Pixiq

You might remember that Canon had just recently announced their new flagship professional DSLR the Canon 1D X. The camera has received much praise and some scrutiny in the photo-blogosphere. There are some who think the camera didn't go far enough in terms of innovation and perhaps there were too many compromises made. Many sports shooters will likely be very happy with what Canon has done. As with any new camera, it's going to be a matter of assessing your needs to determine if the camera is worth the investment.

Hands On with the Canon EOS-1D X

I had a chance, at the 2011 PhotoPlus Expo, to get a little handsy with a pre-production unit of Canon's EOS-1D X and speak with Chuck Westfall who's the Technical Advisor and handles education and training for Canon USA.

It you missed the initial announcements here are the main specs of the camera:

• 18MP
• Full Frame CMOS Sensor
• 14 Frames per second
• Dual DIGIC 5+ processors

First Impressions

My initial thought when holding the 1D X was that it felt really great. To me, Canon has always been better at ergonomics than their competitors and this camera improves on that mark. All of the buttons are right where I want them and there is a naturalness to how the camera seems to operate in hand. This should be especially true for photographers who have a 7D or above.

The images that I took in the camera looked brilliant but because this was a pre-production behind the scenes kinda thing there are no image files to be shared. No biggie. You'll see plenty of those when the camera gets closer to release and I'm willing to bet that all of you pixel peepers will be plenty amazed enough. Low light and high ISO images were luscious. This camera is fast. It responds fast. The auto focus seemed fast. Speed shooters will be happy with what Canon has done here.

18MP?

There are tons of spec pages and press releases online where you can get to the hyper technical stuff about this camera but I wanted to go over some of the things that Canon has done with the EOS-1D X that some photographers might gloss over when looking at those technical specs. It's the little things that count sometimes.

The first thing, and really not that little at all, is the 18MP spec. Is Canon throwing down the gauntlet in the megapixel race? I believe they are and I think that their work here is saying that photographers will be able to recognize that more megapixels doesn't mean a better camera. Bigger megapixels and faster processing does.

This is a three step move. Less megapixels, bigger megapixels, and faster processing equal better low light performance with little compromise on speed.

They're able to do this by using better circuitry in the camera to create a cleaner signal before the image hits the processors. Chuck got really technical and excited when he went over this. This is a pretty big advancement that means Canon is able to push the speed up while not creating more noise.

Basically, Canon went after higher image quality with high speed. Sports shooters who recently made the switch from Canon to Nikon may soon regret that move.

Improved Menu System

When it comes to user interface Canon has kept a familiar menu system for a seamless move for their photographers but, of course, have added a few changes that will likely be welcome amongst said photographers.

The menu system has a new built in "user manual" type of sub-folder system that has explanations of some of the various new functions. Much better than carrying around a user manual in your bag. I didn't ask Chuck but I'm really hoping to see this implemented further down Canon's lineup.

One of the coolest menu/button changes was the "q" button which activates a quick menu (seen in the above photo) on the back LCD that basically shows the same information you'd find on the top display. This is a small but handy feature for photographers using tripods and monopods where their camera is set a little high and they may not have easy access to the top display. It makes navigating and changing the most important and most used settings fast and simple.

Other Improvements

Another good change is the implementation of a dual compact flash card system. I never really understood why Canon had a CF and an SD card slot for redundancy but I know several people who will be happy with dual CF card slots. I think most pros prefer CF cards to SD cards because they are physically bigger, they are faster, and tougher.

For the video photographers Canon has implemented new HD video formats and compression. Lot's of technical stuff going on here but the thing to note is that you're supposed to be able to get just under 30 minutes of video recording and the bigger sensor should translate to better quality video.

Conclusions

There's so much more to this camera than I was able to wrap my head around in 20 minutes of playing and conversation and we'll all have to wait for the camera to get released and we get some more reviews out before we can make a full conclusion.

I did walk away with the sense that Canon did a great job of combining speed, image quality, and a highly customizable menu system. This allows the Canon EOS-1D X to respond to the way that photographers think, acting as a more natural extension of the photographer's eye, brain, and vision.

The Canon EOS-1D X Digital SLR camera is scheduled for March 2012 availability and will be sold in a body-only configuration at an estimated retail price of $6,800.00