of the available quality. Now of course the 2x does compromise IQ and there are some losses but as we have said before on here, if you have great light, a good steady solid platform and stop down to at least f11 or thereabouts, you can get some good results with it. In Live view mode, I also found that the AF still worked with the 7D, and it shouldn't if you read the specs, unless somebody knows otherwise.

Landscape and portrait variants with the 7D, 2 x EFTC and 500 - both full frame

So conclusions!!. Apart from the ability to pick and choose your reach by virtue of crop, factor, lens length and converter size, I am not particularly sure that I have proved anything other that that the results are very similar between the 5Dmk2 and the 7D on this particular image. Does it matter? For me, not really as I am very pleased that there is this level of consistency and I stress for this type of image.

Clearly what I have shown here is very limited and not really scientific in any way.
But it did prove, at least to me, that the pixels on the 5D are very good, but then I am not sure that that was ever in any doubt.

Where I will expect to start to see differences will be in the full frame depth of field effects when I start doing a bit of macro work later in the year, and also where the subjects are closer with the longer lenses.
But I like the 5Dmk2 that is for sure, and after the 7D the handling is so similar as to make no significant difference.

Martin

Saturday, 14 November 2009

Views - Hands on with the 7D

I got my hands on a 7D yesterday for a brief go.

I took along my 1Dmk3 and shot some equivalent images on both cameras, at a range of ISO settings from 400 to 3200 in RAW.

Just processing and preparing them over this weekend, so if you want to see that and my subjective analysis drop by soon.

It certainly felt nice in the hand, although didn't like the lack of battery grip that is an integral part of the 1D.

Martin

Bio's

David Courtenay, a self taught wildlife and nature photographer, has been capturing images for over 30 years. He has had a passion for wildlife since early childhood and remembers being glued to the television whenever Survival, Wildlife on One and other natural history documentaries were shown. In the 2006 he swapped his established career for the life of a wildlife photographer, such a move demands a measure of uncompromising passion and commitment.

David has travelled extensively throughout Europe as well as spending more than 7 months in India working with local guides and trackers in search of Bengal Tiger, Asian One horned Rhino and Asian Elephant. He has also photographed Wildlife in Australia, Malaysia, Thailand, Sumatra, Africa, Canada and America. Working closely with Conservation companies he tries to raise funds to help Wildlife that has been put on the endangered list by poaching and habitation loss

Martin Dyer has had a passion for avian wildlife since childhood, particularly raptors. Photography was also another keen interest and it was with the specific availability and control of the whole process that digital offers that Martin was then able to combine the two in 2003. Based in the UK, Martin is a regular visitor to Scotland, specifically the Isle of Mull to watch the Eagles resident there. Other trips to Europe and around the UK are usually part of Martin’s agenda in a typical year.

However, as a firm believer on making the most of the local patch, Martin has spent a lot of time and hard work creating a wildlife garden which is reaping the rewards with many new species and varieties of wildlife. A keen member of a number of wildlife photographic groups, Martin is keen to expand his portfolio into other areas of wildlife, and has already established a wide portfolio of images of fungi.