• Blogs
• Forums
• Tradeshows
• Partners
• White Papers
• Podcast Show Notes
• Events

 

Canon EOS 7D Review

Jan 28, 2010 12:00 PM, By Jan Ozer

HDSLR provides striking images with good depth of field and little noise.

I recently spent about a month with the Canon EOS 7D solely evaluating its video quality, and the results were impressive. When using the optimal lens, the camera has phenomenal depth of field and excellent sharpness, and it is less noisy than any of the prosumer camcorders that I've tested under similar conditions. It's also small, portable, and unobtrusive.

On the other hand, with a maximum record time of about 14 minutes and primitive audio capabilities, the 7D isn't the optimal first or only camcorder for any shooter. Still, if you're looking for a platform to add more artistic touches to your productions, the 7D, which costs about $1,700, is definitely worth a look. Since most video shooters also need still images every once in a while, I should also note that the 7D is easily the most capable digital SLR that I've worked with and can earn its keep in that realm as well.

Let's start with a brief look at the specs and then user controls. Once you get a feel for the camera and how to use it, I'll discuss my results.

Specs and operation

At the heart of the 7D is an 18-megapixel CMOS sensor that's 22.3mm by 14.9mm in size. The camera shoots at 1920x1080 in 24p or 30p, and at 1280x720 and 640x480 in 60p, storing the video in H.264 format using the Baseline Profile. I spent most of my time working with 720p files, which the camera stored at a bit rate of 45.7Mbps, compared to 25Mbps for DV/HDV and up to 35Mbps for Sony XDCAM EX. The camera captures 16-bit PCM stereo audio at 48kHz, and it stores all audio, video, and still images on a Type I or Type II CompactFlash card.

I ingested and edited video shot with the 7D in Adobe Premiere Pro and Apple Final Cut Pro and encountered no issues whatsoever. I recall that during the early days of Canon's video-enabled digital SLRs, there were format-compatibility problems with some video editors, but these apparently were resolved before the 7D was shipped.

The camera is compatible with all EF and EF-S lenses. Canon sent two for my evaluation: an EF-S 10mm-22mm f/3.5-4.5 USM wide-angle lens and the general purpose EF 24mm-105mm f/4.0 IS USM lens.

In terms of operation, you set the camera in movie mode via a switch on the back. The camera then displays live preview on the 3in., 920,000-pixel LCD panel. You can run the camera in full-automatic mode, full-manual mode, or a hybrid mode that lets you set shutter speed and aperture while the camera chooses the ISO setting. If you're shooting in automatic mode, you can lock exposure so it doesn't change inadvertently during the shoot.

Continue the discussion on “Crosstalk” the Millimeter Forum.
© 2010 Penton Media, Inc.