Thread by @stshank

I rented a Canon R5 to see if I like it. So many thoughts after an hour fooling with it, starting with:
1. Boy do I hate customizing controls and my personal menus to get it working how I like
2. Electronic viewfinder is nice sometimes but plagued by discontinuity at telephoto

That above shot taken with Canon's wacky new 800mm f11 lens. F11 doesn't let much light through, but the price, the weight, the size, the ability to shoot handheld easily... I'm impressed. 1/125 sec, ISO 100

I was disappointed by the 6m close-focus distance of the 800mm f11 lens, though. Most birds are far away, of course, but I had to back away to shoot the close ones by the birdfeeder. Good thing 45 megapixels lets you crop. House finch in the rain, 1/320sec, ISO2500.

Image stabilization with the RF 24-70mm f2.8 lens is such an improvement over non-IS 24-70mm on my Canon 5D4! And f2.8 on the RF 15-35mm is better than f4 on my 16-35mm. Here's a tack-sharp crop of nighttime juniper tree with 24-70mm, handheld at 1/5sec at 31mm, f2.8, ISO3200.

Just got started with eye tracking and it seems to work pretty well on my kids even in dim light. Only took a few shots though, so nothing conclusive. More thoughts in the coming week.

I do like the increase to 45 megapixels. ISO 4000 is noisy when you pixel peep, (no surprise) but I have to do more checking for dynamic range at various ISOs. Here's one cropped view from an ISO4000 photo for pixel peepage.

I had time for a few more shots this morning. Super frustrating moment when I missed sandhill cranes flying by — 800mm f11 can't lock focus when you have AF set to a small spot. And I don't yet have focusing mode tweak in muscle memory. :(

Using Servo and eye-tracking AF, the Canon R5 w/ 800mm f11 got the focus right for this raven sometimes. Not optimal settings (I'd been shooting other birds, stationary), but it worked. 1/4000sec, ISO1600.

Canon R5's eye-tracking autofocus very useful for birds. Although it often didn't find the eye, it did lock onto sitting birds well. Here's our weirdly orange (instead of red) local house finch. 800mm, f11, 1/320sec, ISO800. I should have goosed ISO higher for less motion blur.

More Canon R5 testing with the moon today when the clouds cleared a bit. The 800mm f11 lens was good for this — the moon is pretty bright and 45 megapixels gives room to crop. 1/320sec, ISO200. (I'm always surprised how many people think you can only see the moon at night.)

A couple more bird shots. You do have to crank the ISO up with this 800mm f11 lens. Dark-eyed junco, house finch, both fluffed up for the cold weather. The Canon R5's eye tracking AF is really remarkably useful.

This Canon R5 shot — f2.8, 28mm, 1/4 sec at ISO 1600 with 15-35mm lens, room lit only by dim phone flashlight — was impossible on my 5D4. 1. Electronic viewfinder helped me compose. 2. Eye AF focused. 3. Image stabilization kept it steady. 3 of 6 shots came out OK with the R5.

I realized I needed to RTFM (well, check the web & YouTube) for all the menu options to get the Canon R5 set up how I liked. This is more work with each new camera I've owned, but overall the configurability is a very good thing. Took me ~2 hours including research & fiddling.

Truchas peaks in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains at sunset tonight. Canon R5 with 800mm f11 lens, 1/250 sec at ISO1000. I'm not entirely happy with the sharpness/focus of this lens — probably atmospheric wobbles deserve much of the blame to be fair — but it does have mongo reach.

In contrast, Canon's RF 70-200mm f2.8 is fantastic (and much pricier). Sharp-o-rama. Here's the post-sunset sky. 172mm, f2.8, 1/60 sec, ISO 100. Santa Fe Baldy to the left, Santa Fe Ski Basin to the right. (Shot with Canon EOS R5 if you're new to this thread.)

Some atmospheric distortion here, but otherwise a good long shot of this VLBA (Very Long Baseline Array) radio telescope with the Canon R5. 800mm, f11, 1/320 sec, ISO 160. VLBA background: public.nrao.edu/telescopes/vlb…

This is one of a sequence of 15 shots as he was running laterally and then straight toward me, with eye tracking AF. Every shot's focus was spot on. Impressive. RF 70-200mm f2.8 lens on the Canon R5 I'm testing. 153mm, f2.8, 1/1600 sec, ISO100.

The Canon R5 gobbles batteries — I'd say ~1/2 to 1/4 the shots on my 5D4, and that's with the new higher capacity battery. I have various power-sucking options enabled, though. This is typical for mirrorless cameras that run the sensor all the time, but Sony manages power better.

Today's coyote in the snow, shot through a window but still pretty sharp with the new RF 70-200mm f2.8 lens. Again the eye tracking autofocus on the Canon RF was impressive, once I fumbled to change modes. 187mm, 1/400 sec, f2.8, ISO 500. (Why didn't I zoom to 200mm? No idea.)