Yesterday, I dropped by the Canon Creative Lab in Mississauga where they were hosting Image Wonderland. This was an event showcasing Canon gear (of course), along with a number of sets with models and high end props (including a vintage Cadillac) where you could try out the gear. I’ve never been to one of these, and honestly did not know what to expect.
I’ve been a Canon fan-girl forever, and we were also encouraged to bring our own cameras and shoot away. Images could also be printed through the onsite Canon Print Shop for free, although this was confined to 4×6 prints for walk-ins, and 11×17 prints if you submitted them ahead of time. And there was a series of talks given by Canon Ambassadors, including Irene Rudnyk, Sal Balaji and Steve Russell.
What did I see and experience at the event? Read on…
A very Happy New Year, everyone! Hope that you all have the best year ever in 2024!
I had an interesting experience recently. Many of the YouTube channels I follow have a tradition of publishing their predictions for the coming year, as well as their assessment of the best and worst products of the past year.
In one such review (and I won’t name the channel), the reviewer put out a poll to their viewers and asked them to weigh in on the best and worst cameras of 2023.
I’ll just analyse one of the results: the worst camera. The camera voted as the worst camera of the year by that crowd of several hundred (wonder what statisticians would say about that response rate with a subscriber base of 50K…), with 54% agreeing, was the Canon EOS R100. So just above break even. And that was deemed worthy of a dedicated video. Ok, then.
The Canon R100 was released in July 2023 for a retail price of $799.99 CDN, with the included RF-S 18-45 f/4 kit lens. The camera was marketed as an entry level, first interchangeable lens camera, for new content creators and those moving from their cellphones to their first real camera. It was marketed as the replacement for the T-series of DSLR’s and the M-series of early mirrorless cameras (which have since been discontinued). It provides a low cost entry point with some, in my view, admirable features taken from its higher end brothers and sisters.
But the complaints of this particular group included: no flippy screen and no touch screen and no high speed burst rates or high megapixel count. So obviously a piece of crap. Seriously?
This made me wonder about the standards generally used by these reviewers to assess best and worst. At the end of the day, it takes a lot of skill to offer an objective view of a product, particularly when you yourself are an advanced user of typically much more sophisticated products. Tony Northrup, long regarded as one of those with a lot of this skill, called the EOS R100 a “capable” camera. So why such a difference in views?
In this case, I think it boils down to the simple task of crowdsourcing an opinion. The channel in question is known for mining the opinions and research of other people and makes its name by packaging those for delivery and saving you the time of going out to do your own research. It doesn’t really offer unique perspectives – only those published by others. So it’s not surprising that an opinion on best and worst of the year would be sourced the same way.
Apart from that, I wondered why there was this chasm of divergence in views between Northrup and this other channel. I guess it comes down to what you personally mean by best and worst. The biases that you apply to an opinion are the foundation for debate in a democratic society and we relish those. I certainly do. But I also expect to see a factual basis for a particular viewpoint. And maybe even an agreed standard way of assessing something that purports to provide a ranking at the end of the day. That didn’t happen here in the case of the poll. No standard questions were provided, no guidance on what to consider and what to leave out.
Separately, another channel I very much respect (and which also will not be mentioned) conducted a poll of viewers as well to determine the best cameras and lenses for the current year. Not surprisingly, the cameras and lenses that won top prize just happened to be the ones used by the channel owner and the majority of its viewers.
Manufacturers are partly to blame for this divergence in views as well, shaping expectations of the next great thing by plugging speed, capacity, automation and the quality of the results. At the highest price points, that makes sense. But those same expectations now seem to be applied to more budget friendly options, and is the source of most of the “indignation” and complaints found online when a budget product does not deliver what Joe Public feels it should. In this case, it’s a ridiculous list of expectations in a camera that costs less than 10% (with lens) of the highest price models in the same family (without lens).
In fact, Tony Northrup, in one of his most recent videos, made the case that its time to stop pumping out more megapixels and more speed, and instead make the gear more usable, with things like built-in face recognition security to help prevent thefts, LCD screens you can see in the sunshine, internal storage and reliable wireless transfer of files.
And I guess as a final comment, those same manufacturers (and channels like the one mentioned) are creating an even bigger problem, convincing us (or trying to) that we need those extra features and capabilities just to be functional. In 2015, I purchased a Canon EOS 5D Mark III, which at the time was regarded as one of the best DSLR cameras on the market. It has 20 megapixels, no flippy screen, no touch screen, no high speed burst rate and no tracking of human, animal or insect. I still own the camera and still use it regularly. It gives me the same great quality images I expect from any Canon pro camera. It’s still listed on Canon’s website. But I guess against the standards of the aforementioned channel, it wouldn’t even make the list of has-beens.
That said, in all fairness, I also own two of the EOS R series cameras: the R5 and the R6 Mark II. Both serve very specific purposes and fill very specific needs. It was NOT the hype that lead me to these purchases.
The bottom line: take reviews and gear rankings with a grain of salt. Understand the basis of the opinion and judge if the person giving the opinion is worth listening to. It wasn’t in this case.
Yes, I’m writing about this too. Everybody has. But my perspective is very different, so please keep reading.
I’m both baffled and annoyed at the indignant positions taken by many commentators, including folks like Tony Northrup, on the decision made by Canon to issue cease and desist orders to third party lens makers who are (were) producing RF mount lenses. Specifically, here’s the announcement (in case you really haven’t seen it):
Not his first offering on the subject, but in this one, Tony seems particularly hell-bent on trashing Canon for their decision. Although in fairness, he did choose to hide it embedded in a breaking news piece that focused more on Nikon (thank goodness).
The bottom line for Tony is that Canon is making a huge mistake by not allowing third party manufacturers to produce RF mount lenses, and further that Canon has chosen not to license its RF technology to those same parties, foregoing a HUGE revenue stream. SOOOOO many potential customers are saying that they will no longer consider purchasing Canon products because they need and expect access to less costly gear options to justify the huge up-front investment from them that Canon requires for access to its new line of cameras. And indeed, the commentary on most YouTube posts where the decision is trashed is exactly that.
Every once in a while though, there is a solitary voice commenting that the decision was indeed the right one. One of those voices is mine.
I’ve had an interesting experience since my last post (more than one, but only one worth writing about). The Canon EOS R3 was officially released, after many many months of rumor. The announcement confirmed everything rumored.
Full frame, completely new sensor, instant on, super high speed continuous shooting, multiple people and object tracking modes, eye-controlled autofocus, integrated grip for portrait and landscape shooting, huge ISO range. Additionally, file transfer through multiple methods, including wifi and network cable directly to camera. And lastly, new connection options in the hotshoe, allowing for seamless connection of microphones and other accessories.
For the past year, I’ve been using the Canon EOS R5 as my primary stills camera. It is a superb piece of equipment, carefully engineered to fulfill all of my wildest dreams for stills photography. I purchased it for what will become a recurring theme for me – how to make photography more convenient.
As I get older, there are aspects of photography such as the tracking of moving subjects, the determination of tack sharp focus, remembering to switch from high ISO back to normal ISO, remembering to switch from single shot to continuous shooting and back, that could use a little help. The Canon EOS R5 provides that to me exceptionally well.
Its large, high resolution viewfinder allows me to arrange all of the important shooting information around the edge of the frame without affecting the ability to see the subject clearly. That’s what defines a mirrorless camera frankly and separates it from a DSLR. That clear view of the subject and the settings allows me to set up the shot easily even with my diminishing vision, and when I can’t, there are built-in warnings and colour overlays to help me.
Likewise, the LCD is big, bright, rotatable to any angle that saves my aging back and knees, and yet lets me get the camera into the right angle to capture any scene, no matter how high or how low.
I can customize essentially every button and dial to perform the function that works for me, I can set up and save custom shooting settings that give me everything from landscape setups to close up to action setups at the flick of a button. And I can save out all my customizations to a file to store remotely, in case something causes the camera to need a reset.
Sounds like a gem, doesn’t it. It’s fast, light, smart and takes pretty pictures too. It even shoots video.
Say what? Shoots video. But the title of this blog is that it is not a video camera. Read on, intrepid friend.
I can’t resist commenting on the release this week of Canon’s new mirrorless flagship cameras, the EOS R5 and EOS R6. There are lots of technical commentaries out there; instead, I want to document how I felt listening to the details of the release. Continue reading “Jumping into the Deep End”→
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