Is the EOS-M *THE* Digital Super-8 Camera?

[webrunner5]

Speaking of EOS M, Zeek says they have a new build out that is pretty dope.

 

 

[PannySVHS]

Holy crap, don´t scare me! @webrunner5 I just discoverd my all time favorite colour palette on the EOS M, which I just posted. Now you come up with even cooler news. I have not been a great fan of the colours from the videos on youtube so far. Only the one I discovered gave me wowsers. Until then the videos always had postpro with very crayon and videoish results. Technically nice but not painterly with thick oils. Now let me check that video with a coffee and some cake. 🙂

[Emanuel]

@Andrew Reid, what @ZEEK our fellow member here has been doing is something truly unique (a new camera is reborn every new build!) no matter how hot fresh changes on this project of a decade will be implemented... This serves the world of pictures in a very exclusive way to my book.

Many places to talk about pictures, not so much one-of-a-kind like this one is : )

Where else we found it with the chance we all have to share it with goodfellas like Don and Marty are, humm? :- )

[PannySVHS]

Goodfellas, hehe, you´re sure you named us right? @Emanuel

[Emanuel]

5 hours ago, PannySVHS said:

Goodfellas, hehe, you´re sure you named us right? @Emanuel

Gotcha LOL : ) Ain't we going towards something fresh more prone to be movie related and very well recommended no less (film) referenced where figurative speech is yet most welcome than ever? ; ) We need then to pay attention to the etymological meaning: good+fellas from informal plural of fellow instead... In the Portuguese speaking world, Scorsese's movie received as local title in original Portuguese language "The Good Fellows" (Brazil) and "All Good Boys" (Portugal) -- no idea how occurred in the African countries of Portuguese language or East Timor though, so let's go in the vibe and try something new : D

[aaa123jc]

It's amazing to see what people are doing with this little camera! 

The EOS M always has a place in my heart. For some unknown reason, it just comes with great colors. It only requires some minimal effort to get it to look good in my taste. Not to mention you can install Magic Lantern and add in many useful features. 

Anyway, a camera which can shoot RAW costing around $100 is unbelievable. 

It's unfortunate I had to sell it last year. Maybe one day I would buy it back and play with the RAW feature more😅. 

 

[webrunner5]

It has gotten easier to use ML in the last year. The duration of time has increased by miles lately. They are a magic camera no doubt.

[PannySVHS]

@aaa123jc and it is one of the cameras besides the F3 and the BMMCC which has a fascination on me. I own them three but have only used the Bmmcc. But the latter one at least for a legit 5min narrative piece. Great image, even better when lit. I have posted a bit of my stuff lately. So always eager to see footage from the EOS M and the these classic digim indy cine treasures! Keep up coming, friends!

[tupp]

I shot some EOSM 14-bit raw clips of a fitness instructor, and threw together this video:

This is not a 8mm nor 16mm crop mode -- it's full APS-C, "1080" crop.  However, it is the first time that I have seriously shot raw with the EOSM.  Mostly I have used Tragic Lantern's all-I h264 mode with boosted bit rate.

[PannySVHS]

Love the colour palette. Most of the people make it look to videoish like crayon. Yours looks like a slick Acrylic painting. Love it. Also love the Oilpaint look. Now you guys, please don´t make fun how I put it into words. Or how the marketing youngsters and influmonsters say, wording. Brrr, what a yiksey word. Anyway, thank you for sharing and showing off some gret colours! @tupp

Yesterday and tonight I bid on a second Eos M but I didn´t win the auctions. So I might have to buy the additonal adapters and second and third batteries separately for much more money. I still don´t have an adapter for my little beast. 🙂

[PannySVHS]

@tupp and others. i got a question, now that I got a lens adapter and played around a little bit. Liveview in photo mode is completely off on my camera. In video mode it shows right exposure on the monitor. In photo mode it was way too dark. How do I change that? I also had to make sure to enable shooting without a lens. I pressed and pressed the shutter release and nothing happend. Imagine that, duh! 🙂

[stephen]

 @PannySVHS - Check Zeek's channel on youtube. He has good tutorials how to shoot raw video with EOS M.  Lots of tips and tricks.

You work all the time in live view mode that ML hack gives you. Histograms are used to measure exposure but I have found they are not perfect. If there is a strong source of light in the frame, measurements are not accurate and number misleading.  But it's RAW you have at least 3-4 stops of latitude for exposure, so no worries if exposure is not perfect. Just make sure you don't burn the highlights. With ML RAW hack I always tend to underexpose a bit especially if there is light source in the frame as a lamp for example. The opposite of what most people advise, ETTR and so on. 

in 1080p it is easy, you have correct live view on screen. Crop mode is very problematic as live view is a black and white image with 1fps refresh rate. According to Zeek you can now use external monitor for framing in crop mode but this never worked for me. 1080p has lots of moire and aliasing, crop mode is beautiful but difficult to shoot.

At the end frustration and quirks led me to the point to abandon  EOS M and ML RAW and sell the camera. Hopefully you'll have a better experience. 👍

[PannySVHS]

Thank you. @stephen I would like to give it a try without ML first. Liveview in video mode is correct in photomode it is way too dark. Testing was one 500th second in video and one 50th sec in photo. 500th in video was the correct exposure. How do i get the same correct liveview in photo mode, which i am getting in video mode? checked all the menues a dozen times. Thanks!

[tupp]

10 hours ago, PannySVHS said:

... now that I got a lens adapter and played around a little bit. Liveview in photo mode is completely off on my camera. In video mode it shows right exposure on the monitor. In photo mode it was way too dark. How do I change that?

[snip]

I would like to give it a try without ML first. Liveview in video mode is correct in photomode it is way too dark.

It sounds like you are experiencing a known issue inherent in the first few models of the EOSM (and in some other Canon models) in which the exposure simulation feature is disabled in still photo mode, when manual lenses are mounted.

Without using Magic Lantern, there are two hardware hacks that will allow the LCD screen show a usable image (but that might not be accurate in regards to exposure):

1. Mount a smart lens (Canon or other brand) and open the aperture as wide/bright as it will go.  Then, swap out the smart lens with your manual lens.
2. Get a "preset aperture," lens chip (as shown in the below video) and touch it to the lens mount contacts of your EOSM (or to the contacts on your smart adapter), then mount the manual lens: 

 

It appears that the Magic Lantern "stable" build has an exposure simulation setting within the "Exposure" tab under the "LV Display" title.

I'm using a nightly build, and the exposure simulation setting is in a different place within the "Exposure" tab.  I can't get the exposure simulation setting to change from "Movie" mode.  Also, I can't get the ML menu to appear when the top dial on the EOSM is set to manual photo mode.

The ML menu does appear does appear when that dial is set to the green full-auto mode, and I see the Canon "Exp. Sim." symbol appear on the screen.  However, even in that mode, I still cannot change the exposure simulation setting in the ML menu.

Magic Lantern "stable" build also offers an "LV Display Gain" setting under the "Display" tab, that evidently  only appears or works in photo mode.  It's may not provide an accurate representation of exposure on the LCD screen, but it should allow framing and focusing.  One can then check the histogram on the recorded images to progressively dial-in the exposure.

Of course, one could use a light meter to more quickly arrive at the proper exposure.

 

By the way, a few days ago, @ZEEK released another super16-oriented video on using Soviet/Russian lenses on the EOSM:

 

 

[PannySVHS]

Wow! Awesome! What a beutiful post and answer! Thank you very much! @tupp

[PannySVHS]

Ok, guys. How do I set this thing up? I download two files: crop_rec_4k_mlv_snd_raw_only_2022May30.EOSM202 and Dannephoto-magic-lantern_jip_hop_git-fd976067652d. Ones is 1.7 and the other 67 MB.

I read the FAQ but still confused. Should I just read it again or is there another instruction manual, outside the depths of the ML forum?

Also, the files are date to the 30th of May. Where do I find older builds, esp the one from 22nd of April which zeek was recommending for 2.5, 2.8K recording, which @webrunner5 posted above?

thanks and cheers:)

[webrunner5]

https://bitbucket.org/Dannephoto/magic-lantern_jip_hop_git/downloads/

[tupp]

7 hours ago, PannySVHS said:

Ok, guys. How do I set this thing up? I download two files: crop_rec_4k_mlv_snd_raw_only_2022May30.EOSM202 and Dannephoto-magic-lantern_jip_hop_git-fd976067652d. Ones is 1.7 and the other 67 MB.

Compiled ML builds are only around 2MB-3 MB.  It appears that one of those files is the git repository (possibly many MB).

To install ML on your EOSM, follow the instructions at 03:14 in this video by @ZEEK:

 

  

 

8 hours ago, PannySVHS said:

I read the FAQ but still confused. Should I just read it again or is there another instruction manual, outside the depths of the ML forum?

A lot of the ML documentation is way out of date.  It's best to find recent online tutorials and/or post questions at the ML forums.

 

8 hours ago, PannySVHS said:

Also, the files are date to the 30th of May. Where do I find older builds, esp the one from 22nd of April which zeek was recommending for 2.5, 2.8K recording, which @webrunner5 posted above?

I don't know where one can find the older builds.  Perhaps post the question on the ML forums?

[webrunner5]

It has been my observation that they get better by the month. So, using the latest one is probably the way to go, but, and a big but if you use the higher end modes they are pretty unreliable, but if you stick to say 1080p that works almost non stop anymore on the newer builds. 

ML is a crap shoot. Zeek seems to have it down pretty well, but I try it and I end up with pink spots and 5 second footage, Ugg it drives me crazy LOL, but damn you want to make it work so bad. When it does work wow impressive stuff. Crazy as it seems the EOS M has the most potential.

[BTM_Pix]

I missed this when it was announced a few months ago but Meike have released an EF>M adapter that has a drop in filter slot.

It ships as a package with both the Variable ND and clear filters but also has a polariser available too and of course supports all AF and IS functionality 

€165, I'd say its very reasonably priced for what it will add to EOS-M rigs but of course thats all relative when it costs more than the insanely cheap prices the actual camera itself goes for these days !

I know for many people using EF lenses goes against the grain of using such a small camera but the flip side of that is that with this adapter and a compact EF-S all in one zoom like the Tamron 18-200mm or Sigma 18-250mm (both under €200 used), the EOS-M can become a stabilised, RAW shooting, pick it up and go camcorder for under €500.