5D Mk III vs D800/E, is the 5D3 better at anything?

[Ivar]

It is well understood the value of the 5D3 for weddings. But the same goes for other specialties like studio-landscape where the D800 does better. Different niche, different choice. I bought a 5D2 exactly for these reasons - big "unusable" file size for the time it was released, also very slow camera.

Now I really enjoy the true upgrade to my 5D2 (sorry for the JPG artifacts, also note not so good lens and it was handheld though quite high shutter speed):

 

[D_Rochat]

It is well understood the value of the 5D3 for weddings. But the same goes for other specialties like studio-landscape where the D800 does better. Different niche, different choice. I bought a 5D2 exactly for these reasons - big "unusable" file size for the time it was released, also very slow camera.

Now I really enjoy the true upgrade to my 5D2 (sorry for the JPG artifacts, also note not so good lens and it was handheld though quite high shutter speed):

Good for you (seriously). You needed different tool, so you went and got it. Who cares about brand loyalty. Get what suits your needs.

 

[Bosman]

It is well understood the value of the 5D3 for weddings. But the same goes for other specialties like studio-landscape where the D800 does better. Different niche, different choice. I bought a 5D2 exactly for these reasons - big "unusable" file size for the time it was released, also very slow camera.

Now I really enjoy the true upgrade to my 5D2 (sorry for the JPG artifacts, also note not so good lens and it was handheld though quite high shutter speed):

Good for you (seriously). You needed different tool, so you went and got it. Who cares about brand loyalty. Get what suits your needs.

This is a d800 and 5dm3 post, why are you getting on him for posting?

 

[D_Rochat]

@Bosman What are you talking about? I was commending him for actually switching to a system that suits his needs rather than constantly bitching about how the mark III isn't the camera they wanted. I added the "(seriously)" because I was being serious when I said "Good for you". :

 

[Woody]

Hasn't visited this forum in a while. Interesting post.

I agree Canon need a major shake-up. The most important of which is their sensor department. In the past, they can afford to offer meager functionality (compare D200 vs 40D, D70 vs 10D etc etc) because their sensors totally rule. But now, the tables are turned.

In order to compete on equal footing, Canon may as well follow Pentax, Olympus and Nikon, and start buying Sony sensors for their camera bodies.

 

[psolberg]

I think Bosman is referring to the rate of return. Storage size goes up drastically (22mp vs 36mp) with highly diminishing returns in IQ. So why do it?

May I suggest that with more MP more thinking takes place before the shutter is pressed?
That is certainly true with MF digital.

See, if you shoot lets say...weddings, there are moment where thinking is aplied, and crafted, and applied again, all while trying to control chaos around you. But, there are other points, at receptions and during the ceremony where you as a tog have to be in the moment, and you know what, at that point instinct and experience take over. That's where you shoot in 3 shoot bursts to make sure you get the perfect expression ...and thats also where your filling up your cards. Also, if you take a photo-journalistic approach, and those who do that tend to hand over 600-1000 EDITED images to the client, much of the time from a primary and secondary shooter. How many overall shots do you do to get that kind of return? Generally it will be in the vicinity of 1500-3000 images!!!! a high mp camera just isn't suited to that kind of work unless you can tone the files down a bit. and on the d800, they don't have a sRAW or mRAW option, its RAW or crop and sorry, I'd rather use sRAW for filler shots than crop mode. This kind of issue though is only gonna be important for shooter who who shoot a lot, like wedding photographers. If your a studio/commercial tog, more of your shooting will be spent setting up the shoot than actually shooting ---its an apples to tomatoes comparison.

having actully shot a wedding with a D800, I'm in a position which many here aren't to actually comment in any informed way. sRaw is IMO useless for the wedding photographer. You're throwing away all that data and letting the camera's inferior algorithms resample your image. photoshop will do a far superior job at resizing if you need to sample down due to space constrains. Doing such a thing is next to insanity IMO for you may as well shoot jpg if you're letting the camera handle something as critical as a wedding portrait. You may as well buy/rent a D4 or 1dmk4 and spray and pray low res files which will look better because they won't be butchered by the horrendows "sraw" resize algorithms. If you're nearly out of space and need to switch as an emergency, you'll get better image quality from a 12bit lossy compressed D800 image than from a small raw.

in the day of ever decreasing prices of storage, and ever increasing improvements of print and display media, to capture an image for client in anything but the absolute best the camera can deliver is not only silly, but pointless. sraw is really there for the sport shooters that get 15 shot of the same car going by.

personally, if I knew the photographer shot my wedding at anything less than the highest quality its camera could, well they would simply not get the job at all. If a client pays for the best I can deliver and I wouldn't cheap them out just to carry one or two less CF cards. I'd only step back on the quality if it was an emergency. But if you do weddings for a living and are skimping on the basics...well, that's an entirely different problem not one any one camera can fix.

I agreed with you. 5dm3 is better than d800 bcoz the low light perfomance is great, also a 22MP sensor is enough to do all the work

well if you shoot in a lot of dar places and detail isn't important to you it is. if you shoot light filled landscapes, you know "photo-graphy" as in light not dark-ography, then the selection changes.

 

[birdman]

What to do? What to do? Recently sold my 5d2 and waiting on next announcement from Nikon or Canon. Have a D800 set to arrive in the next week. Beautiful DSLR. going with the Nikon 16-35vR or Tokina 16-28 if I keep that camera.

I needed high MP like poster who uploaded Castle or whatever that amazing building was. Still, I am almost intent on sending back the D800 once it arrives. Too late to cancel right now. Anyway, only the higher useable ISO of the 5d3 are of interest to me over the D800. Well, and build quality supposedly on par with Nikon's offering.

I would hope the low iso files of the 5d3 are noticeably cleaner than 5d2. The JPEG engine on Canons are generally superior to Nikon (I should know -- I've owned the Nikon D70, D80, D700, and D7k, Canon 40d Rebel XS, and 5d2). Canons also meter better. Yes, with its more simplistic metering my Canons produce scary good exposure results. And finally, Canons are generally more user friendly. The final statement I want to make is this: why did Canon only allow 5d3 users to choose between highlight tone priority OR shadow optimizer? Weird choice to force you to choose one or the other.....to me it is, at least.