Great upgrade if you have Canon glass
By Cameron
Rated 4 out of 5
Date: 2026-10-21
I bought the c80 after previously owning the r6ii. I actually loved the r6ii and used it for weddings, narrative short films, documentaries, portraits, and sports photography. It was a great do-it-all camera, but I decided with the new work I was getting that it was time to invest in something bigger. I have Canon EF and RF lenses so making the switch was easy. I pushed the r6ii to its max in terms of rigging, shooting in low-light/difficult conditions, and getting the most out of it for both video and photo. Moving to the c80, I feel like the ceiling of the r6ii has been broken: internal ND's, triple base ISO, full-size HDMI out, clog2, internal cooling, an overabundance of recording codecs, and a cinemitized menu system. I even tested it against its so-called rival the Sony fx6. People rave about its low light performance and when I paired the two side by side for a low-light noise test (same settings, same focal length, and color checked with a Calibrate color checker), I was pleasantly surprised to see the how well the c80 stood up. I could go on and on about all the great things about the camera but I would be reiterating the specs that anyone can look up.
Downsides: Not as clean/sharp as the fx6. The c80 has a larger pixel density, but the fx6 has larger individual pixel areas that I noticed make it just a bit sharper. I could be mistaken and I didn't use the exact same lens when testing the two, but the c80 just isn't as sharp as I was hoping. Next, no IBIS is a bit difficult. I know cinema cameras don't come with it normally, and I knew it didn't have it from the beginning, it was just something that I took for granted with the r6ii. Finally, perhaps the most realistic, when upgrading from the r6ii to the c80, I realized how good the r6ii really was. I can compare images from both cameras side by side and barely notice a difference between the two. That's all I'll say and these opinions are all highly subjective. At the end of the day, the c80 is a great camera for independent filmmakers/freelancers which is what I am and I will never give up the amazing Canon color science!
The perfect documentary camera
By Scene Alive
Rated 5 out of 5
Date: 2026-06-12
I really love the C70. But I wanted better low light, better autofocus, SDI, better screen, better codecs, better camera plate screw position on the bottom, better key features in the camera, and the C80 went above and beyond to do all that. I thought about it as one that uses the C500 Mark 2, The R5, that CF Express 2 not being on the C80 is annoying. But I decided not enough to annoy me. I love the size, the build in NDs, the image. WOW the image is finally sharper in a pleasing way. Canon usually is softer. One key I'll give to people is if you're like me and prefer the Alexa look to Canon's ultra magenta, you can set the color matrix in each color profile to "production" as opposed to "neutral" and this changes the skin tones to knock down the magenta significantly and matches Arri's Alexa color much better. The autofocus is excellent. The lowlight is wow. I used the 24-105 f/2.8 together with the Camera and with the power zoom attachment. Wow that was all I needed. The image handheld was incredible. The battery life is not as good as the C100 days but I still LOVE the battery life compared with other cameras. I don't always want to use Gold or V mount, so this is a great option when you don't. I paired it with the Kondor Blue cage and Gold mount option with the Core snap system as well as the Core Nano and love it! Plus I attached the SmallHD Ultra on the top of that rig with the new Canon camera control and LOVE that I have control of the most important features. The C70's vertical mode is great. The C80 is fabulous also and now includes something Canon needed to have added many moons ago - a horizon level. The false color is great also. The skin tones are quick to grade. It really is one of my favorite cameras for the size and features. Yes I wish RED had built in NDs. I really need them for the work I do. This has all that. My only gripe is CF Express but I LOVE everything else.