This page is a compilation of annotated links to Canon 50D professional reviews, user opinions, feedback and experiences, tests, conclusions, ratings and feedback.
Canon 50D professional reviews and conclusions
Brutus Östling Canon 50D review
Brutus is a highly-regarded Swedish nature photographer who was totally amazed by the blazing autofocus speed and tracking accuracy on the 50D for photographing BIF (birds in flight), claiming that it beats even his 1D Mark III. Here’s his report translated into English. Read a forum reaction to his report here.
Canon 50D user reviews, opinions, experiences and feedback
Canon 50D user report by Vidar NM
Vidar NM was one of the first Canon 50D owners in Norway (he purchased his camera at “FotoVideo” in Oslo (Møllergata), according to this post), and this section is dedicated to his findings. He has posted a ton on information on DPReview, and I hope my compilation of his posts can help make your Canon 50D research a little easier.
All of his Canon 50D test samples is available on Flickr.
Vidar NM’s first impressions of the 50D, dated September 22nd, 2008
His initial report didn’t seem to positive. He used the EF 70-200mm f/4L IS USM lens for the tests.
Positives: Great LCD (allows for focus checking), 13 out of 15 frames in burst mode (AI Servo switched on) were tack sharp, great colors and IQ (image quality). Focusing was also spot-on with the 70-200 f/4L IS USM (here’s his cat photo as an example, which I think is super), although he did encounter some OOF (out of focus) shots when the subject is far away and in challenging light conditions.
More on the AF (autofocus) on the 50D:
The af is very fast. My objection was that it doesn’t feel reliable as it occasionally returns unsharp frames under good conditions (in the same manner I experienced with the 40D). Depending on your kind of photography, it’s quite ok to live with that. You are paying for a prosumer camera, meaning you cannot expect top notch solutions all over
He wasn’t impressed with an ISO3200 photo (see the full-sized image), as banding was visible and there seemed to be no improvement over the 40D in this respect. Karma Traveler advised that it’s best to re-size such a file to 6MP dimensions to judge whether the photo is suitable for print.
You can download the ISO3200 RAW file for your own inspection by following the link in this post.
For those who want to compare ISO1600 output from the 50D vs 40D, follow the links in this post. Vimar acknowledges that even with the 50D being equal to the 40D in terms of pixel-level noise, the 50% increase in resolution in the 50D means that it still comes out ahead in terms of having lower image-level noise.
Vimar summed up his feelings about how the 50D compares to the 40D:
Let me also add that my subjective feeling is that the 50D is solid, well sorted and definitely I step up from the very good 40D.
Vimar also feels that the 50D is a step up from the 40D whether shooting in low or high ISO situations.