Canon 5D MKIII official owners/users thread, anything related to the 5D MKIII

What flash set up are people using?
 
Guys,
Very nearly bought a Mk3 today in Wilkinson for £2999 but ended up leaving to think about it.
If you were buying one, where would you get it from?

I have seen them as low as £2200 on eBay from China, but unsure if this is a good idea....
I know Kerso sells them for around £2600 but these are also grey imports, so I might aswell just get it from China if I was going that route..right?

Any advice much appreciated :)
 
futureal33 said:
....I know Kerso sells them for around £2600 but these are also grey imports, so I might aswell just get it from China if I was going that route..right?
Click to expand...

Wrong!

Kerso provides a UK invoice which gives you a UK warranty.

Buy from him with confidence. I will eat something unpleasant if anyone comes forward with a genuine bad experience to contradict this.
 
Ive a question to all you 5D3 owners...
i know that it takes SD and CF but i heard that you can seperate diffrent pics to each card...can you send raw to the CF and Jpeg to the SD?
i know this may sound like a funny way of doing things...but its something ive gotten used too...lol
 
Mani Gill said:
Hi

I am a little curious, when you say you had more keepers due to the focus, I only use single centre point focus, so would that make a difference to me, or does the focus system kick in all the time. The reason I ask this was, because I was advised at a course I attended to use single point focus at all times....

Cheers

Mani
Click to expand...

The centre point is still better on the mark 3 but with e mark 3 you don't need to always use centre point, that's the beauty of it.
 
onform said:
Owning a 5dc prior to buying the mkIII I always hankered after the micro adjust feature as the 85mm below f2 always seemed to just out and was very frustrating. Now I own the mkIII and it just locks on every time even at the outer focus points!!!

So my Q, how many of you have/or not needed to micro adjust your fast lenses with the mkIII..?
Click to expand...

I ran all of my lenses through, tripod mounted etc on a fag packet with a bank note on it. (-5 - 0 - +5 x3) they all were on..(y) Worth doing though (if it isn't raining!!!
 
Lovely shot Raymond, really like the shallow DoF.
Just ordered my MkIII, can't wait!
 
I just got this camera and I'm still getting to grips with all it many features. The AF sytem is complex but fully configurable for every type of photogrphy.

There's one thing I can't get my head round, and I'm hoping someone can give me the answer.....I'm really a landscape person and so the A1 servo mode is not something I've used much on my EOS30D but in the EOS5D3 manual I notice that the A1 Focus mode is a combination of Single shot and A1Servo - automatically selecting the right mode for the scene being shot, so why not use this mode all the time, it just removes another of the many shooting options available and allows you to concentrate on taking the photo ?
What are the advantages in having to select Single shot or A1Servo modes ?
 
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I'm expecting mine in the next day or so and in anticipation I bought a Kindle book called Canon 5D Mark III Experience. In it the author, Douglas Klosterman says that AI Focus is not the best of both worlds. Any movement you make, such as recomposing, could be interpreted as scene motion and AI Servo kick in when not wanted. Also, in AI Servo mode it may not be as responsive as the actual AI Servo mode.
HTH
 
Ai Focus has never been the best of both worlds, not in the mkii and I doubt it'll be the same in the mkiii. Either use 1 shot for still subject or AI Servo for moving subjects.
 
First go at Fireworks.

7385555440_9969f4a012_b.jpg


7385674144_35bd182a8d_b.jpg
 
Seniorshot said:
Does anyone know what problem(s) this firmware release resolves ?
Click to expand...

All on the download page (windows)

http://www.canon.co.uk/Support/Consumer_Products/products/cameras/Digital_SLR/EOS_5D_Mark_III.aspx?DLtcmuri=tcm:14-937135&page=1&type=download


Description
Changes Firmware Version 1.1.3 incorporates the following improvements and fixes. 1. Supports the single focal length EF40mm f/2.8 STM lens that is to be released at the end of June, 2012. 2. Fixes a phenomenon in which an image may become underexposed when using the Auto Lighting Optimizer for continuous Auto Exposure Bracketing (AEB) shooting. 3. Fixes a phenomenon in which the backlight of the LCD monitor may not turn off depending on the camera settings and timing. 4. Fixes a phenomenon in which the camera's power may not turn on when a super-telephoto lens*1) is mounted to the camera with an extender*2). *1) EF 300mm F2.8L IS II USM / EF 400mm F2.8L IS II USM *2) Extender EF 1.4X III / Extender EF 2X III 5. Corrects mistakes in the Dutch, Italian, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, and Swedish menu screens.
Firmware Version 1.1.3 is for cameras with firmware up to Version 1.1.2. If the camera's firmware is already Version 1.1.3, it is not necessary to download this firmware.
Q&A Section: Preparations for the Firmware Update:
Windows After the downloaded compressed file (.zip) is extracted, a firmware folder is created.
*Extracting the downloaded file: Right-click the zip file, and then select Extract All to extract the file. The extracted folder contains the firmware (file name: 5D300113.FIR / file size: 17,779,532 bytes) and instructions on the firmware update procedures (a PDF file in five languages: Japanese, English, French, Spanish, and Simplified Chinese).
Before starting the firmware update operations, please confirm the contents of the download and carefully read through the firmware update procedures.
(The following is the history of past firmware updates.)
Q: Are the previous versions of firmware included in version 1.1.3? A: Yes, the following improvements from the previous versions are included:.
Changes in Version 1.1.2: 1. Supports a new accessory, GPS receiver GP-E2. 2. Fixes a phenomenon where a pink cast may develop over the image when the shutter is completely pressed with the camera's power turned off (by the auto power off setting). 3. Fixes a phenomenon where the camera operation stops after one shot when shooting in High Dynamic Range (HDR) mode. 4. Fixes a phenomenon where the Shooting Date/Time in the EXIF data of the image shows a later time than the actual shooting time. 5. Fixes the time zone for the Samoa Islands. 6. Corrects errors in the Finnish menu screen.
 
LOL needed to look closer to home (y)
 
Tom - I think he had his eye to the camera rather than his PC :D
 
Finally got my hands on the GE-E2 GPS unit. I've not used it in anger yet but first impressions are good. After all the comments I had read on it I was expecting it to be huge but I actually think it looks quite compact.

I'll report back with a bit of a review once I've had a chance to use it.
 
ChrisJ_SLH said:
I'll report back with a bit of a review once I've had a chance to use it.
Click to expand...

Great as I'd be interested to read it. Any photos with it attached would be nice as well.
 
Just set up a Flickr account so testing how to post from it - a quick snapshot with my 5D3.

7414524224_e14cf91747_c.jpg
[/url] H83A0093.jpg by muntuman, on Flickr[/IMG]
 
Not a lot moving fast in my garden to test the AF. Her blinks are quite quick though I guess..

7407201390_3d399acf58_c.jpg
[/url]
H83A0149.jpg by BigRobinRob, on Flickr[/IMG]
 
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She is so sweet but has a loud bark. The only time she runs now is to chase a fox in the garden.
 
Thanks
 
I've had my 5DIII for a couple of weeks, but haven't posted about it on the forums. Now I've had the opportunity to use it in anger and feel I can say something other than "cool new toy".

One of the reasons I've kept my head down is that there is no quantum leap in camera technology to sing praises of and nothing bad to moan about.
IMHO the reviews that say it is like a blueprinted 5DII are spot on.
Everything has been subtly improved, and while there is no single change you can point at and go "Wow", the overall impression is that is is a much more capable camera and it is a joy to use.

I love the quiet shutter. It would have been a huge asset at the last festival I covered and will get much use.
The quiet shutter also seems to significantly reduce vibration, so it seems like a good idea to use silent shutter for general shooting. Landscapes are defeated somewhat by IR release only available on the loud shutter. A firmware tweak would be nice :)

I turned on the viewfinder grid - lush!
I think I'm going to get far less wonky horizons with the 5DIII.

I'm experimenting with setting M-Fn to viewfinder artificial horizon. I've never got on with the one on the rear screen, so this may actually be useful to me!

Aargh - where did my red focus confirmation dots go!
I'd expected some sort of problem from theading this thread, but not this bad!
Fixed by changing the settings; no idea why it isn't the default setting.
Something very wierd; I was taking a portrait shot with the 50mm f1.4 and the subject commented they could see the focus confimation red flash - what! They are right; there is a bright red flash seen through the lens!

On Screen Zooming - aaargh!
Another problem I was prepared for from reading this thread.
Playback I guess I can retrain myself, but what I didn't expect was how crap it is in Live View.
Setting up the TSE is a dance where the right hand zooms and pans to check focus in Live View and the left hand tweaks the focus ring. On the 5DII zooming and panning needs both hands - rubbish!
Luckily, the workaround proposed earlier in this thread solves the problem; assign zoom to the Set button.
I also set default zoom to 'actual size' on the focus point, so I can quickly evaluate sharpness.

Auto Update Custom Function - excellent new feature which means I may actually use custom functions on the 5DIII !!!

I found I could change the configuration so the Lock switch protects both wheels - I often accidentally change aperture pulling 5DII out the bag, this will fix my problem.
Also, the lock switch is far easier to operate without taking eye away from the viewfinder.

In terms of IQ...
Definitely comparable with the 5DII; which means it is excellent.
However - I've had a couple of shots where I've had bad banding visible in the shadows when I've tried lifting them. One on a pre-dawn landscape, one on a BIF. IMHO neither instance was excessive abuse of the sliders.
I haven't changed my working practice from the 5dII and I find this a little worrying as I'm not convinced the 5dII would have been as bad.
This is not enough for me to throw my toys around, but it emphasises how important it is to get the exposure right in contrasty scenes. I had hoped the 5DIII would be an improvement in this area.

As for the focussing....
For me, the most significant change is that I can set separate focus points depending on camera orientation.
Honestly, I'm struggling to work out how to get any significant benefit!
Every time I tried using fancy focus modes using the 135mm f2 I got loads of portrait headshots with sharp noses, but out of focus eyes. I've gone back to using the most basic AF and the only improvement is that the non-centred focus points seem a bit better than the 5DII.
I've also had a go at BIF at a Red Kite centre; I was sure the 5DIII would excel. In the sky the results very impressive, but as soon as there was a background it struggled. I got an awful lot of sharp shots of distant trees with OOF brown blobs in the foreground. I thought it was supposed to be easier than this! I think I need to pin down a tame 7D birder for their opinion on what AF approaches work best.

If anyone has 2p to add to the above - fire away! :)
 
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Has there been any definitive decision on which cf/sd cards provide the best performance in the mk3?
Apart from my massive indecision of who to buy from, Kerso is favourite but DR current prices have made me question my gambling nature ;) I can't work out whether to use the cf cards I have and buy a few "fast" sd cards but then get confused over the seemingly impossible task of deciphering what class 10 means, apparently it can be 10mb/s or 90mb/s !!
Any ideas? If there is no discernible difference in performance between the 60mb/s cards and the 90s in the mk3, I can stick with what Ive got.
Cheers
 
lala said:
Has there been any definitive decision on which cf/sd cards provide the best performance in the mk3?
Apart from my massive indecision of who to buy from, Kerso is favourite but DR current prices have made me question my gambling nature ;) I can't work out whether to use the cf cards I have and buy a few "fast" sd cards but then get confused over the seemingly impossible task of deciphering what class 10 means, apparently it can be 10mb/s or 90mb/s !!
Any ideas? If there is no discernible difference in performance between the 60mb/s cards and the 90s in the mk3, I can stick with what Ive got.
Cheers
Click to expand...

http://www.robgalbraith.com/bins/camera_wb_multi_page.asp?cid=6007-12452
 
Can anyone comment on how important the speed of the SD card is when used as a backup?

My plan is to use my 16GB Sandisk Extreme Pro in conjunction with a 16GB SDHC card which will be used for backup - but what Im trying to figure out is if the data is written to both cards simultaneously (therefore the write speed of the SDHC card is important) or if the camera delays the write until a period of inactivity?

Also, another question.

I regularly change CF card during a shoot, is the system clever enough to allow a CF card change mid-shoot and still sequentially write to the SD card? Im hoping that by swapping CF card it wouldn't confuse it?

Thanks
 
DuncanDisorderly said:
I've had my 5DIII for a couple of weeks, but haven't posted about it on the forums. Now I've had the opportunity to use it in anger and feel I can say something other than "cool new toy".

One of the reasons I've kept my head down is that there is no quantum leap in camera technology to sing praises of and nothing bad to moan about.
IMHO the reviews that say it is like a blueprinted 5DII are spot on.
Everything has been subtly improved, and while there is no single change you can point at and go "Wow", the overall impression is that is is a much more capable camera and it is a joy to use.

I love the quiet shutter. It would have been a huge asset at the last festival I covered and will get much use.
The quiet shutter also seems to significantly reduce vibration, so it seems like a good idea to use silent shutter for general shooting. Landscapes are defeated somewhat by IR release only available on the loud shutter. A firmware tweak would be nice :)

I turned on the viewfinder grid - lush!
I think I'm going to get far less wonky horizons with the 5DIII.

I'm experimenting with setting M-Fn to viewfinder artificial horizon. I've never got on with the one on the rear screen, so this may actually be useful to me!

Aargh - where did my red focus confirmation dots go!
I'd expected some sort of problem from theading this thread, but not this bad!
Fixed by changing the settings; no idea why it isn't the default setting.
Something very wierd; I was taking a portrait shot with the 50mm f1.4 and the subject commented they could see the focus confimation red flash - what! They are right; there is a bright red flash seen through the lens!

On Screen Zooming - aaargh!
Another problem I was prepared for from reading this thread.
Playback I guess I can retrain myself, but what I didn't expect was how crap it is in Live View.
Setting up the TSE is a dance where the right hand zooms and pans to check focus in Live View and the left hand tweaks the focus ring. On the 5DII zooming and panning needs both hands - rubbish!
Luckily, the workaround proposed earlier in this thread solves the problem; assign zoom to the Set button.
I also set default zoom to 'actual size' on the focus point, so I can quickly evaluate sharpness.

Auto Update Custom Function - excellent new feature which means I may actually use custom functions on the 5DIII !!!

I found I could change the configuration so the Lock switch protects both wheels - I often accidentally change aperture pulling 5DII out the bag, this will fix my problem.
Also, the lock switch is far easier to operate without taking eye away from the viewfinder.

In terms of IQ...
Definitely comparable with the 5DII; which means it is excellent.
However - I've had a couple of shots where I've had bad banding visible in the shadows when I've tried lifting them. One on a pre-dawn landscape, one on a BIF. IMHO neither instance was excessive abuse of the sliders.
I haven't changed my working practice from the 5dII and I find this a little worrying as I'm not convinced the 5dII would have been as bad.
This is not enough for me to throw my toys around, but it emphasises how important it is to get the exposure right in contrasty scenes. I had hoped the 5DIII would be an improvement in this area.

As for the focussing....
For me, the most significant change is that I can set separate focus points depending on camera orientation.
Honestly, I'm struggling to work out how to get any significant benefit!
Every time I tried using fancy focus modes using the 135mm f2 I got loads of portrait headshots with sharp noses, but out of focus eyes. I've gone back to using the most basic AF and the only improvement is that the non-centred focus points seem a bit better than the 5DII.
I've also had a go at BIF at a Red Kite centre; I was sure the 5DIII would excel. In the sky the results very impressive, but as soon as there was a background it struggled. I got an awful lot of sharp shots of distant trees with OOF brown blobs in the foreground. I thought it was supposed to be easier than this! I think I need to pin down a tame 7D birder for their opinion on what AF approaches work best.

If anyone has 2p to add to the above - fire away! :)
Click to expand...

sounds like the 5d3 is not worth double the price of a 5d2. i think this camera should be around the 2k mark at most as all it has over the mk2 is a new AF system. the rest are just minor tweaks here and there.

regardless if i do get a 5d2 or 5d3 i would notice a huge difference over my 400d!
 
futureal33 said:
Can anyone comment on how important the speed of the SD card is when used as a backup?

My plan is to use my 16GB Sandisk Extreme Pro in conjunction with a 16GB SDHC card which will be used for backup - but what Im trying to figure out is if the data is written to both cards simultaneously (therefore the write speed of the SDHC card is important) or if the camera delays the write until a period of inactivity?

Also, another question.

I regularly change CF card during a shoot, is the system clever enough to allow a CF card change mid-shoot and still sequentially write to the SD card? Im hoping that by swapping CF card it wouldn't confuse it?

Thanks
Click to expand...


The SD card speed is fairly crucial to the write speed - the images are written concurrently, so a slow SD card will slow up the camera once the buffer is full, plus take longer to flush the cache. The camera does not record the images to the backup card during a lull in operation.

There are a number of variables also to take into account regarding the formats being written to each card, e.g. Record to Multiple mode (where you get the same file on both cards) is faster than Rec Separately mode. As an example, I believe that writing RAW to CF and sRAW to SD is actually slower than writing full RAW to both cards. As an additional downside, the 5D3 cannot take advantage of the fastest SD Cards (UHS1?). There are some good benchmarks here http://www.robgalbraith.com/bins/camera_wb_multi_page.asp?cid=6007-12452 where you can see that the 95MBs cards are not noticeably quicker in the camera compared to the 45MBs versions (obviously they might be quicker in other devices like a PC that support them).

Not quite sure what you are referring to when you mention recording sequentially, however the camera seems to cope well and is still able to record to multiple when one or other card has been replaced. My approach has been to get a couple of 64GB SD card (45MBs Sandisk Extreme - about £50 each) and just leave one of those in the camera whilst swapping out the smaller CF cards as they fill. That way I can separate the CF cards from the camera regularly, so don't have both copies in one place for too long, plus I can also copy them onto a laptop at intervals. The SD card would only get used for retrieval in the event of an issue with the CF card, so can stay in the camera far longer from my perspective.
 
This might clear it up for you guys:

"Well…after some testing I have determined that, if you care at all about high speed shooting or clearing you buffer quickly, YOU DO NOT want to put a card in the SD slot. Why? Because, for some reason unbeknownst to me, Canon decided to build the 5D Mark III with one very fast CF slot which supports the newer UDMA7 protocol and a standard SD card slot which does NOT support the high speed standard (called UHS – for Ultra High Speed)."

Via:
http://www.canonrumors.com/2012/06/.../rss+(Canon+Rumors)&utm_content=Google+Reader

Source:
http://jeffcable.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/why-you-should-not-put-sd-card-in-your.html
 
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