topic Re: Canon 5d or 6d? in EOS DSLR & Mirrorless Cameras

Canon 5d or 6d?

barrisster — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 01:19:19 GMT

I presently have a 40d and am considering upgrading. I think I would be better served with a full frame camera. However, I can't decide whether to purchase a 6d or 5d. I think the 6d would meet my needs but, don't want to limit myself and thus am considering the 5d. If they were closer in price, there would be no question I like the ability to increase the ISO to such a large number..

I am a amateur, so my concern is that the 5d would be like owning a Ferrari in Los Angeles traffic. I would look good, but I could never use its full capabilities.

My photographic interests range from landscapes to macros to travel. Anyone have any suggestions? Thanks

Re: Canon 5d or 6d?

Sebring5 — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 02:13:07 GMT

Re: Canon 5d or 6d?

hsbn — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 15:30:51 GMT

5DMIII is like a Ferrari FF and the 6D is like Ferrari California. So to most people they are still expensive piece of equipment. Heck, I have taken countless number of wedding and events with my trusted 30D for years. And most people said to me "that is one expensive camera" ha!. Get a 5DMIII and you won't regret. You can learn to use it to its full potential so don't worry, get the best that you can.

Re: Canon 5d or 6d?

ebiggs1 — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 16:17:56 GMT

By all means, if you can afford the price of admission, get the 5D Mk III. It is a wonderful camera and will serve you for years to come. Personally, I would buy a good used 5D Mk II before I bought a 6D.

Re: Canon 5d or 6d?

Skirball — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 16:20:20 GMT

Conversly, you could also learn how to use the "advanced features" of the 5d3 yet still not use them much in the field. Did it hurt to have the 5d3? No, but was it worth and extra $1000+ for features you don't use?

Unless you're shooting a lot of fast moving subjects the differences between the two cameras are minimal. Both are very capable cameras. Me personally, I didn't think the cost difference was worth it, but I'm very much in the minority on the internet.

Re: Canon 5d or 6d?

EOS6D — Tue, 09 Jul 2013 07:09:23 GMT

Me and wife have been through similar decision making recently, so let me sum this up to you to make it easier.

6D ISO capability is same as 5dm3. it's color depth is very close to 5dm3, it's low light focusing is excellent too. that is a major advantage given the price of full frame 6D when compared to professional grade 5dm3.

in fact the only real world differences (apart from external body construction & weight and 6d built-in wifi/gps features) are very simple but can mean a lot to you:

1.
6d has 11 auto-focus points while 5dm3 has 61, so if you are the guy always relying on off-center focus points then consider 5dm3. furthermore 6d has only one precise (cross-type) focus point and that is in center only (the others are vertical or horizontal only, but not cross type - they are less precise) ... that being said either deal with less precise off center focus points or rely on centered focus and recomposing the frame before releasing the shutter.

2.
HDR capability of 6D works only in JPG mode, it's not possible in RAW.

3.
6D runs on SD cards and current fastest you can get is up to 90MB/s write speeds, that is not enough for continuous shooting in pure RAW mode with full speed of 4.5FPS, not for long at least (camera will get busy as SD card write speed will be slower than required). it's not a problem with 5dm3 & fastest CF cards on the market.

so, if continuous shooting or HDR or only 1 cross type focus point
are not a problem then choose 6D as the the rest is nearly same as in 5Dm3 (apart from water proofing seals and body material).

Hope it helps! 🙂

😉

Re: Canon 5d or 6d?

TCampbell — Tue, 09 Jul 2013 20:13:33 GMT

The 5D III has a _vastly_ superior auto-focus system. It goes far deeper than simply the number of points.

The 5D III essentially has the same auto-focus system as the flagship 1D-X (with one slight nuance of difference in how they link the metering modes to the follow focus modes.)

Canon has a 47 page guide JUST dedicated to describing how to take advantage of the focus system. You can find it here: http://www.learn.usa.canon.com/resources/articles/2012/1dx_guidebook.shtml

(This page is just the intro page... click the link in the lower left corner of that page to download the PDF from Canon. BTW, this is for BOTH The 1D-X and the 5D III although the title just says "1D-X" - the text on their intro page will explain that it also applies to the 5D III.)

I upgraded from a 5D II... with the 5D III it was fairly easy to achieve results like this:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/thevirtualtim/8981989420/in/set-72157633992961557/lightbox/

To create that photo, I used a 5D III with an EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM (original) with IS turned on. The shot was taken at ISO 100 using a slow shutter at 1/40th to imply the motion by creating deliberate blur of the background and wheelspokes, while panning to track the subject so that the subject would be sharp. This image only required minor adjustments for white balance, highlights & shadows, etc. but all the blur is natural.

To track the subject, I put the camera drive into continuous high-speed mode, switched the focus mode to "AI Servo", then set the AF tracking to "Case 2: Continue to track subjects, ignoring possible obstacles" (at times there were trees between me and the subject but the camera ignored them.) This would not have been as easy to do with my 5D II because it doesn't have AF tracking.

Given that this is a "panning" shot the subject sharpness has a lot to do with MY ability to follow the subject smoothly while I'm at a slow shutter speed... you get a number of shots that will be blurry NOT due to lens focus or focus tracking, but due to bad camera panning (me). I used continuous high-speed mode to blast off about a dozen shots as he rode past and then looked for the handful of shots that were the sharpest. It was actually an overcast day (you can see there's no shadow of the bike or rider on the ground) which means the image was a bit "cool"... so I just barely nudged the white balance over to "warm" the shot fractionally so that it wouldn't look like an overcast day.

The camera has 6 different AF tracking cases but more importantly... you can actually tune each of them.

When you combine the 61 point AF system with the different AF tracking cases combined with the shutter performance... it's a very attractive system.

Re: Canon 5d or 6d?

barrisster — Wed, 17 Jul 2013 04:15:07 GMT

Tim's photo convinced me the 5 is the way to go.

Re: Canon 5d or 6d?

ScottyP — Wed, 17 Jul 2013 23:06:27 GMT

Great shot, but I would not be so fast to buy 5d based on it alone.

1.). Where's the shot of someone failing to get that shot on a 6d? That is pretty but it is a fairly straightforward panning shot of something moving across frame. Staying the same distance from the camera. If it was a target coming straight at the camera fast it would be harder. Landscapes macro and travel don't need a terribly complex autofocus.
2.). The lens is more important than the camera.
3.). Also any camera will be becoming outdated in 3 or 4 years but a great lens will still be state of the art in 10 + years.
4.). If you are going new, higher resolution, and full frame from older crop you may find your existing lenses actually need upgraded to give good shots on the new body. Higher resolution makes marginal lenses look bad. Also ff cameras frame differently (wider and shorter) so you may want new lenses to deal with that. And of course if you have any EFS lenses that are crop-only, they won't even mount on the ff camera.

If you could get a nice lens with the savings on the 6d you would be better doing that. If you can afford both camera and lens upgrade(s) then never mind.

Re: Canon 5d or 6d?

ebiggs1 — Thu, 18 Jul 2013 13:32:56 GMT

"... but a great lens will still be state of the art in 10 + years."

This is a valid point. Lenses do out last most camera bodies, usually, but "state of the art" after 10+ years? Hmmmmmmmm.

Kicking money to the curb for the moment, by the same measure, the 5D Mk III will always be ahead of a 6D. Even after 10+ years it will be better equipped to handle whatever new lens development that comes along.

Buy the best and cry once!

Re: Canon 5d or 6d?

ScottyP — Thu, 18 Jul 2013 16:58:41 GMT

... But expect to need lenses to go with the camera when you go FF and higher-res. don't spend your whole budget on the camera and then realize it is making bad pictures with your lenses so you need new ones.

As for lens ages, look at the intro date on Canon lenses sometime. Many date back to the late 1980's or early 1990's and have not been updated yet. Many more date back to late 1990's and in any event most are at least 10 years old. If you have the latest XYZ mm lens for your camera, then as far as your camera is concerned that is state of the art for you.

Re: Canon 5d or 6d?

amfoto1 — Fri, 19 Jul 2013 20:24:15 GMT

"My photographic interests range from landscapes to macros to travel."

If those are you primary uses, IMO 6D would likely be just fine... Put the $1500 savings toward great lenses to use on it. You didn't mention what lenses you have with your 40D, and to get the best out of the new camera you might need some upgrades in that area, too. Or you might currently use some "crop only" lenses that would definitely have to be replaced.

If sports/action are key interests to you, then the 5DIII would be a better choice, largely for it's more sophisticated AF system. Also to some degree for it's faster frame rate potential. (However, see below for additional comments regarding FF vs crop.)

If your main interest is higher ISO shooting, a full frame camera can give you that. And 6D is one of the best, some even say slightly better than 5DIII. In-camera JPEGs, in particular, offer pretty amazing high ISO image quality. With RAW images, with either 6D or 5DIII there doesn't appear to be a whole lot gained over 5DII. That tells me that a lot of the gains are software based, and some additional work on RAW should be able to equal the gains, even with an older camera.

Just to put it in context... We all have different opinions about what's usable and what's not. So I can only compare my own experiences. When I was shooting with 10D, I tried not to exceed ISO 800. With 30D, I'd use 1600 but knew it would require some extra post-processing. Later I upgraded to 50D and 1600 was fully usable (I'd rate 40D about the same). Now with 7D, I'll use everything up to 1600 is quite clean, 3200 is usable, sometimes even 6400, with a bit of extra post-processing. By comparison, 5D classic topped out at 3200, but it was always fully usable. 5DII I'll use at 6400 without much concern. I figure 6D and 5DIII are a little better when shooting RAW (not even a stop's worth), but can pretty confidently be used at ISO 12800 or even 25600 if shooting in-camera JPEGs.

With any of them, it's critical to avoid underexposure to keep high ISO noise to a minimum. You never want to have to increase exposure in post-processing, or you will really amplify noise at the same time. In fact, it's better to have to pull back an image a little, to slightly overexpose and then reduce exposure in post-processing, to minimize noise. Softwares have improved a lot the last few years, too. I used to use Canon DPP for high ISO shots, it seemed to give the best noise handling but has never been up to the high volume image processing I needed to do. But it dealt with noise better than Lightroom up through version 2 and Photoshop up through CS4. Beginning with LR3 and CS5, though, Adobe seemed to figure out much better noise reduction. For particularly high ISO shots (and accidentally underexposed), I've been recommended and am currently experimenting with a Noiseware plug-in (also available as a stand-alone, if not using Photoshop).

To complement the fact that they can handle noise well at higher ISOs, both 5DIII and 6D have improved low light autofocus capabilities. I believe Canon rates them both to -3EV, which is approx. moonlight (note: on 6D it's rated this low at the center AF point only). In comparison, 5DII, 7D, 60D I think are all rated to -0.5EV... more than two stop brighter (note: I think this is a little conservative rating for 5DII... I know mine can still focus, albeit rather slowly, in lower light after my 7Ds have pretty much given up).

So, either FF camera will handle high ISO shooting better than your current camera. But, in general, a full frame camera will cost more to buy and to operate than a crop sensor camera. Plus you'll have a somewhat reduced choice of lenses (and might be forced to replace lenses you use now). And coming from a 10MP crop camera there might be other, unforeseen costs: You may need newer software, bigger hard drives for more storage, more and/or larger memory cards, etc.. With 6D you'll have to switch to SD memory, anyway. Fortunately it's not too expensive. 5DIII has dual slots and can use either SD or CF memory (or both).

It's the latest rage, switching from crop to FF cameras. But if you don't ever print larger than, say, 13x19" (or make equally heavy crops), you really aren't likely to see very much difference between FF and crop camera images. You certainly won't see any significant difference with images displayed online, at Internet resolutions and sizes. But, if you print big... really big, such as 18x24" and larger... full frame cameras will definitely have the edge.

Someone shooting mostly sports/action especially, seldom landscape/portraits/macros, may want to stick with a crop sensor camera. There are some other advantages to crop cameras, such as a smaller/lighter and less expensive lens kit. The 7D is now close to a four year old model, but still quite capable and a considerable upgrade from a 40D (5DIII and 1DX AF system is sort of based upon 7D's, but with even more AF points). The new 70D coming in mid-August to early September inherits much of the 7D's AF system, plus boasts a new sensor and a considerable bump up in frame rate from 60D, should be a very nice camera for sports/action shooting. I'm anxious to see how it performs in general, but especially at higher ISOs. In fact, it's going to have a considerably more advanced AF system than the 6D. Personally, though, I'm probably going to wait and see what the 7D "Mark II" looks like. The 7D has been such a success, I have little doubt that Canon will be rolling out a Mark II in the next 6 months or so. I hope so, the pair of 7Ds I've been using for the past three years have given me very good results.

So, if it were me...

- For lots of sports/action shooting, I'd probably stick with a crop camera. For that matter, if I rarely needed to use super high ISOs or make really big prints, I might stick with a cropper anyway.

If full frame still seems to be the best way to go...

- For mostly One Shot shooting (landscapes, portraits, macro), I'd consider the 6D and keep $1500 in my pocket or use it towards other things.

- But if a significant amount of my shooting were AI Servo (sports/action/wildlife), the 5DIII would probably make more sense.

Have fun shopping!

***********
Alan Myers

San Jose, Calif., USA
"Walk softly and carry a big lens."
GEAR: 5DII, 7D(x2), 50D(x3), some other cameras, various lenses & accessories
FLICKR & PRINTROOM