First 4K Footage from Canon’s 1D C Surfaces

Back in April of this year, Canon officially announced its EOS 1D C: a 4K cinema DSLR. And even though consumers (with significant amounts of spare cash) won’t be getting their hands on it until sometime late this year, the first 4K video sample from the camera surfaced a few days ago.

Unfortunately the video had to be scaled down to 1920 x 1080 24p from the original 4K for Vimeo, but EOSHD does have a short 4K sample available for download on their website if you want to see the true resolution in action and you actually have a monitor that can support it.

Sadly, EOSHD’s first impressions of the full 4K file weren’t as stellar as you might hope. The video is “soft” and “not near what true 4K should look like;” although, to be fair, they consider the only “true 4K” cinema camera on the market to be the Sony F65, which retails for 70 grand. It’s also worth bearing in mind that this sample was shot with a pre-production model, and could be lower quality than what we’ll see from the final product.

But even with the rumored price dropping from $15,000 down to $12,000, and even if the final product performs better than expected, its form factor and lack of other important features (25p, an ND filter and slow mo) may still keep the 1D C from being a 4K hit with consumers and Hollywood studios alike.