Canon EOS 1Ds Mark III 21.1MP Digital SLR Camera (Body Only)

Product Description
The Canon EOS-1Ds Mark III is an engineering tour de force which, true to the EOS-1 legacy, redefines the state of the art in no uncertain terms. An entirely new 21.1-megapixel full-frame Canon CMOS sensor delivers astounding image quality and creates new photographic possibilities. Dual "DIGIC III" Image Processors work in tandem to speed up data handling and camera operation, while further refining imaging performance.Tough, high-durability body and shutter designs, combined with the unique EOS Integrated Cleaning System, set new standards for professional dependability. Cutting-edge features-such as a large 3.0-inch LCD monitor with Live View Function, and a fast, precise 45-point AF system-make the EOS-1Ds Mark III powerful and versatile. And, of course, the EOS-1Ds Mark III is part of the unparalleled EOS System, which, with more than 50 EF lenses, 15 interchangeable focusing screens, and extensive wireless, remote control and lighting accessories, is the most advanced and powerful digital photography system in the world.

Wonderful professional camera
I owned this camera since spring of 2008,
So at the point of writing this review, I used it for nearly a year.

Now, if you are earlier owner, you might have experienced a problem or two.
I was unfortunately one of the owner experienced problem, and had to ship it back to Canon for the warranty repair. So, I was not exactly happy about paying expensive FEDEX freight.

But, rest assured, no other nasty problem occurred after warranty repair, and this camera has been workhorse of my photography.

Now, let get on the review.

This is really wonderful 21.1MP camera, and it is well worth the money.
But, you have to determine if you need to use one.

At the time of release, there were no other full size sensor camera with this resolutions.
Of course, it has been since passed by other manufacture... but I will not going to that comparison.

For Professional User.

Important thing about this camera is economics.

I own EOS 5D as well, and when non-commissioned or low paid project, I tend to bring 5D instead of 1DS MK3.
It is due to the fact, overall operational cost tend to be higher on the 1DS MK3 so if does not paid well, there will be no point to bring it out.

But, if it does paid well. there are enough justification to own this system, and you should used it as much as you can.

And this system is really reliable, once you get past some getting used to.

One more note,

Now I do own several different system including Hasselblad Medium format.
Medium Format Digital System is superior system when you are working in the control lighting environment. However, it is rather difficult to work with in the outside activity.

If you are studio photographer with magazine or commercial client, and do occasional out side shoot, you should own both medium format and this camera.

If you are professional just wondering about medium format and full size sensor camera,but without pressing need, then do not bother with medium format.

People who uses medium format digital normally has pressing reason such as satisfying client's specifications to own such system.
And it is not really versatile system no matter how medium format camera maker and digital back manufacture portray.

Canon 1DS MK3 is really versatile system, and it will satisfy most of design agency, publisher or stock photo agency's requirement, and L lens system are reasonably priced for the performance when looking at the economics.


For Semi Pro or High Amateurs User

For semi professional. 1DS MK3 is not going to make best economic argument, if you do not shoot studio.
If you are part time photographer who shoots mainly events or doing photo journalism.
I will recommend 1DMK3 over 1DSMK3.

Also, for photo journalist purpose, nowadays 5D MK2 actually makes a lot more sense than getting 1DS MK3 due to the their HD capability.
And for the photo journalist, it is not that good idea to carry bulky system.

But, for an amateur user with a lot of spending money,

It is one of the best system to get taste of what real pro are using.
And it does not cost like price of new BMW, and for the financially resourceful amateur, 7 to 8 grand may not be much of money.

When I got 1DS MK3 there were several amateur photographer I taught how to use this camera...
Surprising thing is, there are quiet many of amateur owner, and with very limited instruction to them,
They were able to create very good quality images.

So, kudos to the Canon for new 1DS MK3 interface.
It is actually easier for 1DS first timer than older 1DS MK2 for instance.

Of course, people who were used to with 1DS MK2 or older tend to disagree on this.


Now here are list of main advantage.

1. It is 21.1MP, more than most of commercial assignment requires.

2. Color depth of 14bit per channel is really useful for RAW work flow process.

3. Economical compared to the expensive medium format system, and still get comparable or sometimes superior result if conditions are right.

4. Build like tank, and it can take a quiet bit of abuse.

5. For user who are used to with 20D~50D, 5D MK1~MK2, it is really easy to learn interface.

6. Dust cleaning is really useful.

7. AF + Canon L Lens combinations is superior to the other known system in the market as of 2008-9

8. Liveview is useful to shoot architecture, land scape, and products.

9. RAW file format is supported well by the major commercial software.

10.CF slot and SDHC slot actually helps. It did not occurred to me until I run out of memory card on the locations, and had to run to the nearby local drug store. At least they carry cheap SD/SDHC at any large drug store chains, and it is a lot easier to find those store than locating nearby large electronic store...

11. Battery Life is excellent, it will easily cover half day events with nearly a thousand of picture even with taxing RAW + JPEG shoot.

12. Due to its weight and form factor, it is a lot easier to balance with long heavy lens.

13. When used with L lens, it is somewhat comparable with expensive medium format digital back.

14. Silent shutter mode is somewhat useful.

Now here are list of disadvantage.


1. It is slightly new form factor for Canon, and there are chance you had to send it to the warranty repair if you got the earlier production model.

2.There are something wrong with design of wireless port cap. It is relatively easy to lose one since it sometimes fell off with limited torque applied. I lost several of them already... though I stocked half dozen cap after I lost my first cap.

3. It is heavy and bulky. Thus some times not a ideal for certain situations.

4. Compared to Nikon D3X, it has slightly poor SNR on the third party software RAW processing software, so certain journalistic style shoot might suffer. If you shoot in the studio controlled lighting environment, that should not be a much of issue.

5. Many of RAW development software is actually more well tuned for Nikon, This might to be due to the amount of info Canon release to the third party software developer.

6. It is hard to justify its price for the many of users.

7. However everyone else claimed, it still can not replace medium format digital camera. Lens resolution and clarity of images is not there yet. Of course, that is when looking at 1:1 images side by side.

8. Silent shutter mode is not that quiet compared to some of the most quiet camera in the market. So, application such as close quarter Jazz or Classical music shot are still off the table.


Overall, I will recommend this camera to who,


If you are photographer that shoot tons of weddings at high fee structure, you should get one. Otherwise, EOS 5D nowadays makes very attractive choice.

If you are commercial photographer with clients and sufficient invest in Canon system, why are you waiting?

If you are amateur with deep pockets, this is a camera to get, and impress your photography teacher!


I will not recommend to someone,

Trek photographer who need lighter weight gear or those wild life photographer needs of faster fps should consider other offering from Canon.

Any journalistic style should consider 1D MK3 first unless you shoot tons of interview photo.

Shooting for hobby or fine arts purpose should really consider 5D mk2 before taking financial plunge of 1DS MK3

If you think it is heavy for you, do not get it. It will be too heavy for you after few hours of holding camera.

SeattleAmateur
Canon EOS 1Ds Mark III 21.1MP Digital SLR Camera (Body Only)

I am an advanced amateur and was using the 5D Mark I for the past 2.5 years. I loved the images but hated the focusing. In any kind of shot that involved focusing on a subject moving at walking speed, (or less) the 5D would fail to snap into focus. The second shot would never be in focus. In lower light situations (typical interior lighting, not candles), the 5D was even worse. Sometimes the focusing would force the lens to go to maximum close/distance as the 5D hunted for focus - even when the lens was basically in focus to start - this was guaranteed to miss the shot.

The 1Ds, on the other hand, is great at focusing. Super fast, subjects snap into focus quickly, and focusing continues onto 2nd shots and more. And it will focus on lenses that are 5.6 and above - something the 5D did not do (try a telephoto with a filter or extender). From what I can read, the new 5D Mark II has basically the same focusing system so it is not improved in this area.

What kind of shots am I talking about? Shots of people,kids, basketball, soccer, bands, parades, candids on the street, street life, travel, animals in the wild or at home - I would include most everything except still life/landscape photos. Generally any shot you would not be making with a tripod is a situation where the 1Ds' focusing is vastly superior to the 5D.

High resolution is great. But out of focus shots are not keepers.

Finally, the 1Ds Mark III is much more solid than the 5D - everything from the controls to the shutter sound. I love this camera. My only wish is that it were the same size as the 5D since most shoulde camera bags don't account for its height. I don't mind the weight since the the weight of the lenses I am carrying is much heavier than the camera.

Canon's Flagship Camera
I've used several Cameras from Canon, including the F-1N, 10D, 20D, 1Ds, 1Ds Mark II, and now the 1Ds Mark III. This camera will provide you with the tool to capture great work, but you'll need the best lenses. Cheap zooms or cheap prime lenses will produce chromatic aberrations that will make the money spent on this camera a waste. In other words, the resolution of the sensor is so high it exceeds many lenses currently on the market.

Why would someone buy this body instead of the Canon EOS 5D Mark II? Because of the build of the body, the durability of the shutter and battery life. These three factors provide the user with a camera that can withstand the extremes of nature while working.

This camera is heavier than the 5D, even if the 5D has the optional grip, so if you don't like a camera with mass, this camera is not for you.

I have used this camera in the rain, sleet, snow, and the heat of summer. It has performed flawlessly. The resolution provides enough data for beautiful 24"x36" prints.

Yes, I'm a professional photographer and am immersed in the software and hardware to make photographs. I'm aware that there's much more to photography than the camera body, but it's the camera body & sensor that's the cornerstone for great images.

The best Canon has to offer
Ok, the price of this thing is absolutely ridiculous.

Yes, Canon was now nice enough, only a little over a year later, to release a lower level product with equal Megapixels (the forthcoming 5D mark II), and do serious damage to my asset value (this camera). Thanks.

My previous high end camera is the Canon 5D.

It is clear to me that, other than the improved sensor, which gives the latest chip (DIGIC IV), higher Megapixels (21.1) and higher ISO (6400 natively), a very slight speed improvement (3.9 fps) and a bigger, nicer screen on the back (3", 1 million dots), it's pretty much the same camera as the 5D. Thanks to the Megapixel war, Nikon & Sony have turned up the heat on Canon a bit, so they went higher in those specs than they probably would've otherwise. This is great for the consumer, if those are the only specs you're looking at. And hopefully it will eventually obliterate Canon's ability to put pricetags like the one on this camera on anything (see my first sentence).

Of course, I did BUY this camera, nevertheless. Because I could afford to do that. If you can't, then look at what you can, because a lot of insane specs sit at much lower price points.

With that out of the way, let's just view it from the perspective of a mid-range user that might want to move up - someone with a 5D or a 10-50D, who might be trying to decide what else he will get from this camera versus just going for a 5D mark II instead, because either is a very valid option:

- 45 point AutoFocus. What's so great about this? Let's say you've seen it, and you realize it's a bunch of little points congested in the center instead of the 9 on the 5D mark II and their 6 "assist" points. That's just a lot of marketing - 45 is a much bigger number and makes it look much better, right? No, not really. It really IS that much better. I do a lot of bikini/fashion/glamour photography, and therefore I shoot a lot of shots that are of one very, curvy female (ok, yea, I know, I know - it's tough. But SOMEONE has got to do it, and I'm taking the bullet for you guys on this one, OK? LOL). Anyway, as you might realize, a very or at least somewhat shallow depth of field is frequently, in fact is most often, desirable for these types of shots. Curves create a complicated task, and the truth is, the Automatic choice of focal points on the 5D gave spotty results without VERY strict attention to focusing. Consequently, I gave up on it, and set my focus to the Center point and used focus/recompose. This works great most of the time. If the Depth of Field gets TOO shallow, you have to be VERY precise when using this method, which gets very tiring, on both your concentration and your hands/body. However, with the 1Ds Mark III, the advanced AF can be set to automatically detect, and it gives excellent results, with a very low mistake ratio. In observing the points it chooses while I'm shooting, it appears to me that it is very good at recognizing contours, and subtle depth differences, and this is where it achieves it's greatest advantage.

- Focal performance with high end lenses. L lenses perform better with any Canon camera. Even moreso with this. FAST lenses, in this case f/2.8 or faster, perform especially well with this camera. This still ties into the focusing system, yes, but it is worth noting that the better lenses take yet another performance leap on this body. This is no accident, rather by design. I say you lose part of the reason (not all of it, make no mistake) for having the L glass if you don't have a high end body.

- Dual Memory Cards. Yea, it could just as well be two CF cards instead of a CF and an SD, but whatever. I buy a lot of memory cards anyway. And this is more a convenience than anything. It's nice to be able to write large JPEGS to one and RAW to the other. And if you are shooting with someone who needs the photos immediately and HAS an SD card, this could be a huge plus. It, of course, accepts SDHC also.

- Greater flexibility in writing JPEG files. If you shoot mostly or only RAW, this might not matter. But, the fact is, while the 5D and the 10D-50D models allow to write two different quality levels at each JPEG size, this camera has a separate "quality" level that ranges from 1-10, much like Photoshop's 1-12 range. When you look at Canon's site and see the estimate for JPEG's of 6-8MB (it was something like that), it was only an average estimate. They've since removed it (probably because the amount of possibilities are too great to post). I have set mine at the maximum quality of "10." My JPEG's are generally between 10MB-13MB in size. One note, however, as I attempted to photographer a fast moving stage event, and was taken back that I had problems with lag in shooting quickly, as it is advertised at 5fps. I believe you would need to step down to a 7 or 8 quality, whatever their test for "average" is, to achieve these speeds along with it's buffering ability. I used a Sandisk Extreme III card. Since that speed of card has performed exceedingly well on a 50D that I own, at a pro football game, I think it's safe to say the card wasn't the factor. I was blazing off shots on the 50D at 6.3fps for several seconds and it hardly went into using the buffer it was so fast. The "writing" light was barely ever lit whenever I checked right after a long flurry. And that is a 15MP camera - it was set on Large/Fine, which are about 6MB shots, in this case.

- Best weather sealing is on these bodies. If you need it, it's worth it. I think the others are fairly resistant anyway, but the comfort of not worrying much about conditions is nice.

- The display system on the larger body. Less information is pushed up to the top. The display on the bottom portion is easier to look at, and it's nice to have the memory card info visible down there.

- The LCD changing of shooting modes. This might not be something better to some, because if you're used to the other Canon bodies, it can be a bit off-putting at first. But once you get used to it, it's definitely better. Moreover, the simplicity of having the modes you need and no "dumb user" modes, which the 5D had largely eliminated while keeping the dial anyway, is still nicer on here. (e.g. - why do I need a "Sports Mode" when I can set my focus to AI Servo, and then set a high shutter priority speed, and make ISO adjustments as needed to accomodate light changes - or just shoot Aperture Priority with the lens wide open and make ISO adjustments? Whichever).

- Specifically if comparing to one of the new 5D's, my bet is that there will be a very noticeable lag in the 5D mark II compared to this camera, since it is only running one processor versus two on this camera.

This is definitely the best of the best.

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