Canon EOS C70 Real-world Usage Notes

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Patrick

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I am ultra-excited. I finally had a Canon EOC C70 show up. Four pre-orders with different shops on the launch day in September and now in mid-December, the first arrived.Canon EOS C70 with 28-70 F2L.jpg

For the STH YouTube, I have been using the Canon C200 which is fabulous. There are two features I really wanted that the C200 does not have:
  1. 120fps for slow-mo product shots.
  2. 10-bit 422
The C200 has RAW, but for our YT workflow where most of the lighting is consistent (unless I am screwing with it), we do not need RAW and the file sizes are too big. I use a Threadripper 3970X with a Titan RTX and 128GB of RAM with dual Samsung PM1725a 6.4TB NVMe SSDs (x8 PCIe cards) in RAID 0 as my scratch disk. The RAW workflow is still too slow.

I know there are other options. The BMPCC4K is great from a simplicity point of view, but it does not have usable auto-focus. Panasonic cameras (S1, GH5) are fabulous, but I need AF I can trust. We have had more than a few videos go to the editor using them that had 2-5 minute segments where I was completely out of focus using the S1/ GH5.) I also have seen the Sony A7 III go out of focus in the studio. AF became extremely important once the pandemic resulted in stay-at-home orders so I have to film stuff solo. Again, 100% there are less expensive options, but we are so time-limited these days that I need to prioritize what gives me the fastest workflow.

The Canon EOS R and R5 are great as well. But they are more DSLRs adapted to video. The R5's 8K is super, but the RAW is too big to use in our workflows unless we go through the slow transcoding process. Being able to crop on 8K is great so there are a few shots getting done on that (there were 1-2 in the latest Tyan review video on the R5 at 8K and several using a slider/ head with the EOS R.)

It has taken 20+ months, but I finally figured out what I want in a camera, and the C70 is just perfect (except, of course, I now want 240fps for slow-mo.) It has Cinema camera features/ menus, good audio/ preamps (minus the mini-to-full XLR adapter needed). I also have to admit that I love the 28-70 f/2L RF lens. I have been using it on the R5. In many ways, I really like doing product photos with the S1R instead of the R5, but that lens makes the difference.

Since there are a few videos out there, but not too many real-world user experiences, I wanted to just share a few things I see in a thread:
  • Charging the BPA30 (same as in the C200) in the body does not work, just like in the C200. I was hoping this would work.
  • Mini XLR Male to XLR Female cables are needed. I bought the incorrect connectors late at night and did not realize it until the camera arrived. These arrive tomorrow.
  • The C70 body with a smaller lens like the 24-70 f/2.8L is super easy to balance on a gimbal. Much easier than the C200 is. I was faster on the first balance with the C70 than I normally am with the C200.
Metabones 0.71x EF to RF Results
  • Using old 24-105mm f4L IS - caused a hard lock on the camera during recording. AF did not seem to be working but it was reporting f2.8 to the C70.
  • Using the Laowa 24mm f/14 probe worked fine - looks much better at higher ISO for this lens with the C70 v. EOS R, even with speed booster.
  • Will try a few more later.

I am going to do a bit of a charity shoot for a San Jose firefighter's cause today with the camera. After that, I think I am going to sneak a CentOS-> Stream talking head video for this weekend just to try it.

Still much to try. I want to see if the Metabones EF to RF 0.71x speed booster works as an example. I also want to see if the DJI RS2 can handle the weight of the above (without a handle)

I know this is not typical STH content, but I figured I would just get it out there.
 
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BlueFox

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Did you wind up with the Canon over say a Sony FX6 on account of lenses you already had? Sony does have the larger sensor on it, though I have no firsthand experience as to how good Sony's AF is on their cine line. I think the only drawback is that it will only do 120fps at UHD, not DCI resolution, but I'm guessing you stick to 16:9 mostly?
 
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Patrick

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Added a bit of Metabones 0.71x. It is a shame it does not work. I guess Canon wants to sell their own.

@BlueFox - A7S III is on backorder. FX6 is on backorder too and I figured the C70 would get here first.

At some point, it is nice to be able to have glass for the R5 for product photos and the C70. I think this combo is going to let me get away from Panasonic. Also, the 28-70mm f2L is just transformative. It is crazy expensive (to me at least) but I understand why. Until the C70 came, I did not take the 28-70 F2 off the R5 once. For the STH photo camera, it means one lens versus multiple lenses. I know that does not sound important, but it is transformative from a workflow perspective to not change lenses. Camera charged, memory card in, ready to do anything.

Basically, I wanted my C200 with the RF mount and 4:2:2 10-bit. I do actually want to be in DCI so I can crop. Every so often something is on the table or what have you a few pixels on the edge. For example, if I drink water while shooting, sometimes there is a Yeti in frame. UHD is not an issue, but I prefer to DCI and crop if possible.

I would have been totally happy with the FX6 as well (except for those XLRs on the handle which is crazy.) Glass is a big deal too but I could be happy swapping to Sony. Still, it seems easier to just stay with Canon at this point. The FX6 low-light means very little to me given I am almost always in the studio.
 

Magic8Ball

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What do you use for the macro shots? Some of the close ups recently have been awesome and really differentiate the channel from others, so make sure you keep improving this, especially the smoothness of some of the motion.
 

Patrick

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Hey @Magic8Ball

None of the videos online are using the C70 yet as it just arrived.

Have an example you could point out? I have a feeling you are thinking the Laowa probe lens shots. Just want to be sure I am correlating your feedback to the shots you are referring to.
 

britinpdx

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Canon and Sony are releasing some awesome technology these days, they duke it out for the #1 spot and we the consumers are the overall winners :D

I sympathize with the 20+ month journey to try and figure out what works best for you, and kudos if you've finally made it! Congrats on the C70, it looks like a great tool.

40 years ago I got started with Canon in the film SLR days and have pretty much shot with Canon equipment for the entire time period. I had built up a fairly extensive Canon EF lens collection as my photography journey took me from interest to interest. My last major Canon DSLR purchases were the 5D3 and 1DX (my boys were in high school sports). I was never compelled to look at Nikon, Olympus, Pentax et al, the Canon ecosystem pretty much provided me all that I wanted ... or so I thought.

I purchased a Canon EOS M as a small pocket travel camera and that was my first adventure into mirrorless. I picked up a EF-M to EF adaptor to allow me to use my EF glass on the tiny M body .. quite hilarious to see a tiny M body on the back end of a chunky 70-200, but it worked. The key takeaways for me was the massive benefit of mirrorless by providing a WYSIWYG environment and I no longer needed to perform MFA on the body/lens combo.

I kept waiting for Canon to do something "serious" with mirrorless, but it became clear that they were going to stick with an APS-C sensor and develop the technology around small consumer formats.

I had never paid much attention to Sony until one day I had the opportunity to test a Sony A7R2 and realized that I had been asleep and missed the real Full Frame mirrorless revolution. I purchased an A7R3 when it was released and a single lens, a diminutive Sony Sonnar T* FE 35mm f/2.8 ZA (Zeiss design). Brilliant combo ... simply brilliant!!
I tried really hard to make use of my extensive Canon EF lens collection on the A7R3 with Sigma and Metabones adapters. This worked well for static objects or manual focus but anything that required fast autofocus or acquisition was a non starter.

And so the investment in Sony/Sigma glass started ... and little by little I was duplicating Canon EF glass with native FE glass. But there were several jewels in the Canon EF collection that I felt couldn't be matched by the weak Sony offerings (my go-to heroes were the EF 24-70 2.8L II and EF 70-200 2.8L II). I rented and purchased several copies of the Sony 70-200 2.8GM lenses but every one lacked the sharpness and rendering of the Canon, it was disappointing to say the least.

The Sony A9 was (and still is) a revolutionary camera that demonstrated Sony's clear pole position in sensor design. (Great move by Sony to spin out the sensor technology into an independent business). The 20fps electronic shutter from the A9 made my 1DX look old in comparison, and was a great complement to the A7R3. (Although in all fairness the 1D series are outstanding, robust, never let you down cameras. Want to hang a picture, got the nail but can't find the hammer ... use the 1DX)
At this point I was convinced that Sony were the future of the technology and that Canon were done for, and then in 2018 Canon released the EOS-R as a competitor to the Sony A73, with a brand new RF mount.

I followed the introduction of the EOS-R with interest, the reviews and community feedback were mixed, if not polarized. The Canon RF-EF adapter allowed EF glass to be used on the R apparently with great success, and somehow I managed to get pulled back to the dark side and I bought one. Compared to the A7R3 and A9, the EOS-R was somewhat underwhelming, it didn't have the resolution of the A7R3 or the speed of the A9, but it felt strangely familiar (other than that stupid multifunction slider bar), for me the body/grip of the R better suited my big paws, the menu system was a delight, a touch screen that actually worked ...

I moved up to the A7R4 because "it went to 11" (N. Tufnel, 1984) and in many ways it ticked all of the boxes .. apart from ergonomics, menus, touch interface etc.

The EOS-R reminded me that the devil is in the details and small things on the Sony ecosystem just seemed challenging for no apparent reason, and IMHO the Sony software infrastructure is absolutely brain dead. Want to setup your name and copyright on the Canon, connect a USB cable, use the EOS utility and type in your details. On the Sony, use your thumbs on the rear screen. Just come back from a shoot, plug the Canon into USB and follow the EOS utility prompts and have your images automatically transferred to a customized directory structure. On the Sony, prepare to do battle to make sure your USB "mode" is correct, then transfer the files by hand. Small things, but Canon has these type of details absolutely nailed.

Sony and Canon both continue to make significant firmware upgrades to their cameras, and here I think Sony do an absolutely tremendous job. I have to say that the RF-EF adapter allows the Canon EF glass to act "better than ever" on the Canon RF bodies as there is non of that MFA nonsense to worry about, and arguably (for my style of shooting) the R series autofocus capabilities are better than previous Canon DSLRs.

Just before Covid took over, I managed to partially tear both of my biceps, and although there's a long and tedious path to recovery via surgery and PT, I'm not going anywhere near a hospital until Covid is behind us. My days of grabbing a couple of camera bodies, 5 lenses and a tripod are on hold. I've had the time to think long and hard about what my photo gear plans should be.

Meanwhile, Canon released the R5, once again to mixed reactions, mostly because their marketing campaign was completely off the map, by focusing on the hybrid/video capabilities of the camera, such as "8k". There then followed the "overheatgate" saga with more YT "expert" videos than you can shake a stick at.

Well, I bought the R5, and it's really, really good. I have not yet dug into the video side of the capabilities, that's an adventure still to come. Having studied MTF charts, read every review and watched just about every YT video on the R5 and RF lenses, I rented a couple of RF lenses to test against my EF collection, and the rest, as they say, is history.

I rented the RF 70-200 twice and both copies exceeded the image quality of my EF 70-200 on the R5 body, and finally I knew there was a path forward.

My 20 year journey on the Canon EF system has come to an end. The king is dead, long live the king!

I've sold off all of my remaining Canon EF mount bodies, and my entire EF lens collection with the exception of the EF 100mm 2.8L macro and a couple of "big whites" that I can't quite bring myself to part with, although I have a feeling that they will be on Craigslist real soon. I've even parted ways with "my precious" (aka Canon 24-70 2.8L II) and the new kid in town is the RF 28-70. It's big, heavy, unreasonable in so many ways, but the image and rendering from this lens is just something else. If the RF 28-70 was accidentally superglued to the R5 body I wouldn't be upset.
I have ordered an RF 70-200, and FedEx should be delivering it today.

There are still some things on the R5 that I hope will be added via firmware, such as zebras in photo mode (this is something that is available with Sony, one of those things that you don't miss until it's gone), but it's early days.

I've sold the EOS-R, it's really not bad at all especially after recent firmware updates, but picking up the R after the R5 feels like a backward move. I've also parted ways with the Sony A7R3 and A9 and some FE glass, although I still have the A7R4 and some key glass. Rumor has it that there's a new A9III in the works to usurp the R5, and it may "go to 12" ...

I've never been a video shooter, although I think it is time to up the game, given the R5 capabilities now that some "robustness" has been added with latest firmware. I have a CFExpress card incoming to cover 8k and 4k/120fps experimentation, and a Ninja V to cover anything below that. Ninja V looks interesting to provide some of the "video" features missing on the R5, such as scopes and false color, which of course will be native on the C70. The Ninja V will also allow recording in ProRes or DNx formats rather than HEVC, something else to investigate to determine the best post production path.

The C70 has received great reviews and if you're investing in the Canon RF ecosystem it just makes sense, although it's still early days in the RF lens family and some adaption will be required along the way.

I've a shed load of Elinchrom monolights and modifiers for strobe work, but nothing that I could use for video work. I'm looking at some of the Godox range as alternatives to the highly regarded Aputure lights. What did you evaluate and what have you settled on ?
 
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Patrick

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There are rumors that Sigma is doing RF glass next year, which I am excited about. I totally agree on the EOS R. It is hard for me to use the R with the R5/ C70. For photos, it is a pretty huge difference. The R5 for shooting stationary objects is much closer to the S1R. Panasonic just did a huge firmware upgrade to its line which makes the S1/ S1R a bit more interesting than they had been.

On the lighting, I had some of the inexpensive 60W Bowens lights. By the time I had softboxes and grids set up, they just did not put out the light I wanted. I am now using a 120d II overhead, two 300x's looking to the set, and two RGB panels lighting the blue doors. I was looking at the Godox, but the Aputure Sidus link app works great for me.

Again, just for context, this is not exactly a hobby at this point. These cameras/ the studio is getting used to produce STH content 7 days a week.
 
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Patrick

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Ok here is a big one. Canon EF-RF adapter plus Sigma 18-35 f/1.8 Art works! A little vignetting goes away when you flip the EF-S lens switch on the C70. Autofocus is working. Sadly, it got hit by a failed lighting experiment on the photo.Canon EOS C70 with EF to RF and Sigma 18-35mm f1.8.jpg

I have not seen anyone post this combination online yet.
 

BlueFox

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You're going to get quite the workout with that thing on the RS2.
 
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Patrick

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Something on the C70 I have been noticing. Shooting B-Roll at DCI 4K 60fps I am running into buffer quite frequently even with V90 cards. At 120fps this can happen in a few seconds.

I may just need to wait longer between takes, but this is a good example of where having CFexpress B cards would have been a big upgrade.
 

Patrick

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I did a bit more testing. It seems to be an issue with the Lexar Professional 2000x SD cards and the C70. My advice, stay away from them!

Two different cards are having issues even though they are rated as V90 cards.
 

Patrick

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Hey @britinpdx I am not sure if you saw but there are new lower-cost Aputure Amaran 100d and 200d lights that look awesome.
 

Patrick

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Pretty good results. The camera and some B-roll from the C70 made it into today's video. Those shots are straight out of the camera with the in-camera Rec.709 LUT applied. I put the RTX 3090 into a yellow pelican case that was backlit and then put blue lights beneath the GPU in the foam to get a bit of color. An Aputure 120d Mark II is above at 18% with the Aputure Lantern. So this was a fairly dark scene and it came out of camera fairly nice.

Also, I spoke with a local camera shop. They are saying they get 15 or so C70's weekly but only one Sony A7S III and likely will not get the FX6 until early 2021. Sony is blaming a fire, but apparently that has been the production constraint since before the fire as well.
 
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Patrick

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So I am starting to think about replacing the C200. The C200 is an awesome camera, but for my workflow these days 4:2:2 DCI (so I can crop) and simultaneous proxy recording would be nice.

I am still not 100% over the lack of a locking DC power input though.
 

newabc

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In the sony photo cameras which were said to be good for video, the sony a1 (current photo flagship) can only do 4:2:2 10bit 4k on 60fps(600Mbps).

Update: The a1 can wire ethernet cable and send data to a ftp server in recording like a9. When it captures 120fps on 4k, only 4:2:0 maximum.
A7s3 can also get 4:2:2 10bit 4k on 60fps(600Mbps) as a1. If it captures 120fps & 10 bit on 4k, only 4:2:0 and 200Mbps. A7s3 uses a usb-c to ethernet adapter to do get the ftp transfer function.

(I missed a most important spec of a7s3 this morning.)
 
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