Remember the C500? The Canon EOS C500 Mark II 5.9K Full-Frame Camera (EF) is an update to the Canon C500 in name only. This camera is better described as a mashup of the Canon EOS C200 Cinema Camera and the Canon C700 Full Frame camera. Body styling definitely trends toward the C200 with many of the professional features from the C700 Full Frame, including that beautiful 5.7K sensor, squeezed into the smaller form factor.

Affordable Full-Frame Cinema. The likes of ARRI and Sony have already entered the full-frame cinema camera race with their Alexa Mini LF and Sony Venice cameras, but those rentals may price out budget-minded shooters. The C500 Mark II and its 5.9K full-frame CMOS sensor offers the full-frame look at roughly a quarter of the price.

Canon Color & Autofocus. The staples that have made Canon Cinema series cameras a mainstay in documentary and indie filmmaking are still found in the C500 Mark 2. The 20.8MP sensor has 80% coverage for top-of-its-class dual-pixel autofocus, and Canon’s always-dependable color science makes grading your images quick and simple.

Introducing CFexpress Media. This camera features dual CF express media slots. The form factor of this media is the same as XQD but features maximum write speeds around 1200 MB/s. For the C500 Mk II, that means internal 12-bit recording in Canon’s Cinema RAW Light codec at up to 59.94 fps. There is also an SD slot for recording XF-AVC 4:2:2 10-bit files or 8-bit XF-AVC proxies.

Canon EF Lens Mount. This C500 Mark II is compatible with all of Canon’s servo-zooms, EF Cinema, and EF lenses—over 100 lenses, including compact primes, super telephotos, specialty tilt-shifts, macros, and fisheyes. Please note that you’ll need to set the camera to a cropped sensor mode to use some cine and EF-S lenses.