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11/30/2005 01:44:26 PM · #1 |
Hi! I'm Eric. I shoot weddings and tons of family/childrens portraits in my studio. I own a 20d, but I can't stop thinking about the 5d and my desire to acquire.
Do I need it? Should I get it? Why? Help!
Eric
//www.eslayphotography.com |
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11/30/2005 01:47:48 PM · #2 |
Originally posted by eslaydog:
Hi! I'm Eric. I shoot weddings and tons of family/childrens portraits in my studio. I own a 20d, but I can't stop thinking about the 5d and my desire to acquire.
Do I need it? Should I get it? Why? Help!
Eric
//www.eslayphotography.com |
How big do you print 95% of the time? You already own the 10-22 so wide is covered.
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11/30/2005 01:59:33 PM · #3 |
I do mostly 8x10, 11x14, but I have started doing a good amount of 16x24 canvas. I am also a passionate landscape photog who would like to get started on Alamy as soon as I have a minute.
You do make a good point about the 10-22 (although I could sell it and apply it to the 5d) :)
Eric |
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11/30/2005 02:03:52 PM · #4 |
As far as print quality is concerned on digital printers, my experience with the 20D suggests you';re gonna have to go 20x30 and bigger to even be able to tell the difference in a print, and I suspect your customers will not know the difference. Sophisticated upsampling has given me 40x60 from the 20D at astounding quality levels.
So what it comes down to is personal satisfaction, basically; that inner peace that comes from knowing you're working with a tool that pleases/satisfies you. Since you're apparently earning a decent living off your photography and since the new body is a deductible business expense, I see no reason not to indulge yourself in this. It's not THAT expensive. What do you really risk? If you decide the camera isn't for you, you're gonna be able to sell it at a very high percentage of its retail cost anyway.
In practical terms, be aware that the larger the film/sensor size, the more DOF becomes an issue. The full frame sensor is going to magnify any deficiencies in your technique in this area. This suggests that for hand-held wedding work (posed, formal shots excepted) the 20D may be a better choice in that it will be somewhat more forgiving of focus imperfections.
Robt. |
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11/30/2005 02:07:22 PM · #5 |
Originally posted by bear_music:
As far as print quality is concerned on digital printers, my experience with the 20D suggests you';re gonna have to go 20x30 and bigger to even be able to tell the difference in a print, and I suspect your customers will not know the difference. Sophisticated upsampling has given me 40x60 from the 20D at astounding quality levels.
So what it comes down to is personal satisfaction, basically; that inner peace that comes from knowing you're working with a tool that pleases/satisfies you. Since you're apparently earning a decent living off your photography and since the new body is a deductible business expense, I see no reason not to indulge yourself in this. It's not THAT expensive. What do you really risk? If you decide the camera isn't for you, you're gonna be able to sell it at a very high percentage of its retail cost anyway.
In practical terms, be aware that the larger the film/sensor size, the more DOF becomes an issue. The full frame sensor is going to magnify any deficiencies in your technique in this area. This suggests that for hand-held wedding work (posed, formal shots excepted) the 20D may be a better choice in that it will be somewhat more forgiving of focus imperfections.
Robt. |
and possible soft corners from your lenses, that you may not realize is there until you shoot full frame.
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11/30/2005 02:17:02 PM · #6 |
I have the 5D and shot handheld at 1/10 sec without problems...
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11/30/2005 02:23:03 PM · #7 |
I have the 20D and there's no way for weddings I'd go to a 5D - maybe a 1D II but not a 5D.
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11/30/2005 02:24:41 PM · #8 |
Originally posted by mavrik:
I have the 20D and there's no way for weddings I'd go to a 5D - maybe a 1D II but not a 5D. |
Which begs the question; why not?
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11/30/2005 02:26:48 PM · #9 |
| If your current set up works for you, gives you results your happy with, there is no real need to change. If you feel you need the newest peice of equipment, and its in your budget, go for it, I know I would. |
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11/30/2005 02:27:18 PM · #10 |
Originally posted by Spazmo99:
Originally posted by mavrik:
I have the 20D and there's no way for weddings I'd go to a 5D - maybe a 1D II but not a 5D. |
Which begs the question; why not? |
1D II is faster and I shoot weddings like they are sports.
I also shoot fairly tight and the wide angle would just be stuff I cropped. I would love the MP jump, and the larger screen, but that'll all be on the 1D III plus some. The 5D is a baby 1Ds not a baby 1D II. The 1Ds is a fantastic landscape cam, the 5D is a fantastic landscape cam. Just doesn't do what I'd like for people. It suffices, but the 20D is faster. Doesn't make sense as an upgrade to me for wedddings and portraits. 30D should be out in Feb - I'd wait.
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11/30/2005 02:43:09 PM · #11 |
As per usual, Row_Bear has eloquently expressed some very well-considered thoughts. I'd echo his thinking precisely on the "personal satisfaction" side; that really sums up why I own the 5D.
FWIW, if you're very critical of print quality, you will see differences at somewhat smaller sizes than Robert quotes, but we're talking subtelties here.
But the 5D is not all about resolution. It is definitely a cut above in AF performance, and is a joy to manually focus compared to a 1.6-crop cam. As a matter of fact, I feel it's perfectly reasonable to use what I'll refer to as "gestalt focusing" where you expand your area of awareness to most of the frame and watch the focus PLANE move, not watch focus at a point. That's something that Medium Format users do naturally, but few 35mm folks do, and is not really an option with a 1.6-crop cam. To Robert's point, the DoF is narrower, but the difference is not drastic, maybe a stop, and the ease of manual focus plus the awesome AF performance more than offset this.
The 5D also has the rep of needing the very best glass to really shine. This is both true and untrue. It's true in that if you've got lenses with really soft corners, you'll see 'em in all their gory (lack of) detail, but on-center, the pixel pitch is more forgiving than the 20D, relaxing the demands on center sharpness somewhat.
The less aggressive AA filter on the 5D results in less soft out-of-camera images, but also implies that we may occasionally need to deal with a bit of moire; I'd certainly rather deal with the relatively uncommon moire problem and gain sharpness, though, keeping in mind that recovering lost detail is impossible, whereas dealing effectively with moire is not.
For your type of shooting, the 5D should really shine. My only real caution to you is to make sure you are ready to deal with the workflow impact of 13+MB RAW files =)
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11/30/2005 02:44:16 PM · #12 |
Sometimes your desire for a new toy grows too great to ignore and you just HAVE to get it, even though it may not be really what you need and may cost more than you can really afford. You just have to have it. I can understand your feelings.
One should rationalise the matter by telling oneself that it's too expensive and the equipment one has already is more than adequate, indeed it's pretty much state of the art. I try this every time the urge comes upon me to acquire, but I always end up moping around until I get what I want.
To sum up, if you feel that you can justify the cost (particularly if you are making money from it shooting weddings), then get it and enjoy it (be aware that you'll probably only want a bucketload of new lenses to go with it). If, deep down inside, you know that it is not what you really need and that what you've got already does the job fantastically well, then try to resist the urge to buy and try to wait for perhaps the next generation of cameras which might have every feature imaginable crammed into it.
Good luck.
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11/30/2005 02:57:00 PM · #13 |
I spent almost a half hour playing with it yesterday... at the one store that would let me ;D
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11/30/2005 03:26:15 PM · #14 |
Ah yes the old wants vs needs argument. I have it with myself all the time. Also the owner of Englewood Camera knows this. I went in last month to get a tripod, and of course he says "Have you seen the 5D yet?" and twists my arm to look at it. Sweet! I love the new LCD. It is out of my budget right now but hopefully soon. In the meantime I hope to trade my 17-85 EF-s in on the 24-70L 2.8. A little shorter but I already have the 100-400L IS to cover the longer range and the 100/2.8 macro when i dont want to lift weights. When I go to the 5D, the 24 is pretty close to the 17 on the current lens.
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12/06/2005 04:02:16 PM · #15 |
It's still tugging at my heart strings... haha I mean my wallet strings.
E |
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