Canon EOS 40D Review
Review Date: September 22nd 2007
Leave
a comment about this Review
Image Quality
All of the sample images in this Review were taken using the 10 megapixel Fine
JPEG setting, which gives an average image size of
between 3-5Mb.
Noise
There are 6 ISO settings available
on the Canon EOS 40D which you can select at
any time. The
40D offers an ISO range from 100-1600, plus an extra ‘HI’
setting corresponding to ISO 3200. Noise does increase with
higher ISOs, but the quality holds up very well. Here are
some 100% crops which show the noise levels for each ISO
setting:
Sharpening
Here are two 100% crops which have
been Saved as Web - Quality 50 in Photoshop. The right-hand
image has had some sharpening applied in Photoshop. The 40D’s
JPEGs are not as sharp as its RAW files. This seems to be
a characteristic of EOS SLRs in general, and can be annoying.
It’s not obvious, though, except in areas with finely-textured
detail. JPEGs improve with sharpening, but not enough to
make up the difference.
RAW Format
The Canon EOS 40D enables users to capture both JPEG and RAW format files.
We've provided a few RAW samples for you to download and
evaluate.
Download
Example #1
Download
Example #2
Download
Example #3
Chromatic Aberrations
The Canon EOS 40D's 18-55mm kit lens handled
chromatic aberrations excellently during the review, with
barely perceptible levels of coloured fringing mainly present
around the edges of objects in high-contrast situations,
as shown
in
the example below.
Macro
The close-focusing ability will depend on the lens fitted to the Canon EOS 40D,
but the humble 18-55mm kit lens can focus remarkably close,
and
at full zoom it’s capable of shooting close-ups as well as
most compacts. The first image shows how close
you can get to the subject in Macro mode (in this case a
compact flash card). The second image is a 100% crop.
Flash
The flash settings on the Canon EOS 40D are Auto,
Manual Flash On/Off and Red-Eye Reduction.
These shots of a white coloured wall were taken
at a distance of 1.5m. The flash coverage is pretty good,
though at the wideangle setting it’s possible to see a degree
of shading caused by the lens barrel when the picture is
compared to the one taken without flash. This effect disappears
at longer focal lengths.
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Auto
Flash - Telephoto (88mm) |
|
|
 |
| |
|
And here are some portrait shots.
There’s no redeye in either shot, even though one was taken
with the redeye function switched on and one with it switched
off. The pop-up flash is further from the lens than it would
be with a compact camera, and this helps minimise any redeye
effect.
|
|
Auto
(100% Crop) |
|
|
 |
| |
|
|
|
Red-eye
reduction (100% Crop) |
|
|
 |
| |
|
Night Shot
The Canon EOS 40D's maximum
shutter speed is 30 seconds and there's a Bulb mode for even
longer exposures, which is excellent news if you're seriously
interested in night photography.
There’s no sign of noise or ‘hot pixels’ even during night
shots of several seconds. With longer exposures like these,
the Canon EOS 40D takes a second ‘dark’ shot to show up any
wayward pixels so that the camera can process them out. The
shot
below
was taken using a shutter speed of 13 seconds, aperture
of f/8 at ISO 100. I've included a 100% Crop of the image
to show what the quality is like.
|
|
Night
Shot (100% Crop) |
|
|
 |
| |
|
Overall Image Quality
It’s hard to see any significant difference between the pictures taken by the
Canon EOS 40D and those taken by the cheaper 400D model,
although the results do seem particularly clean and saturated,
so
it’s possible Canon’s improved image processing system is
making a difference.
It’s annoying, though, that the JPEGs produced by this camera show the same slight
softness as those generated by other EOS SLRs. The camera only shows the definition
it’s capable of if you shoot RAW files and process them in the Digital Photo
Professional software provided or some other RAW conversion program. Even so,
the overall quality is on a par with other cameras in this price range.
The Canon EOS 40D’s Highlight Tone Priority mode is designed improve the highlight
rendition – digital cameras are often accused of producing
harsh or ‘blown’ highlights
with no detail. It does make a difference, but you have to look quite hard to
notice it, and it’s not really any kind of breakthrough. The exposure system is very good indeed, and the multi-pattern metering reliably
produce great shots with no user intervention. The same goes for the auto white
balance, which even worked well in artificial lighting. Of course, if you want
precise and predictable colour, it’s still better to work with the white balance
presets.
 PhotographyBLOG
is a member of the DIWA
organisation. Our test results for the Canon EOS 40D have been submitted to DIWA
for comparison with test results for different samples of
the same camera model supplied by other DIWA
member sites.
Compare Prices
Support PhotographyBLOG: Buy the Canon EOS 40D from
one of our affiliate retailers:
|
RSS
Feeds
