I've been putting off upgrading my camera bodies for a while for a number of reasons, the main one being that it just didn't make any sense from a business standpoint. With gear more than adequate to meet my client's needs, why spend the money?
Unfortunately, my gear is nearing retirement age and it's time to start looking. I know what I want - a pair of Canon 1Dx's - but I'm not quite ready to swing $13K+. Maybe a couple MkIV's? Then again, I'm not shooting much sports these days, so that might not be the best investment. Maybe the 5DMkIII? It's got just about everything I need, but that shutter speed is fairly slow (barely 5 fps). And the prices are reasonable...
As I had two full weeks of shooting coming up that would represent nearly the full range of what I shoot, I decided to rent a couple of these 5DMkIII's and give them a complete run-through. After checking around, I decided to rent from BorrowLenses.com. They had a great rate for a 10-day rental, which was just long enough to cover the bulk of my shooting. The hardest part was the validation process (they really make you prove you are who you say you are and that you can be found at the address they are shipping to...which makes sense given the value of what they're shipping).
The gear showed up as advertised, in excellent/like-new condition. I popped in my cards and went to work.
Wow. These things were incredible. I really believe they could be good for just about everything I do. It would be a stretch to say they could handle serious sports shooting, but since that's not my primary focus, I think I'll be willing to look past that. Amazing in low light, they handle focusing and noise splendidly. Honestly, the only thing that was tough for me was that I didn't have a battery grip on either one of them and it took a bit of getting used to shooting without it.
I did have one hiccup with one of them. I had been shooting on CF cards for a full week. When the next event came up, I would be carrying my 7D which is CF-only. So I popped some SD cards into the MkIIIs. All was fine until I went to take them out. The first one came out as you would expect. The second one started to come out, but got stuck. I did manage to get it out, but part of the plastic case was shredded. I managed to trim off the shredded edges enough to get it into a card reader; luckily, I was able to download all my images. Even so, I knew the card was toast. I also knew I would be shooting on CF cards on that body for the rest of the weekend. And, after inspecting the slot, I could see a sliver of metal sticking out from the side of the slot, half-way down. Oh well...
I made it through the rest of the weekend with no more problems, other than having a ton of photos to process ;-)
The gear was due to ship back Monday. Before packaging it up, however, I called BorrowLenses to let them know what happened. My main concern was making sure I didn't get dinged for damaging their gear. Quite to the contrary, I was told that they would inspect the equipment upon return and if they found my description of the problem to be accurate, they would arrange some sort of compensation for my trouble!
Here we are, barely two days later and I just got an email notifying me that they have made a significant refund to my credit card! This, my friends, is what customer service should be. This is also why not only can I recommend them without reservation, I will also be going to them whenever I need something not already in my bag.
Message edited by author 2013-10-16 16:56:20. |