Canon EOS 7d Body - New - £699

Raymond Lin said:
"Ruin" - I like to see examples of this and what do you mean by ruined.

Does the photo comes out like it has been smeared by vaseline or it is just mildly grainy, lesser degree than some people's added grain to their work.

Does the photo get ruined so much that it is 5 stop over exposed or 3 stop under exposed.

Or is it ruined by stranged tilt your composition to the sky above or the ground on your feet.

Or is it ruined by total out of focus.

Or do you just mean the photo is simply not as clean as the competition? But if shown online, blog or even in print, you won't even notice.

Unless you are pixel peeping.

How ruined are we talking about?

[I totally understand this "limitation" by the way...been meaning to write a topic on this and half written it.]
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Exactly everthing online is so extreme things are either amazing or totally awful the middle ground has gone. the 7D's iso performance isn't world beating, the 5Dmkii's AF isn't ever going to get any awards but both are perfectly capable of delivering outstanding results in a variety of conditions.
 
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I love my 7D :p Yes noise performance could probably be better but it's manageable under the right conditions :)
 
I'm still not sure. The AF system, size etc. of the 7D are not huge advantages to the consumer market in the same way they are to the professional market, at least not in the same way as "being able to take a half decent pic in any condition" advantage that consumers generally look for, which is about the sensor performance more than anything. The size and bulk of the 7D might even be a disadvantage to consumers just stepping up from a compact.
 
Ksanti said:
I'm still not sure. The AF system, size etc. of the 7D are not huge advantages to the consumer market in the same way they are to the professional market, at least not in the same way as "being able to take a half decent pic in any condition" advantage that consumers generally look for, which is about the sensor performance more than anything. The size and bulk of the 7D might even be a disadvantage to consumers just stepping up from a compact.
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The fact that the 7D is 5th most used camera for images uploaded to Flickr seems to suggest otherwise, making it both an extremely popular consumer and professional camera. Infact the 5Dii is the only real camera in front of it, with the rest being iPhones.
 
Tbh in terms of ISO the 7D seems ok. You do lose detail at ISO 6400 which is a bit counter productive if the only reason you got a crop sensor was for more detail.

For comparison below is a comparison between 7d & D800E raw files normalised at same output resolution. No noise reduction.
Tbh 7d while obviously being less detailed, did better than I thought it would.
canon7d_ISO6400-2.jpg
DSC_0103-2.jpg

canon7d_ISO6400-3.jpg
DSC_0103-3.jpg
 
When you say normalised do you mean using a 1.6x APS-C crop from a D800e file, or the full image cropped as if it were an 18MP crop? If it's the latter I'm seriously impressed given how soft I've seen images from the 7D due to its AA filter's strength, though if it's the former I'm not sure there's that much interest in it as all it shows is the difference given by the low pass design - something that may well be amplified or negated depending on the lens setup in front of the sensor.
 
Ksanti said:
I'm still not sure. The AF system, size etc. of the 7D are not huge advantages to the consumer market in the same way they are to the professional market, at least not in the same way as "being able to take a half decent pic in any condition" advantage that consumers generally look for, which is about the sensor performance more than anything. The size and bulk of the 7D might even be a disadvantage to consumers just stepping up from a compact.
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Do you seriously think the 7D doesn't fullfill this requirement? My 30D managed it and friends 300D's managed it, if you swap 'half decent' for 'truly outstanding when blown up to the size of a billboard' or more likely 'truly outstanding when viewed at 200% in my bedroom' then yes it might struggle but be realistic?

I have no problem with you believing or saying that the D800 is a better camera than the 7D but that does not mean the 7D is total rubish that can hardly take a picture!
 
a1ex2001 said:
Do you seriously think the 7D doesn't fullfill this requirement? My 30D managed it and friends 300D's managed it, if you swap 'half decent' for 'truly outstanding when blown up to the size of a billboard' or more likely 'truly outstanding when viewed at 200% in my bedroom' then yes it might struggle but be realistic?

I have no problem with you believing or saying that the D800 is a better camera than the 7D but that does not mean the 7D is total rubish that can hardly take a picture!
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No i don't. It can't take photos in restaurants or bars or clubs with their dim lighting without flash due to its ISO performance. When I say any condition, I mean it can't handle absolutely whatever you throw at it and put out a decent image - it'll handle some situations incredibly well, and some situations poorly, which makes it specialised, which isn't something consumers want.
 
Ksanti said:
No i don't. It can't take photos in restaurants or bars or clubs with their dim lighting without flash due to its ISO performance. When I say any condition, I mean it can't handle absolutely whatever you throw at it and put out a decent image - it'll handle some situations incredibly well, and some situations poorly, which makes it specialised, which isn't something consumers want.
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So basically the entire Canon crop range is entirely unsuitable for the consumer demographic that it is targeted at? :D
 
Ksanti said:
it'll handle some situations incredibly well, and some situations poorly, which makes it specialised, which isn't something consumers want.
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Yet it's still extremely popular with both professionals and amateurs so I guess they're all wrong :D ;)

I own one and it's a very good camera for the price but it's not the best APS-C around although I think Ksanti is being overly harsh even though some of his points are valid about the sensor being old tech and not as good in low light (it's still not as bad as he's making out though).
 
Ksanti said:
No i don't. It can't take photos in restaurants or bars or clubs with their dim lighting without flash due to its ISO performance. When I say any condition, I mean it can't handle absolutely whatever you throw at it and put out a decent image - it'll handle some situations incredibly well, and some situations poorly, which makes it specialised, which isn't something consumers want.
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Except flickr and the rest of the internet are full of perfectly decent examples of the 7D being used under these conditions. I've seen some great gig photography from 7D shooters and lighting doesn't get much more challenging! Your right it's not ideal for those jobs and better options exist but your continual insistance that it can't do things it clearly can just undermines your arguments.
 
I had a 7D pretty much since it was released and yes obviously camera technology has moved on in the 4 years since but by no means was it a bad camera as you are making out! In my opinion the noise is very manageable as is in most other camera systems.
This was iso 4000

_MG_4627 by southy1978, on Flickr

£699 new is still a lot of camera for not a lot of money, if i wasn't saving for a 5diii i'd be temtpted by another one myself!
 
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a1ex2001 said:
Except flickr and the rest of the internet are full of perfectly decent examples of the 7D being used under these conditions. I've seen some great gig photography from 7D shooters and lighting doesn't get much more challenging! Your right it's not ideal for those jobs and better options exist but your continual insistance that it can't do things it clearly can just undermines your arguments.
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Noise has next to no impact on gig photography, in fact it's often desirable. When the 7D's sensor lets the rest of the system down is where the rest of the system works so well - when using long, dark telephotos for wildlife and sports and so needing to be able to achieve shutter speeds of around 1/1000th of a second and up with apertures of f/5.6 at best.

Yes, the 7D offers a lot over the other Canon crops, but when you start comparing it to even Nikon's and Sony's offerings (let alone Pentax's bodies if you only intend to shoot crop), it doesn't look quite so incredible, even at £700. I may have been a bit harsh but it's not quite as incredibly a deal as it's been made out to be either -a few people may rightly jump at the chance and the 7D may be perfect for their shooting, but for most, I'd wager, the 7D doesn't actually offer that much as the sensor effectively bottlenecks the 7D into only being able to properly stretch its legs in good light and low dynamic range scenes, which is a shame.
 
What if you like Canon ergonomics, lenses and upgrade path over Nikon/Sony/Pentax? What if you want to shoot video? What then? The disparity between sensor performance isn't as big as you make it out to be, look at the samples above - yes there's a loss of detail, and yes there's more colour noise, but when you finally show those files it'll either be a print, which will help suppress the noise (and you'll be viewing them further away) or you'll be viewing them at 1280px at the largest on a screen a few feet away. People have been shooting in the same situations as we do on film (and on older digitals over the last 12 years), plenty of great photographs have been made since then. The 7D's sensor won't ruin anyone's shots in an meaningful way. Hell look at this photo I took:

tumblr_mdwvemuesY1qg7m33o1_1280.jpg


I'm a Nikon shooter and Canon terminology is pretty much alien to me. I took that shot within five minutes of first handling the camera. This was at ISO800. The AF was fast and spot on. You cannot tell me that this camera is very specialised and not well suited for general photography, especially when I've handed my S5 Pro (a much older and slower camera) over to my 13 y/o brother for two weeks in Manila and he managed to get some great shots. The 7D would have done even better with its AF. You seriously need a perspective check.
 
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