After using the ACE 500 for almost two months I thought I would create a quick followup review video of the new entry-level wireless video kit from Teradek. You can check out Part 1 of the review HERE and the new video review is embedded above. Happy viewing! The Teradek ACE 500 feels in many ways like a direct successor to the Paralinx legacy and even takes the “ACE” name from the now discontinued Paralinx ACE 300. It’s a worthy followup to the Paralinx line in my opinion and the price point of $899 for the transmitter and receiver pair makes it especially appealing for anyone just starting with wireless video. However, if you’re already an owner of any of the current generation of Bolt products then you’ll be okay sticking with your current Bolt setup. Image Credit: Graham Sheldon With the ACE 500 it is clear the over $400 in savings (when compared to the closest Bolt 500 LT HDMI kit) stems directly from the plasticky exterior build and lack of a pricier LEMO connector. While clearly not built with the high volume rental house market in mind, I can see the ACE 500 holding up over years in the capable hands of an owner/op. What do you think? Will you be adding the Teradek ACE 500 to your personal kit? Let us know in the comments below.

Canon introduced two “compact-servo” cine lenses back in 2016. One of them, the Canon CN-E 18-80mm T4.4 made its way into my gear bag more often than I might have thought it would. Time for a personal review of this lens! What kind of lens do you prefer? The answer might be hidden between seemingly polar concepts: versatility vs performance, zoom vs prime, cine lens vs photo glass. To be honest, I’m a prime lens person, and I try to shoot on primes as much as possible. That fact doesn’t render zoom lenses useless for me, far from it. If I’m on a one-man-band shoot, a zoom lens can be very helpful indeed, less pain carrying stuff around, more versatility for fast paced shooting. Today I’m looking at the Canon CN-E 18-80mm T4.4 zoom lens which I’ve been using on several jobs throughout the last three years since its introduction in 2016. The other one, namely the Canon 70-200mm T4.4, I didn’t use that often. As stated above, I mainly use zoom lenses if I’m shooting alone as a one-man-band or with just a very small crew and in these cases, the 18-80mm is a very handy focal range to work with. My current setup: Canon C300 Mark II with Canon CN-E 18-80mm lens Canon CN-E 18-80mm T4.4 This lens is special in various ways. It feels a bit like a hybrid between Canon’s long standing expertise in photographic lens design and features you find in modern broadcast lenses. But first things first, here comes a list of main features of this lens: Super 35 / APS-C sensor coverage 18-80mm zoom range (4.4x ratio) Constant aperture of T4.4 (F/4.0) Manual iris Auto & manual focus (but NO hard stops) Minimum focus distance: 50cm / 19.7″ Optical Image Stabilization Back focus adjustment Servo handgrip can be detached Servos are powered through lens mount or connector Weight: 2.6 lb / 1.2 kg Length: 7.2” / 182.3 mm When I first laid hands on this lens more than two years ago, I instantly was surprised how light and compact it actually is. All the “normal” broadcast zooms like the ones from FUJINON are bigger and heavier despite the fact that the Canon CN-E 18-80mm covers APS-C sensors, which the classic broadcast zooms do not since they were designed for 2/3″ broadcast cameras. Canon CN-E 18-80mm next to its “photo pendant”, the 24-70 F2.8 (which is full-frame). The overall build quality of the Canon is pretty good and on par with their lineup of lenses. The aforementioned compact size is really a plus, and on fast turnaround jobs, I like working lightweight and with as little clutter as possible. The focal range might sound a bit limiting but in reality, I never had a problem with the servo stopping at 80mm. In fact, more than once I had the 70-200mm “bigger brother” with me but I barely needed it. Optical Performance The optical quality of the Canon CN-E 18-80 is pretty solid. (Please bear in mind that this is not a technical test, but my personal impression!) I barely experienced chromatic aberrations, just a little vignetting and virtually no breathing. It is a little bit on the soft side (which I like) and the colors are rendered nice and pleasingly natural. Of course, bokeh is not as soft and creamy as with fast prime lenses but since the Canon covers decently large APS-C sensors, you’ll get nice soft backgrounds when opening up the iris. The minimum focus distance is only 0,5 m which is a pretty good value for a lens with this zoom range and although it lacks a dedicated macro feature, you can get pretty close up on things when shooting on 80mm. One of the main features is the servo, no doubt about it. This piece of gear transforms the 18-80mm zoom lens into a solo-shooters weapon of choice for doc work. The grip lets you hold your camera in a broadcast way with one hand holding the lens (plus the camera attached) while the other is free for operating the focus barrel. Even if you don’t want to zoom within a shot but use this lens only as a “variable prime” this way of operating the lens is very handy. The zoom rocker offers a good resistance for your finger in order to pull off a smooth zoom on the first take. The harder you press the faster it zooms. To me, the servo sits between pro grade broadcast zoom lens servos (which are priced accordingly) and entry level zoom controls. More expensive ones offer more steps in order to render an even smoother “zoom curve” than the Canon CN-E 18-80mm is capable of pulling off. So while looong & slooow zooms might not be the flagship feature of the Canon servo it is very capable and I never had any issues on real life shoots with it. The best thing, and a valid feature for labeling this lens a cine zoom, is the fact that the Canon CN-E 18-80mm hold focus throughout the zoom range, in technical speak the lens is parfocal. Virtually all photo zooms are NOT parfocal, because they were never designed for continuous video work. A photo zoom doesn’t have to be parfocal, just set your desired focal length, (auto-)focus, click. For a video/cine zoom lens, on the other hand, being parfocal is kind of mandatory. Have you ever tried to zoom in with a photo zoom lens in order to check focus? Well, you know what I’m talking about, don’t you? If you don’t need the zoom servo, you can detach it completely from the lens itself but you’ll need a tool for that. For adjusting the position of the handgrip just loosen a screw, adjust the handgrip and fasten it again. A servo needs power to operate and thankfully there are different options for powering the Canon CN-E 18-80mm: It can draw power from the host camera through the lens mount or – if you use some kind of dumb adapter – you can feed 12V power directly into the lens through a dedicated connector. Powering trough the lens mount works with native EF mount camera such as my Canon C300 mk.II but it also works with Sony cameras (FS7 for example) using a Metabones adapter such as a Speedbooster for example. In that case, the Sony handgrip with build-in zoom rocker is able to control the zoom servo of the lens. Very neat! One thing is a bit weird, though. You have to connect the handgrip to the lens itself in order to work and that connector sticks out in a very awkward way indeed. It even gets a bit in the way of your hand holding the grip which is really weird. Zacuto offers an angled extension for solving this problem but it would be nice if such adapters weren’t necessary in the first place. Photo vs. Broadcast vs. Cine Speaking of weird design decisions: Canon is labeling this lens as “cinema zoom lens” but the focus barrel lacks hard stops. This is another proof of the best-of-both-worlds concept between photo and cine lenses Canon is working with here. Canon states that they had to drop hard stops on the focus barrel in favor of implementing their dual pixel autofocus system. For me, this is a fair trade as I’m using this lens for solo projects most of the time. But labeling it “cine” which implies things like wireless focus control for example, the lack of hard stops leaves me a bit puzzled, to be honest. Another feature from the photo world is the optical image stabilization which comes, just as you know it from other Canon photo lenses, in three modes, A, B and C. I am personally not a big fan of this feature since it simply doesn’t look 100% good to my eye. It certainly smoothes out shakes but it does it in a slightly strange and artificial way. I prefer a little camera shake when shooting handheld because that’s the whole point, isn’t it? Leaving the human factor in and not trying to flatten out everything until nothing is left. Adjusting the flange back distance. One feature most broadcast lenses have but virtually all photo lenses lack is the ability to adjust the flange back distance. With it, you can micro-adjust your lens to any given camera body in order to operate at peak performance (read: sharpness). While you won’t use that feature all the time it’s nice to have it so you can tweak the rear lens element in order to work perfectly with any given camera – as long as you can adapt its mount. Conclusion I really dig this lens. It’s lightweight, it’s relatively small and compact and it’s very versatile for doc and one-man-band work. You can use it on native EF mount cameras but you also can use it on other cameras, using an adapter (that’s the beauty of the long flange back distance of EF glass). Sure, T4.4 isn’t great but most of the time this isn’t an issue at all. If you’re about to shoot in dark environments you might want to think twice, though, or use a high-ISO camera. A faster aperture would have resulted in a much more heavy and bulky (and certainly more expensive) lens. It’s about balance here, I think. The zoom grip is great and it enables you to operate your camera very ergonomically over extended periods of time. If you are on the lookout for a one-does-it-all lens for your kit, the Canon CN-E 18-80mm might be your guy. To wrap it up, you can watch a short piece I shot with the camera/lens setup displayed above: It’s a review of a high-end Hi-Fi active speaker system but since we’re talking about optics, only the image counts this time around. However, if you are eager for more: head over to John Darko’s YouTube Channel here. Links: Canon What do you think? Do you have any experiences, good or bad, with this lens? Let us know in the comments below!

Z CAM E2 newest firmware (0.89) is already available for downloading (see our article by clicking here), and the big news is, it allows internal RAW recording. That made the Z CAM E2 a perfect candidate for our cinema5D latitude test. How does it fare? How does it compete directly with the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 4K? Interested in finding more? Please read on… BMPCC 4K and Z CAM E2. Photo credit: cinema5D For quite a while I have been using the Z CAM E2, a camera made by the Chinese manufacturer Z CAM. I shot a mini documentary with it in India (see my hands-on review here) and currently I am testing the VAZEN Anamorphic 1.8x 40mm T2 lens with it as it offers this nice almost full sensor 3696×2772 mode in ProRes HQ which desqueezes to a 1:2.4 ratio (review is coming soon). Z CAM is constantly improving on the feature set of this camera via firmware upgrades, and just recently they made another important move and released an internal RAW recording option by the name ZRAW. My colleague Jeff elaborated on ZRAW in this article, but in short, ZRAW supports up to 4096×[email protected] recording to the internal CFast card (60fps to come at a later stage). In theory, the new RAW recording feature should put the Z CAM E2 “on par” codec wise with it’s major Micro Four Third sensor size competitor, the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 4K (BMPCC 4K). So we had to put this new feature to the test against the BMPCC 4K in our cinema5D latitude test. The cinema5D latitude test If you are a regular reader of our website, you have already seen some of our latitude tests. Let me quickly recap on what it is: Latitude basically shows the capability of a camera to retain color and detail while over- or underexposing the image and normalize it back thereafter. In this test we have a standard scene which shows Johnnie sitting next to a color checker: Standard studio scene showing the Z CAM E2 at zero exposure level: Johnnie’s face at max. 60% luma, the white sheet of paper at 65% luma level. From the baseline settings (exposing the face at max. 60% luma, the white sheet of paper at max. 65% luma value) we successively underexpose the shot by 1 stop until we have reached 4 or 5 stops of underexposure. Which we then push back to zero in post, by using the respective camera tools like the ZRAW VideoSuite for the Z CAM E2 and the DaVinci Resolve RAW camera tab for the BMPCC 4K. Developing the ZRAW Files – the ZRAW VideoSuite As said above, the ZCAM ZRAW files were developed using the standalone ZRAW VideoSuite which you can download from the Z CAM homepage (Windows 10 only for now). The standalone ZRAW Video Suite from Z CAM (Windows 10 only). It provides all the necessary exposure correction and grading tools that you could wish for to (batch-) develop the ZRAW files and convert them into DNxHR HQX files. However, it currently does not interface with any 3rd party software like Premiere Pro or DaVinci Resolve, hence the workflow is quite cumbersome for now. The color grading and exposure correction tools in the ZRAW Video Suite. For this latitude test I basically only adjusted the exposure settings (shown in 1/3 stops, so the encircled “15” value above means 5 stops of exposure correction for example), and developed the files using the Rec709 color space to avoid any additional grading steps thereafter. The file sizes of ZRAW are about 50% bigger than the corresponding BRAW 3:1 constant bitrate files at the same resolution/frame rate of the BMPCC 4K. I don’t want to spoil the result of this test, but I don’t see any advantage using ZRAW vs. ProRes HQ on the Z CAM E2 for now. But, first thing first… Latitude Test Results for the Z CAM E2 and Comparison to the BMPCC 4K Both cams were set up at their native ISO’s (500 for the ZCAM E2, 400 for the BMPCC 4K), at UltraHD 25 fps. Noise starts to appear already at 2 stops underexposure with the Z CAM E2, and we cannot go much further than that as at 3 stops underexposure horizontal stripes start to appear which cannot be removed by noise reduction (see the NR results further down). Z CAM E2 at 2 stops underexposure, pushed back to zero. Still usable, but noise is already strongly present in the image. Z CAM E2 3 stops underexposed, pushed back to zero. Horizontal stripes start to appear which cannot be removed any longer. The point of no return has been reached. Compared to the BMPCC 4K which we ran side by side to the Z CAM E2, we can clearly see that the BMPCC 4K has about 1 stop better latitude – which is consistent with our Dynamic Range measurements of both cams (Z CAM E2 shows 10.8 stops at SNR = 2, BMPCC 4K shows 11.6 stops at SNR = 2): Z CAM E2 vs. the BMPCC 4K at 3 stops underexposure, pushed back. The Z CAM E2 (Left) has crossed the limit of usability, whereas the BMPCC 4K (Right) still holds up. At 4 stops under, also the BMPCC 4K reaches its limits, showing horizontal stripes which cannot be removed (the same result was found in our BMPCC 4K vs. BMPCC 6K comparison here). Z CAM E2 vs. BMPCC 4K at 4 stops underexposure, pushed back to zero. Both cams are beyond their limits. At 4 stops underexposure, the BMPCC 4K image starts to become pink, whereas the Z CAM E2 image retains the colors – but a lot of pink noise appears. Both not very desirable. By the way, have a look at our recent BMPCC 6K lab article – you can directly compare the results as the studio settings as well as the exposure values were exactly the same. Last question – we are dealing with RAW files on both cams, can noise reduction on the RAW files help to recover the 3 or 4 stop underexposed image? So I used a temporal noise reduction of 3 frames, threshold: 30 and spatial noise reduction with a threshold of 10 in DaVinci Resolve on the files from both cams. Z CAM E2 vs. BMPCC 4K at 3 stops underexposure, pushed back and using noise reduction (temporal and spatial) in Resolve. The Z CAM image cannot be recovered as the stripes don’t go away (have a look at Johnnie’s shirt, for example). Z CAM E2 vs. BMPCC 4K at 4 stops underexposure, pushed back to zero and using temporal and spatial noise reduction in Resolve. Now also the BMPCC4K image cannot be recovered any longer (more easy to see during playback of the video files, not so easy to see in the scaled static images of this article). Now you may ask why I haven’t tried the noise reduction features of the ZRAW Video Suite? ZRAW VideoSuite DeNoise settings I did various tests with the DeNoise settings on the ZRAW files from the Z CAM E2 while developing them, from “Low” to “Highest”. As there is no documentation from Z CAM, you are left to speculate what the individual settings do to the image. I found that leaving the noise reduction settings “off” in the VideoSuite and using the DaVinci Resolve settings described earlier was giving me the best results (I used the same settings for both cams). Conclusion and a Statement from Z CAM I love the image from the Z CAM E2 at the correct exposure settings, and I applaud the efforts of Z CAM to bring the internal raw recording to the E2 camera. But at the end of the day, we have to see what it really offers. In essence, you should not underexpose important areas of your image more than 2 stops, and ZRAW shows rather limited possibilities to bring it back. As things are currently, I do not see an advantage of ZRAW over ProRes for the Z CAM E2, and for the following reasons I cannot recommend using ZRAW: File sizes are about 50% bigger than the corresponding highest quality settings for the BMPCC 4K, BRAW 3:1 constant bitrate (and you have the option to use up to 12:1 for even smaller file sizes in BRAW). I honestly can’t see a difference to the great ProRes options that the Z CAM E2 offers as well. Workflow is cumbersome because you have to use the standalone ZRAW VideoSuite (which is currently only available for Windows 10 computers) and do a conversion step before you can use the files in your standard editing software The ZRAW VideoSuite offers a lot of options to color correct and exposure correct your footage but does not offer a video playback (only frame preview) – which makes it difficult to see the effect of e.g. DeNoise settings on the image In stark contrast to all the shortfalls above, stands the strong competition from Blackmagic RAW: File sizes are comparatively small (with a lot of options to further reduce them while retaining the 12 bit raw character of the image), the workflow in DaVinci Resolve is super easy and even 6K BRAW files run smoothly on my 2014 Laptop … A Statement from Z CAM We want to be fair and give a chance for the camera manufacturers to respond to our findings before publishing such an article, so we approached Kinson Loo (Z CAM’s CEO) and asked for his response. He and Jason Zhang from the technical team were very cooperative and responded immediately, giving us some insights on their motivation for implementing ZRAW and de-noising: “The key point for RAW is the details of the image. … The RAW test should always include detail test. Our ZRAW is designed to achieve a visually lossless image of a complex scene. We suggest that you shoot complex scenes to check the resolution of the ZRAW. … This would explain why you need larger ZRAW files. … If you don’t care about extreme details but care more about noise then ProRes is a much better choice. …ZRAW itself should have a lot more noise than a YUV based format as the noise came from the sensor. YUV based files including ProRes and H265 have the image signal processor involved so it will have a different level of noise reduction which cannot be performed at Bayer level. … In camera noise reduction / curves / color correction are some major components of the image signal processor … We don’t add 2D noise reduction and chroma noise reduction in ZRAW VideoSuite and our Z CAM  DeNoiser adopts full optical flow based 3D noise reduction which does not hurt details. We would consider adding more denoise related features to our image processing pipeline in the future. … Since your test is noise based so we recommend using our denoise software Z CAM DeNoiser to process the video and test again. We could reduce more noise in the camera but some professionals don’t like it and that’s why we introduce ZRAW” What do you think? Have you used the Z CAM E2, do you have experience with ZRAW? Please share your comments in the section below.

Canon just introduced the Canon C500 Mark II, the long-awaited successor to the C500, which takes a much more modular approach than previous cameras in Canon’s Cinema line-up. Let’s take a look! It’s been over 7 years since the introduction of the original Canon C500, which used to be Canon’s flagship cinema camera before the C700 was introduced in 2016. And it’s also already 4 years ago since the C300 Mark II was introduced. So with the competition heating up and new cameras being released left and right, it was definitely time for an update of Canon’s cinema line. And today is the day this is happening.  Before we take a look at the modular design of the camera, let’s look at the tech specs. The bare-bones body of the Canon C500 Mark II – Photo © cinema5D 2019 Canon C500 Mark II – 6K, Full Frame, 17:9 Sensor It comes with a 5.9K Full Frame 17:9 Sensor which Canon claims offer more than 15 stops of dynamic range. It’s remarkable that we have a full-frame sensor here, and it’s the same sensor as in the high-end Canon C700 Full Frame which was only introduced one and a half years ago. Different Approach: 6K in 17:9 Instead of 4:3 Sensor Now, the competition with 6K resolution in Full Frame is Sony with their Venice, and most recently also Panasonic with their S1H – but with both you get the full resolution only when shooting anamorphic with the 4:3 sensor (Venice) and 3:2 sensor (Panasonic) . Canon takes a different approach in their cinema line and uses a 17:9 full-frame sensor to achieve their almost 6K resolution, which means that you effectively will have more resolution when shooting with normal spherical lenses than on the other cameras. You can shoot with anamorphic lenses using a 4:3 image area too, though, just in this case you will lose image resolution on the side with the Canon sensor. The C500 Mark II also offers anamorphic desqueeze options for correct preview of the footage. Straightforward button layout, with the most important features accessible immediately. Photo © cinema5D 2019 DIGIC DV7 – Cinema RAW Light Internally, XF-AVC 4K 4:2:2 in 10-bit Canon for the first time uses a new DIGIC DV7 processor which allows the camera to record Cinema RAW Light internally at up to 5.9K as well as XF-AVC in 4K 4:2:2 10-bit. So this camera finally does what everybody hoped the C200 and the C300 Mark II would eventually do, but even at a higher resolution with a larger sensor, quite impressive from the specs. 5.9K Over Sampling Processing for 4K Credit: Canon Frame Rates in Cinema RAW Light and XF-AVC Cinema RAW Light can be shot at 5.9K and 4K at up to 60 frames per second, and at 2K in up to 120 fps in a cropped mode, unfortunately. Once you switch to the XF-AVC codec in 10-bit 4:2:2, you can shoot 4K DCI, UHD, 2K and HD only, there’s no 5.9K option in this codec. (4K is delivered by 5.9K Oversample processing so no image crop applied). With XF-AVC you can also shoot up to 60 frames in 4K, and 120 frames in 2K and HD – but only cropped. Cinema RAW Light recording formats and frame rates   XF-AVC recording formats and frame rates Dual Pixel AF – Now More Fine-tuned Canon’s undeniably great Dual Pixel autofocus is also included and covers around 80% of the overall image area. This should work just as well as in other current Canon cameras – what’s new is that you can further finetune the autofocus performance by adjusting the autofocus tracking speed and response – which makes, of course, focus ramps easier. Backside of the Canon C500 Mark II, with all the built-in ports on the right-hand side. The long connector at the back is to be used by the EVF, or alternatively, Extension Unit 1 or 2.  Photo © cinema5D 2019 New Modular Design – Small Body, Essentials Inside The bare-bones body of the C500 Mark II itself only weighs 1750 grams or less than 3.9 pounds, and that’s remarkably small for a camera that already has many essential things included. First of all, most essential connectors are already built in: Monitor out, 12-G-SDI OUT as well as HDMI out, both of which support 4K 50p/60p with just one cable, timecode built in, minijack mic in and of course headphone out, and two XLR-ports built right into the body, with full manual controls and at the bottom a12.6V DC in. The camera uses the same batteries as the C200 and C300 Mark II.  It’s great to have Timecode built right into this tiny body without having to use an extension box like for example with the Sony FS7.  The camera has 2 CF Express Card slots, that’s the successor of CFast, and an SD card slot for simultaneous proxy file recording. It also has three fixed NDs at 2, 4 and 6 stops and can be combined to achieve 8 and 10 stops, but there’s no variable ND filter unfortunately.  To switch to slow motion, there’s now a dedicated S&F button for “Slow and Fast” (just like the “S&Q” button on Sony cameras). Manual audio controls on the side of the Canon C500 Mark II, for the two built-in XLR ports. Photo © cinema5D 2019 Included LCD, Removable EVF, Extension Units 1 and 2 The included LCD LM-V2 is a touchscreen which at 4.3” is slightly larger than the one found on the C200, and features a nice robust mechanical mounting system.  Canon now made the EVF user-removable, which is great: that means that the camera can more easily fit onto gimbals and drones. The interface used to connect the EVF to the camera is the same they are using for other optional extension units. The EVF itself is a 0.46” OLED with 1.77Megapixels.  There’s the small Extension Unit 1 which adds Genlock, Remote Connection and Ethernet to the camera.  C500 Mark II – with the small Extension Unit 1 attached at the back. Photo © 2019 cinema5D The much larger Extension Unit 2 adds first of all a V-Mount to the camera, and also a DC Out with 24 Volts, 2 Ampere, a D-Tap, Genlock, Remote, Ethernet, a B4 lens connector, 12-G SDI and additional 2 XLR plugs and the dedicated controls.  Canon C500 Mark II fully rigged up with the Extension Unit 2 and a Canon Sumire Prime in my hands. Photo © 2019 cinema5D All the included and optional components of the Canon C500 Mark II – Photo © 2019 cinema5D C500 Mark II with the removable EVF attached. Photo © 2019 cinema5D Of course it’s a shame that you can’t use the standard EVF anymore once you connect one of the Extension Units, but in general it’s great that Canon made the most modular camera we have yet seen from them (or many others, for that matter). You can even use the C700’s shoulder pad and rails with this camera, and the overall optical axis is lower than it was on the C300 series of cameras, which should make rigging accessories easier.  Dual CF Express and an SD card slot under the hood on the Canon C500 Mark II. Photo © cinema5D 2019 User-Interchangeable Lens Mount – EF Mount, PL Mount, Cine EF Mount What’s super exciting is that the lens mount delivered with the C500 Mark II is user-interchangeable. The standard EF mount can be swapped for an optional PL Mount or for an EF Cine Lock, by simply unscrewing 4 screws with an allen key. This is great because in the past, there were separate EF and PL versions of many Canon Cinema cameras, and the use cases therefore were much more limited. User-interchangeble lens mount on the Canon C500 Mark II – Photo © 2019 cinema5D Electronic Image Stabilizer Canon has also added an image stabilizer for the first time in a cinema camera. They call it a 5-axis image stabilizer, so it’s technically not an IBIS because it’s fully electronic. Conclusion from Personal First Impressions Of course we haven’t been able to shoot with this camera yet, but from what we see, this is the most flexible and modular Cinema camera that Canon ever produced, and it promises to be very attractive to a wide range of shooting scenarios. As someone who owned (and still owns) the original Canon C300 and shot a lot with it over many years, the C500 Mark II feels like a gust of fresh air from Canon in their ability to create really user-friendly and versatile cameras. Granted, the C200 was a big step in the right direction, yet the missing 10-bit 4:2:2 recording made it impossible for many to make the jump. The C500 Mark II, albeit at a different price, fulfils what many were expecting, and actually also a lot more that caught us totally by surprise. I can’t wait to shoot with it and try it out myself. The Canon C500 Mark II will cost around €15,000 without the Extension Units and optional PL Mount, but while that might seem a lot, it’s actually the same price the C300 mark II cost when it first came out. However, the C500 Mark II offers a lot more bang for the buck – internal Cinema RAW Lite at up to 5.9K resolution plus the 10-bit 4:2:2, the interchangeable mount, great autofocus plus all the features you expect from a cinema camera. It’s the first time in a while where it seems like Canon really got it right – but we will only see for sure once we get our hands on this camera to actually produce some images with it. We will try to get one for a full review as soon as possible! Full camera specifications can be found here. What do you think about the newly announced Canon C500 Mark II? Did Canon get the concept right? Let us know in the comments below!