Canon going Mirrorless

[Peter Mallett]

I'm not.much of an expert on what advantage there is between Mirrorless and a mirror shutter so I'm not sure of the impact this will have.

However it seems from various sources that the Canon 7D Mk ii will be.the last of that particular line and that an enhance 80d will replace it. This is because Canon has decided to concentrate on Mirrorless cameras in the future for its semi pro and pro cameras.

Any thoughts on this from the forum?

I have an original 7D which has been excellent.

[grantp]

Originally Posted by Peter Mallett

I'm not.much of an expert on what advantage there is between Mirrorless and a mirror shutter so I'm not sure of the impact this will have.

However it seems from various sources that the Canon 7D Mk ii will be.the last of that particular line and that an enhance 80d will replace it. This is because Canon has decided to concentrate on Mirrorless cameras in the future for its semi pro and pro cameras.

Any thoughts on this from the forum?

I have an original 7D which has been excellent.

Mirrorless has become very popular and Canon (and Nikon) have now joined the party with virtually Pro level Full Frame sensor offerings. A full range of lenses dedicated to the new bodies will be following to take advantage of the potential for smaller sizes rather than using existing lenses with adapters.

The camera bodies without mirrors are smaller and lighter and better suited to video use. However the development of in sensor focusing capabilities has been a requirement to be able to begin to compete with SLRs for fast and accurate focus. That plus usable screens and better Live View.

For most photographic uses the manufacturers, led by Sony, seem to feel confident they have caught up far enough to satisfy the needs of enough photographers to make mirrorless the future market battleground - albeit a shrinking market.

In part this may be because they think they can convert some phone users into advanced camera converts (at a price) by giving them something that works like a phone and offers much the same instant communications for sharing the results of their creativity.

So the main objective is - like for like in terms of what the camera is intended for - smaller, lighter, simpler and therefore in theory less expensive or more profitable. Providing one does not need long lenses.

If one does need long lenses then the size and weight benefit is compromised anyway. Not sure about performance but I would imagine that the relatively slow long lens would not help the focusing cause in any way - unless it was a dedicated lens and they had come up with some clever way of getting the lens to boost the 'brightness' of the scene to assist focusing. However I am speculating on that. I have yet to go looking for reviews of recent mirrorless bodies when used with long lenses.

In general, for action shooting, few if any mirrorless bodies released in previous years seem to have been considered as candidates for action shooters other than those having very high frame rates to play with. (Simply because they have very high frame rates... not because of the focus performance.)

There have been some suggestions that follow focus capability has been improving with some of the most recent releases but maybe not up to Reflex level yet.

The manufacturers will probably be happy that perhaps only about 10% of camera sales result in regular usage (other than for smart phones where I would guess that most users probably take at least a few snaps every year.)

It's not easy to predict which way to move.

The newer formats will likely work best with their own dedicated lenses.

If one is buying for reduced size and weight (not always a good thing when shooting action though useful for carrying stuff around) and therefore facing the prospect of changing the whole 'system', brand loyalty may be expendable.

And if video is important then Sony and Panasonic and possibly Fuji seem to have the edge - mostly if one is looking for 4k video and has the budget to buy the camera batteries, memory cards, processing hardware and storage capacity to support the creation of 4k content at volumes that would make the choice of system important.

With another Olympics year coming up in 2020 the main manufacturers will be in the process of final development of their next flagship products so the existing technologies will start to trickle down through new releases ever faster one might expect. So this year may well result in a somewhat clearer view of what the near future (up to 4 years ahead) will be bringing to the main stream.

I think the 7D line way well disappear - especially if Canon can persuade people that the mirrorless offerings are good enough for the needs of the non-pro user shooting some sports (or wildlife action) who might have been the main target for the body. And in that respect 'lighter' may be a significant attraction for most potential buyers.

[gary396]

Peter, I switched over from Nikon (full-frame) to mirrorless - Fuji (crop sensor) about 3-years ago and more recently have added mirrorless 'medium' format, again with Fuji.

As Grant says Nikon and Canon have belatedly joined the party after some early false starts (Sony have been the mirrorless leaders in full frame and have developed some very high quality kit over the last few years - really good stuff but maybe doesn't feel as rugged and to me the user interface is not so good. But output quality for Sony is exceptional).

There's very little to choose between them all in terms of quality as you can imagine. One thing to bear in mind with the Canon mirrorless offerings is that they don't currently offer in body image stabilisation whereas the others mainly do. For some that's a negative, for others not so. Similarly single card slots which again for some is a negative

Canon do offer (and maybe bundle) an adapter between the new Canon - the EOS R and cheaper RP - and their old lenses. And they have launched some very high quality RF series lenses if you want to buy new but they're quite expensive and large.

Canon have also been criticised for hobbling their mirrorless 4K video with a crop factor. Big issue for some people and really daft of Canon in my opinion (I'm not alone in that view).

But at the end of the day if you want to stay in the Canon world with the new kit you won't be disappointed.

As to focus speed / tracking - mirrorless cameras have come a long way and they're up there with the best - many sports professionals now use them but maybe some high end DSLRs have the slight edge (in the opinion of some but certainly not all). The official photographic agency for WEC, ELMS and Le Mans uses Fuji for example.

Positive aspects of mirrorless - what you see is what you get - looking through the viewfinder as you change settings you see the effects of exposure changes as they're electronic viewfinders, not optical as with DSLRs. For me that's a big plus - similarly you can review your images looking through the viewfinder so no squinting at the rear LCD screen in bright sunshine (although you can still do that as well).

The bodies can be smaller / lighter (that's not why I got into them) but that advantage has gradually been eroded as they've become bigger again in some cases - and the lenses tend to be not much smaller, if any, than DSLRs. You can get some smaller / lightish mirrorless combinations e.g. for travel. That's how I started as I got an early, cheap Fuji and realised that I'd virtually stopped using my Nikon stuff - hence the gradual change over to Fuji (with a bit of dabbling with Sony for a while but that's now been sold).

The range of mirrorless lenses from Nikon / Canon is limited as they're new into the market but, as said, adapters let you use your old lenses. Sony, Fuji, Panasonic etc have big mirrorless lenses as they're more established in the market - but not all of them are full-frame.

I could go on! Big convert to mirrorless, never looked back but nothing wrong with DSLRs if that's what people prefer (certainly not knocking them).

[Peter Mallett]

Thanks chaps good info.

I like my 7D and have always coveted a 1DX ???? But your description of how the display works on mirrorless is fascinating. One thing I've really not understood is the cropped frame thing. As far as I can tell the pictures I take are the ones I see in the viewfinder so does it matter whether they are cropped or not? But that is a different issue.

If the mirrorless revolution takes hold then will it make the remaining DSLRs more affordable?

[gary396]

There are lots of debates re the sensor sensor issue Peter. The larger sensors clearly have advantages e.g. pixel density / noise etc but having said that with Fuji I moved back from Nikon full-frame to Fuji smaller sensor and have been more than happy. Having said that the Fuji 'medium' format that I also have does make a huge difference. As you say if the view you get is what you're happy with then fine.

The majority view is that DSLRs will continue to be sold for some time (years) but the iteration of new models will no doubt slow down as the launch of mirrorless models increase.

If you fancy a 1DX it might be worth waiting a year or two and seeing if Canon release an equivalent mirrorless for the Olympics (views differ as to whether they will). If so, then 1DX prices may ease off a little?

[grantp]

Originally Posted by Peter Mallett

Thanks chaps good info.

I like my 7D and have always coveted a 1DX ???? But your description of how the display works on mirrorless is fascinating. One thing I've really not understood is the cropped frame thing. As far as I can tell the pictures I take are the ones I see in the viewfinder so does it matter whether they are cropped or not? But that is a different issue.

If the mirrorless revolution takes hold then will it make the remaining DSLRs more affordable?

The 1DX, used, is just about at a sensible price point but likely to shift down again when the next range topping model comes out for the Olympics next year. My understanding is that the 1DX 2 is a big advance over the original 1DX but still very expensive in the used market.

The problem of moving to full frame is that the file sizes tend to increase (but not so much with the 1DX as with some others) and the lenses are now fully utilised rather then using just the centre area of the glass. So good glass becomes a necessity.

Also the additional pixel count on the sensor, if any, does not always compensate for the loss of 'enlargement' factor. So if you are filling the frame with a lens on your 7D the same shot taken with the same lens on a full frame camera will not fill the frame. However you will probably get about the same resolution by cropping the image and the pixels tend to be larger and so offer nicer results.

Stand alone camera sales have been falling for some years. The manufacturers have been moving up market in order to try to continue to make profit and sell more expensive lenses too.

The 1DX likely requires you to buy new memory cards for decent image write speeds and if you have EF-S lenses for your 7D they won't work with the 1DX. Realistically something like a 1DX pretty much mandates the use of Canon L spec lenses to make sense of using it. Or Non-Canon equivalents of L spec. lenses.

As ever, it all depends on what you are likely to be using the images for.

[Peter Mallett]

Ah now I understand. I do have a couple of L spec lenses a 70 - 200 zoom and a 50mm f1.8. Both work well with the 7D. I've also got a 100 - 400 Canon Zoom but that is an EF-S.

Ideally I'd like to upgrade to the 1DX 2 with a 300mm lens.

But this is slightly OT.

[grantp]

Originally Posted by Peter Mallett

Ah now I understand. I do have a couple of L spec lenses a 70 - 200 zoom and a 50mm f1.8. Both work well with the 7D. I've also got a 100 - 400 Canon Zoom but that is an EF-S.

Ideally I'd like to upgrade to the 1DX 2 with a 300mm lens.

But this is slightly OT.

The 7D is a 1.6 crop ratio sensor.

The 1DX is, nominally, a "full frame" sensor in the sense that is size is about the same size as the area captured by a 35mm film camera.

So on a full frame body a 100-400 lens captures the same area of subject matter as it would on a 35mm film camera.

A 7D sensor - the common standard reference being an APS-C size - will capture a smaller area of the view for the same focal length. So at 100mm on the lens the area capture on the 7D os the equivalent of what a 160mm lens would capture fitted to a full frame sensor body like the 1DX.

To look at the the other way around, a 300mm lens on a 7D is approximately the same as a 480mm lens of a full frame body. Or a 300mm on a full frame is about the same as a 200mm on a 7D. (Actually about a 187mm but near enough.)

The EF-S mounts fit on a full EF mount but the lenses are intended to be smaller and lighter (and cheaper) and so do not offer full sensor coverage on a larger sensor. Hence the limitation.

My 1D3 has a 1.3 'crop' ratio (APS-H, now discontinued) and so fits between the two common sensor sizes. Quite a good compromise if compromise is required. Obviously Canon feel it is not required.