My Canon Rebel T2i experience

GoodLuck

GoodLuck

Well-known member
I'm going to try my best to keep an update on it for those considering getting one. Feel free to post questions in here and I'll see if I can answer any. This is my first time trying to work with a video DSLR.

I took a college photography class and got an A in it but I'm no photography expert. So we'll see how it goes.
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What was in the box ($899 at Arlington Camera)
The camera body (with a lens cap on it)
18-55 Canon Lens (with a lens cap on each end)
battery (LP-E8)
battery charger (LC-E8 charger)
Wide neck strap
Interface cable
Stero AV cable
2 CDs, (software, manual on CD)
Two manual books (English, Spanish)

The camera body (quick overview)
Built in flash, hot shoe on top, lcd monitor on back, a small speaker on the back to hear playback and a tripod screw socket on the bottom. From what I've ready similar cameras that are more expensive tend be made from more of a metal casing. This is a hard plastic casing. It's light and from what I've read, is not waterproof like other cameras.

First thought...does it hook up to a monitor?
Yes. It came with a roughly 3 foot a/v out wire with the red/yellow/white on the other end that I connected to my TV and it works, I could see what I was recording. So it will definitely work on a portable monitor/portable DVD player.

Thoughts on the lens..
The lens is an 18-55 image stabilized lens. This is good and bad. It's good because you can adjust it and it's essentially a few lenses in one. The bad is you can adjust it and it could easily get moved when filming video. The other type of lens most people get are called prime lenses. Those are fixed (don't adjust). 50mm and 85mm tend to be really popular. This cam including the 7D doesn't shoot full frame 35mm like the 5d Mark does. The guy at the camera story said the T2i and the 7D both shoot 24mm with a 1.8 magnification. How this impacts video, I'm not sure but is the main reason why the 5D mark costs more and is still a better camera. The guy at Arlington camera suggested I get a Tokina 11-16mm 2.8 lens and it would essentially then be full frame. He said it was the cheapest most value for the buck lens I could get. Basically a wider lens, you'll get more in the shot. I asked if it caused any warp to the image like fish eye and he said no. They have some 50mm primes for $100 up there but were out. I figured I'd try to find some used later if it's worth even shooting on this cam.

Extra stuff purchased
A 58mm UV filter ($15)
eFilm PRO Class 6 Speed SDHC Pro 150x 16gb card ($90)
Digital Foci USB 2.0 Memory Card Gateway with USB cord ($20)
Lowel Pro Camera bag with detachable lens case compartment ($40)
Portable lens cloth cleaner in a bag keychain (priceless)

The total damage with the $5 lens cleaner in a bag came out to $1,155.33 with tax.

The guy there tried to sell me on a three piece filter kit (UV, Polarizer, ND). I asked the noob question, will it work on most lenses? He smiled and said no, every prime requires a different sized filter for the most part. I was like, then I don't need the kit but I'll get the UV filter. (So avoid buying too many filters until you know what lenses you'll be using.) His suggestion was it's better to crack the UV filter in front than your glass on your lens. I've always kept one on my video cam lenses, so I got one. The card you get should be 6 speed based on what I've read. A lot of that has to do with how much it can transfer per second/minute to the card. This is more important for video so you kind of have to pay it. From what I've read the transfer rate on most Canon VDSLRs is ~44mbps. I think most people are fine with something around 30mbps. But you will always be left wondering if it really matters...if I get a cheaper one can I use it? If I get a more expensive faster one will my footage look better? Who knows. The card reader was mostly to reduce wear on the camera with the ports/SD slot as I'm trying to capture footage. Just make sure it says SDHC on the case and you'll be good for this particular camera. The one I got though support compact flash and pretty much all of them with little slots all over it for a wide variety of cards. It also doesn't have to be plugged in so could be used on the go with a laptop.

Important stuff to know ahead of time..
According to what I've read the SDHC 4gb card holds around 8 minutes of full HD footage (1920x1080) from people who've used the T2i so far. Canon's T2i webpage (link) claims 12 minutes at full HD on a 4gb card.

Based on Canon's testing standards using a 4GB card shooting video
Approx. 12 min. (1920 x 1080)
18 min. (1280 x 720)
24 min. (640 x 480)

File Format Capture at: MOV (image data: H.264; audio: Linear PCM (with internal mic: monaural, with external mic: stereo)

This means you will need an editing program that can handle converting H.264 to something you can edit/color correct. Or something that can cut it. All I know is CS4 (what I use) will allow it to be converted so it can be edited/color corrected. Based on what I've read, for MAC you might need the PRORES plugin to convert it. For PC, you could use the CINEFORM plugin.

However, the H.264 compression format requires that files be transcoded into a format better suited to editing, effects, and color grading; this would usually be Apple ProRes. The transcoding to ProRes can be a fairly time- and processor-heavy intermediary step that pays off later with superior speed once the post production process begins. That’s where EOS Movie Plugin-E1 comes in: It doesn’t eliminate the need for transcoding, but it includes several improvements in functionality and interface, making the experience of editing EOS HD Video footage with Final Cut Pro as fast and seamless as possible.

http://www.usa.canon.com/dlc/controller?act=GetArticleAct&articleID=3249
Click to expand...




Final Thought after purchase..
I bet I'm overpaying for something and can find it cheaper at Walmart or on the internet. Second thought, I should probably buy an extra SD card to be able to capture more footage..nah I'll wait to see if this thing even works right first. Third thought, I hope I don't get robbed on the way to my car. That guy in the store seems to be watching me.
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Getting home..
I get home and remember the guy said to let the battery charge for 8 hours before using it because you can dramatically reduce the lifespan of the battery. So I did that and it seemed to be fully charged fairly quickly. Just to be safe, I left it for the full 8 hours.
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Upon Awaking..
I put in the software disc to install it in the quad core PC and it took about 5 minutes to install and then restarted my PC. The install disc is dual PC windows/Mac so will work on both. It appears to have installed successfully on my Vista machine. Now I'm going to go off and test it out. Wish me luck!
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3 Reasons Why I Bought It

1. It looks similar to 7D footage at a cheaper price
Based on some footage I've seen, it seems fairly comparible to the 7D. And I really like the 7D footage I've seen so far. I researched it and others have said similar. From the comments I've read, some are saying that the 7D footage looks slightly better but isn't $800 better. One guy said not even $200 better. Based on quite a few reviews/comments, many can't seem to tell the difference. However there really isn't enough footage out yet to really know for sure.

If you're wondering how it compares to the Canon 7D, there is a review here with video comparisons...
http://www.cameratown.com/news/news.cfm?id=8813

===============
Canon T2i Highlights vs. Canon EOS 7D:
18.1-Megapixel Sensor (7D is also 18 Megapixel)
Full 1080p HD Video with Manual Control (7D also shoots 1080p full HD)
Selectable Frames Rates 24p, 25p, 30p, 50p, 60p (7D does as well)
DIGIC 4 Processor (**7D features Dual DIGIC 4 Processors)
ISO up to 6400, expandable to 12,800 (7D goes to 25,600)
External audio stereo input
iFCL metering System with 63-zone Dual-layer Metering Sensor
Exposure compensation +/-5 stops
3:2 Clear View LCD with 1,040k dots (7D = 4:3 with 920k pixels)
Select maximum value for Auto ISO (not available on 7D)
Movie crop function (not available on 7D)
===============


2. It shoots great footage in low light

**Watch this**
Canon T2i video preview (rainy day in England)...
http://www.vimeo.com/9712377

Keep in mind that he's out there shooting with no good lighting setup...a cloudy sky, in rain, where it's dark enough that the cars are driving with their lights on. Try doing that with a video camera, let alone with a video camera with an adapter and lenses in front of it to get the depth of field. Pretty impressive, especially at the $899 price point.

I downloaded the video from VIMEO and watched it on my 40" 1080p LCD screen and it looks great. In my opinion the footage looks better than or at least competitive to something shot on an HVX or EX1. I asked a filmmaker friend and he mentioned he thought it looked better than some HVX and EX1 footage he's seen.

I took some high res 1920x1080 screenshots from the Rainy Day in England video playing on my 1080p 40" LCD screen. I then went and adjusted them to see what they'd look like in black and white for those interested...




































I think with some good color grading it has potential.

3. It has potential for multicam shoots
It's got a built in adapter essentially for the DOF (no need to buy a redrock/letus/brevis). You'd be pretty competitive running with a two cam setup on two of these and would be dramatically cutting your shoot time in half and would protect yourself against continuity issues with everything cutting together more smoothly. Maybe even a 3 cam setup to get all your angles with DOF on all of them. When you compare getting three of these for a 3 cam shoot, vs. the price of a used HVX without an adapter at $3k, I'd say the T2i wins, if it delivers. Getting two over the shoulder shots back and forth that match up precisely with DOF, I mean that's a dream come true for me. At least for low budget projects.
 
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GoodLuck said:
From the comments I've read, some are saying that the 7D footage looks slightly better but isn't $800 better. One guy said not even $200 better.
Click to expand...
Be careful with these sayings... Should I say not even $1 better too?

I am surely kidding but what I want to say is that to be distinct can be not exactly better or worst either, just...different?

I wouldn't be surprised if we would find some dissimilarities in the next future. Aliasing for example? LOL
 
Emanuel said:
Be careful with these sayings... Should I say not even $1 better too?

I am surely kidding but what I want to say is that to be distinct can be not exactly better or worst either, just...different?

I wouldn't be surprised if we would find some dissimilarities in the next future. Aliasing for example? LOL
Click to expand...

You're right, I shouldn't have repeated. I found a lot of comments like that on vimeo. It might have all sorts of problems, I'll soon find out and will share what I can. :Drogar-Happy(DBG):
 
Thanks for sharing, Goodluck. I still have to run some tests with mine, RTM and all of that good stuff. I think it's totally worth the $$, especially for someone like me who didn't have an SLR. Just picked up a fairly large $60 Canon camera bag. Better to have more storage space than less.
 
GoodLuck, that was a fairly comprehensive overview of the basic questions and answers people have about the 550d/T2i. Thank you for posting that. It's almost something of a FAQ.
 
Great experience report. I noticed that the lens used in the Rainy Day in England footage costs more than the camera...
 
Hey thanks everyone. Yes the lens he used is quite expensive which is why on my first test I'm using just the stock lens it came with. I will also report back with a detailed overview on what the experience has been like. I should have something uploaded late today/early tomorrow.
 
Thanks goodluck. I am really on the fence about buying one of these and I have only found a couple clips with the stock kit lens. I'm very curious about focus issues, breathing etc on the stock kit lens.
 
Good post - nice to know what exactly comes with it. Bottom line is you must have/buy a memory card....

Good stuff/

john
 
Daytime shots look great, once it started raining not so. I have come to the conclusion that if you are shooting when the sun is out aperture does not matter,but when the sun goes or you are filming at night/indoors with no light that's when the faster lenses come into play.



So My main focus is Music Videos, most of them are shot indoors with light kits so aperture is not a problem. Shooting outside with good Sunlight is also not a problem. Shooting outside though at night can/will give me problems but the Canon 50mm 1.8 has me at least covered in that range. All I would need is maybe a 28mm and an 85-100mm.


Still trying to figure this all out

peace
 
Pretty sweet video, man. Loved the water jumping back into the pipe. heh.
~Mechis
 
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Got this PM..
Hey GoodLuck,

I typed a little more than I intended, but the answers should be really quick if you've got a minute. Many thanks!

Doc filmmaker here in Dallas as well. Thinking of getting the T2i for many of the reasons you mentioned. You talked about recording times in your comprehensive post - was curious if you know if there's actually an in-built limit to time length of clip or if it simply depends on the capacity of the SD/SDHC/SDXC card? I am looking for a cam for my next doc, and I just shot 250 hours of footage about a year ago with the Panasonic HMC-150. We used 5 Transcend 16GB Class 6 SDHC cards, and shooting at 720p30 we could get 98 min of footage on a single card - outstanding. Curious if the same might be possible with T2i.

Also, now that you've had the camera a couple of days, how do you feel about it?

And what about as a still camera? Looking to recommend this to a digital artist/photographer friend of mine and wasn't sure how it stacks up vs. the T1i for instance. Any thoughts would be much appreciated!

Btw, what kind of work do you do in Dallas?

Thanks,
Jared
Click to expand...

I think that overall the camera takes amazing photos. Keep in mind that amazing photos have been taking for years on a lot of the old nikons that shoot 8-12mp. This takes 18mp pictures! Really comes down to the operator, but even on accident you could probably take some amazing photos with this thing. The only way to really tell what that means is to look at some photos that others have taken so far with it by searching the web. There's a thread here with some beautiful headshot type stills...
http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?t=201656

As far as the inbuilt recording time limit. That is a very good question. So I decided to turn my camera on, hit record and wait until it stopped. At around the 12 minute 5 second mark, a message popped up on the LCD that read "Movie recording has been stopped automatically". It didn't drop off the screen, it stays on there so you know. Also the blinking red light in the bottom right corner stops blinking when it stops recording. So 12 minutes is all you can get in a straight record. I then put the card in my card reader to see how large that 12 minute file is, and it's 3.98gb. Keep in mind that's at full hd 1920x1080 24fps. And although it's a 16gb card, when I go to look at it in my computer. It reads FAT32, 15gb capacity (so you only really get 15gb not 16gb). So do the math and you'll see you can get a little over 45.23 minutes on a 16gb card shooting full HD.

As far as pushing the recording limit, I highly advise against doing that. The first few times I messed with the camera I did that and let it run. The problem is these files are not drag and drop like shooting on those other cameras. These files have to be converted from H.264 to .AVI or some other format to edit them. And that can take quite a long time if you have hours of footage. What I did after I realized that is I would stop recording on bad takes and start a new take just so I had less to convert and wait on. That's just a preference, but would really suck if you had to wait an hour to convert something just to get the last few minutes off it. So having the files split up some has it's benefits.

How do I feel about the camera? I think it's an amazing camera. I've owned a DVX100 and an HVX200 and have shot on a few other types of cameras like the EX1. I think the image quality is comparibly better than the HVX200 and definitely better than the DVX100. As far as the EX1, it depends on the operator. Really on any of them, the better operator will get more out of it. But I think overall the T2i gives you a lot of freedom to get really creative with your handheld shots, bringing things in focus and out, shooting in the less ideal lighting situations. On my short Mafia Tech Support (http://vimeo.com/8286280) we shot with the EX1 and redrock adapter and that thing was massive on the tripod. It was hard to move it around. In the old days when they shot stuff they had the freedom to really run around with their cameras. You have movies like Man with a camera. Those guys went and shot anywhere, moving shots, got all sorts of amazing stuff. Digging holes under railroad tracks to get the train going over it. I'm just saying that it's nice to have something light with a built in adapter feature to get filmlike shots with DOF. It's got it's negatives but overall It's really great and if you are following the betrayalfest, some of the best stuff in it is shot on DSLRs. They are really rocking the contest. So it's the user but it's having the freedom to go in those direction too that's a huge plus. And nobody seems to think anything of you when you have an SLR, especially a small one like the t2i. It's such a non threatening piece of gear you could go around shooting b-roll or whatever on.
 
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Shooting/pc transfer...
It's hard to tell if you're recording because there is a little red dot that comes on, says busy and then starts recording and it disappears. Since I didn't read the manual I thought I was recording at one point but wasn't. I found out that there is a little red flashing light in the bottom right corner that will blink when you are either recording or playing something back. You want to make sure it's blinking to tell if you are recording.

While out shooting some test footage, I noticed it was really hard to see the LCD screen. When shooting on a video cam you can hover over the LCD some, tilt it at an angle to avoid reflection and make it work. On this, you can't do that. I went to look at LCD lens hoods and tested it out at a local camera shop and noticed they didn't really help. The problem is when you are out in the sun the light hits directly on it from behind. Covering it from the top and sides will help some but I didn't notice a difference.

I was out shooting stuff for about 4-5 hours off and on. I would turn it on and off a few times in between shots and the battery lasted for at least 3-4 hours I'd say that's enough time to fill up at least 1-2 16gb cards. On another longer round, the battery lasted about 1 1/2-2 hours left on. I then came back after the battery was dieing. Another good reason to have the card reader is if your camera battery is dieing and you need to transfer it. I put the battery back on the charger and it seemed to charge back up in about 2-3 hours and was green again. On the charger the green light will come on letting you know it's charged.

Put the SD card in my card reader and connected it to my PC. It wasn't loading on the drive the instructions said so I thought I didn't put it in there right. Eventually I saw that my computer loaded it on a different letter drive. Transferring 11 gb to the pc is taking about 11 minutes.

Once on my computer, all the movie files have quicktime logos, which is good news. It means I have an installed program that can play them. I clicked on a few files and they load in quicktime.

I went through and watched what I had and deleted the ones I didn't need. Some that I deleted had noticable lens flare (colored circles). Some have said it's from the reflection from the UV filter on the lens glass. I later bought a pop out lens hood. It screws on the front of the lens and pops out in a rubble circle around it. It cost $6 at wolf camera. One problem with lens hoods is vignetting. You have to zoom in some to get around it and it can be a real hassle if you are running and gunning like I was. So I shot my test footage stuff without it after it messed up one of my shots.

Another noticable thing is when in moving shots and wind is hitting the lens hard sometimes I'll get a smudge on it. Other times the smudge is gone. Which really shows a monitor is important if shooting fast moving shots.

A lot of the handheld shots were really shaky and seemed almost too fast and unwatchable. This is really a camera that needs a tripod at all times or a really good stabilizer.

Playing back the footage..
The first benefit, is when you hit record and then hit record again to stop recording, it saves it as one file. When you hit record and hit record again to stop recording, that's a 2nd file. It keeps splitting them and it numbers them automatically which can help when synching up footage/audio or finding takes since most people tend to stop on the best take to move on. Some of the really fast footage (out the car window) was really jumpy. It would move across and then hop, move then hop. It was like it was trying to stutter a few frames by to keep up. At first I thought I had some really bad footage.

Later on I realized that my computer can't handle high bitrate H.264 files. And it's not so much that my computer can't handle it, it's that the software isn't really there yet to handle it to process/play it properly. For example when export H.264 blu-ray compressed files out, they will stall on most program I try to watch them on. But they will play on POWER DVD which is designed to playback H.264 blu-ray movies. However sometimes the bit rate is just way too high and POWER DVD won't even play them.

So when you hear people say H.264 files play just fine on their PC, I don't know why yours is skipping...it depends on the bitrate! Sure a low bitrate H.264 file will play on most, but a high one will likely stutter. I'm on a quadcore with more than enough ram to watch and cut EX1 1080p footage but some small H.264 files stutter. It's just the technology hasn't been fully integrated yet I think on the software side to utilize the PCs resources.

So don't be shocked when you playback your H.264 and it stutters. You have to convert them. When you convert them, they will play smooth.


Editing..
Pulled it into CS4. Tried to drag drop the files and see if it played so I could cut it. Wouldn't play. (tried to do it without converting the files, was a no go)

Went and got the NEOSCENE trial software...
http://www.cineform.com/neoscene
Downloaded it, installed it, ran it. I used the program to convert all the MOV (H.264) files. Neoscene automatically converted them to .avi. It took around 15-20 minutes to convert 9.5 gigs.
Neoscene didn't give me any setting options on the conversation, it was basically just browse/add the files and click start to convert.

Shooting on a video cam is great because you can often just transfer/capture it to your pc and then start editing. With this you have to convert the files and that takes a while depending on how many files you have. The best thing to do I think is to not let the camera run (over record) at all. That way each individual file is smaller and you can go through and cut out what you don't need. You'll then spend less time converting.

After the conversion, my files went from 9.44 gig mov's to 12.7 gig .avis.


After cutting...
After cutting the files and exporting it back out to H.264, strangely enough the file would not play again. I exported it back out at a really high setting. I wanted to test it out on VIMEO anyways to see if it would play. And sure enough, after uploading it to VIMEO, it plays on VIMEO for me. This again reiterates that it really comes down to having the right player. VIMEO has a smart player that can handle processing it and streaming it, which shows that my computer can obviously handle it to watch it smoothly.
 
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GoodLuck said:
The problem is these files are not drag and drop like shooting on those other cameras. These files have to be converted from H.264 to .AVI or some other format to edit them. And that can take quite a long time if you have hours of footage.
Click to expand...
I haven't read anyone mentioning this, but if all you want is simple cuts only or basic transitions and titling, the movie editor in the software that ships with the T2i - ZoomBrowserEX - works quickly without having to convert to another format.
 
Awesome. No worries at all on putting that PM on the thread - probably should've done it in the first place!

Yeah so actually it's stopping recording because that file system can't support files larger than 4GB. Damn.. that's too bad. Any way to change the file system type? Or, the Panasonic HMC150 (though a dedicated AVCHD video camera and not a DSLR), is also limited to 3.99GB files but it will continue recording another 3.99GB file and writes the metadata so that programs like NeoScene (or FCP) will read the multiple files as one continuous shot and generate a corresponding transcoded file accounting for however many consecutive 3.99+GB/overflow files there were. I guess the T2i doesn't do this though, or maybe there's a setting? :) At any rate, thanks for the detailed info! Good luck with betrayalfest.
 
Koui said:
I haven't read anyone mentioning this, but if all you want is simple cuts only or basic transitions and titling, the movie editor in the software that ships with the T2i - ZoomBrowserEX - works quickly without having to convert to another format.
Click to expand...

I think it really depends on your computer, some people might have better luck on a 8 core (dual quad) apple PC. I only have one quad and I'm on a PC. The footage stutters, it's unwatchable so I don't see how you could cut it if you can't really watch it. If you are just shooting some stuff here and there and don't have to cut much than you could probably drop the files in to Premiere CS4 (they WILL drop in) and just cut/export it out. Or you could use whatever else you got. You'll know for sure when you try to play the file back and if it stutters or not.
 
jscheib said:
Awesome. No worries at all on putting that PM on the thread - probably should've done it in the first place!

Yeah so actually it's stopping recording because that file system can't support files larger than 4GB. Damn.. that's too bad. Any way to change the file system type? Or, the Panasonic HMC150 (though a dedicated AVCHD video camera and not a DSLR), is also limited to 3.99GB files but it will continue recording another 3.99GB file and writes the metadata so that programs like NeoScene (or FCP) will read the multiple files as one continuous shot and generate a corresponding transcoded file accounting for however many consecutive 3.99+GB/overflow files there were. I guess the T2i doesn't do this though, or maybe there's a setting? :) At any rate, thanks for the detailed info! Good luck with betrayalfest.
Click to expand...

I don't know. Maybe Barry Green knows? But from my understanding FAT32 is used because it's a dual loading format that will load on apple or windows. Versus NTFS which has longer/larger storage space but can only be read by apple pc's but not written to by most apple pcs. So it's more of a universal type standard thing. FAT32 is considered the universal format Apple/Windows. A lot of USB drives are Fat32 but since they are hard drives can be converted to NTFS. So I think it's definitely possible, making it happen, I don't know! :)

To convert with an Apple computer, most people are using PRORES, just throwing that word out there for people who haven't heard it.
 
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