Canon 10D Digital SLR camera - 9 out of 10 stars.
Written: Jun 11 '03 (Updated Jun 11 '03)
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Pros: Great battery life. Really low noise.
Cons: Very annoying focus assist light.
The Bottom Line: For of it's performance and image quality, I'd highly recommend the 10D to anyone who is into photography.
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| flipteg's Full Review: Canon EOS-10D Digital Camera |
Background:
I got into photography about a year ago (2002). It is kind of weird how I got into the hobby. December of 2001, I had a Canon S100. I did not know anything about picture taking back then but I was trying to figure out why my camera is having troubles taking good pictures in low light. It took me about a week to understand the physics of a camera. Well, at least enough to understand why it's impossible to take good non flash pictures in low light with the S100. Once I realized these limitations, I bought a Canon S30. That was a great camera. I pretty much learned everything from experimenting with the S30. About a year (2003) after I bought the S30, one of my friends REALLY inspired me more into photography after a Spring Break trip to Miami. When we came back, I was in the market for a digital SLR. It just so happened that the 10D was released that week.
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Note: I will be mentioning the Canon S30 a lot in this review because it is the other digital camera with manual control that I have used the most. Please keep in mind that you can plug in any small sensor digital camera in place of the S30 or whatever camera you’re familiar with. I just re-read through my review and every time I say S30 it really does apply to other compact digital cameras. Also when I say “other” digital cameras, I’m referring to compact digital cameras with small sensor. I just don’t know what to call them. Examples of the “other” digital cameras are the S30, S50, G3. Basically, non-SLR cameras cheaper than the 10D fall in the “other” category.
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The Obvious:
Most people looking at SLR's already know that you can't use the LCD screen for composing your shots with an SLR camera. I just wanted to address this because I still see new people in the forums asking this question.
In general, the auto focus is what slows a camera down, and although digital SLR's are fast, the speed depends largely on the lens being used and how much light is available. It also depends on what position the lens’s focus is at. If for example the focus on the lens is set at infinity, and you try to focus on a subject 2 feet away, the lens will take a little bit of time (usually less than a second) to acquire focus. When the lens is in focus, you can snap off picture after picture with almost instantaneous auto focus. In "other" digital cameras, the focus is reset every time you press the shutter, unless you never let go of the half press. So the camera needs to refocus every time you press the shutter even though the subject's distance does not change. After using the S30 for a year, I got into a habit of always half pressing before every shot. I thought that I would never use the half press again when I get the 10D. Well, half pressing is so natural to me that I do it all the time even with the 10D. It allows me to recompose and have better timing of my shots. The point is, of all the hype people have over the auto focus lag of a digital SLR, I was expecting no lag AT ALL with the 10D. I was a little bit disappointed when I discovered that this is not the case, but as I mentioned before, the 10D’s auto focus is a lot faster than that of “other” digital cameras. If you’re used to half pressing, the 10D’s auto focus is close enough to instantaneous.
There is a crop factor of 1.6x in the 10D. Cropping happens because the 10D’s sensor is smaller than that of a 35mm film. When you use a lens that is designed to be used with a 35mm film (well technically it’s not actually designed for 35mm, but for the sake of simplicity we’ll say 35mm) the light being projected by the lens is a lot bigger than the sensor. Just like if you drew a square on a wall and projected a circle of light from a flash light. This means that a 50mm lens’ view on the 10D has about the same view as an 80mm lens on a 35mm camera. This isn’t too much of a problem unless you do a lot of wide angle shooting, in which case you’d have to shell out for the VERY expensive wide angle lenses. For my style of shooting, I don’t find it limiting at all. For composition, I’d rather have parts of the subject cut off than have empty, boring space around it. This gives the picture a much more “in your face” personal look (good for portraits).
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Picture Quality:
I love the pictures that come out of the 10D. It has that smooth quality that is characteristic of Canon digital cameras. ISO1600 has a little bit less noise than the S30’s ISO400 (ISO200 on the S50). ISO3200 has about the same noise as the S30’s ISO800. Keep in mind that these comparisons are when you view the pictures at 100% on your monitor. Since the 10D’s pictures are a lot larger, the noise is less noticeable if viewed at the same size as the S30’s (for example 4x6 print from both cameras).
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Controls:
The controls are pretty much the same as the S30’s, but with the S30 I never had to worry about aperture and background blur. Actually, because of the S30’s small sensor (thus smaller apertures), it’s almost impossible to get a good background blur even if you tried. That’s the major thing I had to adjust to with the 10D. With the S30, I can take good macros with the aperture at f4.0. Shooting a macro with the 10D at f4.0 would result in a depth of field of about a quarter of an inch (depth of field is determined by both aperture and distance of the subject from the lens). The ease of isolating the subject from the background does wonders for portrait shots. I was comfortable with leaving the S30 on P mode 99% of the time. With the 10D I have it on either AV or Manual mode depending on if I’m using flash or not. I was also very comfortable with using the S30 in general. When I got the 10D, I "wasted" about 1,500 pictures just trying to learn and familiarize myself with the camera. Although the controls and the basic idea is the same, the characteristics of the S30 are very different from that of the 10D. I really can't put my finger on it. For one thing, the two cameras react differently in the same lighting situation. I have used other cameras with manual control (Canon G2, S50, S45, Nikon 990, 995) and all of those react very similar to the S30. What I'm trying to get at is that I think that most non-SLR digital cameras, regardless of brand, will have very similar characteristics.
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Metering:
I think that the metering on the 10D is good enough that I just leave it on evaluative mode. I am not used to the center weighted and partial metering. When I take a picture, I usually meter the subject in the middle, half press, and then recompose. When the 10D is in center weighted or partial metering mode, the metering will change depending on what ends up in the center of the frame (even when holding the half press). Yes, it is possible to lock down the exposure by pressing the exposure lock button, but I’ve never done this with the S30 and I would most likely forget if I have to do it every time. I want my experience with the 10D to be as close to the S30 because that’s what I’m comfortable with. I don’t like thinking about my camera too much when I am out shooting.
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Battery:
Battery life on the 10D is very good. The rated battery life on it is about 500 pictures according to Canon. Although I have not gone that far in one outing, I assume that this 500 rating is for one day. One time I left the battery in the camera for a week and I got about 200 pictures. I’m pretty sure that the rating of 500 pictures on one charge would be greatly reduced if it is taken in a span of a couple of days. To be conservative, I am expecting about 350 pictures on one battery from a day’s shoot, which isn’t a problem since I have 2 batteries and my memory cards can only hold 270 pictures.
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LCD:
The LCD screen on the 10D is amazing. It is sharp and bright. It has an adjustable brightness with 5 steps. I leave mine on 3. I also like the 10x magnification of pictures in review mode. You can really get in tight on the pictures you just took to see if everything is in sharp focus.
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Things I Did Not Like:
Canon would have been better off if they had left the auto focus assist light on the camera like on the D30 and D60. The 10D uses its built in flash when the light is too low. The flash will emit short bursts of light which would catch everyone’s attention. Even if you don’t mind the attention you’d be getting from people, if you need a focus assist light you will need to pop up the flash. Well popping up the flash tells the camera to use the flash. So what if you want your picture taken without flash but need the focus assist light? Well there is a setting for that which is buried into 2 menus. Having to switch between the two options can get very annoying.
The 10D have a weird system of color balance. The auto white balance goes from 3000 to 7000 Kelvin. The adjustable Kelvin scale goes from 2800 to 10000 Kelvin in 100 Kelvin intervals. The manual white balance setting goes from 2000 to 10000 Kelvin. The thing is, why can’t Canon program the 10D’s auto white balance to go from 2000 to 10000 Kelvin. Why limit it to 3000 to 7000? Same goes for the Kelvin setting. This is one thing that really annoys me about this camera. They have the capability and yet they don’t implement a solution. How does this affect you as a user? Let’s say you have the 10D set on auto white balance and you’re taking pictures under tungsten lighting. Most tungsten lighting has a color temperature of 2000 to 2800 Kelvin. Since the auto white balance on the 10D can only go down to 3000 at its lowest, your pictures under this lighting condition will appear yellow. You can solve the problem by going to the manual white balance or by using the Kelvin white balance. This means that auto white balance is pretty much useless under tungsten lighting. ***About color temperatures: For people who don’t know, color temperature is measured in Kelvin. This is the same Kelvin used in measuring hot and cold, although color temperatures do not have anything to do with hot or cold. Imagine if you have a piece of metal. If you heat that metal to 2800 Kelvin, it will glow to about the same color as light from tungsten. Further heating the metal to 5200 Kelvin and it will start glowing white. 5200 Kelvin is the color temperature of direct sunlight. Heat that piece of metal up to 7000 to 10000 Kelvin and it will start glowing blue. That’s where the reference for color temperatures come from.***
These are just little quirks that I came across with the 10D. Auto white balance is actually very good compared to the other cameras I’ve had. As long as you’re at the correct color temperature, the color is very accurate. Skin color is very natural and reds never clip under the AdobeRGB color space.
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For Canon Users:
On “other” Canon digital cameras, when you hold the shutter button after taking a picture, the picture will show on the LCD as long as you don’t let go of the shutter. I really liked this feature. This is not true with the 10D anymore. You have to set a timer on how long you want the picture to be displayed after taking the picture.
Also, on “other” Canons, you can have a very fast shot to shot time if you press the shutter button repeatedly but not let go of the half press. On the 10D this is not the case. You have to let the shutter button go completely. You can not shoot more than one shot from half press. This is what happens in single frame mode. You can easily put the camera to continuous drive mode and it will solve this problem, but the thing is, when you’re trying to hold the camera really steady and you’re trying to be really careful with pressing the shutter (think 1/20 or slower), you will find that most of the time the 10D ends up shooting 2 frames because of the its 3fps drive. Which is ok but I’d rather like it if I can shoot continuous from half press on both drive modes. So what’s the big deal? Well, if you recompose (which I do with most of my shots) and your subject does not end up in the middle of the viewfinder, it means that you will have to re-center the subject and recompose again and again (considering the subject’s distance does not change) if you want more than 1 picture of the same thing. This is why I consider it important to be able to shoot from half press regardless of drive mode.
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Accessories:
I bought the 420EX flash. In general, I do not like flash pictures but when I got interested in taking decent portrait pictures, I discovered that taking portraits with available lighting is not always possible. This is the only reason I why I bought it. The 420EX flash also has a built in focus assist light which is really good! It solves the annoying 10D assist light. But that's considering you'll have the 420EX flash all the time, and it still does not solve the problem of having to go to 2 menus to toggle the flash on and off if you want to take non flash pictures but need the assist light.
I also have the remote with timer. I like it because it allows me to take star trails pictures. To take these kinds of pictures with a film camera, all you have to do is put the camera in bulb mode, open the shutter and go to sleep. You can’t do that with digital. All you will get is noise when you get back to your camera. What you can do is take many 1 minute exposures and stack them in the computer. With the timer remote, I just tell the controller how many pictures I want, how long to expose each, and the time interval between shots. It’s great.
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Conclusion:
As you can probably already tell, I like this camera. All the gripes that I have are only minor. Overall, it is worth the money if you’re into photography. Digital offers instant feedback which is great for learning and experimenting. If you have any questions e-mail me at ohsnap@gmx.net. I always try to respond.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 1500
This Camera is a Good Choice if You Want Something... Solid Enough for a Professional
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Epinions.com ID:
flipteg
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Reviews written: 8
Trusted by: 2 members
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