Canon EOS M5 Review - From a 6D Owner.

Hi all, I recently had the opportunity to shoot with the new EOS M5, and here were my impressions:

The Good:

Ergonomics – The ergonomics of the camera are great for the size. Coming from a 6D was comfortable and I found my way around easily and button placement is one of the best I have used on an APS-C mirrorless camera.

Autofocus - The autofocus on the M5 is great for a mirrorless camera. I wish my 6D had it in live view! It’s great to see Canon catch up with mirrorless autofocus. As good as it is though, I found it not quite as quick as the Sony A6300/A6500.

Colour – As expected, it has the much-loved Canon colour.

Touchscreen – Being able to touch to focus was an excellent feature which I found especially useful when shooting video. The touchscreen is also great for selecting your focus point when using the EVF as it acts as a joystick.

EVF – Canon have finally implemented an EVF in their mirrorless line-up. Not only have they done it, they have implemented quite a good one! Is it the best on the market? No. Is it still great to shoot with? Yes.

The Bad:

Video – Sadly Canon are still holding back on video. Whilst the autofocus was great and the camera offered useful features like a headphone jack and focus peaking, there’s no escaping the dated 1080p video the camera offers. Had the camera come out in 2012, I’d have praised the video quality but sadly no 4K in 2017 is very underwhelming. If you only shoot 1080p, you may like the M5 but even then, it’s not as sharp as some of the other 1080p options.

Battery Life – As expected, having such a small body means poor battery life. This is something most mirrorless cameras suffer from.

Dynamic Range – Whilst not terrible, it’s a shame to see a camera supposedly based on the 80D have poorer dynamic range. I found compared to the 80D, the camera had lost around a stop of dynamic range at base ISO. The Canon 5DIV has shown Canon are catching up with DR, but sadly not with this EOS M5.

Lens Selection – On one hand you have the excellent line of Canon EF lenses which you can mount with the included EF-M to EF adapter. On the other hand you have a £1000 camera with only a few native lenses, most of which are mediocre. The one lens that I did really like was the EF-M 22mm.

Price – Here in the UK the EOS M5 is priced at £1000 (body only). That’s £300 more than the Sony A6300 (body only) which is a more feature rich camera and part of a much more developed native lens system. I do think £1000 for a camera which does not offer 4K in 2017 is pushing it. Based on the competition, £600 would be a much fairer price.

Conclusion:

The EOS M5 is Canons first proper attempt at mirrorless and in many ways, it succeeds. Canon have finally implemented a good EVF and have great autofocus with the Dual Pixel AF. The inclusion of a touch screen is also useful and the ergonomics of the camera are much nicer than cameras like the Fuji XT-20 and Sony A6300.

The biggest issue with the EOS M5 will always be the level at which it is marketed. To me this felt like a camera I would have used back in 2012/2013. The lack of 4K video, lack of native lenses and underwhelming DR sadly holds this camera back from much of the competition, even though it’s much more expensive. If the M5 had been released with 4K, the DR of the 80D and with a more padded out lens line-up, Canon could have been on to a winner.

If nothing else, the M5 shows Canon can do it, even if they aren’t currently serious about mirrorless. Imagine an EOS M5 with IBIS and 4K video? That would be some true competition in the mirrorless market.

jimbo79 wrote:

Good review, but regarding price, in early May I got minefor £1089 with 18-150 lens. I then got cashback from Canon - £80 for body, £35 for lens. I sold lens for £265. So the body can be bought for less with a bit of effort...

£709 is a much better price for it. I'd still want 4K for that money (XT-20, A6300), but it's certainly much closer.

I don't have any of the issues you raise. In part because I don't shoot video. But, I keep the camera off as much as possible to keep the sensor cool until needed and thereby increase DR significantly (arguably equal to the 80D).  As a landscape shooter no longer able to lug a heavy kit out on the trail, the 11-22 plus 18-150 are a great landscape pairing with IQ that requires no excuses. Or I take just the M 28mm which takes great panoramas and is sharp so allows a lot of cropping.

I've had the M5 for about 4 months and my batteries (both Canon) are still growing in capacity.  At this point they are no longer a nuisance.

The M5 isn't for everybody.  It nails it for me.

That's where I think the M is at its best.

Don Karner wrote:

That's where I think the M is at its best.

I'd have to agree... this camera is a great Landscape unit.  I'm a little baffled by that.  No doubt there was a reason but I didn't see it.  I'm curious now.

Marco Nero wrote:

Don Karner wrote:

That's where I think the M is at its best.

I'd have to agree... this camera is a great Landscape unit. I'm a little baffled by that. No doubt there was a reason but I didn't see it. I'm curious now.

My reasoning for the lower score was the dynamic range. The IQ just didn't wow me as I had hoped. I would love to see Canon create a full frame mirrorless for landscapes. Where this camera is great when shooting landscapes is the size and weight. Carrying this thing around if only for 2 days was an absolute dream.

The DR of the M5 is definitely not in the same league with Sony, it might be even worse than the 80D (I don't know), but it's enough to take great landscapes/cityscapes, in real life photography it won't let you down.

More pics taken with M5 here:  https://www.flickr.com/photos/94074609@N07/albums

PhotoKhan wrote:

With the shutter button half pressed, if I touch the manual override ring on a lens that features it, the image (...in the back screen and the VF, both...) auto-jumps to an enlarged format showing the focus peaking lines, allowing for on-the-fly pin-point manual focus adjustments.

It even works with EF lens that have such ring (i.e the EF 85 f/1.2 L II) and I can only but hope that this is a feature Canon will carry forward to all their future mirrorless, as it is "operationally transparent" and extremely intuitive to use.

PK

This is surely my favorite feature as well ... now that I know about it.  Thanks for the tip.

It should be lower than the 80D ..... unless you are using the 80D in Live View mode.  The sensor warms up when in Live View mode (as with video mode) and heat causes noise in electronic circuits.  Ergo lower DR from the M5 since it is always in Live View mode (when on) so surely its sensor runs warmer than a dSLR not in Live View mode.

I try to keep the M5 off until I'm ready to shoot.  It seems that should improve DR a bit.  Though I too have not found it lacking for my landscape shooting.  I sense there's more room to shoot to the right than I had in my 5DIII.

Interesting comparison, even though several points are not that important to me, and a few I disagree with; the lens lineup looks pretty decent, particularly given the prices, just ask all those Sony users putting Canon lenses on their cameras. 1080p at 60fps looks like plenty enough, given that most people use their laptops and phones to look at videos. But it did take Canon a while to get there.

Regarding price - there seems to have been a recent drop (well, here in NZ) - it is now looking very appealing

Body only, the Canon EOS M5 is NZD 1300 with cashback of 150, so NZD1150

Sony A6000 is NZD 1100 (body only)

Sony A6300 is NZD 1700 (body only)

Sony A6500 is NZD 2400 (body only)

All prices including all sales tax

The main culprit in low mirrorless battery life is that while on the camera is always reading the sensor. With equivalent capacity batteries, if you were to always use live view in your DSLR there would be a big impact in battery life.