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Canon Rebel T2i/550D Native ISO Test
I was invited to do some native ISO testing with Hunter Kerhart over at Hdi RAW Works this week. We did all of the basic testing we thought would get concrete results to find the native ISO’s for the new Canon Rebel T2i a.k.a the Canon 550D. After shooting both with the port cap on, a lens with the front cap and color charts. Then staring at a 50” monitor for a half hour, we came to the conclusion that all of the ISO’s on the T2i/550D are ”Native”. Everything from ISO 100 Through ISO 800 looked clean and held up well. ISO 1600 started to break down, ISO 3200 was hot pixel city. It is also worth noting that we bumped up all the footage to Apple Pro Res and it showed very similar results as directly from the camera. The noise in Pro Res was much worse at ISO 1600 and ISO 3200.
Click Here To Go To Hunter’s Site For More Photos.
He says that there is a definite difference between the video quality, but to the eye its indistinguishable. I really kind of feel as though these tests are useless. Go with what the eye sees and that is all that matters. But let the techies be techies.
The T2i is still an amazing camera for $800. But the video on it is a step down from the 7D, just like the 7D’s video is a few steps down from the 5DII. The difference is very noticeable when you lay 2 of the exact same frames on top of each on a large 10-bit highly calibrated screen. I used several shots, and had many people come in and see who didn’t know what I was doing just to make sure I wasn’t over-exaggerating the difference.
The general public watching it on the web would never know the difference. But as a cinematographer you need to be 1/2 technician and 1/2 artist – this is the technician in me determining the best tools to use in different scenarios.
I’m gonna have to disagree with you when you say the video from the 7D is a few steps down from the 5D. What are your qualifications? It’s 1.6x harder to keep things in focus using the 5D2. According to the recent Zacuto Shootout the 7D also scores 1/2stop more latitude than the 5DII (although I theorize this has to do with the fill algorithm of the 5D faking out a lot more of the image since it only has 4 readouts instead of 8) I think the 5DII has more MTF, but the 7D is “more organic.” horses for courses of course. T2i isn’t even on my radar as a professional tool because it can’t monitor in HD while recording.
Curious about what it is that exacerbates the noise at high iso when converting to prores. Any theories on why? Is it the different colorspace that makes the difference between pixels more noticeable – I.e. Microcontrast?
Nice test though!
[…] 5D did a performance test of the new Canon T2i, which drops the price on a 1080p DSLR to around $800, aboyt half the EOS 7D. […]