Canon R6 Mk II vs R5?

kentmcpherson wrote:

I am making the switch to mirrorless. I have been a Canon shooter for a long time. I have been very impressed with the articles and reviews on the new R6 Mk II. It seems its only drawback is the lower 24MP sensor. I want to make the right purchase to last several years so I looked at the R5 too. It is older and doesn’t have a few of the few features the new R6 does but it does have a 45MP sensor. Its biggest drawback is the price tag which is $1200 more than the R6 Mk II. Does anyone have any thoughts or direct experience with these 2 bodies? Thanks!!

I wouldn't let the 24MP detract you. This not a low resolution camera, but rather 45MP+ is an extremely high resolution. We tend to "get used" to the numbers and forget that fact. Even most of the folks on these forums who want 100MP seem to be birders that want it so they can crop the $h!t out of their photos down to 20MP (ish) for final output. If cropping a lot for wildlife photography is important to you, then the R5 may be your choice.

20-24MP is more than enough for most applications, it's just how you get there. Do you plan to make prints over 30" wide on a regular basis and scrutinize them from nose length away? If not, 24MP is plenty. I've made many 12x18 prints over the years from 6MP cameras that nobody has ever complained they lacked detail.

All the megapixels in the world don't really matter unless you use them in some meaningful output. Pixel peeping on a screen can be fun but that rabbit hole has no bottom. I can 'peep a 500MP image all day, but it's doing nothing other than using a computer screen as a microscope.

Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of applications that can use more than 24MP for final output. But to me, if you have to ask the question you're not in that category. Landscape, fine art and high end commercial photography are the typical uses. And again, it only matters if a large print is your end goal.

The R6II is a fantastic camera. I've had one a few weeks, so it's still early days. But overall, I'm finding it to be just excellent for anything I point it at. The AF is everything they say it is, and the image quality is sublime. It's certainly going to be my most used camera going forward.

Oh, with everything I said above, I should note that I have a 50MP FF camera also.  And 16MP cameras with smaller sensors.  They all get heavy use.  Pics from any of them have yet to fail because of too few MP.