Would you pay $30 grand for a two-megapixel camera? Not in 1972; like right now. Before you strain your superior rectus rolling your eyeballs, consider this: We're talking about a full-frame camera with a special sensor that has an ISO equivalency of 4 million. That's some serious bleeding-edge-of-the-future stuff, even if the camera in question looks like a century-old Kodak Brownie.
The Canon ME20F-SH is your ticket to the two-comma ISO club, and Canon claims it'll capture accurate colors with little to no noise in low light. You'll need to wait till December to buy it, but it'll see through the dark. But keep in mind that this camera is built to shoot HD video rather than stills. That's a big reason for that 2-megapixel sensor, which provides ample resolution to capture 1920x1080 video at 60p, 24p, and 30p. If you have any Canon full-frame EF lenses in your arsenal, they'll all work with this night-prowler.
When it comes to low-light performance, that super-low resolution has major benefits. Because it's a full-frame sensor, the low resolution translates to massive photosites. Bigger photosites translates to better low-light performance without the pock-marky noise you'll get out of smaller photosites. Bigger pixels collect light more effectively, which allows a camera like the ME20F-SH to ramp up the ISO to ridiculous levels without much image-destroying noise.
Canon says the camera can capture solid HD video at light levels down to 0.0005 lux. That might be sensitive enough for a trained firefly to illuminate a scene for you; a sample video shot by an earlier iteration of the camera successfully used a few sticks of burning incense as a light source.
So with that price and those kind of specialties, who is this camera for? Canon is obviously positioning it toward independent filmmakers, albeit ones that need good color fidelity and no noise at fast frame rates in low light. Spelunkers? Subway explorers? If you need the world's most extravagant security camera or have always dreamt of remaking Barry Lyndon without a million-dollar F0.7 lens, this is the camera for you.
