ISO50

Check this out, NIN had live concert footage shot with the Canon 5D MKII and it looks fuckin’ rad! Just an added note to the already great stills it takes.

http://vimeo.com/3385757

does anyone know where you can actually buy large format photos like this? is very frustrating seeing so many great photographers and not been able to hang anything on my wall.

Scott,

I shoot with the original 5D and have a 20mm I use every now and then that produces similar vignetting straight out of camera. The vignetting in his photos may be natural.

scott, have you considered post processing with Apple Aperture or Adobe Lightroom?

While I still think the most important tool for photography is the photograher and the cameras are given too much emphasis, I will say this, that thing shoots some damn nice images dude.

My director has one and even when you zoom in 100% the stuff still looks good, and you can shoot at these crazy iso’s. A dream camera for myself.

even the Camera Raw Processor in Adobe Bridge has a nice vignette feature. i use it constantly.

Not that the 5D II isn’t nice, but you can get the same results with a 40D or 50D and some really good glass. You can’t make up for the quality of a good lens. And the wider you go with any lens, you will start to get more natural vignetting. Most professional photographers I have spoken with, actually see vignetting as more of a hindrance anyway. You can always add more in post if you like it that way.

I went from an original 5D to a nikon d200 now moving to a d700. existing light takes on new meaning at 6400iso.

The vignette i would get with wide angle lenses on the 5d was great on rare occasions and a pita at all other times. The camera wasnt sealed either and that wasnt ideal for shooting fashion on the beach or even some of the filthy locations we shoot at in NYC.

I agree that most of those photos would be hard to tell if they where taken with a digital rebel, d40 or similar, I took some great stuff using an old canon G1 back in the day. It’s more about the composition and choice of photoshop color treatments than the camera, especially with these shots.

These are great shots and the photographer has a great eye, however to choose between camera brands based on them is a bit of a stretch.

i have a 5dm2. i have a 16-35L II. the images are outstanding. but i can also say that after a couple months of use, there are little things. if you hunt around, youll find there are people having issues. i did not have the “black dot”. i do have the “focus” issue. recently, more and more, im noticing shadows have a purple/magenta cast. it is an amazing camera. but it is not flawless. and honestly at 21MP the file size can be too big. unless im shooting for something i know is going to be printed huge. i shoot at the sraw setting which is about 11MP. at full size full res—a raw image exported as a TIFF with LZW compression from lightroom can easily be over 80mgs. that is a quick way to eat up harddrive. i would not trade this camera for anything, but i do not think it wasnt machined in heaven either.

Scott, I just bought a mark II and I’ve owned 5ds for a while. The 5DmarkII is a beast by comparison. The basic 5D was already freakin incredible, and the range and colors – even at iso6400 – straight out of the markII are off the chain and chewing ass. If you’re in the market for a $2700 camera, this is one to buy. I definitely like the out of camera files from canon better than the Nikons, and numerous colleagues who switched to Nikon (after the D3, before the 5DmarkII) agree, but will remain because of other personal preferences.

These images are positively post produced. The vignette is not a native artifact of that lens, but I like it in post. I’m no purist. There is also a good bit of mild post processing using plugin filters and software – my bet (i recognize it). The same toning effects can be achieved by using a solid color adjustment layers, and using channels with adjustments in the red and green.

All in all these are beautiful, and fantastic examples of what the 5DmarkII can do.

I’ve never really been interested in the SLR format because I’m more about street photography, but new projects are going to necessitate a SLR pretty soon. I feel like a D90 or 50D (I have no brand bias yet) is plenty sufficient, but I’d rather futureproof my purchase as much as possible — oh, and I may need video capabilities or large prints. I’d rather be limited by my own talent or my clients than by equipment.

I can justify the $2700 on the body, but I’m scared of how much I’ll have to spend to get a usable system. Memory cards, at least one versatile lens to start, battery grip, etc. for what I need to be able to do. There’s a lot to like about that new Panasonic GH1 for the pricetag…

Anyone have any thoughts? I’d love the wisdom of the crowd. I need to purchase A camera soon and feel like this is the one, but it’s a big spend. I still need a new travel camera too, but that’s another story (DP2?).

Jayson –
dont feel to bad at all.
reasons i personally prefer nikon.

1. Build quality and weather sealing. I drop my camera too often. I shoot in dirty environments and bad weather. My 5D was a PITA and felt cheaply made vs nikon in this regard.

2. Shadows. Nikon and Canon deal with shadows differently and i prefer the more tone neutral shadows of nikon.

3. Noise. I personally find nikon noise much more like film grain than Canon noise.

4. Skin tones. In the studio I prefer skin tones from nikon.

5. Auto focus + metering consistency. see google.

6. Cheap second hand primes. – Nikon used to be the pro standard back in 35mm days and you can pick up great deals on former pro lenses second hand. Like my F1.2 55mm.

These are my personal preferences and what i finds works for me. I totally respect a different photographer may well prefer the Canon for their own shooting needs.

I had the opportunity to play around with 5DII this past weekend and I really loved it.

It’s funny but everyone I’ve spoken with that has one says some slight variation of the same thing…roughly: “This is the first digital camera I’ve owned that I felt like I got ‘film quality’ images with.”

Granted these are not professional photographers, so the comparison there isn’t to mark II’s or III’s, but I think everyone is just relieved/elated to feel like they can mimic film with a digital camera they can actually afford.

Scott, you are way too obsessed with camera makes and specs, and not interested enough in the act of photography itself. Most current-generation DSLRs could take the photos above, it’s the photographer’s eye and post-processing that makes them what they are.

Canon or Nikon – there is no difference.

Lots of good comments here ! I also have a D80 and 5 lenses and wanted to do the same as u but decided to first just try out D700 or wait for the next upgrades. I’d say that video takes quiet some life out of the sensor so . . post production can do a lot of magic, maybe upgrade that knowledge also. I also like this cam comparison – http://is.gd/ok30

Best+

This is my current set up –

Nikon D90 body (came from D80 and I have to say Scott it is a very noticable difference, especially with the AF system, IQ and low light noise levels).

Nikon 50mm F1.8 Prime – amazing, just amazing lens. Amazing for heavy DOF shots. Portraits, product shots, abstract shots and in particular compliments the D90 HD video beautifully as it’s really easy to manually focus when ‘running and gunning’. Best £100 I ever spent.

Sigma 17-70mm Lens – absolutely superb bit of kit. Don’t bother trying to use in MF mode as it’s a bitch to MF but so responsive in AF mode it doesn’t matter. I can take anything from beautiful wide angle landscapes to macro shots of insects with this bad boy. Will focus on subject matter around 1inch from the lens no problem.

Sigma 15mm Fisheye – great for landscapes, quirky urban shots and again works great with the HD video mode for skating vids etc.

Tamron 55-200mm Zoom – cheap, versatilve, lightweight zoom lens. I don’t really require much need for a zoom lens but this does the job on the odd occasion I do.

I have to say that the shots you have posted are all possible using my set up, IMO. The tonal range you see is certainly not because it’s a 5D MKII, it’s because he’s messed about with his curves alot. Most SLRs will capture that range of tone, you just have to bring it out! I have used the 5D and I have to say when you put the shots side by side with a D90 there is not a hell of alot in it.

The D90 video mode definitely has alot of problems but considering it’s essentially a nice little add on I absolutely love it. I am also glad it shoots in 24p mode as opposed to the Canon’s 30fps. Makes for far more cinematic shots (even if it is only 720p as opposed to Canon’s 1080p).

Here is a little test film I made a couple of weeks ago….

http://www.vimeo.com/3485158

Turn HD OFF, otherwise it crashes around 4 minutes. Feel free to turn it on to see the quality though!

Anyway seriously Scott I understand the want to switch to the 5DMKII as I had a D80 and got a little annoyed by certain things, but don’t use photos like the ones you have posted as an indicator, they are without a doubt possible with the D90, no problem at all. My 2 cents!

Hi Scott, if you want to save money you can easily replay the Canon EF 16 – 35mm f2.8 L with the (cheaper, but still amazing) Canon EF 17 – 40mm f4 L.

Hope you are well!

best wishes,
Daniel

Hey Scott, thanks for the kind words…I’m actually sitting under 3 of your posters!

I almost never use photoshop when post-processing my photos. Everything is done in Adobe Lightroom, and most of the “effects” you’re referring to are just changes in white balance and in some cases upping the exposure and contrast. Of course all of that is done with RAW format.

Oh, two of the photos up there were taken with a 30D and a 10-22mm glass and one was with a measly old Digital Rebel! That being said, the 5D completely changed my photography game mostly due to the camera’s inherent image quality and also it’s crazy ISO. Sometimes I’ll put it in Auto-ISO and be indoors in low light and it has NO problem taking great, noiseless photos. It has saved a lot of possibly blurry and crap photos and made them awesome.

a friend of mine shot this with his 5D. i’m still in awe. http://www.vimeo.com/3579151 great shots of this show here as well http://www.flickr.com/photos/25469394@N06/page3/

We just got a 5D MKII at my work and it’s amazing. Pair it with lightroom 2.0 and you’ve got yourself a lot of camera.