EOS 20Da

<p> <a

href="http://cweb.canon.jp/camera/eosd/20da/index.html">http://cweb.ca

non.jp/camera/eosd/20da/index.html</a> </p>

<p> Will someone please translate it for me? </p>

 

 

<p>Happy shooting, <br>

Yakim.</p>

No problem, Yakim. It says, "You thought your 20D would keep you happy for 18 months? Well think again. The nice people here at Canon have found velly funny way to fleece you sooner than that. Next month we will issue the '20Db', then in April it will be the '20Dc'."

This part is very interesting.

The focus adjusting is possible with the liquid crystal monitor, "live view mode"

and 2.5 times more sensitivity to the Infrared band.

Looking at some of the further pages there seem to be a number showing its use in astro-

photography. Perhaps it's a 20D with additional controls and settings built-in which allow/

enhance extra-lomg exposures?

Paul, I meant besides that......

 

Kraig, Could you please elaborate?

 

Happy shooting,

Yakim.

You can view EOS 20Da at the CANON digital house Zero-One Ginza & Shinjuku Umeda plaza S (Shinagawa) "I don't know if this came out right" but apparently it's there on display and demo, and available in 3 months, no price has been set. Does that mean it's free?

from what I read through a translator, it has a live view mode that has mirror lockup and 5x or 10x zoom displayed in full color on the LCD viewscreen for real time viewing and focus adjustment.

yes, the A stands for Astrophotography.

I went through it alittle more, it's a Pre-order ONLY or Purchase order ONLY and that it takes 3 months from the time of the Purchase Order to be deliverd?

<p> Good old trusty Phil.</p>

<p> <a href="http://www.dpreview.com/news/0502/05021405canoneos20da.asp">http://www.dpreview.com/news/0502/05021405canoneos20da.asp</a> </p>

<p> "in use as a 'normal camera' it would probably require an external IR cut filter on the lens".</p>

<p> Summary: Not such a big deal IMHO.</p>

 

<p>Happy shooting, <br>

Yakim.</p>

It would be a good addition for people that spend like $5,000-$10,000 on just telescopes n tripods for telescopes. I think Phill missed the bit about the mirror being locked up for live view mode. The Regular 20D already has a partially transmissive mirror for the AF/metering sensor.

I would think that the ordinary 20D, with the IR / AA filter removed, would be far more

economical. There is a company that will do this for you.

 

Still neat in a gee-whiz sort of way, but it's more for scientists than photographers, just

like gas hypersensitized film is for astronomers and not photographers.

No need to hold off ordering a 20D in the next few weeks then it looks like...

Interesting part is about locking-up the mirror for manual focus with 5x and 10x magnification possible - I might like this feature for landscape shots since Canon removed DEP-mode from DSLRs. Wonder if there might be some firmware update/hack/customization to allow this on normal 20D.

A specialty camera for a specialty group.

I wonder if you can view a live histogram as well. I guess all you would have to do is switch to info display. I think that would be very useful. I wonder if its just a firmware difference that allows this live view and the only physical difference between the two cameras is the filter.

Apparently it has a special mirror to allow the live viewing.

Yes, it's a "special order" item and takes 3 months to be delivered. It's not clear whether this is a "Japan only" item or if it will be available worldwide. Canon have had a number of "Japan only" models in the past (e..g the black Digital Rebel was "Japan Only" for quite a while". Since there's a lot of interest in astronomy in Japan I think it's quite possible that the 20D-A may only be offered there, at least for a while.

<p>

Note there are a couple of places selling Digital Rebels which have been modified by removing the hot mirror. Apart from the "live LCD focus" mode, they serve the same function.

<p>

Note that for the "live LCD" focus mode to work you must have a lens which has truely mechanical manual focus. This means that lenses that had electronically driven manual focus (e.g. EF 300/2.8L and a bunch more), cannot focus in the "live LCD" mode.

<p>

The "Live LCD mode" has the mirror locked up and the shutter open. It's not a pellicle mirror system (which would be totally inappropriate for a camera designed for low light levels!).

<p>

Here's a less than perfect machine translation about the "live" feature"

<p><em>With EOS 20Da you kept in a state where the mirror is lifted, live image of the image pickup element the enlargement color it can be indicated to the liquid crystal monitor loaded "live view mode". Because of this, with just the finder it is possible to do the focus adjusting with the manual whose fine control is difficult more accurately.

<p>

Indication of the liquid crystal monitor are 2 types of enlargement ratio 5 time and 10 times, adjusts to photographing circumstance and it is possible to choose.</em>

Thanks for telling it like it is BOB. Phill did miss the bit about the mirror being locked up for live view mode. It would be really good for macro work, as well as landscape, it's really trying to thread the needle to correctly manual focus an Adapted lens on the subject that you want in-focus.. even if you don't stop down untill after focussing it's not that easy to get it right on the money. If I had all the money for the digital, I'd buy one of these and put my 20D sensor in there all being the same, use the firmware and custom white balance of the 20Da.

The downside is that you'll need an IR blocking filter on every lens for normal use, and they are not cheap. I don't think that the custom white balance fuction will work well enough to compensate for the missing IR blocking filter. In addition without an IR blocking filter exposure could be way off. CMOS (and CCD) sensors are intrinically more sensitive to IR than visible light, so exposure would be significantly affected by IR. That's one reason the IR blocking filter is there in the first place!

 

The ability to focus on the LCD screen at a 10x magnification would be useful for some work though...

yes but. . . the concept of focusing through the lens and using a viewfinder is incredibly arcane old-world-SLR thinking.

 

Seeing the image on the screen for composition is a fundamental advantage of a digital P&S over a dSLR. It is routine for me to hold a p&s over my head - or at knee level - and still accurately compose shots.

 

Now, if you could digital expand the image and use that expanded image for focus control . . .that would be a huge advantage for DOF control or determining focus accuracy when using fast (say, F1.4 or F1.2) lenses.

 

The current generation of dSLR's are very much simple digital mimics of film SLR's, and lack such obviously important functions (in a dSLR) such as ISO indication in the viewfinder. ISO settings in full stop increments is also a paradigm. Why can't I set Shutter 100, F5.6, and have the camera set ISO = 374.2 for proper exposure?

 

Only time will tell if the camera makers start moving away from the film pardigm, and fully embrace the digital potential.

I rarelt need to hold my DSLR over my head....

 

There are reasons why it's better to have a mechanical shutter than an electronic shutter, and with a mechanical shutter you have to use a reflex finder.

 

"Live" LCD displays are only possible by "gating" the sensor electronically, and that leads to lower performance.

 

The "live LCD" on the 20D-A is presumably only usuable in situations where you can afford to do stuff slowly, plus for astrophotography applications, the sensor illumination will be quite low (which helps performance issues).

 

Auto ISO would be nice at times. Some cameras already have it to a limited extent in auto modes. I presume it's being saved for a future "upgrade" where it might encourage a few users to swich. If you gave everybody everything you could now, they'd have no incentive to buy the next model.

Jim, every live LCD I have ever used does not have sufficient resolution to judge focus

critically. Apparently the DMC-LC1 / DLUX2 does, but there's no way I would spend that

amount of cash on a camera that is about the same size as my 10D but is crippled with a

tiny sensor.

Good on them for offering this option!

<BR>Would it really be more expensive than having a specialist company dissasemble and remove the IR filter? ?

<BR>I'm impressed that it is still usable as a normal camera (if at the expense of having to buy certain filters)

<P>A great service by canon overall-usually it's only nikon that go out of their way to make special application models