Canon EOS-1Ds Mark III Digital SLR Announced

It's that time of year again, where we see a whole flurry of digital camera announcements. Starting this week is Canon, with the new 21.2 megapixel EOS-1Ds Mark III. The EOS-1Ds Mark III gets a full-frame sensor, five frames per second continuous shooting, lighter magnesium alloy body, and dual DIGIC III processors. The EOS-1Ds Mark III will be available in November at an estimated prices of $8000.

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The new full-frame CMOS sensor allows the photographer to choose from six recording formats, ranging from 21 megapixel JPEGs or RAW files, down to 5.2 megapixel JPEGs or "sRAW" files. There are ten compression settings for JPEG files.

To process all the data from that sensor, dual processors are used to process the data in parallel, enabling the quick performance and allowing much better image processing capabilities.

The EOS-1Ds Mark III has a 45 area AF system, with 19 cross-type points and 26 "Assist AF" points. A new micro-adjustment features allows fine changes to the AF point of focus. Low light performance for the AF system has been improved by a complete EV step.

A Live View feature allows photographers to frame their shots on the 3 inch, 230K pixel LCD. A 5-10x magnification on the LCD can be used to make sure you have the best focus possible. If you want to remain "old school", the optical viewfinder on the EOS-1Ds Mark III has 100% coverage and a 0.75x magnification.

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A built-in dust management system helps keep the sensor free from dust.

Weatherproofing, a sturdy magnesium alloy body, and a shutter rated for 300,000 cycles give a good degree of durability to the 1Ds Mark III.

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