I just spent almost an hour watching and listening to the ENTIRE Scott Kelby infomercial for the 7D-II. I also downloaded the three JPEG images he made available, each around 2.7 to 2.8 megabytes. My honest opinion of the ISO 640 JPEG shot of #14, the Tennessee Volunteers QB? SOFT. Not much actual detail. The ISO 1000 standing-behind-the-center shot NY Giants QB Eli Manning, made at ISO 1,000? SOFT, not much actual detail. Same with the close-up shot: soft, not much detail. The Tennessee QB was shot during the Florida-Tennessee game two weekends ago, the one Florida won 10-9, during really a dazzlingly bright, beautiful, warm day.
Kelby mentioned this was a 24 megapixel camera a couple times. No, it;'s not; Canon does not have a single camera that has 24 megapixels. Not one. This is a 20.20 MP sensor in the 7D-II, and that's total MP I believe. I am going to guess that the raw files will make better JPEGs, but just LOOK at the images of the two quarterbacks: they suck, detail-wise. There is NO real fine detail. I am honestly NOT impressed, and I think the 6D's sensor is going to be the superior sensor in terms of resolution of actual detail, and also better at higher ISO values. Sure, it's good enough for showing a 5 foot by three foot part of the world full frame with high-end glass, as it did on the Tennessee QB: but LOOK at it close. Then look at a slightly larger segment of the real world, the Eli Manning shot, and look at it only on a 30 inch Apple CInema display. That is a SMALL section of the world, not an immense landscape, which means the detail ought to look simply astounding. But it does not; the detail looks sub-par to me, at both 640 and 1,000 ISO in beautiful, bright, October daylight before mid-October.
He raves about how the 16,000 ISO shots look under the overhead "can lights" in the Tennessee locker room: yeah, so what. There's lowish noise, but damned near no detail, AND the dynamic range is extremely abrupt and narrow. This is the problem: the video is a shill session, made largely on the strength of two days' worth of football shooting in GOOD daylight. The "new" is still on his comments. That tremendous flush of enthusiasm, the factual errors, the misleading few minutes where he talks about the 160 yard distance shot-AS IF it had been made with the 70-200, but it was actually done with his 400/2,8 AND his 1.4x converter...the way that little story was related was...disingenuous...and should have been re-shot and edited to make it absolutely clear; as shown, very misleading to the uninitiated.
I had high expectations for this camera, but honestly, I think the SOOC JPEG images shown were VERY LOW in detail, especially having been shot with high-grade pro Canon lenses. This camera has been kept under wraps very well by Canon. I think that once this thing starts being used to shoot NIGHT football, it's not going to be all roses and chocolates and champagne. I'm not a fan of two-afternoon type, effusive reviews. I am waiting for real, un-affiliated "real shooters" to evaluate the 7D-II. I am honestly extremely skeptical, based on the actual large JPEG images Kelby offered for download, and the locker room stuff he showed at 16,000 ISO? That is shot under CAN LIGHTS, against dark cherry-wood lockers...those images do not show me much at all. I seriously doubt this thing has the resolution for birds or nature, at anything above 800 ISO. The 640 ISO Tennessee QB shot is very weak: NO DETAIL!!!!
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