New 7D firmware released - good upgrades!

John Sheehy wrote in post #14848023
It's nice to have that added feature, but I'd be more interested in limits to Av and Tv range than to ISO; shutter speed and f-stop almost always are the most important thing to me. I'd also like an option to allow the camera to raise the shutter speed in M and Tv modes to avoid severe clipping in very bright lighting.

I might be wrong but I think this is what safety shift in Av or Tv is for...?

John Sheehy wrote in post #14848047
Even when the fence is completely OOF, you can still get a sharp focal plane, but the bokeh can deteriorate tremendously, especially if the background has elements crossing each other at differing distances.

Definitely! I know fence shooting quite well, as I shoot sports, and many, many times that is through fences. However zoo fences are much worse since they are more dense, coupled with the fact you cannot get to close to the fences in many cases. The tiger shot was quite degraded, and I had to play games with darkening and saturation brushes over the affected areas to even get something I would consider keeping.

SO after a zillion posts in this thread the V2 firmware provides the following documented improvements:

Improved maximum burst for RAW images (up to 25)
In-camera RAW image editing
In-camera Image Rating
In-camera JPEG resizing
Maximum Auto ISO setting (ISO 400-6400)
Manual audio level adjustment in movie recording
GPS compatibility
File name customisation
Time zone settings
Faster scrolling of magnified images
Quick control screen during playback

And then the following improvements that are still under dispute:
Better high ISO noise
Improved AI Focus with less hunting and fewer misses or "soft" shots during sequences

Very interested about the last 2, especially the focus improvments

You forgot the ability to view only images with a certain rating, either by rolling by with the top dial or in automatic playback.

bulldog-yota wrote in post #14848580
And then the following improvements that are still under dispute:
Better high ISO noise

I don't think there's any dispute. There have been several people who've actually done proper before/after tests. There is no discernible difference in high-ISO noise.

TeamSpeed wrote in post #14846270
... I do love the new Q playback option, great way to check AF point, and blown highlights, etc. Pretty slick...

Thanks for mentioning it. I had overlooked that feature so I played with it a bit after reading your comment and agree that it is nice.

Bill Boehme wrote in post #14849113
Thanks for mentioning it. I had overlooked that feature so I played with it a bit after reading your comment and agree that it is nice.

I agree I have this with t2i and I am just glad that they added it with 7d.this feature is very handy.

hollis_f wrote in post #14848626
I don't think there's any dispute. There have been several people who've actually done proper before/after tests. There is no discernible difference in high-ISO noise.

Not to mention many of use do raw in-camera anyway.

It's really a shame that we didn't get the handy feature where you can instantly zoom into focus area at 100% when reviewing an image like the 5D3 has. Or at least have the option to program a certain button to zoom in instantly to quickly check the focus hit/miss. Ok, at least the faster scrolling of magnified images is nice .

bulldog-yota wrote in post #14848580
SO after a zillion posts in this thread the V2 firmware provides the following documented improvements:

Improved maximum burst for RAW images (up to 25)
In-camera RAW image editing
In-camera Image Rating
In-camera JPEG resizing
Maximum Auto ISO setting (ISO 400-6400)
Manual audio level adjustment in movie recording
GPS compatibility
File name customisation
Time zone settings
Faster scrolling of magnified images
Quick control screen during playback

And then the following improvements that are still under dispute:
Better high ISO noise
Improved AI Focus with less hunting and fewer misses or "soft" shots during sequences

Very interested about the last 2, especially the focus improvments

While my eyes do deceive me once in awhile, my ears no longer hear my Sigma 50 rattling away in AI Servo mode trying to lock focus and my keeper rate has gone up so I will give my thumbs up to better focusing with third party lens.

Now could it be that only some 7D's were affected such as the 1DMIII problem TeamSpeed spoke of earlier? I can only relate to my experiences with the before and after performance of my 7D and the firmware upgrade did make a difference in my case with the Sigma lens.

I have, as someone else mentioned in this thread, noticed a change to what my MA settings needed. MY 24-105 and the 135L for instance. The 100-400 seems the same, but it was on zero anyway before. I had to drag back the 135 about 5 points from around +3 to -2. The 24 had to be moved about 4 points. Having said that, my 24-105 is now the sharpest it has been so it may have been a slight miss originally when Ma-ing, and the 135, well it's always sharp anyway!

my first thought was that unless they all had be shifted by the same amounts, then it must have been my original MA job was off, but before the upgrade the 135 was definitely on the money at +3, as soon as I upgraded it was noticeably off and I had to go the other way past the zero point.

No biggie, but just throwing my findings out there.

Thanks for the upgrade canon, kudos to you! Of course they could have done "more", but realistically they didn't have to do anything.

TeamSpeed wrote in post #14846132
We went to the zoo today, and I didn't do any bursts, but did use the auto-ISO. Running Av with EC+1/3 just to be safe, only had 2 shots blow out.

It chose pretty decent ISOs, IMO. Some of these were through fences, so they may look rough where the fence diffused the image. ISOs went through the full range of 100-6400.

Awesome shots! Which lens did you use the most at the zoo?

Bill Boehme wrote in post #14845515
Nothing about the frame rate has changed.

Absolutely (but note that I never claimed it had). I'd noticed a drop in the high-speed frame rate after I'd installed v2, but as I'd previously heard talk of the max frame rate on the 7D dropping when light levels are low (regardless of your settings) I wondered if it was due to that (which is why I mentioned the lower light levels in my original post).

Msowsun pointed out that it was almost certainly the lower light issue, so I tested again the next day in better light - as expected; it's a monster.

For me, the faster zoomed scrolling and Q button for highlights checking are my favourites, but if I were a regular sports or action shooter, being able to do much longer bursts in RAW or RAW + Jpeg would be a total game changer for this camera.

I do notice of course that it takes quite a bit of time to empty the buffers now. I'm using 90MB/s Lexar CF cards, but I see there are a few (claimed) 150MB/s cards around now. Anyone got any experience with these (i.e. do you notice an improvement over the 90MB/s cards)?

So far, so good. Very impressive looking update from Canon.

MFA - havent really played with this but, i think its changed.

I had my 24-105 set to around +4 iirc.

Since the firmware update everything went back to 0. And ive left it that way.

The 24-105 focus seems as good as, if not better then it did at +4 before the update.

...............

My first issue.

I usually download my images directly from the camera, using the Canon EOS 7D explorer popup which appears when i connect the camera via the USB cable.

Click on Browse files / Select the CF folder / DCIM folder / 100EOS7D folder/ And all the image files are usually in there. Copy > Paste.

Now when i get to the 100EOS7D folder i see no image files, just a bunch of 'Local Disc' icons, which i cannot do anything with.

I also tried to import photos in Lightroom 4. It see's the camera but says there are no images on it.

All CF cards have been formatted since the firmware update, and new images taken on them...

The only way i can get images off the camera now is by opening the EOS Utility and downloading them from within there. Until today, i have never used the EOS Utility for downloading images from the camera...........

Windows 7 64bit.

...............

Also tried on our MBP.

Lightroom see's the images, but finder does not...

Travis.

Alpinebully wrote in post #14851190
MFA - havent really played with this but, i think its changed.

I had my 24-105 set to around +4 iirc.

Since the firmware update everything went back to 0. And ive left it that way.

The 24-105 focus seems as good as, if not better then it did at +4 before the update.

Interesting. All my Ma setting were still in place after the update, just the actual real world results had changed.

Went out again this afternoon, and with the new settings it's spot on. So mine definitely needed changing after upgrade. Certainly no placebo there!! The 24-105 is pretty tolerant to a couple of MA points either way, but the 135 sure lets you know quickly if it's not right!

Can't help with your upload issue, I always plug the card into a reader, USB2 is too slow nowdays!

But just as a test, I just plugged mine in via USB, in win7 64 also, and it pops up as usual with all the images under DCIM/100EOS7D as per before. I use the Microsoft raw codec as well so I can see the thumbnails and view them if I like.

I don't have LR, so can't test that for you.