Canon - the REAL technical and political reasons behind the lack of decent video

[tugela]

On ‎7‎/‎5‎/‎2017 at 10:25 AM, mercer said:

 

Mirrorless still only accounts for 25% of sales and I am sure Canon is aware of trending markets. The idea that some guys on an Internet forum knows better than the leaders of a billion dollar company that has been in the lead with sales for decades is quite frankly laughable. 

25% is from a few years back. Actually, mirrorless accounts for 36% of the market now, and that number is slowly growing. In a few years MILCs will cross the 50% line and soon after that DSLR sales will by and large crater. The end of the DSLR is rapidly approaching.

On ‎7‎/‎8‎/‎2017 at 3:07 PM, bertholddiederich said:

I don't work at Canon but I could imagine they've decided it's a good strategy for them because it enables them to make their low-end camera cheaper and doesn't cannibalize sales of higher end cameras. Also, what other full frame DSLRs do 4k? I can't think of one off the top of my head. The A7 II doesn't; the D750 doesn't; is there one that does? Perhaps Canon thinks it's more important to maintain a sub-$2k price point then to include video features that they think their target audience (i.e., full frame still photographers) won't want. 

 

A7IIR, A7SII and A9. Every Sony FF camera from now on will do it as well. D5 does as well IIRC. My guess is that most or all of future Nikons will as well.

Not only that, just about every smaller new Sony and Panasonic does as well. 4K enabled has nothing to do with sensor size, so there is no reason why all cameras should not have the feature, unless the processor used in the camera is too primitive.

[tugela]

3 hours ago, Clayton Moore said:

It cannot be argued that when technically they do what they want and don't, that its a marketing / political decision.  Canon today could have dominated the LSS camera space at $1000-$3000 but the simply chose not to. Every year they keep passing on it.  I do feel there is one element to it, camera manufactures (across the board) are struggling to move product right now.

The market is moving so fast that people are to some extent sitting on their wallets.

No it is not. The reason that consumer Canon cameras don't have 4K is that their processors cannot do it in hardware without a cooling solution. Until that is resolved you are not going to see 4K in Canon consumer cameras. To do 4K they have to use software solutions such as MJPEG, which require massive amounts of data to be moved, and consequently is not realistic on consumer cameras, where the user is not going to want to buy very expensive cards to shoot. All this nonsense about people not really needing/wanting 4K is just marketing spin to explain away the absence of 4K when pretty much every other manufacturer is implementing it. It is not like Canon marketing is going to admit that the competition is simply better than them now is it?

It is not a marketing/political decision. it I a TECHNICAL decision forced on them by the inadequacies of the processors available to them. We should be seeing a Digic 8 soon (foreshadowed by the Digic DV6 used in the C200) which may be thermally efficient enough to do basic 4K in hardware without a cooling solution. We probably won't see any serious cameras based on that processor before 2018 though, perhaps a 7DIII, which would be my guess. But even then, Sony/Panasonic (and likely Nikon as well) are still going to be ahead.

[baronmaximus]

IF the 6DM2 had 4K60, or hell, even 4K24, I'd have had to SERIOUSLY consider switching from Nikon to Canon, which would have meant Canon would have sold new lenses, cameras, and accessories.  I suspect that I wouldn't have been the only one, either.  I've been waiting, and waiting, and waiting, and waiting some more for a DSLR that could do beautiful 4K, have decent dynamic range, excellent high ISO performance, with functional AutoFocus in video and could take stills that would knock your socks off, all on a full-frame sensor, for a reasonable price ($3000 or less).  My D800 has served me well since 2012, but it's very long in the tooth.  I bought a used GH2 a while back, which was a lot of fun to play with and gave me some pretty exceptional quality video, as long as the lighting was good, but it wasn't what I was looking for.  I looked closely at the Sony A7S II, but it has some pretty big issues and it's not exactly a photography powerhouse, not to mention the slim lens selection and all the headaches people experience if they have to service their camera.  The GH5 came along and I watched every youtube and vimeo video I could get my eyes on, I read every review that I could find, and decided that it was the camera for me.  The GH5's low light is...well, not so great, my D800 blows it away in terms of low light, and it's a 5 year-old camera, but the GH5 produces some of the most beautiful, detailed video I've seen from any camera, and it does all this for less than $2000 AND I can use just about any lens on the planet.  I waited until the 6DM2 came out, hoping it would have what I was looking for, because the price would be right.  The D850 rumor that it would have an EVF piqued my interest, but when that panned out to not be true, I pulled the trigger on the GH5, I was tired of waiting for Nikon and Canon.  And I may still buy the D850, but it will be purely for photography, since Nikon gimped that camera in the video arena too, by not allowing 4K60, or peaking to work in 4K (which is where you need it most).  I can't say I'm excited about the features of the D850 though, it's just that I'm due for a new photography camera and the GH5, while taking beautiful images in good light, isn't really useable, for me, beyond ISO 1600.

Canon needs to stop gimping their cameras.  Nikon needs to get off their asses and buy, or create a FUNCTIONAL video autofocus, like Canon's Dual Pixel AF (which is one of the reasons I was waiting for the 6DM2 before I purchased the GH5)...there's no better video autofocusing system on this planet than Canon's DPAF.  Of course the GH5 has abysmal AF performance too.  If I wanted decent AF, my only choices were Canon 5DM4 (bleh) or Sony A6500 and I think the GH5 is a better overall camera than the A6500 by quite a bit and the 5DM4 is a bit of a bear for video (what were you thinking, Canon?!?)

The whole thing is silly.  If any of these companies had any brains, whatsoever, they'd make one PERFECT camera, with EVERYTHING that videographers and photographers want and put the other companies out of business.  Imagine a D850 with GH5 video specs (and lack of issues like moire/aliasing, along with 4K60, 2K180, 8/10-bit, 400mbps, many codecs, full-sensor readout, etc), Canon's Dual-Pixel AF, flat picture profiles of the Sony A7 line, Dynamic Range of the Black Magic Cameras (along with the ability to shoot to Pro-Res or H.264) and the low light performance of the A7S II, combined with the photography features of the D850 (even at a lower resolution).  People would only need ONE camera, for the first time ever.  I'd pay $4000-$5000 for that.  Of course we'll probably never see a camera that does both photos and video perfectly, because of all the gimping and lack of thought that goes into cameras today.  

After owning the GH5 and seeing how much better it is than the GH2, I'm pretty sure that DSLRs are going to go the way of the dodo, not just for video, but for photography, as well.  Perhaps not this year, or next, but it will happen.  There are so many huge advantages to mirrorless and the only real drawbacks are "full frame aesthetic" (which is mostly nonsense) and low light performance (which is a legitimate concern and one that I share).  Unfortunately, for Nikon, which has outright REFUSED to innovate, they will go away when the DSLR does.  I've been a Nikon shooter for many years, over a third of my life and I really, REALLY wanted them to succeed, but they're just not doing enough...they just keep throwing out the same stuff, with tiny modifications, but no true innovations.  I'd be surprised if Nikon was around in a decade, and a lot of people have already given up on Canon, because of their incessant gimping of their mid and upper range cameras.  Canon had such a winner with the 5DM2 and 5DM3, if they'd continued that with the 5DM4, they wouldn't have lost so many customers to mirrorless (primarily Sony and Panasonic), but if you look at the youtubers who have traditionally shot with Canon cameras, almost all of them have gone to mirrorless.  Sony is winning, they saw the end of the DSLR over a decade ago.  It's just a shame that Nikon can't accept the fact that the DSLR is dying.

[noone]

6 hours ago, baronmaximus said:

IF the 6DM2 had 4K60, or hell, even 4K24, I'd have had to SERIOUSLY consider switching from Nikon to Canon, which would have meant Canon would have sold new lenses, cameras, and accessories.  I suspect that I wouldn't have been the only one, either.  I've been waiting, and waiting, and waiting, and waiting some more for a DSLR that could do beautiful 4K, have decent dynamic range, excellent high ISO performance, with functional AutoFocus in video and could take stills that would knock your socks off, all on a full-frame sensor, for a reasonable price ($3000 or less).  My D800 has served me well since 2012, but it's very long in the tooth.  I bought a used GH2 a while back, which was a lot of fun to play with and gave me some pretty exceptional quality video, as long as the lighting was good, but it wasn't what I was looking for.  I looked closely at the Sony A7S II, but it has some pretty big issues and it's not exactly a photography powerhouse, not to mention the slim lens selection and all the headaches people experience if they have to service their camera.  The GH5 came along and I watched every youtube and vimeo video I could get my eyes on, I read every review that I could find, and decided that it was the camera for me.  The GH5's low light is...well, not so great, my D800 blows it away in terms of low light, and it's a 5 year-old camera, but the GH5 produces some of the most beautiful, detailed video I've seen from any camera, and it does all this for less than $2000 AND I can use just about any lens on the planet.  I waited until the 6DM2 came out, hoping it would have what I was looking for, because the price would be right.  The D850 rumor that it would have an EVF piqued my interest, but when that panned out to not be true, I pulled the trigger on the GH5, I was tired of waiting for Nikon and Canon.  And I may still buy the D850, but it will be purely for photography, since Nikon gimped that camera in the video arena too, by not allowing 4K60, or peaking to work in 4K (which is where you need it most).  I can't say I'm excited about the features of the D850 though, it's just that I'm due for a new photography camera and the GH5, while taking beautiful images in good light, isn't really useable, for me, beyond ISO 1600.

Canon needs to stop gimping their cameras.  Nikon needs to get off their asses and buy, or create a FUNCTIONAL video autofocus, like Canon's Dual Pixel AF (which is one of the reasons I was waiting for the 6DM2 before I purchased the GH5)...there's no better video autofocusing system on this planet than Canon's DPAF.  Of course the GH5 has abysmal AF performance too.  If I wanted decent AF, my only choices were Canon 5DM4 (bleh) or Sony A6500 and I think the GH5 is a better overall camera than the A6500 by quite a bit and the 5DM4 is a bit of a bear for video (what were you thinking, Canon?!?)

The whole thing is silly.  If any of these companies had any brains, whatsoever, they'd make one PERFECT camera, with EVERYTHING that videographers and photographers want and put the other companies out of business.  Imagine a D850 with GH5 video specs (and lack of issues like moire/aliasing, along with 4K60, 2K180, 8/10-bit, 400mbps, many codecs, full-sensor readout, etc), Canon's Dual-Pixel AF, flat picture profiles of the Sony A7 line, Dynamic Range of the Black Magic Cameras (along with the ability to shoot to Pro-Res or H.264) and the low light performance of the A7S II, combined with the photography features of the D850 (even at a lower resolution).  People would only need ONE camera, for the first time ever.  I'd pay $4000-$5000 for that.  Of course we'll probably never see a camera that does both photos and video perfectly, because of all the gimping and lack of thought that goes into cameras today.  

After owning the GH5 and seeing how much better it is than the GH2, I'm pretty sure that DSLRs are going to go the way of the dodo, not just for video, but for photography, as well.  Perhaps not this year, or next, but it will happen.  There are so many huge advantages to mirrorless and the only real drawbacks are "full frame aesthetic" (which is mostly nonsense) and low light performance (which is a legitimate concern and one that I share).  Unfortunately, for Nikon, which has outright REFUSED to innovate, they will go away when the DSLR does.  I've been a Nikon shooter for many years, over a third of my life and I really, REALLY wanted them to succeed, but they're just not doing enough...they just keep throwing out the same stuff, with tiny modifications, but no true innovations.  I'd be surprised if Nikon was around in a decade, and a lot of people have already given up on Canon, because of their incessant gimping of their mid and upper range cameras.  Canon had such a winner with the 5DM2 and 5DM3, if they'd continued that with the 5DM4, they wouldn't have lost so many customers to mirrorless (primarily Sony and Panasonic), but if you look at the youtubers who have traditionally shot with Canon cameras, almost all of them have gone to mirrorless.  Sony is winning, they saw the end of the DSLR over a decade ago.  It's just a shame that Nikon can't accept the fact that the DSLR is dying.

While I like your post, one thing I find a bit odd is that you say the A7sii has a slim lens selection but the GH5 can use just about any lens on the planet?

You do realise the E mount cameras can actually take the same lenses but M43 can not use E mount lenses?     Now if you want to USE some on an A7sii is another thing.

All I know is I use many of the same lenses on both my A7s and M43 camera but the A7s adapts more.

The A7s meets MY needs for a photo and video camera but I don't need super AFC or fast tracking AF or more than 12mp though I would take some of those things if I could keep the rest as is.

 

The D850 does seem to be getting close to a do everything camera, so does the A7Rii to a point. 

 

[baronmaximus]

On 8/26/2017 at 4:11 PM, noone said:

While I like your post, one thing I find a bit odd is that you say the A7sii has a slim lens selection but the GH5 can use just about any lens on the planet?

You do realise the E mount cameras can actually take the same lenses but M43 can not use E mount lenses?     Now if you want to USE some on an A7sii is another thing.

All I know is I use many of the same lenses on both my A7s and M43 camera but the A7s adapts more.

The A7s meets MY needs for a photo and video camera but I don't need super AFC or fast tracking AF or more than 12mp though I would take some of those things if I could keep the rest as is.

 

The D850 does seem to be getting close to a do everything camera, so does the A7Rii to a point. 

 

Sorry, Noone, I didn't make myself clear, I was talking about native lenses on the A7 series cameras.  You're right though, with the short flange distance, they can adapt pretty much any lens to the A7S series.  I had the A7S II in my cart at Amazon when I was trying to decide between it and the GH5.  I had the money for whichever one I wanted, but I went with the GH5 mostly based on the fact that I do occasionally get my cameras a little wet because I do most of my videos outdoors and there was a huge discussion in the review section of the A7S II about people who had gotten their cameras wet (one guy had some flop sweat fall on it, another got caught out in a light rain), Sony refused to fix them.  And then there are the endless videos on youtube about Sony's customer disservice.  If I spend $2700 on something, I like to know that the company will stand behind it and will be able to fix it if I break it.  I'm not a wealthy guy and I can't throw money away.  I'd have LOVED to have had the A7S II low light capability, since I do a fair amount of shooting very early in the morning, just after sunrise and very late in the evening, around sunset, but I was scared away by the customer service horror stories.  I wouldn't be purchasing 2 bodies and multiple "G-Master" lenses, so I couldn't get into their "professional" program, so I went ahead and got the GH5 and I'm loving it.  I got a speedbooster and put my Nikon 50mm f/1.2 on there and I can actually film the stars (I tried this morning), which was surprising to me.  It's nowhere near as good as what the A7S II can do with the stars, but it's pretty amazing to me.

I know that Nikon service is amazing.  I had to send my D800 in for service on the LCD.  I USE my cameras, they're tools and sometimes they get wet/dirty.  My D800 looked like it had been through a tornado.  When Nikon sent it back after fixing the screen, I actually had to check my serial number to make sure they sent me back the same camera, it was SPOTLESS.  I didn't pay for a cleaning, I didn't ask for a cleaning, but they did it anyway.  That's the kind of thing that I remember, when a company goes above and beyond what is expected and it's made me fiercely loyal to Nikon, despite occasionally being disappointed by the cameras they release (like the D850).  I'm purchasing a D850, but purely for photography.  It can't touch my GH5 when it comes to video features, but my GH5 can't touch the D850 for photography, either.  It's just unfortunate that I have to have two cameras like that.  I'd love to have ONE camera that can do everything I need...and the GH5 is mighty close.  If it had better low-light performance, I'm not sure there would really be a reason for me to buy the D850.

[tugela]

Or just get a A7RIII or A9, and get the best of both worlds.