Long Way Home – From the Canon 6D to the EOS R

From the Canon 6D to the EOS R – Long Way Home

In this adventure:

• I’ve got to stop looking at odd routings and thinking they’re good ideas
• Sleep? What’s that concept? Off to Heathrow T3
• Lounging around Heathrow T3
• AA99 London Heathrow to Chicago O’Hare
• The Hyatt Regency O’Hare
• The Nutella Cafe
• Fooding Around Chicago
• The Canon 100D – Good for aviation photography?
• Camera shift – from EOS 6D to EOS R
• Back to O’Hare, Air France Lounge
• AY10 Chicago to Helsinki Vantaa… with Air Italy?
• Two hours and 20 in Helsinki Vantaa
• AY1335 Helsinki Vantaa to London Heathrow
• Bussing back home
• Long Way Home or short way back?

Those who know I like my photography. In all its forms. However, the Canon 6D has been giving me concerns the past year with its performance, some odd mistakes it’s making and some performance issues.

Nothing end of the world but enough to make me stop and ponder. So much so, I was thinking of jumping ship to Sony at one point.

Earlier this year, Canon finally announced its entry into the mirrorless market. Branded the EOS R, it introduces a mirrorless body, a new lens mount and features from a Canon 5D Mark IV into a more compact body.

Not a totally compact body such as the Sony’s A Series, but for a Canon… a lot more slimmed down..

And I’d be the first to admit there are one or two issues that might dissuade the non-Canon buyer – namely the cropping of video in 4K mode (which turns it into a 1.75 crop of the sensor). As for the lack of two card slots… there are many poles to pin your flag to and fight until the end. This isn’t one of them in my case (as I’ve lived with single-card socket cameras for years).

The big one is the lack of in-body stabilisation (helpful for reducing camera shake) – with Canon suggesting letting the lens handles it. Considering every other manufactures went the other way and put in stabilisation in-body… And that’s concerning for now.

But since most of my lenses are Imaged Stabilised anyway…

For me, even the video compromise isn’t that bad –  I’m a photographer who shoots a little video on the side. Videographers and Vloggers would probably think this is the end of the world (unless you put a 10-18 EF-S lens on it).

Unboxing the Canon EOS R

So here’s the kit I brought at Best Buy. Yes, I could had got it sent to another address, but there were reasons and such.  Let’s do some unboxing.

The box. Big. Black. And a big R on it so you don’t confuse it with the EF Mount

With the box open, what goodie are in it?

A manual that no one will ever read, a  new  battery and a data cable. Note – no lens or R to EF adaptor (different to the EU market where this is bundled)

Multifunction cable

Canon LP E6N battery – a fresh one is always welcome.

EOS R I presume.

The EOS R with the R Mount to EF adaptor.

So what lens do I put on this? I could have gone all out and brought the new kit (EOS-R with an RF 24-105L series). But I already have a good L Series lens – just so happens to be the 24-105 f4L . So I went for a body kit, with the lens adaptor – and slapped the 24-105 f4L on it.

Native lenses do have some advantages in terms of speed and autofocus, but its only reared its ugly head once or twice so far.

How does it look when put together? A bit like this.

Front the front….

From the back

Lets go shooting in the streets! – and there’s never any harm leaving a camera in automatic when you’re learning how to use the damn thing.

 

Handling

If you’ve used a Canon EOS of any sort (be it EOS 100D, 5D family, m50, EOS 80D, etc etc etc), the controls should come to you pretty naturally. Things on the camera body are where you should expect them to be. Lens controls are very natural, as are the menus. There are three things that might make long-time users go hmm – namely the capacitive touch bar (which is for all intents and purposes – pretty useless), the lack of a joystick (replaced by a multi-function control), and a twisty wheel (which is useful when reviewing photos)

The Electronic Viewfinder – this is probably the biggest difference for those who have let the mirrorless revolution pass them by until now. It’s crystal clear – with only a little lag between shutter actuation – and being an EVF it can deliver a lot more information than a mirror with an LED inside could ever do. I like using it – and it felt natural to both record video and shoot images with.

So onto actual use – and it feels… well… right. Not too light, not too heavy. Putting it on a strap and using it showed it was actually usable, The wake-up time was acceptable to be ready to shoot too.

You’ll need to invest in batteries however, I chewed through three batteries with ease (in about 12 hours)  – with them rated at a measly 370 images, extra battery packs aren’t an idea – they’re a requirement. (although I got 2000+ images on a brand new battery, with the camera driving a big lens with no problem. Again – depends on your battery packs)

The images  

Most of the trip report from here on was shot with the EOS  R. I’m really happy with the “Canon Colour” and just how the images look with the short amount of experimenting  I did with them

Image number 1 – a first step forward

Battlehardened, and fleeing from the Cylon tyranny, the last battlestar, Galactica, leads a ragtag fugitive fleet on a lonely quest: a shining planet known as Earth (close enough for this beast of burden)

They are green.

The camera exiting from whence it came – The John Hancock building

Crossing the Chicago River on the bus – because I was lazy. Or running late heading back to the airport. Take your pick

Divvy bicycles

Crossing into the Loop – Some interesting colour contrasts

No, I cannot.

The darkness of being near the loop and sunlight peaking through work here

The L Train moving at speed makes for a good challenge. Good thing there’s a decent burst mode of 5fps on this.

A new gotcha is the CR3 files this thing knocks out start at 30mb, and creep upwards fast depending on content and ISO level used. If you’ve been using CR2 RAW files, budget for extra storage. You’re going to need it.

First thoughts 

Its way to early to do a full review of the EOS R  – but even with the negative points, I’ve raised…  it delivers cracking images and it’s a camera I’m getting used to. And as I get used to it, I’m sure to extract more use and value from it.

I have done a day out with the EOS R for aviation photography – and I’ll be covering that during Christmas week all being well for those who are interested.

Next: Back to O’Hare Airport and the Air France-KLM Lounge

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