5D Mark IV - IS always active in Live view?

[Gongedan]

Hey folks,

When I recently got my 5D Mark IV I soon realized something was different in live view: With image stabilized lenses (and the IS on the lens switched to "on"), as soon as live view is activated, the image stabilizer becomes permanently active. On my other camera bodies (6D and 7D Mark II), it doesnt't become active until I half press the shutter button. When I release the shutter button, IS becomes inactive again after about 3sec.. I actually prefer the latter. I feel rushed by the camera when IS is always active, it drains the battery faster and I guess it is also more stress on the motor and mechanics of the IS. And, with certain lenses, the always active IS is also quite noisy. The IS even stays active when I took a shoot in Live view and then review the pictures on the back of the camera.
Many have already observed that the battery life of the 5D Mark IV is significantly shorter than on previous Canon bodies and I guess this is (apart from the dual pixel technology) maybe one factor why the battery drains faster.

So my questions would be:
- Does your 5D Mark IV show the same behavior with IS being permanently active in Live view?
- Is there an option in the menu with which you can go back to the way it was in older Canon bodies that I haven't found yet?

Apart from this (in my opinion unnecessary) design change, I'm actually quite happy with the 5D Mark IV, especially the dynamic range improvements.

 

[SalAlexander]

Exactly the same happens on my 5D3.
I'm pretty sure all my other cameras were the same, too (600D, 6D, 80D)

 

[YuengLinger]

Check page 332 of the English version of the User's Manual.

I don't find the same warning in the 5DIII manual for Live View, though it is there for Movie Mode.

Good question, as I've never noticed this before, and, wow, it certainly does suck the charge from the battery!

And...The 80D manual has the same warning as the 5DIV, see page 291.

Just checked: 5D III, the IS does turn off and on--not staying on permanently.

I do agree this is annoying, and I wonder if it is tied to the tremendously faster LiveView AF? Sure would be nice to see a firmware update do something about it, give us an option; on the other hand, easy enough to just switch off IS until ready to use it...

 

[Gongedan]

Hey YuengLinger,

thanks for the reference to the manual, there it clearly says:
"if the attached lens has an image stabilizer and you set the image stabilizer (IS) switch to <on>, the image stabilizer will operate at all times even if you do not press the shutter button half way."

So, my camera is indeed working as intended from Canon. However, I really don't like that change. For certain shooting styles, it might be useful, but for my routines I find it annoying. And it surely decreases battery life even further. So I would love to just have the option in the menu to disable it and go back to the way it was in former cameras (can't speak for the 5D3, but I can definitely say that in the 6D and 7D Mark II it worked differently (as pointed out in my initial post). Would be easy to implement via firmware update I guess. However, I don't have too much hope that we will actually get a firmware update where they implement new or missing useful features.

 

[LordofTackle]

If you use the 100-400 II (or any of the new big whites) you could use IS mode 3, that should at least prolong your battery life while still retaining IS (as IS is only activated when picture is taken)

But I agree, it's strange they haven't put a menu option in there to disable it (or rather only enable it on shutter button press).

-Sebastian

 

[SalAlexander]

Interesting, I was indeed thinking about movie mode.
Sorry

 

[LordofTackle]

Interesting, I was indeed thinking about movie mode.
Sorry

In that case it actually makes sense to have the IS on all the time while filming or disable it completely by switching it off on the lens.

-Sebastian