5d mk iii - really struggling with "glass before body" here!

Dorman wrote in post #14227437
Great questions Ben. Better AF can NEVER hurt, and I do shoot at higher ISO quite a bit. Both of those are "nice to have's" when it comes to my landscape shooting, but would be key features for capturing more photos of my little girl, especially when inside the dark house. I'm sure you can relate! Thanks for chiming in.

Dorman wrote in post #14227438
I have always been a believer in don't compromise, buy what you want the first time.

get the 5D3. I've been LOVING it for shooting the kids around the house. I actually upgraded my landscape lens from the 17-40 to a 16-35 just because the 5D3 is good enough in low light 2.8 can now play where I'd been using fast primes for the last 6 years. I won't be selling them, but it's nice to use a 2.8 zoom now when I want to be lazy or have some fun with a wide...

Get the 5DIII

jacobsen1 wrote in post #14227509
get the 5D3. I've been LOVING it for shooting the kids around the house. I actually upgraded my landscape lens from the 17-40 to a 16-35 just because the 5D3 is good enough in low light 2.8 can now play where I'd been using fast primes for the last 6 years. I won't be selling them, but it's nice to use a 2.8 zoom now when I want to be lazy or have some fun with a wide...

Excellent to hear - I remember reading your struggles to capture the kids, needing 24mm f/1.4 to deal with the low-light. Thanks!

I had been in a similar situation. I have the original 5D and skipped the Mark II because I was frankly disgusted with canon decision to use the AF of my 5D for the Mark II. I had missed many pictures because the AF simply couldn't cope. The 5D AF was perfect for static situations and slow moving stuff, but inadequate for anything else.
I felt that the Mark III is the upgrade I was looking for - in my eyes this is the Mark II or the follow up act to the original 5D. I did pre-order after a couple of days of thought (3rd March) and received it on the 29th.
I am still learning. I consider the Mark III a completely different beast from the 5D and have to re-learn my shooting setup when handling it. It is far more complex. And it makes my lenses seem sharper. This is probably due to more accurate focusing. This should answer your question - do not bother with the Mark II! Just buy the Mark III. I did find that it does focus hunt as much as my 5D in low light. I think canon should have had an AF assist light on the body.
The ISO sensitivity is better than the 5D.
I do have a full complement of L lenses, so I did not have to choose.
In your case I still feel body over addional lenses is the right thing due to focus accuracy issues.
This is contrary to my belief system of lenses over bodies. I had the lenses but the original 5D made it difficult to use.
As far as the Mark III goes I am still learning and will know soon if it is what it's supposed to be (better AF, better low light sensor performance, better weather sealing, etc.).
Here are my thoughts so far on the cons:
1. I did find that the firmware is quite glitchy and has frozen more than a couple of times.
2. In addition they have made it harder to review picture with magnification by now forcing you to press a magnification button, followed by rotating the dial.
3. Choosing the AF point takes an additional button making it slower to do this operation.
4. The AF is fast and locks on accurately, but hunts in very low light - an AF assist lamp would have made a dramatic difference in very low light situations.
5. Lenses I have tried so far are the 85 1.2 II, 50 1.2, 24-70 2.8.
I will try the rest of the lenses in the next couple of days notably the 70-200 2.8 II and the 16-35 2.8 II.
More to come later.
6. It drains batteries faster than the 5D. Fortunately I had ordered a spare battery. I did pre-order the grip.
I use my original 5D with a grip. It balances better with heavier lenses.
I have decided to rent a D800 with a Nikkor 24-70 2.8 for the next weekend to see what the fuss is about.

Appreciate the insight LifeInPictures!

The 5DIII is only a small upgrade from the 5DII so you shouldn't worry about going that route if you wanted to the 5DII was a huge leap over the 5Dc though.

rick_reno wrote in post #14227416
Go for the 5D3, it's the one you want and will hold it value nicely (for awhile).

It is the worse option as far as dropping in value. The 5d2 has already been depreciated. A year from now, the 5d3 can be bought for $2800 with less than 5000 shots.

I've seen 5d2's going for $1500 with low shots on it. Only you can decide if buying a new camera costing $2000 more will give you better images. I know where I would spend my money and it would not be on a brand new camera.

your flickr gallery suggests you mainly shoot still subjects rather than action, if that is the case the two prime lenses would probably be the best option as the biggest advance with the 5D3 appears to be the AF. You can then mount your 35L /135L on the 45MP 5DX landscaper's dream in 2015.

Most people would agree that better lenses before bodies, and yes if you have crap lenses upgrading to the L lineup would be the way to go, but if you have good lenses upgrading the body can be huge. The 5DC does not have micro adjust and that alone is huge, I calibrate all my lenses to my bodies and I am here to tell you it DOES make a difference. Every lens needed a little tweaking even my brand new 70-200mm f2.8 MK II. Having only 9 focus points made me crazy and I soon dumped my 5dC,and to me only 3 fps of the 5d MK II is useless and only 9 focus points on that as well. From what I have read the 5D Mark III is in a class by itself, making this camera both a great portrait/landscape as well as a wildlife camera. You might even find yourself doing some wildlife shooting if you had a camera that was capable.

i've gone from 350D -> 5d mk2 -> 5d mk3.

Image quality is relatively similar between the mk2 and mk3, colours are a bit nicer and ISO is around 1-1.5 stops better (this is just from a few empirical tests - nothing scientific )

Focus is fantastic, Dual card slots are perfect (backup for weddings, eye-fi+ipad for the artistic director for fashion/ advertising shoots). Weather sealing ... camera looks beefier than the mk2 but only time (and rain ) will tell.

Video -> no idea

In my humble opinion, most of the people who will be thrilled with the mk3 are people who make a living with their camera. Most people will be better off with a mk2 + new lens for the same $$.

Dorman...

take a step back from it and remember why you're "into" photography
If it's not for business or to make a living then sometimes logic doesn't even come into it. I totally go along with the quality lenses before body argument, but sometimes you just *want* a new body. You don't need one, there's no real advantage, but you just WANT it.

If you can afford it and it's not hurting anyone then just do it! Life's too short to be logical all the time.

cheers

Racketman - my flickr is far out of date! While I do shoot many static subjects my main one (daughter) is getting faster and faster everyday! That combined with a dark house really makes me lean towards a cam w/ better af and high iso. The extra resolution wouldn't hurt for landscape enlargement either!

Thanks shadowcat, hoglof, kparis, talaska - good points to ponder.

Bill - i used to be in it for $ but that killed the fun, took a step back, sold off much of the gear, and now mostly shoot for me. The 9-5 keeps us comfortable so we're not going without for any purchase I make. Agreed, sometimes you just need to get what you WANT - I've learned that via my other hobby which is guitar - just get what you really want, buy once and be happy.

My opinion is that Canon has changed the glass before body mentality since the introduction of the 1DMKIV and now with the introduction of the 5D3 and 1Dx. The high iso capabilities of all 3 cameras means F/4 glass which is cheaper will prabably be a better and smarter option for most photographers. Unless you have specific needs for shallow depth work, the high ISO capabilities make the body a must buy situation before glass anymore

that buy once and be happy mantra is crucial. The other thing is not everyone needs a bunch of lenses. I have four. I used to have a lot more, but scaled it back to what I NEEDED. Having 2 bodies also helps because it doubles my FL effectively. I need the two bodies because I shoot the occasional wedding and I don't like renting.

Here's the other thing that came up on the blog-o-sphere last week: "When shooting your kids, but the best gear you can afford." This is SO true. Using my 5D3 with my kids for the last 2 weeks, I've gotten SO many shots that were impossible with the 5D3. For AF reasons and for ISO reasons. Shooting them has become MUCH less stressful because the AF can finally keep up with them at all ponts (in 45 mode). No more trying to use the center point and hoping it keeps up. That's been huge for me. Shooting kids used to be a bit stressful for me because I'd miss the occasional shot I wished I hadn't. I made do with what I had and thought it was good enough (I HATE 1 series bodies size wise). But now that I have 1 series AF again, I'm in heaven.

Food for thought, but yeah, I have a 24L, 50 1.4, 16-35 (just upgraded from a 17-40 because with the 5D3 2.8 works inside!) and 70-300. So 2 expensive lenses and 2 pretty average lenses (the 50 is a sigmalux that is awesome on the 5D3 and the 70-300 is the tamron).