Comments on: File size on the Canon 5D2

By: Fuji’s Organic Sensor Technology | Peter.vdHamer.com

Fuji’s Organic Sensor Technology | Peter.vdHamer.com — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 07:39:42 +0000

[...] wants this. Current Canon SLRs already have a similar resolution scaling feature that Canon calls SRAW, but the option is not used very [...]

By: Jon Buchbinder

Jon Buchbinder — Thu, 30 Sep 2010 19:58:26 +0000

My RAW file sizes tend to be even larger – in the hi 20′s to mid 30 MB. This is because I tend to shoot a ‘correct’exposure of 1/3-1/2 stop higher than indicated by my 5DII’s meter.

Jon

By: iPad Camera Connectivy Kit « Peter.vdHamer.com

iPad Camera Connectivy Kit « Peter.vdHamer.com — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 18:40:56 +0000

[...] the good news is that the iPad can reads heavy-duty RAW files from a Canon 5D Mark II and display these (it internally generates a medium resolution JPEG). But the crashing Photo [...]

By: NAS and Lightroom performance « Peter.vdHamer.com

NAS and Lightroom performance « Peter.vdHamer.com — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 19:35:00 +0000

[...] average size of a photo is 8.65 MBytes, but recent photos are about 26 MBytes each (new [...]

By: pvdhamer

pvdhamer — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 08:52:11 +0000

You are right, thanks. Variable file size obviously also applies to JPG files. For lossless compression (CR2 is a compressed and lossless or near-lossless format) you can actually proove that the compressed file size depends on the image content.

Peter

By: Joergen Geerds

Joergen Geerds — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 02:33:45 +0000

I just wanted to add that the file size for the .cr2 are not constant, but depend directly on the noise level of the image, either from iso noise or from image content and exposure level. I have seen cr2 files ranging from 20MB to 34MB. so 26MB is a good middle average, but one shouldn’t rely on it.

By: pvdhamer

pvdhamer — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 08:11:17 +0000

Thanks. See http://peter.vdhamer.com/2009/01/19/canon-5d2-and-compact-flash/ for the answer to “I head high-speed UDMA cards are needed”. Answer: not really.

Regarding “special card reader needed”. No – any somewhat recent card reader will work. Maybe if you really care, you could get a Firewire card reader rather than USB 2 (to increase readout speed).

If possible, put any card-related Responses next to the card-related posting. More chance that others can benefit.

Peter

By: Steve

Steve — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 23:10:35 +0000

Thanks Peter, had to read that one three times there till it sank in. I just use RAW s for special occaisions, usually when its a big, critical or tricky shot. Otherwise I am one of the renegades that is quite happy with JPEGS. I have often shot the Raw + Jpeg together, cant see much advantage of the RAW most of the time to a proplerly shot JPEG.
From what you say it sounds all good; bigger is better even at a large inbetweenie JPEG size cos I wont be makin too many big posters from the wedding game…
I hear the high speed UDMA cf cards are the business for this camera, especially for the video bit. Was wonderin do you need a special reader to download a UDMA card?
Keep up the good work, there is gonna be a lot of heads tryin to figure out how to tame this beast.
Cheers
Steve

By: pvdhamer

pvdhamer — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 08:36:58 +0000

Alternative answer (but same advice): the 5D Mark II’s 10 MPixel scaled down photos are likely to have better image quality than the 5D Classic’s 12 MPixel photos.

This because the 5D never really had 12 million R/G/B values to start off with. And the 5D Mark II generates it 10 MPixel image using the full resolution image. So “has 10 MPixel resolution” and “has 12 MPixel resolution” statements are both correct-ish, but use a different definition of MPixel

By: pvdhamer

pvdhamer — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 08:28:08 +0000

Despite popular belief, MegaPixels are not all they are cranked up to be be: I used two L-series lenses on a 6 MPixel Canon 10D until I bought “the beast”. Even cropped 6 MPixel work out fine at A3 on a high-quality printer (B9180). Maybe partly because (well-)interpolated pixels tend to be higher quality than original (de-mosaiced) pixels in the first place.

So I wouldn’t worry about using 10 MPixel rather than 21 MPixel unless you are doing studio work, using a tripod, or may have an award-winning photo opportunity. I can see if I can add a posting showing the impact of sRAW1 on picture quality one of these weeks.

The one to possibly worry about, however, is whether you want to shoot JPG (as you stated) or RAW. That one is even more painful as that gives a 5x size difference rather than a <2x size difference. That obviously impacts your workflow much more.

Remember that not all post-processing software supports sRAW1 format. Good luck.

Peter