CANON EOS C500 MARK II GEAR
ENDURING CLASSIC CANON PASSES THE TEST OF TIME The proven C500 Mark II is now the brand’s full-frame flagship – and more affordable following a price cut C amera technology moves at an incredible pace, with new models hitting the market all the time, usually WORDS AND PHOTOS ADAM DUCKWORTH
boasting all the latest innovations and a significant increase in price. Yet there’s one camera so advanced that even now – three years after launch – it has spec exceeding pretty much everything else on the market. Best of all, its price has just been cut massively to £10,543/$10,999 body only. That’s the Canon EOS C500 Mark II. We first tried it out in prototype form in 2020 and fell in love with pretty much everything – apart from the steep price of £16,999/$15,999. Back then, we said that if you could stretch to it, it’s a camera the majority of filmmakers could harness for most paid jobs and get better results than ever. Much of that is thanks to the convergence of all the latest tech packed into one body. We stand by that conclusion. But now that it’s more affordable, it’s become an incredible buy for independent filmmakers. It still has fantastic low-light performance and shallow depth- of-field you can only get with a full-frame sensor, high-tech AF that really works, in-body image stabilisation and manageable Raw files you can record without an external unit – all in the body of a multi-purpose cinema camera.
The C500 Mark II is a hybrid of Canon tech borrowed from the firm’s cine cam range at both the affordable and super-exotic ends of the market. It blends it all into a camera that’s not a jack-of-all- trades, but a master of them. It has the same 5.9K full-frame sensor as the C700 FF, which cost a whopping £31,490/$33,000 and recorded in 16-bit Raw, though was intended for multi-crew use. The C500 Mark II is designed for a single operator and uses 12-bit Canon Raw Light, recording to a pair of CFexpress cards. It also offers 4K 4:2:2 10-bit XF-AVC, making it broadcast-ready with a richly detailed codec. The C500 Mark II is a do-all machine – you can strip it down for gimbal or drone use, but also build it into a broadcast or cinematography rig with extension units. By bolting on the side grip, it makes it easy to handhold as well as providing more control buttons. Fasten the top handle and screen bracket and you have a perfectly serviceable camcorder. At the rear is a port where you can plug in one of the accessories, such as the EVF. This tiltable, 1.77m dot OLED viewfinder is solid, bright and has an adjustable dioptre wheel.
In its place you can mount two different units. The slimline Extension Unit 1 EU-V1 offers Ethernet, an RS-422 socket and genlock/sync out options. The larger Extension Unit 2 EU-V2 has a V-Mount plate for bigger batteries, two XLR ports, a 12-pin lens terminal and 24v DC out to power other peripherals, turning the camera into a broadcast- and streaming-ready production unit. Even the standard 12G-SDI interface offers four times the speed of 3G-SDI, enabling 4K 50/60p output with a single cable, while HDMI output allows 4K 50/60p. The standard EF mount can be unbolted in seconds and replaced with an EF Cinema Lock mount, which is ideal for cine primes with a follow focus rig attached, or a PL mount which supports the Cooke/i system to communicate lens data to the camera. But stick to Canon EF lenses and its Dual Pixel CMOS technology uses on-sensor AF sites that cover 80% of the frame and track moving subjects well. You can touch the screen and set a focus point, and the camera will track the subject. Or by touching a different point on the screen, the camera will rack focus.
CODEC KING The Canon does offer Raw shooting, but the XF-AVC is a great alternative and edit-ready
EASY ACCESS All the main controls are on the left side of the body, complete with customisable function buttons and the twin CFexpress card slots
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