EOS R5: Maybe Just A Wake Up Call

To be honest I was extremely susceptible about all the R5 rumors. 40MP and 20FPS shooting from Canon? Too good to be true.

The truth is that I wasn’t giving too much thoughts about the camera industry recently because well, first the industry is so fucking boring. Second I have a newborn baby recently so I’m just sleep walking all the time. But now that I’m face palmed I’ve finally woke up, calmed down and gave some thoughts about it, and I start to realize that R5’s spec is not crazy at all.

The sensor of R5 has more than 40MP and the frame rate is obviously not slower than 20FPS.

IMX251 has 42MP and the readout speed is around 15FPS according to Jim Kasson’s test. And it goes to 30FPS with lowered dynamic range. JK’s results seem to be a bit on the high side but can’t be too far away. So basically Sony can make a camera just like R5 with IMX251. Now here comes the problem:

IMX251 was debut in June 2015.

So now it looks like Canon has finally come up with a sensor that Sony can make almost 5 years ago. That actually sounds quite bad for Canon.

The thing is that Sony was also hibernating during the past 5 years. They did have some highlight moments like A9, but their A7RIV still uses this stupid IMX451 sensor which is basically a IMX251 with higher resolution but lower readout speed. Their APS-C line’s sensor hasn’t been changed since February 2016. Their cameras are getting better but their sensors are still the same. This might give people some illusions that they can easily slaughter the dragon in its dream. Well I guess the dragon has to be awakened now, and that’s the real excitement for me.

I’m starting to sound like a Sony fanboy (as I am) but I do think that no matter how good EOS R5 is (and it could go the other way given Canon’s track record, like no AF in 8K video or 12FPS burst shooting with locked AF etc.), it’s wise to keep your money warm in your pocket until Sony announces A7M4.

I don’t want to make any prediction about the actual performance of EOS R5 because it’s mostly likely another face palm, but here is my general feeling: since the market is shrinking rapidly, it’s more and more important for all camera manufactures to milk their customers slowly instead of biting each other’s tails. So one small step at a time, nobody is gonna throw a nuclear bomb (like A6000) anymore, especially top makers like Canon and Sony. It’s just not sustainable for their business. The companies that still want to drop A-bomb into the market are those underdogs. Unfortunately their uranium supply is totally in Sony’s control.

So my guess is that R5 is gonna be good enough that Canon users are happy to pay for it with some extra push of brand loyalty, but also crippled enough to give hardcore Sony fanboys some relieves. And Sony’s reaction, A7M4 or whatever, won’t make Canon look too bad either. It’s just like EOS M6II has a more powerful sensor than A6X00 and yet I still can’t convince myself that a $850 camera without EVF is even better than the $600 A6100 (yep, the price of A6100 is dropping pretty fast!).

After so much bashing I’ll give Canon the credit where credit is due: EOS R5 has a 2-axis screen just like its siblings. That’s gonna be a big stick in Sony fanboys’ eyeballs. So big that I’m not sure if it can actually fit there.

F7.1

This is another topic. As I said, give credit where credit is due.

A lot of people are mocking Canon’s new F7.1 brothers. But I think it’s a brilliant idea. 24-105F4-F7.1 = 12-50F2-F3.5 for the M43 system. You can bet that if Olympus ever make such a lens they are going to stick a big PRO label on their first M43 zoom that reaches F2 and sells it for probably $1600 or even more. And Canon’s lens only cost you $400.

Back in the old DSLR days you can’t go below F6.3 because most PDAF modules are just blind beyond that. Now we are finally free from the strings it’s time to shift the paradigm a little bit. Full frame lenses can just be as slow (equivalently) yet compact as M43 lenses. Canon and Tamron are clearly leading in the new age of mirrorless lens design and I totally appreciate it.

The problem is that this F7.1 lens is not as compact as I expected. You know Fuji’s 16-80mmF4 (0.25x magnification) is 440g and Sony 16-70mmF4 (0.23x) is only 308g. Well Canon does have a huge mount which might be the problem here. It’s just my wild guess, but as I said before, Sony might have chosen the best mount diameter in the mirrorless age.

Anyway it’s just a $400 lens and I guess the performance is better than any sub-full frame counterparts, so what’s not to like? Not to mention that delicious looking RF100-500. I think full-frame is showing more and more potential to kill off APS-C and M43 completely. But someone (except Sigma) should first make a full frame camera without the EVF hump. I’ve finally made my peace with it after using the A7R series for 3 years, but recently I bought a FeiyuTech G6MAX, which is probably the most compact gimbal that actually works with A7III+Tamron 17-28. And I can’t go inverted mode because of this stupid EVF hump. This makes me want to but an A6X00 camera again.

(Sorry dudes, it’s an article about EOS R5 but somehow I just can’t stop talking about Sony)