5D or 60D for day out inc bird displays?

Messages
6,359
Name
John
Edit My Images
Yes
Hi,

I'm going on a family outing tomorrow which will include bird in flight displays and I'll be taking the bigma ii so expect high iso.

Which would you choose - iq and slower af or higher noise and better af?
 
Ooh that's a tricky one!! I struggle with the whole BIF, AF and 5D combination, but the results are always excellent when properly focused, whereas I'm sometimes disappointed by the 60D's IQ at higher ISO. Here's some manual shots:


Vulture landing by ManualFocus-G, on Flickr


Alaskan bald eagle landing by ManualFocus-G, on Flickr
 
Manualfocus I see you've the same bodies as me and those are great shots I'd be proud of, although I couldn't manual focus if my life depended on it!

I have to say I'm used to using the 60D so its a bit of a cop out in some ways and initially I thought as Alex did that the 60D's a no brainer but more and more despite the 60D being excellent I'm drawn to the 5D and am tempted to try it out and see just how "bad" this AF truly is.

As an aside anyone know if the 5D II is better on that front, I know its no 7D, but over the classic is it better?
 
Last edited:
If it is the 5D classic that you have I would go with the 60D as high ISO is at least as good and AF and cropping ability is better. If it is the 5DII then I would go with that one.
 
manualfocus-g said:
The AF and cropping ability might make it worthwhile, but not the high ISO. The 5D is way better IMO.

I'd disagree, over 1600 iso at least.

I prefer my 50d at high iso than my 5d mk1.
 
I'd disagree, over 1600 iso at least.

I prefer my 50d at high iso than my 5d mk1.

OK, but I'm talking about a 60D, and I'm not sure shooting BIF over ISO 1600 is very sensible anyway, without noise reduction, certainly if cropping.
 
manualfocus-g said:
OK, but I'm talking about a 60D, and I'm not sure shooting BIF over ISO 1600 is very sensible anyway, without noise reduction, certainly if cropping.

Very true.
 
Will the extra reach of the crop sensor on the 60D benefit you? Might sway it maybe?
 
In the end I took both bodies - I'll find out later how the images turned out, but so far from the preview screens neither were very high keeper rate wise.
 
Sorry to hear that :( It will be interesting to see where you think the problems lie i.e. AF, high ISO, need to crop in too far.

BIF is certainly not easy, and to be honest a lot of us probably have low keeper rates :lol:

I'm also really keen to do some proper camera v camera testing at high ISO to study things a little better. Myself and Odd Jim obviously have different experiences, so I might try some tests over the next week or so. I'm not 100% sure of the best way to do this however, so might need some advice from fellow members.
 
I wouldn't have a clue either!

However I do see a 5D MkIII in my future, if the rumours are true - ISO boost, less noise and better (nearing 7D) AF I can see it being my dream camera! I don't mind lowish FPS as I rarely do large bursts.
 
JohnN said:
I wouldn't have a clue either!

However I do see a 5D MkIII in my future, if the rumours are true - ISO boost, less noise and better (nearing 7D) AF I can see it being my dream camera! I don't mind lowish FPS as I rarely do large bursts.

I'm eagerly awaiting the mk3, so I can buy a cheap mk2!

I can't see AF anywhere near the 7d though, as this would mean the 5d mk3 would be stepping on the 1ds/x series, and the 5d has always been a different beast, as it's never been aimed at sports togs. Near 7d AF would be nice though! And Canon havn't released any mk3 facts as yet...
 
Last edited:
Back
Top