Canon EOS 40D 10.1MP Digital SLR Camera (Body Only)
by Canon
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Canon EOS 40D 10.1MP Digital SLR Camera (Body Only)
Customer Review: Canon EOS 40D (body only)
Summary: 5 Stars
Pros:
- 10.1MP
- Fast 6.5fps
- Solid and rugged magnesium body
- Picture styles and C1, C2, and C3 functions
- Massive and intuitive menu feature
- Dials and buttons for a faster and manual controls of f-stop and shutter
- The kit lens is better than the rebel series'
- 3.0" LCD
- Very fast start-up time and virtually no distinguishable shutter lag
- Plethora of shooting options and functions available
- EF and EF-S compatible
- RAW, JPEG, or RAW+JPEG shooting
- Canon software DPP
Cons:
- 1.6x crop reduces effectiveness of wide-angle
- Pop-up flash is near useless
- 3.0" LCD is lacking in color and resolution
Thoughts:
I've upgraded to the 40D from my Canon SD870 IS and the jump is huge. Even though the 50D and 5D mark II is out, the 40D is still a good value. I've used this over the course of 6 months and I love it! I have taken this exploring many places: in rain, sun, and humid and have used 5,000 actuations. It's rated to about 100,000 actuations so I've fine just shooting away. I've used this body in conjunction with my 24-70mm f/2.8L and 70-200mm f/2.8L IS. It is a solidly constructed camera with those L lenses. A weather sealed package allowed me to shoot in light rain while touring Asia, but I'd dare not shoot in anything more than that.
The 3.0" LCD is nice but doesn't show the full color range as when viewing on a monitor. Live view is good only for showing the composition. It is a bit slow for shooting anything moving. The viewfinder should be the first and only place to go. Also, using only the viewfinder allows you to better brace the camera for less blur. Be sure to use the on-camera highlights feature in review to show parts of the picture that are overexposed.
I don't recommend using the pop-up flash unless used with a pop-up diffuser. A dedicated flash unit like the 580ex II is highly recommended. Using pocketwizards or even just the wireless infrared is a good start.
This is a very nice starting camera. If and when I decide to buy a new full frame camera, this will be a nice backup camera. I use this with 2 SanDisk Extreme III 8GB CF memory cards. Try not to get too big or too small of a memory card. 10.1MP shows up as 3888x2592. For JPEG, files are about 4-5mbs each. For RAW, files are about 10-20mbs each. The 40D has the option to shoot both RAW+JPEG at the same time, but at a reduced rate since the buffer can't keep up. I shoot almost exclusively in RAW, and the buffer is about 6 shots continuous. In JPEG, the buffer shows 99. High speed burst is a good option to use, and I used it for 3 shot bursts.
The manual controls are good. A dedicated wheel to the right of the LCD controls the f-stop and a smaller wheel behind the shutter release controls the shutter speed. ISO, metering, color balance, shot setting, AF, and AE lock are right behind that wheel on the top right corner. The grip on the body feels easy to use and the finish is just right all around.
The bundle that is included with the camera is nice: the industry standard neckstrap, DPP, cordless wall charger, and li-ion battery pack. The neck strap is decent, but I wear it backwards as it irritates my neck. Digital Photo Professional is the proprietary software that is included and it is great for after shot changes for white balance and to a small part, exposure compensation at 1/3 stops. The battery charger is small and does not have cords to deal with; the prongs fold down and plug directly into the outlet. The battery pack is li-ion, charges relatively fast, and looks like 2 AA batteries combined.
Recommended with:
- Canon Speedlite 580ex II
- Canon 50mm f/1.8
- Canon 50mm f/1.4
- Canon 24-70mm f/2.8L
- Canon 70-200mm f/2.8L IS
- Canon BG-E2N Battery Grip
- Lowepro Slingshot 200
- SanDisk Extreme III (2GB, 4GB, 8GB) CF memory cards
- SanDisk SanDisk CF Type I/II ImageMate
Bottom line:
Highly Recommended! If you're in the market for a DSLR and are looking at the rebel line (XSi, etc) you might as well get the 40D or other x0D series instead. The difference is +$200~ but you get so much more value.
Customer Review: Easy to use and the pics look great (Without the help of Photoshop)
Summary: 5 Stars
Things I really like...
Live view.
You can magnify the image on screen 10x's so checking focus is very accurate. Also, you can see the exposure change on screen while you are trying different settings. The same is true for white balance. Not sure which white balance to use? Put it in live view and try all the presets and see which one looks the most accurate. This is very helpful! Live view is also great for taking low level shots that wouldn't be possible if you had to look through the viewfinder. Also, it is great for overhead shots. Works great if you are in a crowd and cannot see your subject. It is also good for candid shots. Being able to take pics while not looking through the viewfinder helps you get very natural pics. (No posing or looking nervous that their pic is being taken) Also, Live view is 100% view. Very helpful! What you see is what you get.
6.5 frames per second. You can get the exact shot you want when you subject is moving. Or, if you don't have a lot of light and you forgot to bring a tripod, fire away and one of your pics will be sharp. You will have to delete a lot of crappy pics but at least you will have one pic that is not blurry.
Easy navigation through menus. The top knob goes from menu to menu and the wheel on the back goes up and down the menus. This is a very efficient way to do this.
Auto ISO
Sometimes I use a higher ISO than I need to for low light situations. Auto ISO helps you choose the exact ISO you need. The lower the better.
Comes with a cord to be able to look at your pics on a TV. I love using this to review photos before I download them to the hard drive. I get rid of the duds before they start taking up needless room on my hard drive.
3 inch screen makes it much easier to read menus. Also, reviewing pics is easier. The screen is brighter than previous models so it is easier to see it in bright sunlight.
ISO in viewfinder.
Spot meter. (could be a smaller circle but this is not a huge deal)
Low noise levels at high ISO's. It helps you get decent low light pics until you can afford the very expensive wide aperture lenses. Also, it helps you get more depth of field when the their isn't a lot of light to work with. ISO 3200 is surprisingly useful!
Custom menus-saves time if you have to switch settings in a hurry.
Highlight Tone Priority; It gives you more dynamic range. Less blown out highlights with very little downside. (It takes away ISO 100 and ISO 3200)
Shutter speed 1/8000. Amazing!! You can use large apertures in very bright sunlight giving you a very shallow depth of field affording you more creative options. I took some hand held pics at this setting the other day and it looked like I used a tripod! I zoomed in a lot and the photo was very sharp.
10 Megapixels. Leaves you lots of room to crop and still print big pics.
Things I don't like...
Flash must be used for auto focus assist in low light. It should have a separate light for this.
View finder not 100% view. (but live view is!)
White balance is not accurate for indoor lighting. I have to use an expo disc or gray card to get accurate colors inside. Apparently Nikon is better at this. Canon needs to catch up in this area.
Having to purchase different focusing screens. The Nikon D300 comes with different focusing screens.
The 40D not a perfect camera but it is a really good camera and the price is very fair. I enjoy using mine and the picture quality is excellent. I am learning that photography isn't all about equipment. It's about finding a camera you enjoy using that inspires you to take pics. The 40D makes me look forward to taking pics every time I use it! Thanks Canon for a great camera.
Customer Review: Powerhorse that last forever
Summary: 5 Stars
I have been using Canon 40D for two years. It is my second camera (my first camera is Pentax k100). It is big, solid and tough. I thought Pentax K100d is quite big, but it is nothing compare to this 40D. The grip is very ergonomic. I feel confidence handling it.
Body and control
The built quality of Canon 40D is excellent. It is made from magnesium alloy body. It is weather seal as well. It is made to withstand plenty of abuse. I dropped the camera once to the ground, and it still performs like new. I think entry level camera such as Rebel XSi would not able to withstand it.
Canon 40D has many buttons and two main dials. The first dial is thumb dial, located near shutter button. The second one is the big round dial located at the back of the camera. I especially like the round dial. I usually change aperture, view photo, choose menu using this dial. To access live view mode, I simply push the button in the center of the dial.
ISO and Auto ISO
The ISO range starts from 100 to 3200. The auto ISO range is from 100 to 800. I hope it is 100 to 1600. 40D handles noise very well up to 800. You will see more noise creeping in at 1600. At ISO 3200, the image quality is unacceptable. The Auto ISO is the biggest disappointment for me. It tends to stick at ISO 400 most of the time.
LCD Screens
Canon 40D has two LCD screens, the main / back screen and top LCD screen. The top LCD screen is clear in the dim light condition such as indoor or evening, but not clear in the bright daylight. To solve this problem, you can use accessory called Hoodman. The top LCD screens is helpful to check out camera settings at any time and any circumstances. It has green light lcd that could be turned on if necessary.
Auto Focus System
Canon 40D has 11 AF points, distributed in diamond formation. The speed of AF will depends on the lens. Lens that have USM (Ultra Sonic Motor) is generally perform faster than non-USM, but some lenses like Canon 85mm f/1.2 USM AF are quite slow because of the complicated lens elements. Some lenses are also better in tracking subject than other.
Favorite features
There is a feature called Highlight tone priority. I think it is a great feature because it protects the highlight from over exposure. It is great to use for portraits, wedding, landscape and so on.
The shutter has a distinctive noise. It sounds very professional. This camera can also shoot up to 6.5 fps which is great features to capture fast moving object.
Competition
Because this camera is more than two years old now, it has many cameras that match or surpass this camera in term of its specifications. For example Canon 50D which has high-res LCD screen, higher image resolution and better Auto ISO. Nikon D300 is superior regarding AF system. It has 51 points and better tracking system.
There is also Nikon D90 which has hi-res 3 inch lcd screen, cleaner image in high ISO speed but slower continuous speed and worse built quality. Read controversy regarding Nikon D90 vs Canon 40D.
Conclusion
This is a very good camera suitable for either professional or amateur photographer. The size might be a bit too big for casual shooters, but after a while you might use to it. The image quality with the kit lens is good, but I recommend to get a higher quality lens to get maximum quality. Even it is more than two years old now, this camera is still capable and robust for you if you can live with its limitation (hint: Auto ISO and LCD screen. Please check out more reviews at my blog radiantlite dot com.
Customer Review: Wonderfully refined upgrade from the perspective of a 30D user.
Summary: 5 Stars
Fuzzy Wuzzy's Summary:
***** Highly recommended with warm fuzzies!
As a long-time 30D user with 5 Canon lenses, I bought my 40D to accompany my existing 30D in dusty African safari locations where it becomes rather difficult to change lenses in areas with blowing dust and to accommodate the need to quickly switch between wider-angle shots and telephoto zoom lens shots. Not to repeat all of the previous accolades from other users and product reviews out on the Web, I will just say that nearly every aspect of the 30D has been improved in the 40D. The various ease-of-access layouts of buttons, options, and menus is much improved over the 30D, as is the ability to customize the various camera settings more to the way each user may want to use their camera, along with nice little touches like displaying the ISO in the viewfinder (yes!). Taking shots also feels nicer because the 40D has a noticeably quieter mechanism. And with the Internet-retailer price of the 40D at the time of this writing being more than $700 cheaper than the Nikon D300, this is a camera packed with value.
The one minor quibble that I do have with the 40D's ergonomics is that I really would have preferred the row of buttons on the back to go along the left side, the way they were positioned on the 30D, instead of being lined up along the bottom back edge of the camera. Every so often when I have the camera slung from the strap, the (Playback) or (Info) button gets accidentally pushed and I look down to see the LCD screen displaying an image or the Info information. I never had the buttons bumped when they were aligned on the left edge on the 30D. The bigger 3-inch LCD screen is brighter than the 2.5-inch LCD on the 30D, but it still has the same 230,000-pixel count. Canon should have also increased the pixel count on the larger LCD, grrrr.
My favorite add-on accessory for my 40D is Canon's Canon EF-D Focusing Screen for Canon EOS 40D Digital SLR Camera While there are third-party focusing screens for the EOS 30D, I really love this gridded focusing screen, and its usefulness has grown on me as I have used it over time.
One additional note... While I have purchased various electronics from Amazon before (including camera lenses), I chose to purchase my 40D from, ahem, another online Internet camera store. This decision was not based on price, since both the other site and Amazon had nearly identical prices, but was based on Amazon's hit-or-miss quality of how well they cushion the products that they ship nowadays. It seems that Amazon has gotten more and more sloppy and careless with how they package goods in the past one or two years, with the bubble wrap and air pillows not sufficiently being filled to hold products firmly inside their external shipping boxes. While having books sliding loosely in the cardboard shipping container is not an issue, I have received numerous CDs from Amazon where the CD case was heavily damaged, and I did not want to risk having such an investment like this camera being thumped and tumbled around in the process of shipping. Ironically, Amazon ships books very securely, with thick plastic shrinkwrap tightly securing the books to a cardboard backing, whereas electronics boxes sometimes slide and tumble too easily inside the Amazon shipping box.
Customer Review: Hands-on first impressions...
Summary: 5 Stars
Canon's new cameras at this level are often criticized as "merely an upgrade". This stems from two facts, Canon wishes to produce a desirable camera at a reasonable price, and they are starting from a pretty solid base. Yet if you look deeper, the 40D is the most significant upgrade in the 10D, 20D, 30D line. Of course, most things are much like the previous cameras. As far as size and weight, it's very similar, although I thought the grip improvements made the camera fit a little better in my hands. (I did not have an optional grip to try on the camera).
Most of the hype will be on the upgrade to 10 megapixels and the 3" LCD with "Live View". While the former may be criticized as merely catching up to the XTi and competition, we must not overlook the 14-bit processing. This is a huge boost in image capability if used properly. Those that shoot RAW, and those that understand the desirability of the "Hightone Priority", will gain the most benefit. The LCD upgrade is handy, especially combined with its greater color range, but "Live View" without autofocusing my not be that beneficial to most. However, something very interesting for some is "PC Live", which allows the user to connect to a computer, view the image live on that computer, and operate the camera (including focus) remotely from the computer.
While the AF improvements usually get second billing, this may actually be the biggest benefit to sports photographers (although the boost to 6.5 fps is welcome). The 30D only used a cross-basis system at the center point, where the 40D uses this system at all nine positions. This should greatly improve the off center speed and accuracy. Additionally, the center point (the most often used) has been boosted in performance.
The viewfinder has been increased in magnification, which should be welcomed to all. But people who must use eyeglasses should be amazed at the viewfinder being both larger and better eye relief (meaning they will be able to see the viewfinder better, even though their eyeglasses push their eye further back).
Durability has been improved (including extending the internal metal chassis inside the grip) making a good design even better. The sensor cleaning filter is also welcome.
Images look sharp, but I haven't really put the continuous AF (Servo) to a real sports challenge (just cars down a city street). Additionally, I don't have any real feedback on high ISO shooting, although Canon has traditionally done well here.
Comparisons to the competition are everywhere. Image quality wise, the 14-bit processing and hightone control can come in handy for more critical users vs. all other 10 megapixel cameras that are cheaper. For sports guys, the 6.5fps comes cheap, as $1,000 will only get you 3fps. Only the Pentax K10D comes close in build quality, under $1 grand.
As of this writing, Nikon has introduced, but is not close to shipping, the D300. On paper, it's all of the 40D and more (12 megapixel, higher quality LCD, more AF points), but at a price rumored to be $1,800-$2,000, body only. Additionally, Sony will soon have a higher end product. Will they have enough more to justify the price? Your call.