Canon EOS 5D Mark II in the Wild

The Canon EOS 5D Mark II has shipped in Asia, and the videos are pouring in. Today we have a Korean adaptation of Reverie and some gorgeous Beijing streets at night, complete with perhaps my most vivid Beijing memory, constant spitting.

Both of these movies allow Vimeo members to download the originals for closer inspection, which is worth doing as Vimeo tops out at 24 fps for HD. That means these 30 fps movies are getting a crappy 24p conversion when Vimeo compresses them, which hides some of the 30p smoothness, but not in a good way. Watching the originals, you vividly perceive the you-are-there smoothness that comes from 30 fps and a 360 degree shutter. Some love it, I hate it, but regardless of how you feel, on Vimeo you are not getting the true 5DmkII footage experience.

EOS 5D Mark2 Movi Prism

Video filmed by Guardian photographer Dan Chung entirely on a production Canon EOS5DmkII and adapted Nikon and Zeiss lenses using manual focus. The camera was purchased to use solely as a video camera with existing Nikon kit. The film was shot an edited in about twelve hours directly after picking the camera up from a Beijing camera store and charging the battery. Lenses used are: Nikon 17-35 f2.8 Nikon 80-200 f.8 Nikon 85mm f2.8 shift lens Nikon 16mm f2.8 fisheye Zeiss/Contax 85mm f1.4 The camera was set to neutral picture style, sharpness all the way down and contrast at -2. Saturation was left alone. Edited in Final Cut Pro, the footage was all converted to Apple Prores 422 using MPEG Streamclip because there were problems using the native H.264 Mpeg files. It was exported as a QT at 720p. There was no grading, exposure or colour correction on this footage. For a comparison you can see a Nikon D90 low light test video here http://vimeo.com/1728575 See www.guardian.co.uk/profile/danchung for more of Dan Chung's work. And see http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/china for more coverage of China from the Guardian.

Discussion with Dan Chung here.

Vincent Laforet has some new footage up on his blog as well, including some aerial tilt-shift work.