Canon R6 Review for Wildlife Photography

hi i'm charles from pangolin photo support and this is the canon r6 [Music] the last couple of weeks i was privileged to test the canon r6 here in the field in chobi national park so in this video i'll be sharing my thoughts with photos and videos of the camera's build quality the image quality autofocus and animal eye tracking its low light capabilities and my conclusion if the r6 is any good for wildlife photography [Music] this video is not sponsored by canon but i would like to thank canon south africa for borrowing us their canon r6 and some other gear for testing so stay tuned for more reviews to come although most of the hype in the mirrorless world over the last few months was about the canon eos r5 with its 45 megapixel sensor and 8k video capabilities i as a wildlife photographer was more interested in his little brother the r6 and you might ask why well pixel count is only one measure of image quality and an indication of the r6 qualities especially in a low light performance is that its 20 million pixel full-frame sensor is closely related and its processor is exactly the same as canon's flagship the 1dx mark iii the go-to camera for most wildlife and sports photographers this means that for two and a half thousand us dollars i can get similar image quality and low light performance than buying canon's top of the range one dx mark iii for six and a half thousand us dollars and on top of that the r6 share most of the new and exciting skill sets of the more expensive r5 like the built-in stabilization continue shooting at up to 12 frames per second using the mechanical shutter and up to 20 with the electronic shutter the same rear controls the same screen articulation and crucially the same superior autofocus system including animal eye tracking although the r6 is a hybrid camera designed to meet the demands of both photographers and videographers this review is more concentrating on the photography side of things let's first have a look at the cameras built i'm very happy with how the camera sits on my hand it has a deep grip like i am used to from all my canon cameras and the body feels solid but weighs only 680 gram including batteries half the weight of my 1dx mark ii coming from a canon dslr i could adapt seamlessly as the menu system and button layout is almost identical and provides plenty options to customize the camera there are three dials the index finger dial a large style on the back and new for me coming from a dslr is the dial on the top play by default it's used to change the iso since there isn't a dedicated iso button anymore however all three dials can be said to operate what you find most useful with the key advantages being that you don't have to take your eye from the viewfinder the af joystick or multi-controller is positioned closer to the viewfinder than on canon dslrs but i quickly got used to it i did find though that the quick menu info and magnify buttons are difficult to distinguish by touch and it's easy to press the wrong one with the camera up to your eye something i do miss is the lcd screen on top i am very used to glance at it when picking up my camera this usually gives me the chance to adjust settings much quicker when now i have to either tell the camera to look on the back screen or wait until my eyes on the viewfinder i also wish there was a quicker way to switch between photo and video mode rather than having to switch the top dial back and forth which doesn't come as natural to me pressing the record button will start a recording but gives no option to adjust any settings beside exposure and compensation only the movie dial will give you access to full manual control and separates the movie settings from stalls however these aren't deal breakers for me and in contrast i am loving the articulated touch screen for low angle shots and having an electronic viewfinder for immediate feedback on color white balance and exposure the quality of the viewfinder is a little bit lower than the r5 but definitely competitive for its class with the high refresh rate enable i didn't experience any lagging and although there is blackouts when shooting with the mechanical shutter i found it only to be visible on the single shot in burst mode it is so quick that i don't even noticed it there are two uhs two sd card slots for storage and with the cameras relatively low pixel count it means that it can shoot over a thousand bursts in jpeg and hive or around 240 photos in raw format before it will slow down and buffer i generally prefer the faster and more robust cf express card but on the upside the sd cards are more affordable and i don't need to invest in another cf express card reader although the r6 uses a new battery with a capacity boost of 14 i appreciate that they kept the form of its predecessor so i can still make use of the batteries from my older 7d2 and 5d4 the new lp e6 nh battery is rated to get around 380 shots per charge when using the evf but i managed to get more than double than that with just a few tweaks in the menu you can check out the video link on top for more information on that and some other helpful wildlife settings on the r6 and as always if you like to support us please take time and like the video as a wildlife photographer i would definitely opt to buy a battery grip with this camera it is a lot of extra money but it doubles the camera's endurance it nicely balance the weight of my 500 millimeter prime lens and i can make use of the vertical grip and buttons as i'm used to from my 1dx2 now there is basic weather sealing on the r6 but less extensive than on the pro bodies it feels nicely and solid but for peace of mind i'll probably won't take it out in heavy rain like with my 1dx mark ii when testing the r6 i was most excited to see whether it could match up with my dslr in terms of autofocus speed and accuracy and i must say i'm impressed thanks to canon's dual pixel autofocus 2 in which every pixel can be used for face detection autofocus works exceptionally well even in low light in addition having focused area coverage across the entire frame is a huge advantage when tracking birds in flight and composing especially with larger animals canon has provided a good array of focus area selection modes and made it very easy to cycle through them via the a of area and manual function buttons but it's the eye detection and tracking mode that i really wanted to test i shot with autofocus set to track across the entire frame with eye detection on and subject to detect set to animals canon said works with cats dogs and birds but it did a decent job on wild animals as well birds however were the species where i found are eye tracking that work at its best have you ever seen the eye of a red bishop they are black on a black face there is no real contrast there to speak of and yet the r6 picks up the eye with mesmerizing accuracy even when the bronze he sits on is swinging in the wind and i'm photographing from a moving boat achieving focus on birds in mid air has never been so easy and is probably my favorite time to make use of the animal eye tracking of course it isn't flawless and whenever it can't pick up the eye it enlarges its outer focus zone and simply track the head or entire subject instead and although the camera doesn't lose focus on the subject this can be a disadvantage when shooting on a wide aperture where the depth of field is so small that focusing anywhere by the eye can ruin the shot i found this to be even more true when focusing on larger mammals as the distance between the eyes and other body parts like ears and noses that the camera likes to lock on is greater don't get me wrong it still does a pretty good job but without you having any control over it so the days of pre-selecting an auto focus point aren't quite gone yet and i definitely had to switch between the two systems it takes a while to get used to but once you do it provides a whole new shooting experience as a little tip whenever the eye tracking is lost on an animal use a single focus point and regain focus on the subject before switching back to tracking this seems to do the trick in most cases there were a few occasions where autofocus needed a bit of help when the subject was far from the background and focus accidentally locked on infinity the only solution was to manually focus to give the autofocus something to look for and only then could i grab the subject again allow me to demonstrate i placed the owl far away from the background and then focused on infinity trying to refocus on the little l in front isn't a problem for my dslr 1dx mark ii whereas the r6 just stay locked on the background and i have to help out with manual focus until the cameras find definition again if you have a mirrorless camera regardless the brand and you have experienced this issue as well please let us know in the comments down below so while the animal eye autofocus can struggle to find its mark at times it is an incredible tool to be able to reach for and i can finally compose my image without having to shift the focus point around to be fair though composing your images has generally become much easier with an improved joystick that moves smoothly and an added option to use the rear screen as an autofocus touchpad although i still prefer the former something i noticed was that the spot af point is quite a bit larger than on my dslr and therefore i am less precise when focusing not sure why this is as in the eye tracking mode smaller points exist if any of you maybe knows let us know in the comments down below if you are a canon dslr user like me eyeing up the eos r you probably won't go out and buy a new set of rf lenses straight away but instead use your existing ef lenses via canon's rf ef mount adapter i have tested my canon 100 to 400 mark ii my canon 500 mark ii and the third party sigma 150 to 600 millimeter contemporary lens on the r6 and all of the lenses work flawlessly to their abilities the only difference was that there was a minimal restriction on the focus area when using the sigma lens i also use my canon 1.4 mark iii teleconverter on both my 500 millimeter and 100 to 400 millimeter mark ii lenses in combination with the rf ef adapter mount and it worked perfectly focus was quick and precise without any restrictions on the focusing areas and of course as usual you will lose a stop of light but that is all the compromise there is with its 20 million pixel sensor the eos r may not capture as much details as its rivals but it makes up for this in other aspects of image quality the larger pixels can take in more light and with a standard sensitivity range of iso 100 200 and 2400 this camera's low light performance is outstanding at low sensitivities it delivers finely detailed images with attractive color and barely any noise plus the low isodynamic range is remarkable at iso 250 i could pull up the shadows all the way to retrieve details in elephant skin without any visible loss of quality there's barely any dropping quality on increasing the sensitivity to either thousand six hundred but let's look at iso eight thousand noise free it isn't but what you've got here looks like foam grind rather than anything terrible disruptive and unlike some cameras at such a high iso there isn't a color shift to content with with a little more work in post you could reduce the noise particularly in the defocus background even more the next image is at twelve thousand eight hundred again it's grainy noticeably so is the background but the areas of the fine detail looks really sharp and i have no hesitation at all shooting at high iso if the situation's demands it's only at iso 25600 that noise has a real impact we'll find details starting to blur and color saturation fading but still i would consider it usable if something once in a lifetime unfold in front of me overall the r6 sensor delivers an excellent image quality and even can produce beautiful large prints perhaps not billboard size but few people need that anyway and i really appreciate that the raw files aren't that huge the five axis in body stabilization is also very effective when shooting in low light canon claims up to 8 stops of shake reduction with supported lenses and i got sharp shots down to a 15th of a second with a stabilized lens giving that animal was static of course the stabilization isn't only useful in low light though but for everyone capturing video 2 making it far more stable to film out of the hand switching our attention to video the eos r allow recording at 4k resolution up to 60 frames a second switch to full hd and you also get 120 frames per second high frame rate option something that i like to use a lot just be aware that there will be no sound recorded at this frame rate canon log gives output suitable for color grading in post-production and a zebra pattern display is available to warn of overexposure the camera will shoot video in an auto exposure mode if you hit the record button during normal shooting or there's a full movie exposure mode which gives you access to a lot more control the great thing about using the movie dial is that this uses its own settings distinct from those used in the stills mode this means you can jump back and forth without the settings you're using for one impacting the other although overheating generally isn't an issue for me as i normally film very short clips i have used this camera for flogging style production where we did film full hd 60 frames a second on and off for roughly about four hours in the sun around 30 degrees celsius just before finishing up the overheat symbol came on and i had to wait a few minutes before being able to film the last sequence other than that i didn't film long enough to have any other issues let's wrap things up by counting down the three things i like about a camera and three things i don't starting off with the negatives number one it might seem minor to some but i really wish that the r6 had a top lcd screen like my other cameras to quickly check my settings out in the field number two i would have appreciated if there was a much easier way to switch from photo mode to video mode with separate settings and full control especially from a hybrid camera like this number three the autofocus occasionally locking on the background although this only have happened a few times it could cost me valuable shots and i would expect the camera to be able to refocus on the subject in an instant once focus is lost i really hope that this can be solved in future firmware updates let's talk about the amazing things number one the extremely quiet but efficient shutter 12 frames per second mechanical and up to 20 frames per second on electronical shutter is handy for any wildlife photographer and although i love the shutter sound of my 1dx i do see the benefit of operating almost silently especially when dealing with wildlife number two how brilliantly the camera works with ef lenses via the ef rf adapter a big advantage for me being able to use all my existing glass without compromise number three of course the animal eye tracking what a great add-on to canon's brilliant autofocus system that will help to increase my birds in flight keep it right so would i buy the eos r6 yes as a secondary body to my 1dx mark ii i wouldn't hesitate i currently own the 5d mark 4 in addition to my pro body and testing the eos r6 convinced me to be willing to trade my 5t4 for this mirrorless camera animal eye tracking a much faster frame rate and in body stabilization is worth much more for me than the higher pixels of the 5d mark iv having said that as a professional wildlife photographer i'm definitely not ready yet to let go of my 1dx mark ii just yet the strong and robust bolt the excellent weather ceiling a battery life that can keep me going for much longer and in my opinion a slightly faster focus acquisition are important factors that i can't ignore but the canon r6 is also not meant to be a pro body nevertheless i still recommend this camera to any professional wildlife photographer as a decent second body for half the price of a full pro body camera and of course to all the enthusiastic amateurs out there that mainly want a great photo camera with the benefits of shooting short high-res videos if you are concerned about a relatively low pixels i can assure for most users 20 million pixels is plenty even printing large files with high izers will create beautiful images with sharp details and great color thank you for watching this review and don't forget to subscribe to see a detailed comparison between the r5 and r6 coming soon and as always leave a comment down below how you like this video bye bye and see you soon

Channel: Pangolin Wildlife Photography

Views: 49,587

Keywords: canon r6 review, canon r6 review for video, canon r6 review photography, canon r6 review wildlife, canon r6, canon r6 for wildlife, canon r6 real world review, canon eos r6 review, is the canon r6 good for wildlife photography, r6, review, canon eos r, canon eos r6, canon eos r6 for wildlife photography, canon eos r6 video, canon full frame mirrorless camera eos r, canon mirrorless, canon r5, canon r5 vs r6, canon rf, eos r6, eos r6 footage, eos r6 vs eos r

Id: EN2PZmf5u6Y

Length: 21min 21sec (1281 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 21 2021