Hate my 7D, what about a Mark IV instead?

1ds4Me wrote in post #15335311
The 7D with the 100-400mm should absolutely kill at wildlife or BIFs. Don't take this the wrong way but it could be either your technique or the camera is defective. If the camera is able to take sharp pictures of still objects then it could be your technique that may need some adjustments.

I agree. I used that combo for about a year. Actually, pic #2 and #3 at the bottom of page 18 were shot with my 7D and 100-400L.

TeamSpeed wrote in post #15334573
1) The green cast on the chin is a reflection of the papers she was coloring on? That has NOTHING to do with the camera at all.

2) The raw image is not blown out to the right at all, with a small amount of blue clipping, but it takes away nothing from the image IMO. There is only about 7 stops of raw data dynamic range due to the conditions.

3) I cannot afford high quality lighting all over my house. We have almost 5000 ft2 to cover with lighting, and that means going to CFL, because I cannot afford LED and incandescent is difficult to find, by law now. I am not sure where that became a necessity of the discussions we were having? I was at the dinner table and pulled out the camera and took my daughter's picture, plain and simple.

4) The last 2 pics I posted, the first is the 7D with sunlight coming in a window in front of her, shot with the 17-55 IS Canon lens. Sure, with flash, pictures look better, there is no doubt. However I shoot almost exclusively ambient lighting. Perhaps that is where the disconnect is. You seem to always shoot with a flash, I don't. You seem to be accustomed to well lit subject material all the time as opposed to shooting events where flash is either not allowed or will have no real impact on the shoot. I am the opposite, I shoot many events where a flash won't do anything for me, or isn't allowed, or I actually want the drab natural look that I see with my eyes. If I were doing modeling shots, then yes, I would use lighting.

5) The 2nd of the 2 images I posted is the 5Dc at ISO 3200. Not only is it a bit noisy, it has banding where the 7D doesn't. This was also with natural lighting.

So knowing that you are really just looking for flash or well-lit subject material at high ISOs (which actually is not high dynamic range shooting, flash can actually help level out your dynamic range to something less extreme), let's see what I can find. Typically, that is not where ISO 1600 and 3200+ would be used, but hey, its a start.

We can all make excuses why a bad image is bad but in the end its still a bad photo, right? I like the rest of your photography just that one I didn't like.

Sovern wrote in post #15335419
We can all make excuses why a bad image is bad but in the end its still a bad photo, right? I like the rest of your photography just that one I didn't like.

Fair, it was just an off the cuff shot, it wasn't supposed to be photographically good. Most family shots aren't actually. It was pretty much like your "girl on a bed not happy she is being photographed" picture. Not a good picture, alot of white, no real color gamut (blue, brown and faded red), it didn't tell a story, etc. Probably means something to you though, and I respect that, but not a good picture.

Funny thing about photography, it is purely objective, you calling a photo bad.... doesn't make it a bad photo.

It just means you don't like it, nothing more.

TeamSpeed wrote in post #15335482
Fair, it was just an off the cuff shot, it wasn't supposed to be photographically good. Most family shots aren't actually. It was pretty much like your "girl on a bed not happy she is being photographed" picture. Not a good picture, alot of white, no real color gamut (blue, brown and faded red), it didn't tell a story, etc. Probably means something to you though, and I respect that, but not a good picture.

Those two photos were only to show that the difference from iso 100 to iso 1600 on the older rebels is very small but point well taken.

This one wasn't a bad 12800 specimen from the 7D, I forgot about that one. I can't really print this too much past a 5x7 though, and a couple of spots on her shirt clipped out, due to the reduced DR at this ISO level.

Sovern wrote in post #15334537
Those images look good, I can see a lot of noise in the bokeh on the second image but it's still good. As for the post by the guy that said the highlights aren't blown hes just an angry poster. Take what he says with a grain of salt hes still bringing anger from the past threads to this one.

Bokeh....what bokeh?

hondafans wrote in post #15336025
Bokeh....what bokeh?

You didn't notice the out of focus background blur aka bokeh of the little girl?

Bokeh, as I have learned it, is the characteristics of the blurred parts, and not simply just OOF sections of photos.

Not sure if it helps the OP but here are few of my higher ISO wildlife shots from the 7D.
I almost always crop my shots for either composition or to "get closer" (So these are cropped, which always hurts the overall noise levels of the final, cropped image.)

Anyway, these may not be my best work here (unlike the ones on page 18), but that's not the point here. Sometimes we need to use higher ISOs to capture the moment (or just simply because animals are usually most active after sunrise and before sunset and there isn't much light) But the 7D is OK for me for now. I know these are not really high ISO shots but these are what I personally consider acceptable for my nature shots (prefer not to go ISO 6400 unless I see something really cool happening ).
Would like a 1DIV in my hand? Sure

ISO 1600:

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com …/29108710@N04/8​034562065/

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com …/29108710@N04/7​206375428/

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com …/29108710@N04/5​966112762/

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com …/29108710@N04/4​908588349/

TeamSpeed wrote in post #15336098
Bokeh, as I have learned it, is the characteristics of the blurred parts, and not simply just OOF sections of photos.

Bokeh and out of focus regions are the same thing from what I've gathered and read on wiki.

Quoted from wiki "However, bokeh is not limited to highlights; blur occurs in all out-of-focus regions of the image."

Wikipedia is not any type of definitive source, anybody can edit into it. The term has been described more often than I can count here by those that know the language from which it derived.

In any case, what that definition is saying is that bokeh describes the quality of other oof items in the scene than just light highlights, for example a fence or grass reeds, etc.

Right on the money of course, TeamSpeed. One says the bokeh is pleasant or unpleasant based on the overall appearance. It is not a technical quantity or quality based on a limited part of the whole.

TeamSpeed wrote in post #15335666
This one wasn't a bad 12800 specimen from the 7D, I forgot about that one. I can't really print this too much past a 5x7 though, and a couple of spots on her shirt clipped out, due to the reduced DR at this ISO level.

This is quite nice for ISO 12800.

The 6D is nowhere near as good as the 7D is for birds or sports.

Gabe, I am bowing in your general direction. Incredible work.

gabebalazs wrote in post #15334742
I've owned 2 7Ds so far, along with 40D, 50D, 60D, a literally all the Rebels, including the XSi (currently we have a T4i and a T3i in the family).

Since my #1 interest is wildlife, I wish I could afford a 1DIV. But the 7D is also great. I do shoot a lot of images at higher ISOs since in the recent years most of my wildlife pictures has involved action.
I consider the high ISO capabilities of the 7D pretty decent and it never really caused me any problems, especially after my PP workflow.

Let me post a few examples here, many of you have seen my work already.

I'm proud to say that the first 3 photos below titled "Water Droplet", "Ballerina", and "Gone Fishing" swept the very competitive Local Fauna category in the National Center for Nature Photography's (Toledo, OH) annual photo contest (1st, 2nd and 3rd). Our area is a huge birding mecca due to the western Lake Erie marshes.

The last photo "Battle of the Elements" will be published in the January issue of Popular Photography.
(You can see more if you click on my Flickr link in my sig.)

So here are some images from the 7D:

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com …/29108710@N04/8​123746144/
Seagull with a Fish 2012 4 by gabebalazs, on Flickr

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com …/29108710@N04/6​205616469/
Egret Ballet by gabebalazs, on Flickr

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com …/29108710@N04/5​745126464/
Heron Fishing 1 by gabebalazs, on Flickr

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com …/29108710@N04/7​416178762/
Blue Herons Fighting by gabebalazs, on Flickr

http://www.flickr.com …/29108710@N04/8​017711835/
Sitting Hummer 1 by gabebalazs, on Flickr

http://www.flickr.com …/29108710@N04/6​982833742/
Great Egret with fish 6 by gabebalazs, on Flickr

http://www.flickr.com …/29108710@N04/7​215623566/
A storm in Grand Canyon by gabebalazs, on Flickr