Canon, OH CANON, thou hast left me underwhelmed

[Jacques Mersereau]

Well, from what I've read so far, I have to say I am underwhelmed.
Had this cam been delivered THREE YEARS AGO, it would have rocked the world.

I hope to be proven wrong and flamed to a cinder, but come on. No 4K. No 1080P@60.
NO 4:4:4. No RAW. 50mbps? $16K?!!! UNDERWHELMED. SORRY.

[Jacques Mersereau]

Did I forget? NO global shutter. From what I see, nothing groundbreaking. Nice follow Canon.

[Lawrence Bansbach]

Originally Posted by Jacques Mersereau

Did I forget? NO global shutter. From what I see, nothing groundbreaking. Nice follow Canon.
You can go to reduser now, but then again, so many tried it's down.

And $20K, not $16K.

[Peer Landa]

And still yet, there's the 1DX (rumored to be a 355 mbps beast) here by March and/or another X pro DSLR body video camera in the pipe. Yep, more to come as they say ;^)

-- peer

[Chris Luker]

Saw the cameras in action today.
60fps interlaced at 720 max. 4:2:2 color space.
Price of a Scarlet X kit.
Was not impressed enough to buy one, and I buy pretty much all the newest cameras when they come out.
It was alluded to that they didn't make the 4k sensor for nothing... but they weren't about to say more on that.
So, obsolete next year at this time?

[Brian Drysdale]

Not obsolete for broadcast work. It depends on what you want to use it for.

[Charles Papert]

While I agree that we were all hoping for more (or this feature set for less money), the bottom line for all of this is picture quality. The vast majority of users of a camera at this price range do not need 4:4:4. Most of their work will exist in a limited environment where the difference between that and 4:2:2 will be so negligible that it's not worth mentioning. Likewise to an extent with 4K, although that does allow for lossless reframing within a 1080p/2K environment. 60 fps at 720p is not ideal by any means, but again, for many users the quality loss will be all but undetectable.

Yes, any of these can be "disproved" by side-by-side full res tests and frame blowups and lengthy technical discussions. But none of this has to do with making beautiful pictures, which is what I hope should be the goal of every shooter out there. I won't pass any judgement on the C300 based on specs alone, or even any of the initial or more recent shorts that have been done with it. I want to test it head to head against the F3, the Alexa and the Scarlet (or at the very least watch properly designed and carefully conducted tests that someone else will surely do) and judge the images on a large high-res display or top-end projector and make my judgement at that time.

[Jacques Mersereau]

The NEW NIKON D800 camera is exactly what a ton of people hoped Canon would do and is exactly WHY I am so disappointed with Canon.

Okay, so the D800 isn't perfect - but for $3K? Compared to the Canon C300 for $16K?!!!
For those who disagree, that's cool, but as I have said, the C300 should have been delivered at $8K.
Nikon's D800 proves it.

Nikon D800 D-SLR Camera | High Dynamic Range Camera

Come on folks, what I saw on those demo clips looked darn good to me.

AND, though this is far from a done deal, there will be tons of hackers and programmers getting inside
and *possibly* having some cool D800 mods. The camera has USB 3 out. If enabled, we could be recording RAW at 12bit or maybe 10bit S log. Who knows? The thing is, at $3K, that means for around $10K I can put together a whole kits that will do just fine. I have lots of extra money to add stuff I would need even IF I bought a C300.

It really sticks in my crawl that Canon, with what it has done with both the price points of both the C300 and new DSLRs, has FORCED me to move to Nikon. That is not what I wanted, but there it is.

Congratulations Nikon. Not to understate it, but you just handed Canon its *$$.

[Chris Hurd]

Jacques, will you be going to NAB this year?

[Peer Landa]

Yea, I bet the D800 have now made Canon to try rally their troops before their upcoming 1DX release -- its low light capabilities, clean HDMI out, headphone jack, etc. If I didn't have so much invested already in Canon lenses, I wouldn't think twice moving to Nikon -- but for now, I'll wait to see what the 1DX/5D3 will offer.

-- peer

[Jacques Mersereau]

Hey Chris,

As of now I will be at NAB this year and would love to see you - that is - ...
if you still will talk to me ;-D

Peace, love and understanding (in our own production world way),

Jacques

[Phillip Palacios]

Originally Posted by Jacques Mersereau

Congratulations Nikon. Not to understate it, but you just handed Canon its *$$.

That pretty much sums up my feeling on both the c300 and the new Canon DSLR offerings. BUT I have Canon glass... sigh. At the end of the day I have to remind myself that my clients view and display my work embedded in a webpage.

[Jacques Mersereau]

I also have near $3K in Canon 35mm glass. Yeah, that's nothing for many, but a lot for me.

After asking about adapters it turns out that you can put Nikon glass on Canon camera, but not the other way. SO, yes, that hurts.

I want to stay with Canon, but not happy by the hobbling of the 5DMK3 and the super expensive, but missing the features it should have for $16K C300. The answers are, sell my Canon glass, take a hit and go Nikon OR, somehow afford a used Red One package or F3. As of now, I am waiting.

[Phillip Palacios]

I've been looking at the F3 as well, but that is a stretch for me as for how much I'd want to spend on a cam. It's a wait and see game at this point for me. NAB is close and we may see some other manufactures step up their game in this lower end market.

[Les Wilson]

Originally Posted by Phillip Palacios

...BUT I have Canon glass... sigh. ...

Sell it. You will fetch a good price for it. There's plenty of young filmmaker wanna bees with their T3I and 60D bodies that would jump at it ... not to mention the pros.

It's this very "oh I feel so locked in" perception that fuels the very thing people are lamenting: Canon isn't producing the camera they want. The best way to get the message to Canon is to hit them in the spreadsheet: buy from the equipment maker that does.