R5 m2 vs R6 m2 Advice please!

[serenal]

I already struggle with decision making and this one is such a big one I'm really having a hard time.

I photograph such a wide variety of subjects that I'm hoping someone who knows more about the cameras can offer advice. I do a lot of portrait and family photography, sports photography sometimes in low light settings, and nature photography including birds and landscapes. My main concerns are being able to print photos at least up to 36x24 with decent resolution, battery life when I'm remote and can't charge, and autofocus for moving subjects. Of course, cost is also important. I am currently working on trading my 20 + years of acquired photography equipment in for just one body and a few excellent lenses. Any advice from the community would appreciated.

[shadowsports]

Greetings,

To make prints that large, I suggest you go with the R5 mk II.  While the R6 Mark II has slightly better low light performance, lens choices can impact this aspect of your photography a great deal. 

[March411]

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@serenal wrote:

Of course, cost is also important.

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And the cost for each of these bodies, there is a fairly steep gap. The R5 MkII body is currently $4300 US and the R6 MkII is $2000 US. Nailing down a real budget number may give you the answer without needing any assistance, a $2300 price gap between the two may be enough to solve the struggle.

I have the R5 and the R6 MkII, I bought he R6 MkII first believing I could  use it for wildlife, portrait and sports photography and found that I needed the extra MP when I went to print, especially if I cropped during post production.

If I had to make the purchases again with my current knowledge I would have flipped and purchased the R5 first just for the MP alone because I print quite a bit.

That being said, I am a big fan of my R6, especially for indoor sports. It can be pushed further in low light and performs better than the R5 when it comes to the auto-focus response and noise. Rumor has it that the R5 MkII has resolved those challenges, I haven't had the opportunity to shoot the new R5 in those conditions but if it's accurate  the R5 MkII would be my first option. Personally I would have to rent the R5 MkII and test it because low light is extremely important to me.

Others will jump in and offer thoughts. Good luck with the sale of your old gear. Hopefully you obtain a good deal and the decision around cost of the new body becomes less of an issue.

[serenal]

Yeah, your exact scenario is why I think biting the bullet and getting the r5 m2 makes the most sense. I do crop a lot and while I don't always make large prints I do want that option in the future. Also my primary camera before was a 5drs and the resolution on that is outstanding, I think I would notice the difference with the r6.

[p4pictures]

On top of what Rick suggests the EOS  R5 Mark II gives you a resolution advantage that will allow cropping for distant wildlife images and still allow larger prints without many problems. I have printed an image from my EOS R6 (original Mk1 with 20MP) at 60 inches by 90 inches on a Canon large format printer, and no-one has commented that the print suffers from the low resolution. 

Note that for both cameras you can use high power output power banks to charge the camera in the field. This does help to top up batteries while you are away from mains power. However the cost of such power banks means that often it's close to the cost of another LP-E6P battery and that is also much smaller and lighter. 

The best way to make such decisions is to rent each of the cameras - ideally at the same time - and subject them to the kinds of scenarios you shoot in.

[serenal]

Yeah, renting is going to be one of my plans to see which one I like best. I'm considering using my trade-in money on lenses that I know I want and then my tax refund for the body. This way I can rent the bodies and see which one makes the most sense for me. Thanks for the input on the batteries!