Canon EOS M 18.0 MP Compact Systems Camera with 3.0-Inch LCD and EF-M 22mm STM Lens (OLD MODEL)

I alternate between liking this camera and not liking it. The positives: It takes really good pictures. Similar quality to a Rebel DSLR like the t3/t4 etc. The touchscreen works really well, lets you do pinch to zoom etc, which is really nice if youre used to that on smart phones and tablets. The menu system is very similar if not identical to their DSLR cameras,so if youre used to that it will be really easy to use this cameras menus. Its extremely light, and coupled with the 22mm lens that you can get for this mount its extremely mobile and takes great quality pictures. I did a studio shoot using its hot shoe to trigger the studio flashes and was taking really great pictures with that were hard to tell the difference between my 24-70 2.8 II lens using a Canon 6D DSLR. While focus is slow, its extremely accurate. I had about a 95% keeper ratio with in-focus shots. I was shooting at f2.8 and sometimes in blinding sun where I couldnt even see the results until I got home. Cons: Well, it has a really annoying lag between shots. Every time you take a picture, even if you turn off review, it has some irritating delay before you can take another shot. For any kind of action thats a non starter. The touchscreen can be annoying when you accidentally activate the touch shutter option. That is where it will automatically snap a picture if you touch to focus somewhere on the screen. Quite annoying when all you wanted to do was focus somewhere, and doubly annoying that theres a lag between shots so you not only took a picture you didnt want, but you have to wait a second or two before you can take the one you do want. Also your model thinks youre an idiot :) It has no built-in flash. I know, a camera this tiny shouldnt have one anyway because red-eye will be a problem...but still, in a pinch it would be really useful to have at least something. Even the lamest smart phones have an LED flash. Its too easy to jog the mode selector on top and end up in movie mode etc....that wouldnt be so annoying if it was able to switch modes faster. The battery life is pretty bad compared with a DSLR. Probably since it has no viewfinder, and uses a big LCD for everything, the battery usage is high..and the battery is really small since the body has no room for a bigger one. So I would definitely invest in extra batteries. Good news is that there are really inexpensive 3rd party batteries that work well with it. I bought 2 of those, and now have 3 batteries that I charge before a shoot. Without a viewfinder, its hard to see what youre framing or shooting when youre outdoors in the sun. Youll need to cover it with your hand or use a hat to put shade on it to see what youre doing. Sometimes in the dark, it wont show you anything but a dark screen until you try to focus, but at that point the focus is probably on the wrong thing, so you need to touch the subject on the screen and re-focus....so thats irritating having to focus twice. Once just to get the screen bright enough to see what you want to focus on..and the second time to actually focus on something youre interested in.

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I find myself in a bit of a quandary with this camera. I like the touchscreen to set the focus point and trigger the shutter. BUT, the screen is so sensitive that it keeps changing settings as the camera brushes against my shirt. I find that I have to keep turning the camera off to prevent unanticipated settings changes as I walk. I have a Panasonic GX1 that has a similar touchscreen shutter, but have not experienced this problem on walkabouts. On the subject of focus, the smallest focus zone on the EOS M is far too large. The focus point on the GX1 can be set much smaller. The focus point on my Olympus E-P1 is about the same size as the EOS M, but appears to focus more accurately. A plus on the EP-1 is that when the camera is set to Autofocus+Manual Focus, just moving the manual focus ring on the lens automatically zooms to 10x which then reverts back to full screen a second or so after youve stopped adjusting focus. This is much quicker than the EOS M method of constantly tapping the touchscreen magnifying glass. Image quality (with sharpness set to maximum) is about on par with the GX1, which I would describe as somewhat "creamy". I prefer the "out of camera" sharpness of the Olympus E-P1. However, in both the EOS M and GX1 sharpness is easily adjusted post production. This criticism may not be fair, as I have only the 18-55mm and 11-22mm Canon lenses. If canon produces some decent, native, prime glass (say 14mm, 25mm, 50mm), then I may retract this criticism. The one big plus of the EOS M is the video, which is superb, and you can capture stills while recording. The audio quality is also surprisingly good from the two, small, built-in microphones. If you are into video - buy this camera. Bottom line, for the current "clearance" price, this is a good buy, especially for video. However, I remain convinced that both the Olympus EP-1 and Panasonic GX1 are better cameras for still photography. I will likely replace my better halfs "point and shoot", with the EOS M (shes developing a really great eye). I, however, will continue to stay in the micro four thirds camp (Olympus & Panasonic) where there are far more choices of really good lenses and whose cameras that have much better user interfaces.

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