Should I upgrade to a 7D

ecoleman

ecoleman

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Sorry, I'm sure this has all been discussed before, but after doing a search for canon 7D, I got every result under the sun but none that seemed to be related to a 7D.

Anyways, I'm thinking about upgrading from a 40D to a 7D and was wondering what people's thoughts are now.
After reading a lot of reviews there certainly seems to be a mixed bag of opinions. Many reports of poor AF and much noisier images compared to a 40D.

I do understand that many of these were early reviews and I would hope that canon ironed out any issues with newer versions.

So what are your thoughts. Is the upgrade worth it. Does the AF work as expected? How do you feel about noise levels?

Lenses that would be used with it are
Canon 50mm 1.8
Canon 17-55mm 2.8
Canon 100mm Macro
Canon 70-200mm L f4
 
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What do you like taking photographs of?
 
I've just purchased a 7d and the autofocus is fast, it all depends on what lens you use to be honest. In regards to noise its leaps ahead of my 20d which you would expect, i would happily shoot 6400 if I had to need it but the chances are I won't need to.
In regards to whether you should get one it all depends on what you shoot
 
Hi there,

I've previously owned both, so have an idea of what they can both do. One thing I did feel when I got the 7D at first, was that at the apertures where images appeared softer (e.g. 2.8 on 70-200mm) were even softer on the 7D. After thinking about it, though, it made perfect sense, because of the higher resolution.

I never really warmed to the 7D, and after 8 months, I sold it to upgrade to a 5D MK III, for a few reasons.

Mainly, it was to go along better with the noise performance of my other camera, the 5D MK II. The noise on the 7D drove me up the wall. It was fine in ideal conditions, when there was enough light, and you could use ISO between 100 and 640. Anything over that, I found, was problematic.

I was bothered with the fact that the AF was sometimes quite unpredictable. It would focus here and there, as it wanted, and sometimes, it would get it right. Don't get me wrong, the AF was fast, and much faster than my 5D MK II in low light. Due to the poor noise performance, however, I never really liked to use it in low light, as I knew the 5D would cope with it so much better.

Auto White Balance was a laugh, as well. It would sometimes go way off for some pictures and set the White Balance absolutely fine a few shots later. That didn't really bother me that much, though, as I always shoot in RAW.

The frame rate is good, though, and you can rattle off a good few shots in quick succession, if you do something that needs some extra FPS, such as nature or press photography.

Altogether, I don't regret owning the 7D at all, because it gave me some good images and at the time, I was needing a camera with higher resolution than my 40D. At this point in time, however, I wouldn't be so eager to go out to buy one, because there's a good chance of an upgrade at some point - hopefully, with all these niggles with AF and noise performance sorted. It's difficult to guess when this could happen, and different sites are saying different things. Personally, I wouldn't be surprised if we saw it in the next few months.

Sorry about the long reply, but hope this is of some use.

Allan
 
The 7D is a great bit of kit, my brother in law had a 40D and upgraded to the 7D just after I got mine. No regrets, though it does pay to read the manual a few times.
 
I had a 40D, two actually and can assure you that the 7D is an upgrade in every area.

A good stop or two improvement for noise and the AF is significantly better, just have to be a bit careful to get the right exposure. So strange how some people hate the 7D and others like myself think it's excellent, maybe there are good or bad samples?

The last big firmware upgrade provided a couple of good features and sure you would be pleased if you did decide to get one
 
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I went 40D to 7D and really it's a no brainer. Fantastic camera. I also have a 6D now but am keeping the 7D for wildlife.
 
ecoleman said:
Sorry, I'm sure this has all been discussed before, but after doing a search for canon 7D, I got every result under the sun but none that seemed to be related to a 7D.

Anyways, I'm thinking about upgrading from a 40D to a 7D and was wondering what people's thoughts are now.
After reading a lot of reviews there certainly seems to be a mixed bag of opinions. Many reports of poor AF and much noisier images compared to a 40D.

I do understand that many of these were early reviews and I would hope that canon ironed out any issues with newer versions.

So what are your thoughts. Is the upgrade worth it. Does the AF work as expected? How do you feel about noise levels?

Lenses that would be used with it are
Canon 50mm 1.8
Canon 17-55mm 2.8
Canon 100mm Macro
Canon 70-200mm L f4
Click to expand...

I have both cameras and absolutely hate everything about the 40d in comparison to the 7d.

Honestly can't think of any bit of the 40d I rate over the 7d, or even that matches it.
 
D-pearce92 said:
I've just purchased a 7d and the autofocus is fast, it all depends on what lens you use to be honest. In regards to noise its leaps ahead of my 20d which you would expect, i would happily shoot 6400 if I had to need it but the chances are I won't need to.
In regards to whether you should get one it all depends on what you shoot
Click to expand...

:eek:

I certainly wouldn't... anything above ISO 1600 starts to get pretty bad... 3200 is nasty and 4000 is awful.

The 7D is a great camera, but at higher ISO's it's a not great. If someone wanted to shoot at above 3200 ISO and expect even half decent performance than the 7D ain't the right camera for them.

As I said up to and including 1600 it's a great piece of kit though
 
I went from a 50D to a 7D and found a noticeable improvement in every area. Of course what you shoot is important when you're choosing a camera but for an all rounder the 7D is hard to beat imo... especially as you can pick one up from HDEW for just over £700!
 
ajax_andy said:
:eek:

I certainly wouldn't... anything above ISO 1600 starts to get pretty bad... 3200 is nasty and 4000 is awful.

The 7D is a great camera, but at higher ISO's it's a not great. If someone wanted to shoot at above 3200 ISO and expect even half decent performance than the 7D ain't the right camera for them.

As I said up to and including 1600 it's a great piece of kit though
Click to expand...

compared to the noise on a 20d above about 400 then 3200+ looks great
 
Thanks for all the comments everyone. Seems it's still a mixed bag of thoughts on this camera.

I'm not a pro and shoot various things such as landscapes when we are walking to birds around the garden, kids, family, some macro stuff etc.

We sent to the Red Kite feeding station a couple of weeks ago and out of 100+ shots I think I managed to get one good one. The AF tracking on the 40D just isn't fast enough and the weather was foul so was also having to shoot at Max ISO to get any decent shutter speeds which didn't help image quality. It was whilst deleting all these photos that I thought it may be time to upgrade.

I've heard rumors of a new 7D coming out soon, but I'm sure the price will go right back to well over 1K again so was thinking of grabbing an older version from Panamoz for under £700 delivered, but I think I may hold on a bit and see what price the 6D settles at. The problem with that is I will need to get rid of the 17-55 which I have only just bought :(
 
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ecoleman said:
We sent to the Red Kite feeding station a couple of weeks ago and out of 100+ shots I think I managed to get one good one. The AF tracking on the 40D just isn't fast enough and the weather was foul so was also having to shoot at Max ISO to get any decent shutter speeds which didn't help image quality. It was whilst deleting all these photos that I thought it may be time to upgrade
Click to expand...


Don't be disheartened about photographing birds in flight, been to The Hawk Conservancy near Andover and must admit it wasn't easy photographing the birds. I thought motorbike and aircraft were challenging, but the speed and change of direction to capture the subject was just another level, but it's all about getting the right camera setup and perhaps the right lens.

What camera setting were you using (shutter speeds, apertures, ISO setting) and what lens?

These were taken with a 1D and 300mm f2.8, but must admit got most of my setting wrong. I was definitely using too slower shutter speed, but conditions were overcast and it was raining and my 1st attempt at capturing these beautiful birds. Personally I would definitely have another go or 2 and just play with your setting before upgrading.

1.
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2.
IMG_3738copy1.jpg


I've still taken some very good images with my 20D, but used the right lens.

As for a camera recommendation forget the 6D, it has the same autofocus system as the 5D MKII which is probably worse than your 40D.

The problems I see with the 7D have been with the lenses people were using, unfortunately as we get better sensor technology this also shows flaws in the quality of the lens and hence people complain about the quality of their images or blame issues with autofocus, but actually it's working as advertised but the problems with the lens not the camera or people not knowing how to setup the camera by not using the right settings and custom functions.
 
freefall said:
The white balance and general colour reproduction on my 7d is a downer for me. Especially compared to my 5dmkII
Click to expand...

But that's the same for all cropped v full frame cameras due to the sensor and size of the pixels.
 
pete.rush said:
Don't be disheartened about photographing birds in flight, been to The Hawk Conservancy near Andover and must admit it wasn't easy photographing the birds. I thought motorbike and aircraft were challenging, but the speed and change of direction to capture the subject was just another level, but it's all about getting the right camera setup and perhaps the right lens.

What camera setting were you using (shutter speeds, apertures, ISO setting) and what lens?

These were taken with a 1D and 300mm f2.8, but must admit got most of my setting wrong. I was definitely using too slower shutter speed, but conditions were overcast and it was raining and my 1st attempt at capturing these beautiful birds. Personally I would definitely have another go or 2 and just play with your setting before upgrading.

I've still taken some very good images with my 20D, but used the right lens.

As for a camera recommendation forget the 6D, it has the same autofocus system as the 5D MKII which is probably worse than your 40D.

The problems I see with the 7D have been with the lenses people were using, unfortunately as we get better sensor technology this also shows flaws in the quality of the lens and hence people complain about the quality of their images or blame issues with autofocus, but actually it's working as advertised but the problems with the lens not the camera or people not knowing how to setup the camera by not using the right settings and custom functions.
Click to expand...

WOW, If I got images like that I wouldn't even dream of upgrading.
Looking at some of the images I kept I was shooting at 1/1000 at f5.6 at ISO1600 with a Canon 70-200L f4 with a 1.4x TC attached, hence the f5.6 (this was for birds in the sky which was a dull grey).

As soon as the birds got down to hedge line my shutter speed dropped like a ton of bricks and ISO 3200 in a 40D is not pretty, so pretty much all of those were binned.

Maybe I should invest in a 70-200 f2.8 instead, but it would have to be a Sigma as I can't justify Canon prices as a hobbyist.
 
ecoleman said:
WOW, If I got images like that I wouldn't even dream of upgrading.
Looking at some of the images I kept I was shooting at 1/1000 at f5.6 at ISO1600 with a Canon 70-200L f4 with a 1.4x TC attached, hence the f5.6 (this was for birds in the sky which was a dull grey).

As soon as the birds got down to hedge line my shutter speed dropped like a ton of bricks and ISO 3200 in a 40D is not pretty, so pretty much all of those were binned.

Maybe I should invest in a 70-200 f2.8 instead, but it would have to be a Sigma as I can't justify Canon prices as a hobbyist.
Click to expand...

That's the problem, even the 7D would have struggled in those conditions and that's what lets the 7D down, is its ISO performance, but as I said, don't be disheartened, most consumer gear would have struggled in those conditions. At the end of the day you need good light to get decent images.

You were using a 70-200mm f4 with a TC. The problem with a TC is, as you started you lose an f-stop, but you also lose about 50% autofocus speed and the conditions were very challenging, so my recommendation would be give it another go or 2 in better conditions and see what results you get and keep topping up the lens/camera fund.
 
I love my 7D to bits and find it great for birds in flight. I've never had any WB issues, but then again I never use Auto WB. The ISO performance is occasionally limiting, but it is considerably better than the 50d I upgraded from, and I think that however good ISO is, it is the one thing that is limiting on any camera - however good it is one always wants more!

I was going to make the same offer as the poster above as to trying out the 7d if you are local, but I see that both offers are in Worcestershire so you will probably need an offer from another region, depending on where you are.
 
daugirdas said:
Nothing wrong with 7D, but also consider 1D mkIII which is a bit faster and certainly produces cleaner files, but you'll need to replace 17-55 with 24-70mm or 16-35mm
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1st I would look at upgrading the 70-200mm f4 before the 17-55mm f2.8
 
daugirdas said:
Nothing wrong with 7D, but also consider 1D mkIII which is a bit faster and certainly produces cleaner files, but you'll need to replace 17-55 with 24-70mm or 16-35mm
Click to expand...

ecoleman said:
Cheers for the offers. I'm west Wales so a bit far away.

1D MkIII look lovely, but a bit out of my price range.
Click to expand...

I went from a 40D to a 7D, the 7D is better in every way. But it's really let down by ISO performance and I too have found issues nailing white balance and exposure, where I didn't with a 40D... Probably user error, the 7D just shows it up more.

I last night purchased a 1D MkIII, they can be had for as little as £750 used. Wish I had gone there first and missed out the 7D.
 
So I've decided to stick with the 40D for now and upgrade my lens and flash instead.

Just ordered my 600EX-RT from Panamoz and will be selling my 70-200 f4L IS to fund a Sigma 70-200 f2.8 OS .........

Thanks for all the replies.
 
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