Canon EOS 5D Mark II

New features

The 5D Mark II is the first camera in the EOS line to provide video recording functions. Still photography during video recording is possible, but the camera suspends recording video until the final still frame is captured.

The Li-Ion battery for the 5D Mark II (LP-E6) has an 1800mAh capacity. Each battery contains a microchip with a unique identifier for reporting charge status and battery health for display on the camera. The 5D Mark II's "Battery Info" screen can track battery health and shooting history for up to six LP-E6 batteries.

The camera has native ISO values of 100 multiplied by a power of 2; other ISO values are obtained by a digital exposure push (ISO values that are multiples of 125) or digital exposure pull (ISO values that are multiples of 160). The digital exposure push ISO is 1/3 stop greater than the native ISO, and a digital exposure pull ISO is 1/3 stop less than the native ISO. The digital exposure push ISO settings produce more noise than the native settings with a reduced dynamic range, and the digital exposure pull ISO settings produce less noise than the native settings.

Video recording

While the Nikon D90 was the first DSLR to shoot 720p high-definition video, and the Panasonic GH1, a MILC, was capable of 1080p/24 recording before the 5D Mark II officially gained this capability, the latter was the first full-frame DSLR to feature 1080p video recording. The Canon PowerShot SX 1 IS followed with 1080p video in a bridge digital camera soon after.

The 16:9 aspect ratio portion of the sensor used in video mode is similar in sensitive area to a VistaVision 8/35 frame. This large sensor allows videos to be recorded with very shallow depth of field for a "film look". The 21 megapixel sensor is downsampled to HD resolution by only using every third line and 4:2:0 chroma subsampling, leading to concern about Moiré patterns in recorded video.

Video clips can be up to 4 GB in size, approximately 12 minutes of 1080p HD or 24 minutes of SD (640 x 480) footage. These limits stem from the 4 GB maximum file size supported by the FAT32 filesystem format used on Compact Flash cards. The camera also imposes a hard maximum clip length of 29 minutes 59 seconds if the 4 GB limit has not already been reached. Video and audio is recorded to QuickTime (MOV) container files with H.264/MPEG-4 (Base Profile @ L5) compressed video and uncompressed 48 kHz/16-bit PCM audio at . The bitrate for 1080p is approximately 38 megabits per second (4.8 Mbyte/s), while for SD it is approximately 17 megabits per second (2.2 Mbyte/s). Although the internal microphone is mono, stereo audio is supported through the audio input jack. When recording for long periods, especially in warmer climates, increased video noise may occur due to CMOS overheating.

Video functionality

The EOS 5D Mark II is capable of video recording in low-light situations and it is sold for a relatively low price, compared with professional video cameras. For the first eighteen months of its release, the camera only had a 30 frame per second (30p) video mode. On 15 March 2010, Canon released a firmware upgrade to add a 25p mode for PAL format compatibility and a 24p mode for compatibility with motion picture film cameras.

The firmware update also modified the 30p mode to record 29.97 frame/s and the new 24p mode actually records 23.976 frame/s to have frame rates compatible with NTSC. Lastly, the update added manual control of the audio record levels and an official way to disable the automatic gain control.

Following the success of the Canon Hack Development Kit (CHDK) for Canon's PowerShot cameras, third party firmware was also produced for the 5D Mark II. The Magic Lantern firmware provides many additional video and cinematography related controls and meters such as false colors, and zebra stripes for exposure control, depth of field estimates via peaking filters, audio VU meters and disables the automatic gain control on the microphone input (although some of these features have since been added to Canon's official firmware, as noted above). Recent nightly builds have even managed to provide a stable output of uncompressed 14-Bit RAW video data onto fast UDMA 7 CF cards at almost HD resolution (1004p vs. 1080p at Full HD). Although the size of the files and high price of appropriate cards are considered moderate drawbacks and the 5D Mark III generally shows better performance regarding RAW video, the Mark II, being the oldest among them, still remains to be the next best among reasonable choices for DSLR RAW video output and showcases thus, that uncompressed HD RAW video on a DSLR was already theoretically possible with technology of the year 2008.

Independent film and television

Notable film and television productions that used the Canon 5D Mark II include (in order of release):

Third party production rigs and lenses

Several aftermarket vendors have developed professional video accessory packages, to take advantage of the large 35mm sensor, which provided cinema-like depth of field. Redrock Micro and Zacuto are two of these.

For 3D video shooting Anachrome 3D is offering several dual camera mount packages, which make use of several short focal length Canon prime lenses. Specialized "shifting prisms" compensate for the "too wide" spacing of the pair of cameras. By inverting one of the cameras, the spacing is further reduced. Sync issues are also addressed in these 3D packages, with a "sync comparator" as "gen-locking" two 5DM2s is not readily do-able at this early stage.

A company in Los Angeles, CA, Hot Rod Cameras, is offering cinema style PL lens mounts, which will allow a few of the larger cinema lenses used on Arriflex film cameras to be fitted to the 5DM2. The sensor is actually the size of two motion picture 35mm frames, similar to a 20th-century wide-screen process promoted by Paramount Studios, Called "Vista-Vision". This was 35mm film, run horizontally through the taking camera, using twice the area of a normal 35mm cine frame.

Software

The included software package contains the following software: