5DMK2 +1.4 TELE vS 1.6/1.5 sensor DSLR?

I realise that the results wont be exact (as far as field of view and apature are concerned) but does anyone know of any sites where they have tested this?

I have both the 5D MKII & several of the latest crop bodys, 7D, 60D, etc. and the 5D MKII sensor will retain slightly more detail and allow you to shoot a higher ISO producing less noise then the crop body sensors whether your using a 1.4, 2x, or no extender.


http://www.dxomark.com …/Canon/%28brand​3%29/Canon

Regards,

Silverfox1 wrote in post #12937706
I have both the 5D MKII & several of the latest crop bodys, 7D, 60D, etc. and the 5D MKII sensor will retain slightly more detail and allow you to shoot a higher ISO producing less noise then the crop body sensors whether your using a 1.4, 2x, or no extender.


Regards,

not really. Once you are talking use of extenders you are surely distance limited and once you are distance limited (the framing that you want is smaller than the size of an APS-C framing that they can get with the lens you are using) things change. Use the same lens set to the same focal length on a 7D and a 5D2 and aim at a bird the same distance away and if the lighting is good enough to use a lower to mid-low ISO, get high enough shutter speed to stop blur, then the 7D puts noticeably more detail onto the bird than the 5D2. And while at ISO3200 the noise may have reduced the reach advantage of the 7D to about nil (even at ISO1600 it's largely gone), since the 7D sensor is slightly more efficient per area and it has a bit less high iso banding and you can downsample to 5D2 res to get rid of demosaicing artifacts, the 7D still gives a very slightly better result.

As for 5D2+lens+1.4x vs 60D/7D+lens I didn't check that since in that situation you'd probably use 60D/7D+lens+1.4x. But 18/21.1 * (1.62^2 / 1^2) = answer and sqrt(answer)=1.5x so those two cams are sort of like a 1.5x TC relative to the 5D2, which is a bit more than the 1.4x TC. OTOH the 7D has split greens and is a trace softer but then again the TC probably adds a little extra loss relative to higher sensor density alone pushing a lens. Maybe a super marginal win for 60D/7D made a bit larger since they retain full AF speed. Although the 60D has worse AF than the 5D2 and the 7D center point might be trace worse than the 5D2 center point for stills.

Anyway it's hard to say, maybe the APS-C come out a trace ahead or maybe just call it a tie.

(but nothing stops you from using the TC with the APS-C and then they leap into the lead again if conditions have enough light)

MattD wrote in post #12937676
any sites where they have tested this?

Not exactly. There are a bajillion individual tests by photographers posted all around the web, but I haven't seen any systematic testing of all available lens/camera combinations for this specific scenario.

The closest thing I can think of is the-digital-picture.com, which has resolution charts available for the 1Ds3 (same resolution as the 5D2) for many different lenses, but they don't really apply to your situation because they were all made at different distances, not the same distance.

My personal thought (coming from the rather un-superb T1i / 500D) is that if you are looking for maximum quality, try a full frame camera (but keeping in mind that the 5D Mark II's autofocus system has garnered some criticisms for its tracking ability) and the longest lens you can get affordably. If your subject is still too small, then a 1.6 crop sensor DSLR may help.

I think it may come down to this:

Birds / many wildlife shots: I've found that nothing substitutes for sheer subject size, the result of native focal length or its equivalent (from a crop body and maybe a teleconverter). Big subjects look good with most modern lenses when they fill the image, especially when you can get close. They look a lot better than when you try to "uprez" in software after or go pixel peeping / crop severely (already mentioned, The Digital Picture has a comparison of 180mm f/3.5L macro shots with and without the various teleconverters, and compared to an uprez job in Photoshop).

Flowers / many macro shots: On the other hand, I was not terribly impressed with the TS-E 90mm f/2.8 + 2X Extender III combination. Maybe I just need to put time into it, but the 2X magnification of the extender was not especially gentle on the images I saw. Perhaps I just was clumsy, though. It does seem feasible to me that macro lenses would be a bit more dependent on "sharpness" when you are really looking to bring out the best in every little area - not to say birds are an undemanding subject (they aren't) but some of the focusing problems inherent in macro lenses aren't to be seen. It might be worth stating that I feel the TS-E 90mm is susceptible to some color fringing (in rare situations) but the lens I use for bird photography (the Sigma 120-300mm f/2.8, after the 120-400mm) essentially isn't.

If I had to attach some importance to all this, it would be "what is your intended use?"

I own and use both and TCs too ..
It's very simple ! action/sport @ 90% with apsc (apsh for me now) and every thing else with 5DMKII (if I had a 1DMKIV, maybe 5DMKII would not go out so much). If you except 1DMKIV, all apsc has less dynamic and sharpness than FF.. It's pity Canon APSC are really a step behind nikon and pentax concerned with dynamic. With any canon apsc you won't make a difference between 85L and 85F1.8, Sigma F1.4, Zeiss 85F1.4 .. but on fullframe, you will much better results with 85L than any other apsc.


TC is only interesting when you can't move and don't own a zoom, as degradation is significant (speed, DOF and edge sharpness and even centre if you don't close a bit).

If you can use a TC on the 5D2 then you can use it on the APS-C body too. If you're looking for maximum reach then the sensor with the more dense pixels will win (all else being equal).

Something else to consider is AF. The 5D2, like the APS-C bodies, can only AF up to F/5.6 (with good performance and without "tricks"), so if you're using an F/5.6 setup then you cannot just add a TC for extra reach without AF problems.

I found myself always cropping pictures on 35mm, so the APS-C sensor size was right for me, since it crops naturally. lol