Canon 7D, Martin Beek
UPDATE: this article is outdated, please read this blog from the top. ISSUES OUTLINED IN THIS ARTICLE MAY NO LONGER BE ISSUES AT ALL..!
Hi all.
I’d like to update you on the whole 7D issue.
We took a few days to evaluate the 7D after it arrived on thursday, october 1. Bottom line is: Canon, give us new firmware; your production model is useless for professional film making. Period.
…
Problem: the Liveview / Filmmode freezes frames for a two-frame period on a regular basis, resulting in a noticeable stutter. It looks like the processor can’t cope with differences in the image (contrast-rich patches), both in live view and while recording. It is card-independent, it is recording-independent, it is FPS independent, it is independent of ANY setting – all experiments with settings and configuration on the whole were not successful in solving the problem.
The 7D’s imageprocessor seems to be busy with things that get in the way of the 25fps timing.
What bothers / surprises me though, is that this artifact doesn’t show up in any of the wellknown 7D movies you find on the internet (eg. by Phil Bloom). Why? I think i know why… They were all made with pre-production models with special and/or beta firmware, maybe even tuned towards better videorecording. Call me suspicious, but that has happened with the 5D before as well. UPDATE: Phil Bloom stated that all his 7D movies are made with a production model. UPDATE 2: Canon Development states that Phil Bloom’s films ARE made with a specially equipped 7D !!!
I have found more posts on the subject, so it’s not a problem of the specific camera i have.
I have spent a nice sum on the camera, the lens, the shoulder support, the CF cards, the matte box – et cetera. But i am not seeing myself using the thing in the near future.
So it’s a total waste of money so far.
I am getting grumpy mails from some of you. All very nice of those, to support Canon. Don’t understand me wrong. It is probably a monster of a DSLR photo camera. It is also a very nice affordable videocamera if you make little movies that are intended to feature on Youtube. But the problem lies here in, that the camera is marketed as a full HD professional camera that can cope with even the Scarlet. A hype is created by e.g. Philip Bloom, and i have been affected with this disease -> seeing is believing! Ofcourse, i understand now that you can’t get such a camera for 2000 euro’s, but Canon and their apostles like Phil and others are doing a good job in trying to make us believe this.
I’d like to see Canon or any of the Canon filmmakers to comment on this.
A collegue contacted Canon (Netherlands) on friday. Their exotic response: “we are not in the position to comment on this”. Huh?! Are we politicians here?! I am a customer with a problem!
I think Canon has to change it’s attitude (at least Canon Netherlands) and come up with a solution QUICK.
I won’t repeat the bottom-line. You are free to suggest new solutions, but please read all previous posts and comments first.
Grumpy Martin.
This test also had a stutter on export…http://vimeo.com/6978786
let’s wait for nikons answer!
have you tried non-canon lenses? I’ve seen plenty of stuttering on the 5d Mark ii if it tries to communicate with the lens while shooting video. thats one of the big problems with these cameras for video, that the lenses and lens communication isnt made for video. in non-manual mode i know the 5dmk2 stutters if you zoom or if your zoom is a little loose or between focal length values. that was because the camera tried to change shutter based on focal length and had to process new focal lengths etc. ive had it happen on non-eos primes as well though. it stopped happening, though, it might have been that the lens mount adapter was hitting the 5dmk2 lens mount contacts for communicating with the lens.
Mmmm… you might have a point there Noah..! I am using a Tamron lens and will try another Tokina next week. I’ll include a Canon lens test then too!
Good thinking that man!
M.
Martin,
I just got my 7d and went outside to do some test shooting and was horrified to find that in several clips the video stuttered or more precisely for me choked like someone put their finger on a sprocket of rolling film.
I am using the stock lens that comes with the 7d. I am also using a Sandisk extreme 16g card. Hard to believe that a card faster than spec would cause problems. Likewise, spent a bundle on the fastest cards, seemed like the right thing to do.
I was filming outdoors moving subjects with autofocus and not in manual mode I don’t believe. It might when the camera tries to autofocus and or try to match a change in light it chokes up.
Shot where the camera is not following action seemingly do not have this problem so far. However if I can’t follow action and move through fast changes in light the camera wont be that useful to me.
So far the GH1 has been far more video friendly.
Hopefully a solution will quickly emerge.
Jeff Gibbs
PS I am going to try disabling auto white balance and using manual mode and see if that helps. Maybe reformatting my card. Then lower rated card trick. The 7d appears to have a more robust raw image than the GH1 but is less out of the box friendly so far for anyone shooting real world chaos.
On top of unpredictable focus issues and flaky metering, I’ve run into another problem with my 7D which is very annoying.
My 32GB RiData 233X CF cards, which work fine in my 2+ year old 40D, are not recognized by the 7D. So, I bought a brand new PhotoFast 64GB CF card to use in the 7D. That brand new card has problems, too. It re-partitions and formats the PhotoFast as an 8GB card with 56GB not partitioned. If I partition and format the card using Swissnife.exe on my PC, the 7D sees the whole 64GB until I format it in the camera. Then it fixes it at 8GB again.
I’ve complained to Canon support about it and I’m waiting for their reply. The bottom line? We need an emergency firmware update for the 7D to address all of the bugs in the production unit.
Just spent 2 hours with the Canon rep and another tech at Pictureline in SLC trying to solve the stutter problem. Then we got on the phone with Canon tech through the rep. Best evidence points to the computer processor. Macs need to be Intel based. I have an Quad Core G5 and the video stutters on that in Quicktime and in Final Cut exactly as stated above. But it doesn’t stutter on their Intel-based iMac. I saw the same clip side-by-side with a my PC laptop stuttering. It’s not processing power because you only need a Core 2 Duo 2.6Ghz but it needs to be Intel based. As for PC – I tested video on my brand new Sony Viao with Intel Core 2 Duo CPU a 2.00 GHz and the stutter was terrible. I’ve yet to see it work on a PC. The 7D Box states Core 2 Duo 2.6GHz for Vista or XP (it’s not in the user manual). It seems to be a software issue with the processor. The Canon Rep said the file has a Quicktime (.mov) “wrapper” with H264 codec and the processor has to decode it, and it’s not a file size issue. File sizes much bigger play on both systems. Hope this helps because it’s been a pain.
Ok here is something that might work:
I have found in AMD chipped computers that AVCHD, HDV and other codecs that the frames repeat 2 at a time at unspecified times. Once I tried the same codecs on INTEL Core 2 and i7 the problems went away completely. And I could use the footage on productions.
Now have you tried transcoding into another intermediate codec and checked the video? It might only be a problem with direct H264 playback. Hope I’m wrong!
This is very disappointing. I am PC based. Don’t want to start over with a Mac. My computer, according to the minimum specs, is fast enough, but I get incredible stutter in Quicktime. I can smoothly play back using Windows Media Player but the sound cuts out after about 15 secs. I can’t even figure out how to edit the .mov files. I tried to convert the .mov files to mp4 and dvi but there is a tremendous loss in quality. As you can see I don’t know what I am doing. Where should I go to figure all of this out and get up and running without spending a fortunate??
I am searching on Bing with the words ‘working with 7d .mov files’ and not much comes up. What the heck is everybody else (all of those 100s of people who have bought a 5d2 and 7d) doing with their .mov files.
Please follow my workflow for the 7D, which inludes converting all camera .mov files to prores mov files, using the free program MPEG Streamclip. Also available for PC. It makes your mov files play like a charm!
Martin
I just saw your most recent post “…follow my workflow for the 7D…” which sounded like a good read but I can’t find that article on your blog. Could you please direct me to it (link)…
Cheers!
I have put one online just a moment ago! http://marvelsfilm.wordpress.com/2009/11/18/my-canon-7d-workflow/