# Bryan Carnathan has completed his review of the 7D Mark II



## Marauder (Nov 23, 2014)

As always a thorough and well written review and the one many of us have been most anxious to read. 

http://www.the-digital-picture.com/Reviews/Canon-EOS-7D-Mark-II.aspx


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## Sporgon (Nov 23, 2014)

Well I hope Brian's knowledge of the camera is better than his knowledge of horses ! 

That nag galloping towards the camera at '40 to 45 mph ' , who does he think it is, Red Rum ? If a horse like that was really going flat out it would be about 500 metres per minute max - 18 mph.


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## AvTvM (Nov 23, 2014)

Well written and comprehensive review. 

Conclusion: confirmation of what was already known ... IQ improvement vs. 70D minimal and even vs. 7D quite disappointing. Too bad. Really great DSLR otherwise, everything there, except built-in WiFi.


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## Mt Spokane Photography (Nov 23, 2014)

Its good to see a competent review. I try to read reviews from multiple competent reviewers, since some tent to pickup on points that others miss, or even disagree.

I did not see anything that surprised me in his review, its mostly in line with other reviews.


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## wtlloyd (Nov 23, 2014)

Sporgon said:


> Well I hope Brian's knowledge of the camera is better than his knowledge of horses !



You might try reading the review before embarrassing yourself with a gratuitous negative comment.


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## Sporgon (Nov 23, 2014)

wtlloyd said:


> Sporgon said:
> 
> 
> > Well I hope Brian's knowledge of the camera is better than his knowledge of horses !
> ...



"Perhaps even more beneficial for understanding what can be done with this frame rate is to look at a visual example. Drag your mouse over the labels under the following image for a visual look at the 10 fps rate. Drag your mouse completely across all of the labels in 1.3 seconds to get an idea of the speed of the approaching horse – approximately 40-45 mph (64-72 kph). I know, the labels are a bit small for that mouse move, but this approach happened very fast."

She would have to be riding a top form Derby winner - on the flat - on good going - with a race saddle - riding weight less than 7 stone. As I said, this target would have been travelling towards the camera at 18 mph max.


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## Marauder (Nov 23, 2014)

AvTvM said:


> Well written and comprehensive review.
> 
> Conclusion: confirmation of what was already known ... IQ improvement vs. 70D minimal and even vs. 7D quite disappointing. Too bad. Really great DSLR otherwise, everything there, except built-in WiFi.



It is a comprehensive review, but I'm not sure where you're getting the negativity about IQ. The IQ is substantially better than the 7D and has considerable improvement over the 70D as well and he's clearly impressed with the IQ. I certainly didn't expect it to match the FF 5D III, but it has excellent IQ for a crop frame. 

And of course, as you allude, the rest of the camera is great. The AF system, buffer and speed are amazing. I was very impressed that the actually got far more than advertised from the buffer with the Lexar 1066x CF card. Looks like a HUGE winner to me.


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## Woody (Nov 23, 2014)

AvTvM said:


> Conclusion: confirmation of what was already known ... IQ improvement vs. 70D minimal and even vs. 7D quite disappointing. Too bad. Really great DSLR otherwise, everything there, except built-in WiFi.



Wow. Did you even read the review or you just assumed Bryan will share your opinion? From http://www.the-digital-picture.com/Reviews/Canon-EOS-7D-Mark-II.aspx

"... More surprising is the 7D Mark II's high ISO noise performance....

... I predicted that the 7D II's image quality would be at least as good as the 70D but not significantly better...

Truth is, I expected to see practically no difference between the 7D II and 70D results until at least ISO 1600 or 3200...

Overall, _*I see more image quality improvement from the 7D II than I expected. I love when my expectations are exceeded*_...

I continue to be impressed with the 7D II's improvements over prior Canon APS-C bodies. The 7D II shows off its noticeably higher resolution against the 7D and shows some high ISO noise level improvements. Though very similar to the 70D at ISO 100, the 7D II shows progressively cleaner results as ISO settings are increased...

After seeing 7D II image quality exceed my expectations, and knowing the huge array of other 7D II feature advantages over the 70D, I began having serious second thoughts at this point in the review process. Overall, the Canon 7D Mark II looks impressive from an image quality perspective.

Going into this review, I was thinking that there was little chance that I was going to be replacing my 70D with a 7D II... After seeing 7D II image quality exceed my expectations, and knowing the huge array of other 7D II feature advantages over the 70D, I began having serious second thoughts at this point in the review process...

My 70D is on the porch waiting for the brown truck as I write this. I sold it to B&H Photo's Used Department to help fund the 7D II acquisition."


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## Marauder (Nov 23, 2014)

Woody said:


> AvTvM said:
> 
> 
> > Conclusion: confirmation of what was already known ... IQ improvement vs. 70D minimal and even vs. 7D quite disappointing. Too bad. Really great DSLR otherwise, everything there, except built-in WiFi.
> ...



+1


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## Cosmicbug (Nov 23, 2014)

Great review...
Pretty much comfirms to me this camera is far from being a dud, but a camera I believe will help me deliver the goods. 
It would have been unrealistic of me to expect 1Dx performance at a greatly reduced price just because it has a couple of FPS fewer and a cropped sensor. Sure, it would have been nice to have a sensor with much higher DR and less high ISO noise but the truth is I rarely shoot action in low light situations and as suggested by Bryan, I can always use my FF 5D for those darker moments ( I can't justify a 1Dx for my work). The sensor which seems to attract alot of criticism is just but one component (albeit important one)in a camera but for me, the AF, FPS, durability and available lens system is just as important.

I have total faith in the Canon lens system and looking at the Canon body line up, the 5D3 is too slow and the 1DX is too pricey. It looks like I only have one to choose from. The product people at Canon have certainly got me in their buyer pool!


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## Chapman Baxter (Nov 23, 2014)

Despite Bryan's commentary, I'm with AvTvM on this. To my eyes, the noise comparison page (link below) shows minimal difference from the 70D at any ISO and certainly less than a stop (maybe 0.5 stop?) against the 7D, which seems to me a disappointing return for five years' progress. Along with a 6D, I still have a 7D but there's not enough here for me to feel the need to upgrade it. YMMV.

http://www.the-digital-picture.com/Comparisons/Canon-EOS-7D-Mark-II-ISO-Noise.aspx


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## Marauder (Nov 24, 2014)

Cosmicbug said:


> Great review...
> Pretty much comfirms to me this camera is far from being a dud, but a camera I believe will help me deliver the goods.
> It would have been unrealistic of me to expect 1Dx performance at a greatly reduced price just because it has a couple of FPS fewer and a cropped sensor. Sure, it would have been nice to have a sensor with much higher DR and less high ISO noise but the truth is I rarely shoot action in low light situations and as suggested by Bryan, I can always use my FF 5D for those darker moments ( I can't justify a 1Dx for my work). The sensor which seems to attract alot of criticism is just but one component (albeit important one)in a camera but for me, the AF, FPS, durability and available lens system is just as important.
> 
> I have total faith in the Canon lens system and looking at the Canon body line up, the 5D3 is too slow and the 1DX is too pricey. It looks like I only have one to choose from. The product people at Canon have certainly got me in their buyer pool!



Yeah, I tend to agree with Bryan that the IQ is far better than the 7D's and quite a bit better than the 70D's. Combined with a superb AF system and amazing performance, it looks like a huge winner to me. So many reviews are talking about how well it does at high ISO, which also gels. The constant negativity about it seems surprising...yet I guess I shouldn't BE surprised at it ultimately! LOL


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## weixing (Nov 24, 2014)

Sporgon said:


> wtlloyd said:
> 
> 
> > Sporgon said:
> ...


Hi,
Know nothing about horse, but are you sure horse run so slow?? Slower than most top athlete?? Hmm... I thought basically any healthy horse can out run the fastest human... 

Have a nice day.


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## krjc (Nov 24, 2014)

Read the review and agree with the results. In real life shooting I would never go over 800 with the 7D but with the 7DII willing to go to 3200. When you put that in context that everything has been improved and that new features added, I'm extremely happy with my upgrade to the 7DII, now I need a buyer for my 7D. Anybody interested?


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## Woody (Nov 24, 2014)

Chapman Baxter said:


> Despite Bryan's commentary, I'm with AvTvM on this. To my eyes, the noise comparison page (link below) shows minimal difference from the 70D at any ISO and certainly less than a stop (maybe 0.5 stop?) against the 7D, which seems to me a disappointing return for five years' progress. Along with a 6D, I still have a 7D but there's not enough here for me to feel the need to upgrade it. YMMV.



I do not own the 7D2 and have no intention of getting one (too heavy for me).

I am also in agreement with you there is minimal image quality difference between 70D, 7D and 7D2. Or even the Nikon D7100, Sony A6000 etc (at least before any 5 stop shadow recovery is carried out...)

However, there is a difference between what you and I think, and what Bryan Carnathan says in his review. I do not think it's fair to state otherwise.


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## sagittariansrock (Nov 24, 2014)

Sporgon said:


> wtlloyd said:
> 
> 
> > Sporgon said:
> ...



Completely digressing from the topic, I think a horse can manage 30/35 mph at a gallop for very short distances. In this particular case, I wouldn't be surprised if Bryan asked his daughter to urge her horse fast towards the camera to model for the shots. You are referring to speeds held consistently over the course of a mile or so. 



> Widely believed to be faster than cheetahs in endurance races, the thoroughbred is the fastest breed of horse in the world, and can maintain a speed of 45 miles (72 km) per hour for a distance of more than a mile (1.6 km), making the Derby's 1¼ mile-long race the fastest two minutes in sports.


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## dash2k8 (Nov 24, 2014)

+1 on the post above me. Horses can easily run faster than the 18mph that Sporgon said. Please exercise at least common sense. A horse cannot run faster than a human? Football running backs run at 20mph, and none of them will outrun a horse. And yes, various online resources rate the horse at around 45mph tops. Which makes the AF all the more impressive.


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## Hjalmarg1 (Nov 24, 2014)

Marauder said:


> As always a thorough and well written review and the one many of us have been most anxious to read.
> 
> http://www.the-digital-picture.com/Reviews/Canon-EOS-7D-Mark-II.aspx



Well done by Bryan! I will wait around a year to get funds for the purchase of the 7D2 and hopefully a price drop.


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## Sabaki (Nov 24, 2014)

This review is the one I've been waiting for and I find that it's telling me I bought the right camera for what I want to shoot.

The 70D is still a fairly new camera and that the 7Dii, IQ wise, improves over it, even by small margins, is enough for me.

After all, it is easier going from 0-100 than from 100-200.

Now it's less about reading up on the camera and more about taking photos with it


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## AvTvM (Nov 24, 2014)

Chapman Baxter said:


> Despite Bryan's commentary, I'm with AvTvM on this. To my eyes, the noise comparison page (link below) shows minimal difference from the 70D at any ISO and certainly less than a stop (maybe 0.5 stop?) against the 7D, which seems to me a disappointing return for five years' progress. Along with a 6D, I still have a 7D but there's not enough here for me to feel the need to upgrade it. YMMV.
> 
> http://www.the-digital-picture.com/Comparisons/Canon-EOS-7D-Mark-II-ISO-Noise.aspx



Yep, exactly what i see.

7d II IQ is visibly lower than sony A77 II and Pentax K-3 and even nikon D7100. And also behind sony A6000. 
It just demonstrates Canon's ongoing sensor/readout weakness. 

I don't want to be negative. Had a 7D from the first day in 10/2009 when it started to ship. Sold it in june 2014. Had the 7D II sebsor been fully competitive with any other APS-C camera on the market, I probably would have bought it, despite me looking for a more compact, preferably Ff-sensored mirrorless system. I am not going to do so for only a 0.5 EV improvement after 5 years. No way. Does not matter, how good the rest of the cam is. It is lacking in the most important discipline: image quality. A specializrd tool for reach-limited photographic applications, where there is not a lot of competition at currrnt due to nikon's fumble re. d300s successor and sony's lack of good long tele lenses.


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## e17paul (Nov 24, 2014)

Marauder said:


> Cosmicbug said:
> 
> 
> > Great review...
> ...



If this can be done with a 1.6x crop sensor, then the next generation of full frame cameras with 2.5x the sensor area should mute the critics, at least for a short while.


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## justaCanonuser (Nov 24, 2014)

Great that Bryan's review is now online, I have waited it for it eagerly. As always, well done! I appreciate in particular that he persuaded Chuck Westfall to explain the differences of the 1DX, 5D3, and 7D2's AF systems in detail.


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## heptagon (Nov 24, 2014)

Looking at the noise comparison above ISO3200, the 7DII clearly is a little bit better than the 70D. - I suppose this is about as good as we get with Bayer pattern silicon sensors. It is not possible to make large gains.

Reduce read noise? At high ISO, the Canon sensors are already close to the limit.
Improve Quantum efficiency of the subpixel? Yes, but not with current silicon.
Use multicolor subpixels? This hasn't worked out well, so far, with silicon.

In that light, even the tiny gains, that Canon could achieve, are great.

Current sensors throw away a lot of light. Color filters block out a lot of light from the other colors. Green is the most important channel but only half the pixels detect green. That would be almost one stop improvement if every pixel was green.

I would expect 1-2 stops improvement when the sensor manufacturers move on to utilize new materials to build Layered sensors with multiple colors (possibly more than RGB) and 90% quantum efficiency throughout the spectral range.


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## Woody (Nov 24, 2014)

heptagon said:


> In that light, even the tiny gains, that Canon could achieve, are great.



Yup.

While there will always be whiners who want to see 2 to 3 stops of improvement in high ISO performance for APS-C sensors, the reality is that even Sony with all their sensor wizardry cannot perform better. Just pit Nikon D7100/5300 vs Sony A6000 vs 7D2 using DPReview comparison page. Only Fujifilm 'appears' to be better... but anyone can also achieve the same kind of performance by tinkering with their RAW files.


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## neuroanatomist (Nov 24, 2014)

e17paul said:


> If this can be done with a 1.6x crop sensor, then the next generation of full frame cameras with 2.5x the sensor area should mute the critics, at least for a short while.



Fat chance.


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## e17paul (Nov 24, 2014)

neuroanatomist said:


> e17paul said:
> 
> 
> > If this can be done with a 1.6x crop sensor, then the next generation of full frame cameras with 2.5x the sensor area should mute the critics, at least for a short while.
> ...



I'm one of life's greateste optimists


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## Sporgon (Nov 24, 2014)

dash2k8 said:


> +1 on the post above me. Horses can easily run faster than the 18mph that Sporgon said. Please exercise at least common sense. A horse cannot run faster than a human? Football running backs run at 20mph, and none of them will outrun a horse. And yes, various online resources rate the horse at around 45mph tops. Which makes the AF all the more impressive.



If only we had some photographic evidence. Oh wait ! We have ;D

OK, in fairness Brian's example was to show the effectiveness of ten frames per second in capturing the moment of suspension in the horses's gait rather than AF accuracy with a target moving towards the camera, and ten frames per second has clearly capture the horse..... in canter gait, not gallop. 

I'll give in, maybe she had it up to 22 mph. 

Incidentally I think the 7DII is shaping up to be a really excellent value top end action camera.


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## ritholtz (Nov 24, 2014)

Chapman Baxter said:


> Despite Bryan's commentary, I'm with AvTvM on this. To my eyes, the noise comparison page (link below) shows minimal difference from the 70D at any ISO and certainly less than a stop (maybe 0.5 stop?) against the 7D, which seems to me a disappointing return for five years' progress. Along with a 6D, I still have a 7D but there's not enough here for me to feel the need to upgrade it. YMMV.
> 
> http://www.the-digital-picture.com/Comparisons/Canon-EOS-7D-Mark-II-ISO-Noise.aspx


Nice review. Brian always exaggerates latest one as a greatest one. Based on DPR comparison tool, there is a noise improvement over 70D at high iso. But colors are little different. 70D some how has brighter colors (red/green boxes) with more noise. I think, there is a little difference in the processing.


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## NancyP (Nov 24, 2014)

To put things in perspective, Eadweard Muybridge did the same 10 fps thing back in 1878 and following years>
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eadweard_Muybridge


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## Mt Spokane Photography (Nov 24, 2014)

Sporgon said:


> Well I hope Brian's knowledge of the camera is better than his knowledge of horses !
> 
> That nag galloping towards the camera at '40 to 45 mph ' , who does he think it is, Red Rum ? If a horse like that was really going flat out it would be about 500 metres per minute max - 18 mph.


 
His daughter has been involved with horses for many years, as we have seen from his photos.

I've also owned many horses. Your 18 MPH speed is way off for a quarter horse.

*[font=arial, sans-serif]Horse Speed in MPH - How fast is your horse going?[/font]*
[font=arial, sans-serif]Horses speed varies with their stride length, body build, and other factors, but here is a basic idea of how fast-- in miles per hour-- horses move at their various gaits: [/font]
[font=arial, sans-serif]
*Walk:* Roughly 3-4 MPH. A pleasure show horse can go as slow as 2 mph. Gaited horses-- who do not trot-- can do a 'running walk' as fast as 15 mph.[/font]
[font=arial, sans-serif]*Trot:* The trot is roughly 8-10 MPH. Again, a shorter striding horse could trot slower, and a horse with a long stride could move faster.[/font]

[font=arial, sans-serif]*Canter/Lope:* 10-17 MPH. [/font]

[font=arial, sans-serif]*Gallop:* This depends on the horse's condition and athletic ability. Some horses are not built to run fast an may only do a fast canter at their best; however, the gallop is about 30 mph. Thoroughbreds, which are bred for running distance but not speed, have been clocked at over 40 MPH. Quarter horses, bred and raced for short distances at speed, can reach 50 MPH in short bursts according to the AQHA's website.[/font]


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## Marauder (Nov 24, 2014)

NancyP said:


> To put things in perspective, Eadweard Muybridge did the same 10 fps thing back in 1878 and following years>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eadweard_Muybridge



Fascinating article! Thanks for sharing it!


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## fragilesi (Nov 24, 2014)

Reviews like this are not helpful.

They just fuel GAS.

I really want this camera now!


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## Marsu42 (Nov 24, 2014)

Mt Spokane Photography said:


> Gallop: This depends on the horse's condition and athletic ability.



From what I shoot, I can tell that the perceived speed also depends on if you're standing, kneeling or lying in the line of the horse's path or not :->


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## Arctic Photo (Nov 24, 2014)

Sporgon said:


> dash2k8 said:
> 
> 
> > +1 on the post above me. Horses can easily run faster than the 18mph that Sporgon said. Please exercise at least common sense. A horse cannot run faster than a human? Football running backs run at 20mph, and none of them will outrun a horse. And yes, various online resources rate the horse at around 45mph tops. Which makes the AF all the more impressive.
> ...


To me it looks that the stride length indicates canter which supports your original statement. Also, I don't believe she would ride in full galop on the side of that slope.


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## Marauder (Nov 24, 2014)

fragilesi said:


> Reviews like this are not helpful.
> 
> They just fuel GAS.
> 
> I really want this camera now!



LOL Well, if it helps, I'm quite GASSY myself! Er..........that just sounds wrong! LOL

Saving my dimes for my own 7D Mark II--probably in he new year some time. Wish I could do the 100-400 II at the same time, but it takes time to save the dough!


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## justaCanonuser (Nov 25, 2014)

e17paul said:


> neuroanatomist said:
> 
> 
> > e17paul said:
> ...



Pretty sure that the DT (Dynamic Trolls) will always find something to complain...


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