Canon 1d mkIII vs 1D MKIV

Chris Primadona

Chris Primadona

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I was wondering if anyone has/had both and noticed a real difference in low light performance. I have been torn between upgrading to the 1D MKIV or just holding off to see what the next gen 1 series brings to the table. I'm very happy with the performance of the mkIII at the moment in all situations except going to silly iso levels (And not too impressed with the screen vs the 5dmkII).

Will the jump from the mkIII to 1D MKIV make a huge difference or should I hold off for the newer stuff coming later in the year?

I use my camera mostly for photojournalism, portraiture and a bit of equine/spots. The only time I feel the mkIII struggles is like I said, low light when I'm ramping up the iso to 3200 and even more so at "H" (6400).
 
I have both, and although I was happy with my 1DIII and never had any focus problems the jump from the MkIII to the MkIV is remarkable. The low light is very much improved as is the focus. I recon my mis-focused shots at an event now are less than 1%. So if I take 1500 shots at an event, less than 15 of them are out of focus due to the camera.

The only negative I have found is the battery life, possibly due to the different screen and the larger file size I'm struggling to get over 2000 jpegs on one charge, this was easily obtainable on the MkIII.

Since buying the MkIV I now have a 70-200 f/2.8 MkII and this combo is absolutely superb. I have to say I'm really chuffed with it!
 
There is always a new body coming soon. What you have to way up is weather the difference in body features is worth the extra money. Ask yourself what is wrong with your present camera that the new body could fix ? As for a new body thats "coming soon" its more likely to be a 1Ds Mk4 rather than a 1D Mk5.
 
vulcan2912 said:
Hi Jim

Were those 2000 images taken over a few days/weeks?I've had over 6000 images out of my batt in a day and still had plenty left.I dropped £100 on a spare and have never had to use it.

Cheers
Gary
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In one day.

What file size are you using?

I certainly couldn't get anything like 6000 images out of a battery..............I must chimp too much.....:lol:
 
It's worth remembering that the lens in many cases is the biggest current draw from the battery.
Shooting with a 300/2.8 IS stopped down will draw much more than a 400/5.6 wide open as the latter has a much lighter focus motor and no requirement to move the aperture. Similarly, a 85/1.8 will draw significantly less than an 85/1.2

Bob
 
Hmm, thats a lot to think about. I'm actually happy enough with the mkIII to just keep hold of it now for another few months anyway. If something comes along with more than 1 stop improved iso I might be tempted again. I'm picking up a faster lens this week so I will see how that works out for the low light stuff (Going from my usual f2.0 or f1.8 to a f1.4).
I notice I can get anything from 3k - 6k shots from one charge, depending on the lens, if I chimp a lot and if the speedlight is attached. At least it seems that the camera uses a bit more power communicating with the speedlight? :shrug:
 
The 1DIV is significantly better than the 1DIII for high ISO processing. It is also dynamically superior and more accurate. You'll definitely notice the difference and it is worth it.
 
Chris Primadona said:
Cheers for that, I'm going to try blag my mates camera for a weekend and see what I think. I'm just a bit concerned about changing to the MkIV with the rumours of a new body coming "soon™"
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To be fair I think the new 1D5/1Ds4 is going to be getting on for twice the price of a 1D4 anyway, as it's going to replace both of them.

Ziploc said:
There is always a new body coming soon. What you have to way up is weather the difference in body features is worth the extra money. Ask yourself what is wrong with your present camera that the new body could fix ? As for a new body thats "coming soon" its more likely to be a 1Ds Mk4 rather than a 1D Mk5.
Click to expand...

All the smart money is on Canon amalgamating the 1D and 1Ds into a single replacement product which, whilst a FF sensor, will be able to shoot in APS-H and APS-C "crops" in camera, with higher FPS speeds to boot, thus rendering the current APS-H crop 1D line redundant really.
 
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