User reviews for Canon EOS 5D: Digital Photography Review

Opinion: I love this camera. I own an mkII as well, and I really do prefer shooting with and viewing images from the mkI better.

I will never get rid of this rig.

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Opinion: I use this camera next the Canon 7D for nature photography.
Not so much potential than the 7D, but excellent picture quality.
Second hand very cheap now.

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Opinion: I bought the 5D used around the same time the 7D came out. I wanted to get a full frame camera but I am willing to wait until canon has a full frame camera with the 7D's feature set. I have been happy with the upgrade from my now dated Digital Rebel (1st gen). Shooting at 12mm gives images the guys with their 10mm lenses on their 1.6 crop bodies can't get.

I use it for urban and rural landscape and real-estate photography. I haven't shot any events with it yet because I don't have any walk-around or portrait lenses with the resolving power to handle the 5D's full frame sensor.

Problems: I aquired this camera used and there is no frame counter so I am unable to estimate exactly how much use the camera has had. I ran into a problem of LCD images looking posterized. Pressing the camera body somewhere close to the play button corrected the problem. I haven't had it since.

The full frame depends on the resolving power of your lens and vignetting is common on my low-end lenses at the wider stops.

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Opinion: Hands down, THE best DSLR available in the re-sale market today...bar none. This camera has everything that 99.99% of shooters like me actually needs to turn out spectacular shots.

IMO, there is simply no full frame in the market that beats the 5D in quality, reliability, durability and price. My advice, stop saving for the 'latest' and just get the best at a ridiculously low price before everyone wakes up and there's none left.

Problems: None.

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Opinion: The 5D is now available second-hand for a hefty but not unattainable sum of money. I upgraded from a Canon 350D, mainly so that I could experiment with full-frame fisheye images; the 5D has the best ratio of performance and cost for a 35mm-format digital SLR on the second-hand market. The Kodak DCS SLR/C is cheaper but it is a dog. The original 1Ds fetches a similar price, and is physically superior, but is relatively limited, and it's larger and heavier. The 1Ds MkII has four more megapixels but is twice the price.

In its day the 5D was one rung down from the top of the ladder, and despite being more than four years old it's still competent as of 2009. From 100-800 ISO it has no more noise than any modern digital SLR, and it has no obvious quirks otherwise. It's actually quite hard to write about, because it does almost everything your modern digital SLR does. I can't moan about the noise because there isn't much noise; I can't moan about the performance because it's fast and snapper. The twelve megapixel resolution hasn't even dated all that much - it's the same as Nikon's modern D3/D700 and the Micro Four Thirds cameras. In my opinion twelve megapixels is plenty, and the 5D gives you sharp, well-detailed, noise-free megapixels.

The full frame sensor has a powerful romantic appeal for people who do not have a camera with a full frame sensor, and this has helped keep the 5D's used prices buoyant. If you have a 5D, you will always feel like a King compared to the peasant worms who opted for a used 20D.

It takes standard BP-511 batteries and Compact Flash cards. It has an interchangeable focus screen - I have a split-image screen in mine, which is handy for manual focus. The viewfinder is larger than most digital SLRs although it is still much smaller and dimmer than my ancient old 35mm Olympus OM10.

One big plus of the full frame sensor is that Canon's relatively cheap 50mm f/1.4 and 24mm f/2.8 primes take on a new lease of life as "do-everything" lenses; and the excellent and also relatively cheap 70-200mm f/4 L becomes a viable walk-around lens, where 70mm would be too long on a cropped body. Assuming you stick with primes you don't necessarily have to spend a bomb on new lenses although in practice you lose out on the 1.6x telephoto multiplier of a cropped sensor, and there aren't very many ultrawide lenses that are sharp in the corners.

Problems: In terms of mechanical or electronic problems, I have shot more than 10,000 frames in less than a year, on two continents, without the camera ever freezing or breaking or missing a beat. I had one problem whereby the shutter would not stay open when set to the sensor cleaning mode, but this cured itself and was probably a consequence of duff batteries or a dirty battery contact. The memory card door gives a bit when I squeeze the grip, but then again it gave a bit when I first got the camera, and it hasn't broken or come loose since. The rubber still fits and has not come loose, something that Nikon needs to learn from.

In terms of drawbacks or limitations, the 5D has a very spartan feature set by modern standards. It has picture styles for JPG output but that's about the only special effect. No art filters, no face detection, no trap focus, no multi-spot metering, no artificial horizon, no highlight tone priority, no dynamic range expansion, no movie mode, no automatic pan stitching, no in-camera anti-shake. Macho male photographers tend to pooh-pooh these things, but they're nice to have, assuming they can be turned on and off to suit individual taste. The sensor cleaning mode merely holds the shutter open. You have to clean the sensor yourself - and you won't get it perfectly clean. Not around the edges.

The 5D's mirror box is arranged in such a way that many old prime lenses - the old Pentax Takumars in particular, plus lots of Contax Carl Zeiss lenses and other wide angles - tend to block the mirror when used with an adapter. Other Canon digital SLRs do not have this problem. I can't really hold this against Canon, but I miss using my 50mm f/1.4 Takumar.

The fact of the sensor being full frame is superficially impressive but wears thin very quickly; the widespread availability of ultrawide "designed for digital" lenses and advances in sensor technology have wiped out most of the advantages of a full frame sensor. The 5D has great romantic appeal, but on a rational level a cheap new Canon 550D is the superior machine. In particular, the existence of the excellent and very cheap EF-S 18-55mm IS kit lens makes the case for a twelve megapixel full frame digital SLR seem very weak. There is no full-frame equivalent that has the same combination of low price and consistent image quality. On the other hand, there is no crop-sensor equivalent of the 24mm f/1.4 or 35mm f/1.4.

Bear in mind that a used 20D goes for about £200 in the UK. That's roughly £500 less than a used 5D. The 5D gives you four more megapixels and wider lens coverage, the 20D gives you £500 to spare. The 5D has romantic appeal, but £500 is a mighty useful sum of money.

On a tangent, you'll have a hard time finding a wide or ultrawide lens that's sharp all the way to the corners on the 5D or any Canon full-frame body. It can be done - Nikon's 14-24mm is excellent in the corners, and so is Carl Zeiss' 21mm Distagon - but seemingly not by Canon.

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Opinion: The original 5DmkI is an outstanding dslr bar none, even with today's more modern technological advances in the capabilities of other dslr cameras.

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Opinion: Satisfied after using 350D, 400D, 30D and 40D.
This full frame camera will have great result with my 17-40L, 24-105L IS, 70-200L IS, 200L II and 300L.
I also have old 1D, Nikon D90 and Olympus E-3, but for landscape/potrait/static subject...my choice is 5D.

Problems: Not for Sport or wildlife...

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Opinion: Excellent Value for the Money. This 2005 35mm Digital SLR is simply amazing and still to this day. The image quality is outstanding which will suite almost anyone who desires top notch quality for portraits, landscapes or still objects. Even without the aid of weather seals the camera body is constructed quite well out of its magnesium alloy. Performance is pretty snappy from off to on and its AF is no slouch either. My only wish which hasn't come true yet even with the 5D II is a 5fps or higher burst mode. Other than that I can't complain.

Problems: None

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Opinion: I just recently sold my 40D in favor of the 5D, and it is absolutely amazing. Full frame is a difference maker (for me) above anything else. I shoot mostly portraits and static things, so the speed of the camera suits me just fine. High ISO is a charm, as is the better bokeh. Tonal gradation also seems smoother and more pleasing to the eye. Overall, images just have more "pop". I am 100% satisfied with this camera.

Problems: Some hot pixels, 1 dead pixel. Not a big deal however.

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