Canon USA reveals EOS 5D Mk. IV with 4K, new L-Series Lenses

[Noa Put]

I think the mark 4 will be very popular among weddingvideographers who want full frame, mainly because of it's DPAF, finally a way to keep your subject in focus :)

[Gary Huff]

Originally Posted by Jon Fairhurst

4K allows a high res DSLR shoot clean video with the native optical antialiasing filter at a reasonable crop factor.

A C100 Mark I is cheaper and will do the same thing without requiring you to spend that time in post.

In post, you can bring it down to HD or do a 2:1 reframe.

I am working on a project right now that I am reframing up to 150% from a 1080 source on a 1080 timeline. This is with footage from my C300 Mark II, which is more than capable of some great 4K footage. You know why I am doing this? Because I have filled up nearly 4TB of content from this job from 1080 footage. Shooting these long pieces of content in 4K just to have the ability to reframe would make that blow up to about 15TB.

If you're constantly needing 4K in order to reframe shots, perhaps the problem isn't not having 4K.

Frankly, where 4K truly matters is 30 fps frame grabs. But that's really a photo use case (with short shutter), rather than for videographers.

Which makes strobe lighting useless, and requires a really high shutter speed to eliminate motion blur (frankly, for photos, 60p is the only rate that makes sense to me). Also, who exactly is doing this?

[Gary Huff]

Originally Posted by Noa Put

I think the mark 4 will be very popular among weddingvideographers who want full frame, mainly because of it's DPAF, finally a way to keep your subject in focus :)

In 1080 only. 4K is a 1.7ish crop factor. Plus, given the lighting situation in a lot of wedding shoots (especially during the reception), DPAF can be unusable.

[Andrew Smith]

Also, can clients tell the difference in photos that are taken with the latest camera ... or is it only us?

Andrew

[Jon Fairhurst]

Originally Posted by Gary Huff

A C100 Mark I is cheaper and will do the same thing without requiring you to spend that time in post.

True. But it won't do stills.

Yes, for the video only shooter, get the video cam. For the hybrid shooter who can put up with some headaches to get great end results for photos and stills on a budget, the 5D4 looks like a nice buy.

I am working on a project right now that I am reframing up to 150% from a 1080 source on a 1080 timeline. This is with footage from my C300 Mark II, which is more than capable of some great 4K footage. You know why I am doing this? Because I have filled up nearly 4TB of content from this job from 1080 footage. Shooting these long pieces of content in 4K just to have the ability to reframe would make that blow up to about 15TB.

If you're constantly needing 4K in order to reframe shots, perhaps the problem isn't not having 4K.

Regardless, windowed 4K is the ideal solution on a DSLR.

Which makes strobe lighting useless, and requires a really high shutter speed to eliminate motion blur (frankly, for photos, 60p is the only rate that makes sense to me). Also, who exactly is doing this?

The panel of photographers loved it. Yep, natural light only. Yep, higher shutter speed. The goal of the feature is for that perfect moment. Sports, handheld macro, baby photo, the bouquet, rice in front of the bride's face. Apparently, you can shoot 4K, select the best frame and save it to the card as a still. Then delete the video. At 8.8 MP you can send it to your phone and post immediately. The panel spent a lot of time talking about this feature.

[Gary Huff]

Originally Posted by Jon Fairhurst

Regardless, windowed 4K is the ideal solution on a DSLR.

Windowed 4K for aliasing has zero to do with reframing in post.

The panel of photographers loved it.

Of course they did. The panel of photographers sponsored by Canon. What else are they going to say? Do you always buy the marketing?

Apparently, you can shoot 4K, select the best frame and save it to the card as a still. Then delete the video. At 8.8 MP you can send it to your phone and post immediately.

That is so overwrought. My A7R Mark II can do that as well, which I never use it for. A handful of times I have sent a photo from it to be posted on Instagram. The vast majority of the time, I am using my own cell phone to take and send the photo because you cannot beat that ease of use. And the quality is very good considering the delivery medium when it's all said and done.

The panel spent a lot of time talking about this feature.

Of course they did. It was one of the points the marketing department told them to expound upon.

[Jon Fairhurst]

Marketing aside, they offered real-world use cases that make sense. As I don't use strobes, the feature would work for me. It's all about hit rate. With handheld macro, it's hard to get that perfect focus point. My wife does public speaking. It's tough to get that perfect moment when the emotion is right and her mouth isn't in a funny position as she speaks. For action shots, I recently photographed some kids doing martial arts, breaking boards. At 4fps, I wasn't able to get that perfect moment, or those perfect three frames to show the approach, the hit, and the immediate result. So yeah, I'd use it. Certainly not always, but I have a collection of "almost" photos that this feature would have improved.

Along those lines, anti-flicker is another killer feature for me. Shooting stills under fluorescent lights means that the exposure and color temp are all over the place. Sync'ing to the lights when you need a faster shutter will be great. Yeah, I could use a flash, but it's too conspicuous for candids.

I'm thinking that the DSLR vs video camera thing is off track. Clearly, dedicated video cameras remove compromises, but video cameras do even worse as still cameras than DSLRs as video cams. You can buy one of each, but that's expensive. For great quality for stills and video on a budget, DSLRs remain a great option for many.

The real question is whether the 5D4 competes against offerings from Nikon and Sony. That's the real competition. The A7 line may still have the edge in video, but it's mirrorless, which typically doesn't focus as fast as a true DSLR. Nikon is on par for stills but I don't know that they are on the video side. Frankly, I'd have to dig deeper to really understand the pros and cons. And given that I already have L glass...

[Gary Huff]

Originally Posted by Jon Fairhurst

Frankly, I'd have to dig deeper to really understand the pros and cons. And given that I already have L glass...

So how close are you to spending $3500 + new CF cards for 4K at this moment in time? Have you pre-ordered?

[Jon Fairhurst]

I'm not buying right away. It's not for my business and I'm doing a major remodel on the house right now. And I just replaced my 20 year only riding mower with a new Toro Zero Turn. The question about buying has as at least as much to do with personal finances as product capabilities.

But I never really considered the 5D3. Its digital filters for video were just too soft. If I had an important project recently, it would have been between a rental, A7s II or C100 i/ii, depending on the project requirements.

The 5D4 looks viable for me, but I'm still in evaluation mode. It would certainly improve on my hit rate for stills and be more sensitive than my 5D2. And the video quality would be crazy better. (Though note that I have the Mosaic Engineering filter for the 5D2, so I don't have to put up with DSLR aliasing. And my son has a Shogun that I can borrow, so I can improve on the coding too.) But windowed 4K and DPAF are sweet improvements.

I don't plan to buy right away, but maybe in 2017...

BTW, I took a look at Nikon and their D810 doesn't really compete. It's cheaper, should but lacks 4K, DPAF, touchscreen, and WiFi. But it was released in 2014 and who knows what they might release next.

Sony's A7x looks great, but with no mirror and a different lens mount. I don't think it has enough advantages to tempt me more than the 5D4 does today.

So what about a C100? If I had an 8-bit, video intensive project that didn't need higher frame rates, I'd probably go for it. But as a general purchase, I prefer the 5D4 as it's more of a Swiss Army knife.

[Gary Huff]

Originally Posted by Jon Fairhurst

The question about buying has as at least as much to do with personal finances as product capabilities.

The question about buying is always tempered with finances. Which is why I don't just willy-nilly recommend an upgrade to everyone over some nebulous features I saw in a marketing video.

The 5D Mark IV is a good upgrade for those who had the Mark III if it makes financial sense to them and if they can see an improvement in their work with the features it offers. However, as someone who is very much a fan of the Canon color science and DPAF, and who is currently using a C300 Mark II and A7R Mark II, I am in no way enticed by this. The 1DX Mark II is a better choice with its use of CFast media, but still neither competes with what I need as a B-cam to my C300 Mark II that the A7R Mark II is currently providing.

And this is also from someone who, if the 5D IV had peaking and Clog, would have spent that $3500 now. Because, you know, I have actual paid projects I would have liked to use it on.

[Jon Fairhurst]

Originally Posted by Gary Huff

The 5D Mark IV is a good upgrade for those who had the Mark III if it makes financial sense to them and if they can see an improvement in their work with the features it offers.

Coming from the Mark II, I have no doubt that the improvement will be significant for me. A lot happens in eight years!

Oh yeah, the new iPhone 7 will be announced on Sept 7th. My iPhone 5 has one broken microphone, the screen is popping out on one side, and the memory is full. I've been putting off replacing it to be on the favorable side of the upgrade cycle, but it's yet one more purchase that delays my DSLR upgrade. Oh well. 1st world problems...

...if the 5D IV had peaking and Clog,

Personally, I've never cared for peaking. (I'm not saying it's bad; it's just not my preference.) I've used it in my son's Shogun, but it always seems a bit eager to say that things are in focus. Maybe I need to look more at the peaking in front of and behind the subject, rather than at the subject itself.

That said, a flat profile and more bits is the thing I most want, but isn't in the spec. I believe that one can dial in a flat profile (is Technicolor's CineStyle still available?), but it won't be exactly Clog. I don't need Clog as I'm not matching other cams, but I can appreciate that if I had a Cinema EOS camera, I'd strongly want Clog in my b-cam too.

[Jon Fairhurst]

Speaking of the Shogun, I wonder how well this will work with the 5D4?

I expect that the HDMI will have a clean video output, given that this is true on the 5D3 and its competitors.

The open question is about resolution and sharpness. When shooting full frame, DSLRs depend on line skipping or filtering on the sensor in order to reduce the data rate from the device. The 5D3 video is soft. Will full-frame HD on the 5D4 be sharper? We will see...

And then there's windowed 4K. When shooting in this mode, the HDMI output is HD. I wonder if the downsampling is good? The nice thing is that all of the 4K data is available to the Digic chip without pixel skipping. It's possible that the Digic downsampler will have high quality, and then the Shogun can provide peaking and a variety of recording formats to SSD. Yes, it's extra kit, but it would make the camera quite useful for bigger projects.

[Noa Put]

Originally Posted by Jon Fairhurst

Personally, I've never cared for peaking. (I'm not saying it's bad; it's just not my preference.) I've used it in my son's Shogun, but it always seems a bit eager to say that things are in focus. Maybe I need to look more at the peaking in front of and behind the subject, rather than at the subject itself.

Having worked with different brand camera's the implementation of peaking can be very different, from unreliable and difficult to judge to very accurate, my jvc ls300, eventhough it has not good a good quality lcd, has the best and most accurate peaking of any camera I ever had, this combined with magnified focus while recording has become a critical function for all my shoots when it comes to guaranteeing it's in focus. I think if you say you don't care about peaking is because you never had a camera that has good peaking, especially with full frame camera's peaking/magnified focus is not a luxury as how good a autofocus system can be, in most situations you want to be able to check up and finetune if needed, having no peaking and no magnification during recording is not very reassuring.

[Jon Fairhurst]

Thanks, Noa. I've played around with a few cameras with peaking at trade shows, and each time I felt that I could do better by eye and that the peaking actually obscured the details that I wanted in focus. Good to hear that some implementations are better than those I've seen.

Still, I'm wondering if looking for peaking just in front of and behind the subject might be a good technique. Not all compositions provide the right context, but when they do, one could confirm that the subject is in the middle of the focus band.

Then again, if DPAF works as well as I've read, this might be somewhat moot. For solo shooting, DPAF would be my go-to solution. For team shooting (though it's been a while), we do the traditional 1st AC / follow focus thing. In that case, the focus puller doesn't look at a monitor. It is, however, important that the camera op be able to see when focus is "buzzed."

One thought on this: for team shoots, maybe it's even better if the camera op sees the full picture for framing only and if an additional person has a larger or zoomed monitor and watches for buzzed focus only. It's always best when each person can focus on a single task.

In other Canon news (not related to the 5D4), Canon has developed a global shutter sensor.
Canon develops global shutter-equipped CMOS sensor that achieves expanded dynamic range through new drive method | Canon Global

For 5D4 performance, the 8-bit limit is a disappointment. The remaining big questions are low-light sensitivity and rolling shutter. Canon's announcement of a global shutter sensor might be another key step in moving to mirrorless cameras. Combine a fast, global electronic shutter with improved DPAF-style focus and the mirror will no longer be necessary. That makes cameras smaller, more robust, and cheaper to produce. Canon executives have previously stated that they don't plan a high-end mirrorless camera because they don't believe that the performance is quite there yet. (Keyword: "yet.")

[Dylan Couper]

Hey Chris! My 5D mk4 arrived!

Here's my official DVinfo article:
It takes a good picture. It only comes in black.

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Please deposit my paycheck directly into my NAB bail fund.
Thanks!