Truth hurts so it seems. There are some nice EF-S lenses. The ones TB Rich mentions. But that is it. No pancake's. No fast primes. No advantage in size. No L glass. Only the 17-50 with constant aperture. It's also the only fast EF-S zoom. No tele zoom beyond 400 mm (35mm).

This body is small, but users can't take advantage of it because the Canon EF-S line is sadly far from complete.

You go try it. Here's a link:

http://www.dpreview.com/galleries/reviewsamples/photos/2511306/img_0098?inalbum=canon-eos-100d-rebel-sl1-preview-samples

Go push those clothes and rocks as far as you want. They aren't black-point clipped.

There isn't much in the shadows to begin with as it was exposed for the shadows, with an almost fully clipped sky as a result, even though the DR of the scene was already limited due to overcast (going by the whole set, rain coats and flat light).
And then there's still the factor mush from shadow NR, which hides more than than we can guess.

Several stops?! Okay, first I have to understand what your definition of "several" is. To some it is two or three and some it is four, five, six...maybe more. If you think there is that much difference then no wonder you hate Canon. If you buy DxO's analysis, then there is a 2.2EV difference. That is two, count'em TWO, stops. I personally don't buy their RAW processing of Canon files. According to DPR the 7D has a 9.8EV DR using RAW in ACR. DPR didn't do a RAW comparison on the D7000, but with ADL off it has a 9EV DR and ADL cranked up 10EV. Let's give their RAW files the same advantage as the 7D files going from JPEG 8.3EV to RAW 9.8EV, for a 1.5EV increase which would put D7000 neutral JPEGs up from ~9.6EV up to 11.1EV just for fun. That STILL only would have the D7000 ER 1.3EV above the 7D in DR. Far from several (to me several is at least 4 and usually starts at 5). You must hate the D7100 going from D7000 13.9 down to 13.7EV...that's like three stops!

To exaggerate so much I assumed you must have a bias against Canon. However, I didn't assume anything about DxO's testing methods. They may "measure directly from binary data" but guess what that binary data is called....a RAW file. So let's not call it "processing" let's call it their "method of interpretation." Whether you agree with their analysis or not, the consensus is there is a difference and it's not a major one. I'm familiar with banding in the 7D and it has only occurred for me personally when I push a file beyond the roughly 2-stop headroom RAW gives me....and that was because I underexposed, which is the worst case scenario for the occurrence of banding. Anyway, I don't think even if you believe the 2.2 stop difference you get to round up and call it "several." It is a couple at most, and more like a tad over 1. Now where are all the people to talk about the DR of a print or a screen?

If you're underexposing to "expose for the highlights" then you're chopping off a huge amount of data the sensor is capable of capturing in the first place. Shooting in RAW and using the histogram displayed (which is the JPEG histogram with all the arbitrary tone curves that go along with it already applied) you really do have to expose to the right. Even if you don't blow highlights in the histogram, you're doing your shadows a favor, and you can probably "blow" highlights in the histogram by a stop and still get them back in RAW conversion. You shouldn't push your shadows you should pull your highlights thus preserving your shadows. If you underexpose to preserve highlights then I see why you're so concerned with banding in the shadows. If you push shadows you're stretching data that was already thin to begin with since the sensor captures a full half of its data in the single brightest stop. For future reference, several isn't 2.2 in most people's minds. The other guy agrees.

Instead of blowing highlights you've chosen to crush your shadows, probably trying to preserve highlights that were already safe.

"To use today's DR to its full extend, means exposing for the highlights in a large DR scene, which usually means underexposing shadows and pushing them in a converter..."

Gotta agree with hoawardroark on this one... TrojMacReady, it seems you are describing an approah that is widely viewed as poor digital practice precisley because it aggravates the shadow noise problem.

As howard indicated, best practice recommends overexposing the highlights w/o blowing them, and then pulling the highlights down during PP.

Is this a remnant of the film days? I recall being told about pushing film, but about the time I was going to get into it digital came along and lured me to its rocky shores with the sirens' call. Thanks for the confirmation I wasn't misinterpreting Troj's description, david. The arbitrary tone curve applied to JPEG's is also applied to every histogram the camera displays (wouldn't that be a great feature, the "RAW Histogram"!), which means if you go by that and underexpose an image you're underexposing an already underexposed photograph. Brightness in a digital sensor increases in a linear fashion rather the the curve of your eye (or even film) so the gamma adjustment compresses highlights and stretches shadows to more closely approximate human perception. The worst case scenario is underexposing where you're using less than half the available levels the camera is capable of capturing.

I owned the D7000, absolutely loved the body back when I was a Nikon fan. I now own the Canon 60D. The Canon smokes the D7000 in image quality with only the highest ISO going to Nikon for a win. The Canon delivers worlds better color and skin, accurate white balance, better per pixel detail and better tonality.

It sounds like you're saying exactly what we said in a different way. "Exposing for the brightest parts" is a little confusing since using a spot meter for the brightest tones will make your exposure very dark. If you're saying keep the highlights as far to the right as possible (either without blowing any or maybe blowing enough to know you'll get them back in PP) then I think we're in agreement. As for the memo, I'm familiar with how RAW files, JPEG files, and histograms work and I know how to expose properly. If you don't take advantage of the brightest stops the shadows are compressed and pulling any detail out of them will also pull all the noise up with it because then number of brightness levels won't change, only where you shift them in the histogram.

Noise in the shadows isn't the main issue. It is a property of the data that a digital sensor responds with a linear increase in levels to photons striking the sensor. That means the actual number of values available to each stop double as you go up from the lowest to highest exposure values. I've shot underexposed at ISO 100 and pushed the shadows, too. I didn't come down with the last drop of rain. The best results as far as noise and detail come from pulling highlights down to preserve shadow detail. That's just a fact and I've processed enough CR2 files to know. How files from other sensors respond is not what I'm referring to and if you've had great luck with them, then great. The A/D encoding of voltages to luminance values is very straight forward and they speak for themselves. How those files are processed has limitless options, but you can't get the same detail from the bottom stop that you can from the top stop of DR.

Who in the world is talking about dithering at high ISO's on a Fuji camera? I've shot high and low on the camera I'm talking about (we're in a Canon camera's comment section after all) and I know how the RAW files respond being pushed and pulled. Why in the world would you pull down highlights more than two stops? And you're vastly oversimplifying the process of adjusting the levels across the entire spectrum of luminance levels. Highlights can be pulled back without pulling back the entire exposure. Shadows can be conserved locally without making universal changes. RAW editors are not confined to these macro adjustments that seem to be the entire framework for your exposure philosophy. Keep on doing things your own way and if it works for the camera you're using then that's awesome. The capture of luminance levels isn't that complex, and if you pull down highlights and lose color information then you either blew a channel or all three. Color information can't be lost if it exists.

Wow this has gone on. Sony sensors have an advantage in shadows at low iso due to their per column ADC. This is what gives it its better DR and why it could make sense to underexpose on those cameras. On a balanced exposure nobody is going to see the difference unless they pixel peek. Past iso 800 the sony loses its advantage and Canon does a little better. This all only makes a difference if you push exposure in 90% of pictures its not going to matter.

You can't have a fast pancake on a DSLR, the long lens mount means any lens with a focal length under 40mm or so has to be a fair bit bigger than an equivalent mirrorless lens.

My bad. I completely forgot that 65mm f2.8 primes were popular as heck during the film SLR days. Everybody wanted one coz they were so useful.

I think that's part of the reason why Canon is the market leader (in terms of market share). You don't sell millions of cameras by being innovative, i.e. catering to gearheads and enthusiasts. You do it by reiterating the same old winning concept, i.e. catering to the masses. As long as the Rebels continue to sell well, Canon will have no incentive to make any radical changes.

Well, I agree that Canon and Nikon sell a lot of cameras on the strength of their brand names and because of their marketing resources. But you don't build that kind of reputation in the first place by making bad products.

This is like watching monkies flinging poo at each other. People think they are the judge and jury of innovation, but the truth is they are just dissatisfied, bored, and impatient. I bought the 7D on day one and I've been thrilled with it for three and a half years. Haven't seen anything in that market segment from any company that would even make me consider ditching it. Bought the G1 X on day one because Canon happened to be the first company to answer my wish for years to have a large sensor compact. It's sad that people think a camera has to be tiny or have some useless infant technology that is only interesting because its new (e.g. EVF) when some older technology is usually cheaper and better (e.g. pentaprism 100% VF). Some specialized situations require smaller cameras or a novel little feature, but no one camera is going to do everything at the highest quality for the lowest price.

Are we to conclude that to use huge lenses like "Sigzilla" you would want a camera body the size of a small suitcase? :)

I'm not talking about Sigzilla type lenses or cameras as large as suitcases. Insinuations of this kind are logical fallacies. I am talking about Canon spending a lot of R&D to make a really small camera that pairs with their wide variety of 35mm lenses and billing it as a solution that is as small as mirrorless systems. There are a few small lenses (there always have been for every DSLR system), but the vast majority of Canon lenses negate the size advantage of the camera. When you compare the mirrorless systems (cameras and lenses) to even a very small DSLR with regular DSLR lenses, the difference is very substantial in system size and weight. My opinion is that Canon is unwilling to compete with mirrorless because it would hurt their bread and butter DSLR market, but they do want to say "We have this SL1 which is just as good if not better; believe us because we are Canon." Yeah, whatever Canon.

Untrue, see the comment above yours.

Don't forget the voigtlander 20mm and 28mm pancakes. Canon could easily give crop users a 30mm f2.8 pancake but choose not to.