Re: Which EOS-M camera to use as a webcam
1
icepick wrote:
Do you guys have any more experiences with it? My main question (for the m50, m200 series especially):
- Can I just leave it „on“ all the time (with a dummy battery), and so does it shut off automatically, when it‘s not used as a webcam?
- Question would then also be if it powers on automatically as soon as an app on my computer tries to access the cam
- Basically I want it to act like a „regular“ webcam
Thanks!
Florian
I haven't used the M200, but it has the potential benefit of using either USB or a HDMI capture solution. Same goes for the M50 Mark II and M6 Mark II. One thing to keep in mind with HDMI on Canon cameras is that the camera's screen will turn off after 30 minutes of button/touch inactivity even though the camera will continue to output HDMI. The negative of Canon's USB solution is low resolution (under 1080p... can't recall the exact resolution).
The original M50 only uses Canon's USB webcam utility software. The software keeps the camera running in that mode. Besides the original M50 I've used the M6 Mark II in USB and doing clean HDMI output (the camera's screen turning off after 30 minutes applies there).
I guess technically you could leave the camera on while using your PC, but that sounds like a bad idea in the long run. Keep in mind these cameras are not specifically designed to do this, so the more your stress the camera the more potential of something failing eventually. I've been leaving one of my M50 cameras setup and ready to go for streaming. Though I keep it off and unplugged from power unless I'm using it.
I've been experimenting a lot with the original M50 through USB with streaming. I haven't had any big issues yet. Sometimes it takes the camera a few seconds to work or can rarely fail to initialize when I start OBS (I always turn on the camera first). I'd say the longest I've streamed with the M50 at at time is probably around 4 hours. Total amount of hours so far would probably more than 20.
I'd say don't expect a dedicated camera to completely act like a normal webcam, but it at least it seems like Canon's webcam utility or HDMI output can be consistent.