Announced: | 15 Sep 2014 |
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Sensor Resolution: | 20Mp |
Sensor Type: | APS-C CMOS |
ISO: | 100-16000 |
Weight: | 910g |
Physical Dimensions: | 149 x 112 x 78 mm |
Viewfinder: | Optical (pentaprism) |
Screen Type: | 3" Fixed |
Video Resolutions: | 1920 x 1080 |
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Conceptually born as a “morphing” between the recreational characteristics of Canon EOS 70D and the advanced ones of CANON EOS 5D Mark III, Canon EOS 7D Mark II is actually an updated version of the Canon 7D model, launched on the market in 2009.
It is an APS-C reflex camera with DX-format sensor with exceptional characteristics, both for photos and videos. Canon EOS 7D Mark II is fast, precise and it offers an amazing performance at high ISO.
The camera body of Mark II is not that different from the 5D Mark III or the previous 7D one. Its features are typical of professional FF reflex cameras, and you can tell it immediately. It’s not pocket size, but 148.6 x 112.4 x 78.2 mm. It isn’t also very light, with its 910 gr (including battery).
According to its “professional” status, Canon Eos 7D Mark II is tropicalized and made of magnesium alloy.
At the center of the back there’s the 3” LCD display, with 720x480 resolution. Sadly, it’s not touchscreen, but it has a good automatic lighting system. This makes the image brightness adaptable to the environment, so no more runs to the shadows to see the shots we’ve just taken. Anyway, beside the automatic mode, the display has 7 brightness levels.
On the ergonomic point of view, the grip of Canon Eos 7D Mark II has a well-designed shape, it’s comfortable and secure. The feeling I had was of a professional camera, very solid and well-built.
Canon EOS 7D Mark II has a 20.2 megapixels APS-C format sensor, far better than the sensor of Canon EOS 6D, full frame. This is to silence the “legends” saying that APS-C format is always worse than FF format.
In Canon EOS 7D Mark II there is the Dual Pixel CMOS AF sensor, with a new element: each pixel is divided into two. This way, in live view mode, the Autofocus will be as good as in the images looked through the viewfinder! An advantage that doesn’t need comments.
Together with such an innovative sensor, Canon EOS 7D Mark II has DUAL DIGIC 6 processor, that increases the recording speed of the images.
Burst mode of Canon EOS 7D Mark II is 10 fps for 31 RAW and 10 fps for 130 Jpeg. The Dual Digic 6 processor and a very capacious buffering are the main reasons for exemplary performance, enhancing sports photography and, more in general, action shots.
Then there’s Autofocus, the real excellence of Canon EOS 7D Mark II. Better than the one of 5d mark II and than the pro one of 1DX, it offers different modes. So many different settings that the first few times it is better to rely on the versatile multifunction mode, perfect for many situations.
Needless to say, it doesn’t miss a beat, always hooking the subject and keeping it focused perfectly: 65 cross-shaped AF points and one double-cross-shaped central AF point make themselves felt.
The sensor of Canon Eos 7D Mark II divides the scene into 252 areas, processed by the camera to find the parameters for a well-regulated photo in terms of exposure. The exposure meter works perfectly also with strong contrasts, where light areas and shadow areas alternate. The exposure modes are: m, s, a, p and scene.
Placed on the left side of the camera body, sadly, Canon EOS 7D Mark II connections do not include Wi-Fi, which can be added with W-E1 adapter in the SD card slot. There are audio input and output, plug for the headphones, sync flash socket and remote control port. There are also HDMI and USB 3.0 ports. GPS is present.
Good, even perfect, for any situation – including portraits and landscapes – this camera gives its best when there’s a moving subject to capture, in sports or any other occasion. Burst mode and autofocus make it easier to capture very animated movements. The richest details are due to the amazing sensor.
Personally, I appreciated the different control drives and the possibility to deeply customize the settings, which is not always possible also in high level cameras. The settings menu has many options but it’s rather intuitive. Valuable is the “Q” button – quick – to directly go to the mode you use more often.
Canon Eos 7D Mark II offers three kind of files: jpeg, raw and jpg+raw. In jpeg with high ISO (3200) quality is visibly lower, but such compressed files are definitely improvable. The colors are well-regulated while saturation can be chosen among 9 different options.
Moving to videos, Canon Eos 7D Mark II has MOV formats, Full HD 1920×1080 at 60 frames per second. While recording, you can keep the continuous AF active and change several settings like contrast, peripheral illumination and chromatic aberration. Video quality is really good; not so good is the internal microphone. The problem – common to many cameras – can be solved buying an external mic.
Among the most fanciful features, there’s the silenced control mode, the wind filter for external shooting, the sound attenuators and many others. The maximum length of a video is more than half an hour (one hour in slow motion mode).
Out of the market since 2014, Canon Eos 7D Mark II is now more affordable than when it was launched and cost – camera body only – around 1,700 euros. At the moment it is approximately 1400 euros, a real deal for its value.
With this model, Canon succeeded in satisfying the prosumers – professional consumers. Big time. Extremely competitive in action photography – competing with Nikon D500 especially – it has an enviable burst mode and a very capacious buffering. The 1.6 multiplying factor of the format, besides, is also a big plus, pushing for better lenses. And finally there’s the autofocus that, alone, is worth the entire value of this excellent Canon, which has many qualities and very few flaws.
Review | compare Canon EOS 7D Mark II with | overall score | Portrait | Landscape | Sport | Street | Everyday | |
CanonEOS 7D Mark II | 59 | 50 | 49 | 64 | 61 | 65 | £535.00 | |
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CanonEOS-1D X Mark III | 75 | 68 | 69 | 87 | 69 | 72 | buy on | |
NikonD6 | 71 | 68 | 68 | 79 | 66 | 69 | buy on | |
CanonEOS 850D | 59 | 51 | 49 | 57 | 66 | 69 | buy on | |
PentaxKF | 58 | 51 | 50 | 55 | 63 | 67 | buy on |
The Canon EOS 7D Mark II is a DSLR camera launched on 15/09/2014.
Technically speaking, the Canon EOS 7D Mark II ranks in the best 25% of its category (and in the best 88 of all cameras in our database) scoring 59 overall. The Canon EOS 7D Mark II weights 910 gr and spans 149 x 112 x 78 mm. This means that it is one of the largest and heaviest cameras within its category.
Going into details, the Canon EOS 7D Mark II behaves better than average in its category for:
On the contrary, the performance of Canon EOS 7D Mark II is below the category average in:
However, the technical performance of your camera should be put in context. Indeed, depending on the type of photography you are interested in, each individual camera feature can impact your pictures to a different extent. This is the reason why we developed the iCamRank. iCamRank has been designed to weight all the individual technical specifications of each camera in the camerarace database, depending on different shooting conditions. Thus, here is what we suggest, depending on the photography type you like most:
Last but not least, the price. You can find the Canon EOS 7D Mark II sold on Amazon for a price comprised between 535.0 GBP and 535.0 GBP, which is in the average for this camera category.
Overall, Canon EOS 7D Mark II is a good value for money. However, alternatives are also available, which you may want to take into consideration before taking the final decision. Click here to see alternative options.
Sensor Type
CMOS
Sensor Size
APS-C
Sensor Dimensions
22.4 x 15.0 mm
Sensor Area
336.0 mm2
Sensor Resolution
20 Mp
Max Image Resolution
5472 x 3648
Max Native ISO
16000
Min Native ISO
100
RAW Support
Manual Focus
Lens Mount
Canon EF/EF-S
Number of Lenses
292
Focal Length Multiplier
1.6
Screen Type
Fixed
Screen Size
3.0"
Screen Resolution
1040Kdot
Live View
Touch Screen
Viewfinder
Optical (pentaprism)
Viewfinder Resolution
None
Viewfinder Coverage
100
Viewfinder Magnification
0.63
Min Shutter Speed
30s
Max Shutter Speed
1/8000s
Continuous Shooting
10fps
Shutter Priority
Aperture Priority
Manual Exposure Mode
Exposure Compensation
Custom White Balance
Image Stabilization
Built-in Flash
Flash Range
12.0
Max Flash Sync
1/250s
Flash Modes
n/a
External Flash
AE Bracketing
WB Bracketing
DxO Overall Score
70
DxO Color Depth
22.4
DxO Dynamic Range
11.8
DxO Low Light ISO
1082
Multi-Segment
Average
Spot
Partial
AF-Area
Center Weighted
AF Touch
AF Continuous
AF Single
AF Tracking
AF Selective
AF Center
AF MultiArea
AF Live View
AF Face Detection
AF Contrast Detection
AF Phase Detection
Number of Focus Points
65
Number of Cross Focus Points
65
Video Resolutions
1920 x 1080 (59.94 50. 29.97 25 24 23.98 fps) 1280 x 720 (59.94 50 29.97 25 fps) 640 x 480 (29.97 25 fps)
Max Video Resolution
1920x1080
Video Formats
MPEG-4
Microphone Port
Headphone Port
Wireless Connectivity
None
HDMI
USB
USB 3.0 (5 GBit/sec)
Environmental Sealing
Water Proof
Dust Proof
Shock Proof
Crush Proof
Freeze Proof
Weight
910g
Physical Dimensions
149 x 112 x 78 mm
Battery Life
670
Battery Type
Battery Pack
Battery Model
LP-E6N
Self Timer
Yes (2 or 10 sec)
Timelapse Recording
GPS
Storage Type
CompactFlash + SD SDHC SDXC
Storage Slots
2
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