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A few years ago I did a camera job for an auto/moto TV show. We were using GH5 cameras. I had to "fight" with the director to use a tripod for some of the static car shots! And he is almost 65 years old..not some young guy that doesn't know any better.. A tripod shot, is a tripod shot. IBIS is not. I see a trend with various trends in the industry. First we had the 5D full frame look (in some projects it was hardly anything in focus). Then we had the GoPros, the directors wanted 2 to 3 of those in each project..then we had drones, I know documentaries that were using drone shots (Phantom2) instead of tripod shots..then IBIS, some directors didn't even want any tripods on set. Now there is a trend with AF on set (especially with C300mkii cameras). I have never used AF on any project in my life, that is why I got the R7, to see what's what. It is a language that has evolved for more than 100 years now, everything has its place but the basics have been set decades ago, when there was no ibis, no log, no AF, no full frame! The old school stuff is almost 90% of that language in my opinion.

If it was Royal Mail then its probably worth asking them if its still there so you can do a re-shoot 😉

I picked up the Canon R7 a week ago and shot with it for a week in a variety of conditions before starting this thread. I had a trip to Las Vegas coming up and a retailer showed one in stock near me, so I literally got it on the way to the airport. I had one hour to put it in a camera bag with the kit lens and I took the Sigma EF 50mm F1.4 and straight through RF to EF adapter because I knew I wanted to test it in lowlight conditions and the kit lens at F3.5 wasn't going to be fast enough. On paper the R7 checks every box I was looking for as s b-cam to the C70 and as a second body for the R5 so I went for it. So, below are my thoughts on the Canon R7 after shooting with it for a week. My intended use is as a B video camera for the C70, possibly a gimbal camera, and some light solo/travel photography/video work and maybe as a second camera for the R5 for weddings (not a fan of weddings at all but who knows what the future holds). This review will ramble a bit, I now own the R5, R7, and C70 and have owned the Canon R6 (for 1 week), Panasonic S5, and GH5 so at times I will probably compare some likes and dislikes with those cameras. I will probably compare it mostly to the Panasonic S5 since to me they are the most direct competitors that I have used. THE GOOD Ergonomics - This camera's ergonomics are perfect to me. This is without a doubt one of the most comfortable cameras to hold that I've ever owned. I like big heavy cameras (I already added the battery grip to my R5) and thought I wouldn't like the ergonomics of the R7, but the grip is perfect. I actually did not like the ergonomics of the S5 at all, very uncomfortable to hold with its shallow grip and even the R6 wasn't that great in my opinion. Canon made the grip on the R7 much deeper and somehow that did the trick for me. I did not even have time to rig up a camera strap before my trip so I had no camera strap when shooting photos or video and it still was really comfortable. Joystick Thumbwheel - Another home run for Canon. I was a bit neutral on the thumbwheel; I don't like change as much as anyone else, and was unsure about the thumbwheel around the joystick, but after using it I wish all of my cameras had it there. It is very logical and the height of the joystick protrudes just enough that you don't accidentally scroll then wheel. Speaking of the joystick, it is so much better than the one on the C70, it is actually precise and useable unlike the terrible one on the C70. Dedicated Video Switch - It is great that they brought back the dedicated video switch, its still annoying to me on the R5 to have to customize a button for this and use that button instead of a toggle switch. Viewfinder / Backscreen - These are pretty acceptable, I read online some people were complaining about the viewfinder specs; personally, I am still not a fan of EVF's in general and still miss my OVF in my 5DIV but to me the R7's EVF is no worse or better than say the S5 or R6. The backscreen is definitely better than the S5, the back screen on the S5 especially when focusing was a constant source of annoyance for me. Batteries / Battery Life - Nothing short of incredible. I shot a mixture of clips and photos each day for about a week and the battery only dropped 20%. Way better than the R5 in this regards and maybe slightly better than the S5. This is the first camera I would be comfortable shooting photography with without a battery grip. As far as batteries go, I am literally overflowing with them...they are the same batteries as the DSLR 5D series as well as the R5 and R6, so its nice to be able to swap batteries between the R5 and R7, interchangeability is very important to me. And yes, I know the older DSLRs took a slightly different battery, but it still works in the R7 (minus in body charging). Video Quality - The video quality is pretty much what I expected, nothing earth shattering, but also totally acceptable results. 4K60FPS, 4K30FPS, 4K Fine, and regular line skipped 4K are all there. I like compressed IPB so that's the only thing I used during the trip. Loaded up with dual 1TB SD cards and I could probably shoot on a month long trip without running out of space. Dual Slot Recording - Canon finally gets it, they released this feature on day 1. A huge Canon pet peeve of mine has been they typically don't offer dual slot video recording. With the R7 it is there and works as expected. Speaking of recording its great that it uses SD cards, I can share them between the C70, R5, and now the R7 so there's that interchangeability thing again. Photography Quality - Nothing out of this world, but perfectly fine for social media or even print work. I didn't get to really test the photography features, since I did not take a wireless trigger or any sort of lighting, I did not really push the quality boundaries of the sensor since I was stuck with ambient light. Ambient light does make you work a little extra in post, and the images did not fall apart when pushing the shadows and dropping the highlights. For the images I shot in cRAW. Kit Lens - I haven't used a kit lens in years, and forgot how useful that range is. The kit lens is a RF-S 18-150mm F3.5-6.3 with no lens IS. Yes I hate variable aperture, but that turned out to be super useful range when travelling. No lens swapping needed to get wider or longer, for what it was it performed pretty well. IBIS - It was nice shooting with a camera with IBIS again (after shooting with the C70). IBIS is rock solid when stationary and only doing simple camera movements. I also turned on horizon leveling (a first for Canon cameras) but couldn't tell how well it works since I am already a stickler for level horizons so I couldn't tell how much it was helping me keep it level. Walking with the IBIS is still impossible to me, if you want to walk with this camera and have good results you still need a gimbal. CLOG3 - I used CLOG 3 extensively, it performed as expected, nothing exceptional, but no surprises isn't a bad thing. Build Quality - I would say the build quality is about on par for Canon's recent releases (R5, R6) and of course above the quality of the C70 (sad isn't it?). All of the buttons, the back screen, and the feel of the camera is better than the C70. I would place the build quality right below the S5 and two steps below the GH5. Not bad....just predictable at this price point for Canon. Menu System - If you have ever shot with any Canon you will be right at home with the menu system. You do know though that you are using a modern Canon offering when you hit the first menu and it has 10 pages. I actually like the S5's menu system better in some ways, but once again, the R7 is just very predictable. Auto Focus - Just like every other Canon.....it just works. I didn't really stress it or try to break it, I just shot with it and it focused on what I needed it to and it maintained AF. I still am not really a fan of the person or eye AF when there is more than one person in the frame, I probably just need to learn how to work with it better, but for me, the most predictable AF settings are still to just use expand AF and put the cross hairs on what I want in focus. Eye AF works well though for talking heads or when the subject fills the frame. The AF is definitely much better than the C70 and seems about even with the R5 and R6. Low Light - I think it is not bad, definitely not as good as the S5 with its dual native ISO, but perfectly acceptable up to about 3200ISO. With a speedbooster and fast lens it is probably on par with the S5 in low light. Lens Mount - I mentioned it somewhere else, this is the ONLY Canon camera that supports EF, EF-S, RF, and RF-S at the moment; meaning it has a massive lens selection on day one. Knowing I can use every Canon and Sigma lens that I own on this camera is a great feeling. So, to wrap up THE GOOD, my overall assessment is that it is just a very predictable middle of the road camera which does photography and video equally well. Of course putting it like that makes me realize just how good this camera really is, I have said many times that I think Canon accidentally created the perfect hybrid with this camera and based on my experience so far, I still think that is the best way to describe it; a reliable solid 4K camera that is also very good at photography, that's all I have ever wanted out of a hybrid. BTW, I was in Las Vega with average daily temps of 95F-106F and never even thought about overheating. These were short clips mixed with photography and fiddling with menu settings; the exact same setup I had with the R5 when it gave me an overheat warning. THE BAD Highlight Rolloff - without a doubt the absolute worse problem with this camera. The highlight rolloff is horrendously bad. I don't even think about highlight rolloff with modern cameras, I typically leave that to the pixel peepers to complain about, but with the R7 it is without a doubt its biggest flaw. Its highlight roll off performance is about equal to my Canon T6 Rebel and far worse than even my drone with its 1" sensor. At first I thought it was just the kit lens causing it to be so bad, but I shot with the Sigma 50mm F1.4 and it did not get better. Highlight rolloff is important to me because I mostly shoot people in bad lighting where hot spots abound. Kit Lens - Yes it has a great range, but optically it just isn't very good. At the long end it gets cloudy, somewhere in the middle its not very sharp, and at the short end its somewhat acceptable. I think the Canon EF 24-105 F4.0 L lens or the Sigma EF-S 18-35 F1.8 would be a much better lens for this camera but neither offer the type of range that the kit lens offers. The camera sensor definitely far outperforms the kit lens as is to be expected. IBIS Wobble - at the 18mm end of the kit lens the IBIS wobble is pretty bad, definitely worse than anything I got with the S5. If you try to walk at all, it introduces wobble that cannot be removed in post. Towards the 30mm+ end of the range it gets better. Also, the lens did not have IS so a lens with IS may perform better. Video Tools - Typical Canon, no WFM, no false color, and my #1 pet peeve....the electronic level and histogram disappear when you hit record. The S5 and GH5 both keep them on the screen while recording. The R5, R6, and now the R7 don't. The C70 doesn't even have an electronic level. Accessories - No battery grip and possibly there never will be one. I am on the fence if one is needed with a hybrid camera, I typically use one for photography and none for video and I also typically put a cage on my video cameras and none on my photography cameras, so this one is a bit of an oddity to me. But I do like the battery grip because I mostly work with people and shoot vertical, with a battery grip the shutter button and wheels are at my fingertips when shooting vertical. Power PD - This camera like the R5 needs a Power PD USB-C power supply. This is annoying for me because my current setup does not meet the requirements for power PD. Ironically, the C70 doesn't even have this requirement and works just fine with my V-Mount battery. The R5 and R7 have this requirement, whereas the C70 and S5 work just fine with my current setup. Settings Sharing - The R7 does not seem to share settings between the photography and video menus. With the S5 it let me pick which settings to share between them such as ISO and WB. This may be an option in the menu settings somewhere but I haven't found it yet. OTHER I think this camera combined with the Viltrox speedbooster and EF lenses could be a great combination if you already have EF lenses. Or you could go with the straight through adapter and use your EF-S lenses. I have both Twice out of over 100 clips during my trip the camera for some reason ignored the CLOG3 profile and recorded in something else. I never even went back into that menu during the trip so I don't think it was user error. I also thought maybe I pressed record while in photography mode but it doesn't start recording when you do that; so I am not sure why it did that. I noticed the same thing with the R5, it will randomly record a clip without using CLOG3 occasionally. CONCLUSION I think I am done with purchasing any camera bodies for the next 5yrs or so. I once again have a fully interchangeable system, batteries, memory cards, and lenses are mostly interchangeable. IN CASE YOU MISSED IT Here are my reviews for: The S5 - Panasonic S5 User Experience The C70 - Canon C70 User Experience BONUS I shot a video with the R7 while I was in Vegas. My goal was to test photography, video, daylight, dusk, and lowlight. I do think I did this camera a disservice using the kit lens for a video test, but it was the most useable lens I had with me; the 50mm turned into an 85mm on this camera and was too zoomed in for most of what I wanted to film. I also did not bring a mic, so I was stuck using the integrated mic. For the video below I went out of my way to film different skin tones, lighting situations, etc. I also graded it to Rec.709 since I always hate seeing camera test videos where they have a heavy creative grade making it impossible to see what SOOC looks like. I don't believe in doing the pixel peeping test chart thing so I just get out and shoot the type of content that I shoot to see how a camera performs.

Thee camera that shall not be spoken about. It got a HUGE firmware update. Now does 5K and is basically a Leica SL2 for half price. I seem to remember AF works a lot better on S1R especially in 4K/60p full frame than in 4K on the S1 and S1H. Anyone tested this? I don't think it can do V-LOG? But it has HLG now. And it is one of the very few full frame 4K/60p cams for under $1500 used. So maybe it should be more on our radar than it was?

Highlight roll off is a common problem at the moment. Try this with it, I'll give you a free copy https://www.eoshd.com/dynamic-range-enhancer-H264-H265/

Thanks for the latest, good stuff. Since 2014 you have been giving us these so that is commitment to say the least!

Greetings Everyone, Another hectic week...ugh...but I did manage to create a couple of cool new tracks to share: "TUNNELS UNDER METROPOLIS " "TUNNELS UNDER METROPOLIS _v001" You'll find them on my City/Urban 3 page. Here's a link: https://soundimage.org/city-urban-3/ Other News Glad to see that my Ogg music packs are coming in handy! They should be a huge time-saver...plus you can create your own playlists and listen to them to audition tracks while doing other things. So enjoy...and as always, please stay safe and keep being creative. 🙂

LOG For me there is no substitute to What You See Is What You Get. Whenever I shoot LOG I tend to forget to look at tonality and contrast. Sometimes even a limit on dynamic range is useful because it forces you to prioritise which part of the frame to expose for. Whenever I shoot LOG I tend to get lazy and forget this. I do use a view assist when available or load a LUT onto the camera, but then you are postponing the judgement of what works for a scene to post. And what a fucking nightmare it is choosing LUTs and grading every shot differently in post, when you could have got it all right in camera, in the moment of the shoot! So LOG is overrated and a hinderance. RAW on the other hand, that's much nicer. You don't even need to grade RAW, you can just let the meta data handle it. If there is a white balance change that needs doing, you can do it without weird results. RAW is all about ultimate image quality so give me that over LOG any day. IBIS IBIS is king of ALL the lazy unmotivated camera movement we see today. It's a huge convenience doing away with a tripod, as well as the biggest single loss of the last 10 years! There is simply no substitute. Floaty, warpy, too smooth, too robotic, IBIS has it all in equal measure. The least cinematic camera feature you can choose beyond shooting it all in 30fps! Also when you are sticking something on a tripod that doesn't have IBIS like the Sigma Fp you are actually locked down into one frame. That really makes you think about the composition and refine it, because you're stuck with it! All my early stuff was shot on a tripod. I never recaptured that shooting style with IBIS. Even the slightest small movement detracts from the calmness of a locked down shot. With IBIS you can only fake a locked down shot and everyone knows you couldn't really be arsed to do it properly! 10bit It is hailed as the biggest new feature of modern times and everybody shits on 8bit, but whenever I put the final images side by side from a decent 8bit codec and a modern 10bit one, why do they always look the fucking same? AF A bit like IBIS autofocus is a great shot getter when you're rushing and making a hack of it. I used to use a single S-AF to grab focus before locking it on the GH2 and recording the unfolding scene with the focus not moving. Short of hiring a professional Hollywood focus puller that is the best any of us can do, because as soon as you hand things over to the camera you may as well call it a home movie and be done with it. Oops it's shifted to the background. Oops it's wobbling. Oops the subject has moved but the focus hasn't. Ooops that's not what I meant. Autofocus is an affront to filmmaking. The best AF is too perfect. Nails the subject in focus with no human intention behind the focus pull. If I see another gimbal shot with autofocus I will kill myself. So just to sum up... Maybe we could have an EOSHD challenge... No LOG, no 10bit, no IBIS, no AF, just a tripod, you, a manual focus lens and a camera like the Sigma Fp or Samsung NX1? Let's see how the results look compared to the next day when we all go back to the usual modern style of shooting! And pick the best!

Better value, I think. I love my MacBook Pro, don't get me wrong, but I'm not sure if it's worth the 3x or whatever extra I paid for it, especially when I am using it at home with an external monitor a lot anyway!

It's ok they are already re-shooting with it themselves!

I always fancied trying one of their Go Pro mods because the issue I have always had with action cams is how wide they are.

I think it’s a good call actually. As you already said, you messed up a few things so I suspect if you went back and re-did the test, it would be a different result?

Just a thought... It would be great to modify a smartphone so that it has only a sensor with no lens over it, and on the back cover a screw mount for C-mount lenses. Then it really would play in the same league as the Digital Bolex in RAW. It would need a lot of machining and new metal parts on the back to make it work and hope your OS doesn't notice that AF is missing! But not beyond the realms of possibility is it?

I know it gets you more shots and freedom but it doesn't look as good does it. Even on the best systems it still does weird stuff like slowly rotating the frame for no reason, or panning carries on when you don't want it to, just knocks your framing off by a slight amount but enough to be distracting.

Button pushed, arrives Friday. I have 7 weddings left this season so going to give it a whirl for static full length ceremonies & speeches and then still on a tripod for all entrances & exits ie, static tracking stuff and then gimbal for those few occasions where I now use one. It’s replacing the ZV1 and S5 and the 20-60mm kit lens, so I am hoping to get the tracking of the little Sony, but with better quality (and 4K 50p instead of 4k 25p) in a compact package the same size & weight as the Lumix. The ZV1 has overheated 3x in a row with the long stuff and the S5 rear screen is now hanging off, so the timing is just about perfect to give this little beast a go. I can’t see it doing anything but shining in it’s role actually. The only thing I don’t like about it (so far) is the flip out side screen and I wish it had the GH6 style, but can’t have everything I suppose…

IBIS to me is meant for handheld work. I don't use it in place of a tripod or monopod. IBIS gives me freedom that a monopod or shoulder rig doesn't even moving around. If I'm not in a rush, or need a static shot, I'll always go with a tripod or monopod. But if I'm literally running and gunning, like I do for weddings or my sports work, good IBIS is so vital to getting good looking footage.

I have rented one a few times and fell in love with the image. I barely have any EF mount lenses anymore but damn I have a lusting for one so bad.

Still love the old 1DC

Hi all, I have taken all the knowledge from this thread and my past experience and compiled it into LUTs. Llaasseerr was so kind to provide the V-log to ARRI log-C transformation earlier in this thread. So in the following dropbox you will find two LUTs which are convertingV-log to either Arri Rec709 or Panasonic Rec709 from ProRes RAW. Only thing you have to do in advance is select the RAW to LOG conversion in FCPX to Panasonic V-Log. Next you have to apply only one of these LUTs which is doing the work for you. Whichever you prefer more. 🙂 And yes, they also work in the Ninja V to monitor and meter the exposure. Some banding is present, but that seems to be a technical limitation of the fp, as Atomos stated in their release manual. Now the result is matching exactly in the NLE and while recording. Hope this will be of value for you guys. For me a little dream came true, Sigma fp to pocket ARRI Alexa... 🙂 https://www.dropbox.com/sh/h82hwjk12kvck4d/AAC9wmF8ezXhSVo4YBxNgwRla?dl=0

I've been using the Komodo for the past 6 weeks or so bare bones as a B cam for corporate. I mostly leave the Canon 35mm F2 IS on it and sometimes a 100mm Macro. It really is nice to use, even for corporate where it's just set up for another angle. The battery life on 2x Canon BP-975 is actually pretty stellar. I think I've gotten almost the full advertised 6 hours of run time. The file sizes are decent and the quality is high and malleable even in 6K LQ. The little LCD is really usable and I haven't blown any exposures because of the traffic light system and the color reproduction is excellent with RED's lut or the REC709 decode for quicker projects. I'm going to add the RED handle and a 5" monitor for when I want to get the camera up for higher angles. The internet tests show it with a dynamic range lower than the manufacturer's claims but I don't feel like I need anymore then they are delivering. The roll off is just really nice. The images hardly need any work. Everything they've done with the image quality makes the price justified over the $2,000 - $4,000 range cameras for me. Though financing it is another thing. . .

I went with an R5C

Ditto. It’s the one thing on this list that I couldn’t really do without now and has been one of those ‘game changer’ things they talk about. Tripod was slow, monopod faster but still not as quick and portable as my own two hands.

Yeah, but MotionCam does really not work very well at all on Sony phones and not great using Samsung phones either. So, like the video says other apps work out better. And if you have a really old phone probably none of the apps work. It takes a lot of horsepower for some of the apps to work.

Definitely agree that RAW video from these things looks absolutely lovely. Are there any smartphones that shoot RAW and Prores? From my limited experience with cameras that shoot both codecs (P2K / BMMCC) and downloading footage in both formats from various RED, ARRI, etc cinema cameras, the Prores files were basically as nice to work with and grade as the RAW files. My theory was that Prores isn't better as a codec per-se but it's just that on cameras that shoot RAW the manufacturers know how to dial in the codec to look good. If it is in the ballpark of RAW image quality then the file-size differences can be a useful benefit. The fact that many movies screened in theatres were shot on 1080p Prores HQ was a pretty big call as far as I was concerned - if it's good enough to project that big then I figure it's better than most of us need!

But this video with 3 different cameras show maybe Filmic Pro might be a better option than MotionCam on different phones.