Lost in the clutter of last night's announcement of the EOS 1D Mark IV digital SLR, was a curious press statement regarding the 5D Mark II.

According to a press release that, at the time of this writing, only appears to be issued by Canon Europe not Canon U.S.A., Canon is developing firmware for the 5D Mark II to enable the camera to shoot high definition 1080p video at 24 and 25fps. Those frame rates have been a highly requested feature among photographers since the 5D Mark II was announced a little over a year ago.

The firmware update is slated to be ready in the first half of 2010, according to the press release, the full text of which, is below.


PRESS RELEASE

Canon EOS 5D Mark II: Statement on Firmware Development

Canon today announces that it is currently developing a firmware update to the EOS 5D Mark II to enable the recording of high definition 1080p video at 24 and 25fps. The decision to develop new firmware to support these features has been taken following feedback received from cinematographers and photographers.

Introduced in September 2008, the multi award-winning EOS 5D Mark II was the first DSLR product to offer full frame 1080p HD video recording, opening up a multitude of new creative possibilities for photo journalists, news photographers and amateur filmmakers.  Since then, Canon has continued to develop its groundbreaking EOS Movie functionality, firstly with the firmware update to the EOS 5D Mark II that enabled manual exposure control, and more recently by introducing a choice of video recording frame rates with the EOS 7D and EOS-1D Mark IV.

Canon currently expects the firmware update to be made available during the first half of 2010.  An announcement regarding details of the update and its availability will be made closer to the release date.