Canon EOS 6D Mk II preview
After years of waiting, Canon has extensively reworked the 6D. We got our hands on the new full-frame DSLR for enthusiasts
Introducing the world’s smallest DSLR (with a vari-angle screen and full-frame sensor)
Canon’s original EOS 6D is now almost five years old, and rumours of an update have been circulating for an inordinate
amount of time. Now the wait for a new enthusiast-level full-frame Canon DSLR is finally over. Canon has improved things across the board for the new model, and the big news is that the camera arrives with a fresh 26.2Mp full-frame sensor. This can be adjusted to ISO40,000 before you need to venture into expanded sensitivity settings, which reach as high as ISO102,400.
The EOS 6D Mark II also receives Canon’s latest DIGIC 7 processing engine, which is claimed to be an impressive 14 times faster than the previous DIGIC 6 version. This is also the first time we’ve seen the DIGIC 7 employed in a full-frame EOS model, having previously only been used inside APS-C bodies and Powershot compacts.
Naturally the camera records HD video, but for this model, Canon hasn’t enabled 4K capture, claiming the EOS 6D Mark II’S target buyer isn’t likely to prioritize such a feature. Video resolution instead tops out at Full HD quality, though maximum frame rate is upped to 60fps. You also get a 4K time-lapse movie mode that stitches together images captured over a period of time into a 4K-res video.
The body itself is crafted from a mixture of aluminium alloy and polycarbonate with glass fibre reinforcement
The EOS 6D Mark II makes use of a glass pentaprism viewfinder that offers approximately 98% frame coverage. This represents a marginal 1% improvement over the 97% offered by the EOS 6D’s viewfinder, though still falls tantalisingly short of the full 100% coverage offered by other cameras; the EOS 5D Mark IV, for example. Another usability improvement over the EOS 6D is the LCD screen. It’s still a 3-inch, 1040k-dot panel, but now features touch-sensitivity and is mounted on a vari-angle hinge.
Despite the extra screen articulation, a weight of 765g with a battery and card in place makes the new camera just 10g heavier than the original EOS 6D, though it does increase the body’s thickness by 3.6mm. The body itself is crafted from a mixture of aluminium alloy and polycarbonate with glass fibre reinforcement. Canon states it’s resistant to dust and moisture, but stops short of claiming the camera is fully weather sealed.
Wi-fi, NFC and Bluetooth connectivity have all become ubiquitous since the original EOS 6D was introduced, so it’s no surprise that the trio make it into the Mark II. On top of this, there’s built-in GPS, together with a 7560-pixel RGB+IR metering sensor, plus five-axis digital image stabilization for video recording.
The old EOS 6D came in for a fair bit of stick for only having an 11-point AF system with just a single cross-type point in its centre. For the 6D Mark II, though, Canon has employed an AF system that’s very similar to the one inside the recent EOS 80D. This features 45 points in total, all cross-type, with the centre point being f/2.8 and f/5.6 dualcross-type. Furthermore, 27 points, including nine cross-type, remain operational when using a lens – or lens/teleconverter combination – with a maximum effective aperture of f/8.
The new camera also packs plenty of autofocus customization options, and the fact that the system is sensitive down to -3EV further enhances the EOS 6D Mark II’S versatility in low-light shooting. What’s more, Canon’s impressive Dual Pixel CMOS AF system is on board, which should make light work of focusing in both Live View and video mode.
And it’s not just the new AF credentials that boost the Mark II’S flexibility. Next to the original EOS 6D, Canon has not only upped the maximum burst rate from 4.5fps to 6.5fps, but it’s also slightly increased the burst depth from 17 Raw frames to 21. The 150-frame burst depth for JPEG is admittedly quite a drop from the 1250 limit on the EOS 6D, but then a 150-frame burst depth is hardly limiting.
Canon has also added the same flicker detection system that we’ve seen on previous EOS DSLRS, to help maintain exposure consistency under artificial light sources. This is great news when you’re shooting indoors, especially in events or sporting arenas where such lighting is commonly used.