R5 Mark II or R3 for sports and news?

[Sportseditor123]

I'm a sports editor of a weekly newspaper and I use a 7D with 2.8 70-200 and 2.8 24-70 lenses.

Looking to upgrade. I'm torn between the R5 Mark II and R3. I would use it primarily for sports and general news. Family and landscape shots would be secondary uses.

High school fields and gyms are often low light (night football is that eternal challenge). Bigger lenses are likely out since I take extensive notes at games and can't hold a monopod at the same time. Heard the R3 is better in low-light with high-ISO, but I will crop on some images so I'm wondering if the 45mp of the Mark II would be better than the 24mp of the R3. And I hear the Mark II has an amazing autofocus system. Not sure if it's better than the R3.

In overall image quality, is the Mark II better since it has newer technology than the three-year-old R3?

Our full-time photographer uses a Nikon D6 (1DX Mark III equivalent) with a 300 lens. Pretty high-quality images. I considered the 1DX Mark III, but I'd rather upgrade to mirrorless.

Regardless, what newsprint does to photos is pretty sad. Images look great in the online paper, though.

I appreciate any input. Thank you in advance.

[p4pictures]

The EOS R3 is the camera designed for news and sports. Even though it is a few years older, it still is exceptionally good and great in low light. It won't be bothered by whatever the weather might throw at you while you're shooting. 

One thing you might find is that your lenses have less reach than when you used the EOS 7D. Since the EOS 7D has an APS-C sized sensor, then your lenses have a narrower angle of view than they will on the full-frame R3 or R5 Mark II. In this respect the EOS R5 Mark II can shoot in crop mode to give the same angle of view and reach as your EOS 7D does with your lenses, and it will still produce 22MP images. EOS R3 will only be around 9MP. 

[Sportseditor123]

Thanks, Whiz!

I rented an R5 several months ago for a weekend and noticed the narrower angle of view right away. It honestly felt like the 7D had better zoom since it filled the frame, but I didn't need to stand as far away to capture closer subjects with the R5.

Thank you so much! That's the first detail I've heard on the difference in MP when cropping! Do you have any idea if there's a large quality difference in print between 22MP and 9MP?

[jeffn54]

IMO: You're making a multi-generational leap from the 7D to any of the mirrorless cameras. For its time, it was an exceptional camera. Regarding the R5II and the R3, I have many years of use of the R3. My primary use is Ballroom dance photography. Just think about really bad lighting; that is always changing for artistic reasons. Note the rather large range of artistic expression. I like using a flash (EL-1, or EL-5) when the competition allows supplemental lighting. That is a -1/3 stop mixed with random ambient. The EL-1 and EL-5 work in HSS with The R5, R5II, and R3. I also spent years working for ABC, gathering news. Even with a lower pixel count, I find I prefer almost every aspect of a photo with the R3 over the R5,  There is some intrinsic quality of the R3 in both prints and final output that grabs your soul (I have not been able to quantity what this is. This same intrinsic quality was in the 1DxII and 1DxIII).

If you want longer reach I would highly suggest a teleconverter. The sensor and tracking capabilities are much better in the R5, R5II, and R3 than in the R7. Using DPP I could see that even though the camera "thought" a fast-moving object was the focus point (the red square) it was not. I spent a lot of time with various modes on the R7 for object capture and hysteresis, DPP will show you what the camera "thought" did and what the camera did. The R3 is the best of its generation. The R5II is very good and IMO radically different in its capabilities with the AI moving into the camera (It will take me a long time to wrap my mind around the R5II capabilities). In summary: move to the EOS-R series with their 2nd and 3rd generation, get very good fast lenses, a teleconverter, and stay away from R7 you should be very happy. This is my first longer reply. Any feedback would be appreciated.

[Sportseditor123]

Thank you! What I learned about teleconverters, aside from losing some light, is that while the EOS lenses can work with mirrorless cameras with the adapter, teleconverters do not work with that setup. I'd need to get RF glass with an RF teleconverter. That might be years away given pricing.

This might sound ignorant, but would a 1DX Mark III be just as good as an R3 for sports? I could use a teleconverter with that.

[p4pictures]

You can definitely use EF lenses from a DSLR with an EF extender on the mount adapter. I regularly use an EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM with EF 1.4x Extender Mk3 on my R6, R10 and R6 Mark II. One of the reasons for me not getting the RF 70-200mm F2.8L IS USM is that it cannot work with an extender at all. 

I also use EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM and EF 135mm f/2L USM with the extender and mount adapter on my cameras. 

[Sportseditor123]

I was told you can't use extenders with the adapter and mirrorless cameras.

Canon support via chat just said the extenders aren't supported in that case. They may be used but they said you'd lose a lot of functionality. What's your experience? How many stops do you lose?

[p4pictures]

I get the same loss of light as I do with DSLR. 1.4x loses 1-stop and 2x loses 2-stops. 

Perhaps the confusion comes from misunderstanding which extenders to use and where. 

camera - mount adapter - EF extender - EF lens works

camera - rf extender - mount adapter - EF lens does not work. Actually the mount adapter doesn’t physically fit on the front of the RF extender. I have tried! 

For me I don’t find any loss of functionality using EF lenses with EF extenders on the R-series cameras, at least in comparison to using the same EF lenses on R-series cameras.

[Sportseditor123]

Oh wow. This clears that up. Thank you so much!

[wq9nsc]

I am biased because I shoot primarily sports and I love the optical viewfinder, rugged weather sealing, and extremely long battery life of the 1DX III for sports.  I use a pair of them and will be ordering a third shortly.

If you are doing primarily poorly illuminated HS sports photography, a lower MP sensor with its larger photosites works very well so consider that in your R5 vs R3 decision.  Interestingly, high MP images can show additional slight motion blur over lower MP sensors when shot with marginal shutter speed.  Several of us discovered that when the 5DS and 5DS R came out.  Depending upon your lens and the lighting, you may find yourself forced to the edge on shutter speed at some events to keep the ISO in check but fortunately modern sensors do very well at high ISO.

High school football and soccer tend to be the most demanding of "fast" glass and high clean ISO capability but even swim which tends to be the best illuminated of indoor HS pushes ISO regularly into the 6400 range.

The first three photos were captured on a typical middle to lower illumination HS field with a 1DX III and EF 400 f2.8 @ 1/1000, f2.8 at 51,200, 32,000, and 25,600 ISO respectively.  The next two were captured with a 1DX III and EF 70-200 f2.8 @ 1/1000, f2.8 @ 16,000 and 12,800 ISO respectively.  The last is from a better illuminated indoor aquatic facility captured with a 1DX II and EF 70-200 f2.8 @ ISO 6,400.  All were shot in RAW and converted to JPG with Canon's DPP software using only the built in DPP NR algorithm.  All were cropped fairly heavily which of course accentuates noise and loss of detail but the camera sensor does a great job under these conditions.

HS lighting is improving at many locations but it will be a long time before they are all good and it will never be like a D1 major university field where you feel the need for sunglasses and sunscreen after being used to HS 😂

Rodger

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