Canon Professional Services - Landscape Event

Canon 5Ds + Canon 16-35mm f/2.8L II 

On Tuesday 29 November 2016, I happily attended a special Canon Professional Services Landscape Event at Durlston Country Park, Swanage. We were allowed to bring a guest so I brought me best mate Liz along. It was a long drive for us, around three hours there and then another three hours back, but we love a good road trip. Especially when photography is involved. Not only was photography involved but we got to play with some new kit as well. That's always a bonus.

We were greeted with coffee/tea and cakes, treated to displays of gear from Canon, Manfrotto and Lee Filters and enjoyed a talks by Canon Explorer David Norton and Professional Photographer Jon Gooding. A bit later we were given a light lunch and then later in the evening treated to a proper hot dinner. They took very good care of us. :-)

Canon 5Ds + Canon 16-35mm f/2.8L II

 There was gear from Canon of course as well as Manfrotto and Lee Filters. I've got a nice basic selection of Lee Filters already as well as Manfrotto tripods and heads so I was more interested in the new Canon gear. Specifically the new Canon 5D IV and 5Ds/r DSLR cameras, and the super wide angle lenses. Canon 8-15mm f/4L Fisheye Lens and 11-24mm f/4L. Of these I managed to get my hands on the Canon 5Ds and the Canon 11-24mm f/4L, but not at the same time. I really wanted the lens first as by the time we swapped gear around I knew it'd be dark, but that wasn't to be, I got the camera first. Two photos above were some of the first photos I took with it. Later I photographed sunset with it.

Canon 5Ds + Canon 70-200mm f/2.8L

The Canon 5Ds is a 50 megapixel full frame camera. I'm not a technical person so I'm not going to go into the spec details, apologies if you came here for that. If you are interested it's easy enough to look up, especially when I made you a handy link to click on above. :-)

I only had the camera for a short amount of time and didn't really have time to put it through it's paces. But what little time I spent with it was enough to fall in love. The camera was already familiar to me as I own both the Canon 5D II and 5D III cameras. It's pretty much set up just like the 5D III, button wise, and I had no problems controlling the camera or finding my way around.

The 5D III is a 22.3 megapixel camera and the 5Ds is a whopping 50.6 megapixel camera! Much larger files means larger prints and more image definition. Again, I'm not going to go into the technical details, these are just the basics. But say you printed an image from the 5D III @ 300dpi you'd get roughly a 19 x 13 inch print. With the 5Ds you'd get roughly a 29 x 19 inch print. I did my best not to drool all over the camera.

Canon 5D mark II + Canon 70-200mm f2.8L

I shot with a 50 megapixel camera a few years ago, in a studio situation. It was a medium format Hasselblad. I'm in love with that camera too. OK, I confess, I'm in love with a lot of cameras. :-) Wish I could have had the Canon 5Ds and the 5D IV for a few days to test under more controlled conditions, but I have to make do with what I can get my hands on. :-)

My thoughts on the 5Ds, I love it. I am seriously thinking about retiring my Canon 5D II and replacing it with the 5Ds. Not only for the image quality and size but because the controls are the same as my 5D III. When you are shooting with two cameras it helps if their buttons are all in the same places and the controls the same. I often get confused between my 5D II and 5D III cameras. As for the 5D IV which I did't get to play with, yes I want, but I'll have to wait for the price to drop a bit before I can afford it. It's very rare for me to run out and buy the latest gear, I have to be a bit more frugal.

On to the night time shoot..

Canon 5D mark III + Canon 11-24mm f/4L with a hint of  the Milky Way.

There were two shooting groups for the evening which we were suppose to all get a chance at, but there was some confusion and Liz and I missed out on nearly all of one of them. There was photographing the night sky and light painting. We only caught the tail end of the light painting group before they packed up for the evening. Shame we missed that, but I have done light painting more than I've done night sky shooting so I went for that first.

For the evening shoots I borrowed the Canon 11-24mm f/4L lens, which is a fabulous lens and one I've been drooling over. Yes I know, I drool so much I should wear a bib. What's so special about the super wide angle 11-24mm zoom? Well it doesn't have all the distortion that other wide angle lenses do. It's not to everyone's taste though, as Liz says, that takes all the fun out!

Canon 5D mark III + Canon 11-24mm f/4L

Using this lens at night really wasn't a great test for the lens, but it's when I could get my hands on it. I still enjoyed using it though. It's definitely on my drool list. Oops I mean want list! I can just about justify it as a business expense so I might eventually get one. I can think of several shoots I have coming up that it sure would be handy on. I'm thinking especially large group shots, like at events and weddings. It has a hefty price tag though, so might take me awhile to save up for it.

Canon 5D mark III + Canon 11-24mm f/4L with a hint of  the Milky Way.

I've been to a few Canon Professional Services Network meetings, and I always enjoy myself. I highly recommend them if you are a CPS or CPN member. This one was exceptionally nice as they fed us and provided us with lots of coffee and cake! I also really liked being able to check out the gear to try in the field. I did already know most of the information given in the talks but it was a nice refresher and provided some much needed inspiration to get out there and do some more landscape photography, both during the day and night.

Here are a few photos from my phone of the event:

We were greeted with cake and coffee! :-D 

The Canon Table (First venue, there was more gear at second venue)

Manfrotto Table (First venue, there was more gear at second venue)

Lee Filter Table (First venue, there was more gear at second venue)

One of the talks at the first venue.

The Canon 5Ds I had on loan, they teased me by putting a 5D IV strap on it. 

Back of the Canon 5Ds

If you are a professional photographer and have a lot of pro Canon gear, I highly recommend signing up with the Canon Professional Services Network. Especially if you enjoying attending free network meetings like I attended above.

Happy shooting!