From Canon.

One of the signal advances for photographers has been the continuous improvement in processing software. The enhanced capabilities for shadow recovery and highlight taming in products like Lightroom 4/5 (and doubtless in others like DxO, CaptureOne and Aperture – none of which I use, but competition always does its thing) give new life to old picture files.

Case in point, my first serious DSLR was the original Canon 5D (2006). When I pull up images from that body in LR5 they appear with an exclamation point lower right alerting me that an older version of LR was used to process them. Update those to the latest version (Develop Module->Settings->Process) and your images can enjoy the benefits of the latest in processing technology.

I have gone back and re-printed some of these and the results really are impressive.

The indoor pool at Hearst Castle.

The above 5D Mark I image has high dynamic range. Updating to the 2012 Process from the original 2003 in LR5 allows easy recovery of the shadows and taming of the highlights with the related sliders. A touch on the Noise slider takes out what ails the shadows. A quick click in the Lens Profile section has the 15mm Canon Fisheye image de-fished for a linear rendition, into the Print module and the 18″ x 24″ print will knock your socks off.

Sure, neither the original 5D or its ‘pro’ equivalent 1DS Mark II had sensor dust removal, but I can assure you that my Nikon D700 did and it was almost useless. You still had to clean the sensor with moist alcohol swabs, as I now do with my Nikon D3x. The price of a lightly used, amateur owned 5D or 1DS Mark II? How about $450 or $800? If there’s a better bargain for a photographer looking to make really large prints from full frame negatives I do not know of it. And you can forget the overpriced ‘red ring’ Canon ‘L’ lenses. The 15mm f/2.8 Fisheye (discontinued), the 35mm f/2 USM, the 50mm f/1.4 USM and the 85mmf/1.8 USM ‘cooking’ variants deliver all the quality you need, at bargain prices. Just avoid the cheap and nasty zooms if you are printing big. For web display any FF DSLR is overkill.

The exceptional Canon 1DS Mark II.

Nikon? There are no FF bargains yet. The D700, which has an excellent low noise sensor sells lightly used for a surprisingly high $1,300, the D3 (same sensor, pretty much) for $1,800.

New prices of the 5D and 1DS Mark II? How about $3,000 and $8,000, respectively? Do you really need the latest and greatest or would a small fraction of the extra money be better spent on a large format printer, paper, ink and some mounting supplies so you can really show your work for once?