Canon releases firmware updates for the EOS R5 and EOS R6

[entoman]

I always leave lens aberration correction off when shooting RAW, which is I think is a recommended procedure. The problem I found in focussing on objects close up was when a face started to fill the frame the eyeAF stopped recognising eyes. It will focus on small objects close up.

Yes, I also turn off all lens corrections, as my experience with other Canon cameras is that it slows down AF and causes buffer overload.
I have the camera in airplane-mode for the same reason.

 

[AlanF]

Yes, I also turn off all lens corrections, as my experience with other Canon cameras is that it slows down AF and causes buffer overload.
I have the camera in airplane-mode for the same reason.

Same here for airplane mode, and also to minimise battery drain.

 

[Chris.Chapterten]

After updating the firmware, my R5's eye focus seems to be much better but I haven't had a chance to do much testing.

On the topic of memory cards, there have been multiple anecdotal reports on problems with memory cards causing various issues with the camera. I only use the Sony CFexpress Tough and Sony SF-G64/T1 SD cards and have never had an issue with them. Other than the shame of using a Sony in my Canon, I swear by them.

Thanks for the input. Just to add to this - I was using Sandisk 512gb CFexpress and had a lockup approximately once every 2000 images taken. After 5 lockups (10,000 photos) I switched to a Sandisk SD card - 128GB 170MB/s. In over 50,000 shots over the last year I have not had a single lockup with this card.

I will agree with Tig that I don’t think the brand of the card actually makes much difference. I have heard of lockups with every single brand now. It seems to be luck of the draw - something funky with your camera or something funky with the card and potentially them not communicating/ playing with each other nicely. I should note that I now own 4x of the Sandisk 128gb SD cards I mentioned and none of them have seen a camera freeze.

I am reluctant to change firmware at all now as my camera has been stable for well over a year… 1.5.2 is the first time I have considered the upgrade in quite a while…

 

[jprusa]

Same here for airplane mode, and also to minimise battery drain.

When I updated to 1.51, everything was good with my 100-500 and 2.0 TC then I changed my lens to the 15-35. it was perfect until I went back to the 100-500 and TC it was doing the same thing with 1.50. It would have been nice if I had thought about lens correction then.

 

[Big_Ant_TV_Media]

all these bird and animal shooters smh HAS ANYBODY tested the new firmware on human sports eg: American football, soccer,baseball and bball since it can follow TORSO & Helmets now? or even AUTOMOBILE RACING?

 

[YuengLinger]

...The problem I found in focussing on objects close up was when a face started to fill the frame the eyeAF stopped recognising eyes. It will focus on small objects close up.

This doesn't sound like a problem I'd have with portraits, which is what I mainly shoot. If I'm close enough for just a face to fill the frame, I really don't want eye AF.

But for torso + head with a bit of extra room for print-size options--then in some situations it would be a step backwards for me to lose top-notch Eye AF.

And if you are saying it doesn't seem, at near MFD, to affect AF without tracking, then it should not be a problem for macro, etc.

I have no doubt that Canon will fix this if it gets reported enough--and can be reproduced by Canon.

Glad to hear it is working better still with quick birds filling so little of the frame!

 

[David - Sydney]

Here are the ones Canon states are compatible, FWIW.

Canon Knowledge Base - Compatible Cards (EOS R5)

Unfortunately, Canon hasn't updated that list from when the R5 was first released. I got the Sony Tough 128GB CFe as it was the only ~128GB option that was available (I couldn't find Lexar and the others were very expensive). I have had 1 lockup in 21 months so far. I believe that 1DXiii has the same list.

The R3 compatible CFe cards start at 256GB!
https://cam.start.canon/en/H001/supplement_0040.html

 

[AlanF]

This doesn't sound like a problem I'd have with portraits, which is what I mainly shoot. If I'm close enough for just a face to fill the frame, I really don't want eye AF.

But for torso + head with a bit of extra room for print-size options--then in some situations it would be a step backwards for me to lose top-notch Eye AF.

And if you are saying it doesn't seem, at near MFD, to affect AF without tracking, then it should not be a problem for macro, etc.

I have no doubt that Canon will fix this if it gets reported enough--and can be reproduced by Canon.

Glad to hear it is working better still with quick birds filling so little of the frame!

That's my attitude too. If it works for the butterfly and dragonfly seasons, especially DIF, then I won't worry.

 

[AlanF]

all these bird and animal shooters smh HAS ANYBODY tested the new firmware on human sports eg: American football, soccer,baseball and bball since it can follow TORSO & Helmets now? or even AUTOMOBILE RACING?

Not much American football and baseball over here, and basketball not that popular.

 

[allanP]

I always leave lens aberration correction off when shooting RAW, which is I think is a recommended procedure.

Actually me too. Recently I tried different settings and this one got stuck instead of being off

 

[stochasticmotions]

First time out for bird in flight shots with the new firmware yesterday. Using the canon EF 500 f/4 (with and without the 1.4 teleconverter). Camera locked up while shooting 5 times in the first 10 minutes. Next hour it only locked up twice. I need to get out a more before deciding if this is worse than the previous firmware since it is common for it to do this a few times in a short period then be more stable for a while. It is too bad, this is the most unstable camera I have owned in many years but it is really so great when it is stable. For now, I have to stick with the Sony cameras for when I need to know that I'm going to get the shot, or go back to using the 5DS which seems so ancient when it comes to autofocus now.

 

[angelisland]

First time out for bird in flight shots with the new firmware yesterday. Using the canon EF 500 f/4 (with and without the 1.4 teleconverter). Camera locked up while shooting 5 times in the first 10 minutes. Next hour it only locked up twice. I need to get out a more before deciding if this is worse than the previous firmware since it is common for it to do this a few times in a short period then be more stable for a while. It is too bad, this is the most unstable camera I have owned in many years but it is really so great when it is stable. For now, I have to stick with the Sony cameras for when I need to know that I'm going to get the shot, or go back to using the 5DS which seems so ancient when it comes to autofocus now.

I've not had a single lockup in years with 4 different R5 bodies. They've been 100% reliable (unlike my a7r4, which did lock upon occasion.)
If the above were me, I'd be on Canon's ass to replace the camera!
Obviously most R5s do not have this issue...

 

[Juangrande]

Well at least mine does this consistently once in one shot AF in low light. I switch back to servo and it does not. I wonder if exposure simulation has anything to do with it.

That’s the exact same issue I have. Relatively low light (indoors ambient daylight for example) nothing extreme, and one shot. I haven’t tried servo as I’m usually shooting static portraits. I first noticed it when shooting with a colleague in a studio setup and she had the exact same body and lens as me, an R5 and RF 50mm 1.2. Her camera was not having the issue and we tested from the exact same position and focused in the exact spot. So it seems to be an issue with a certain batch of R5 bodies and not by design. I took my camera in to the Canon Center in Santa Ana, CA and explained the issue and that my colleague didn’t have the issue with the same setup and exact conditions. I was able to demonstrate the issue to the person at the customer service desk and he agreed it was odd, but when he took it back to the technician the tech said everything worked fine. I should have asked him to bring the tech out and demonstrated it for him myself. I asked them to record my visit and take notes of my issue because my one year warranty was close to expiration and wanted to prove I brought it in prior in case the issue worsened or more people reported it and there’s a later fix. It’s not the lens either because the issue persists no matter the lens. I even swapped lenses at the time with my colleague to test if that was the issue.

 

[Juangrande]

I haven't yet updated the firmware on my R5, but yesterday I shot a golf tournament with my R3, which has the new firmware "fix." It froze up probably close to a dozen times during the day, the most it has ever frozen up. I kept getting an error message that said to remove the battery and restart it (this message is new as far as I know.)

Today, I shot a baseball game and a softball game -- no freeze. Only difference was the card (Transcend 256gb vs. ProGrade 128 mb)

As I've noted in the past, I've had other freeze ups with the R3 since the firmware upgrade (with SanDisk and ProGrade cards). Since freeze ups seem to be random and occur sporadically, I suspect it will be months before we can be confident that Canon's "fix" actually fixed anything.

Said this before and I'll say it again, we R system users are all paying to be beta testers for Canon's mirrorless system.

Is it possible to upgrade the firmware on the cards as well? Maybe there’s an issue there.

 

[unfocused]

I don't understand why people feel compelled to post that they have never had a problem with the R5, R6 or R3 freezing up. That imparts no useful information. It's a bit like saying you've never been in a tornado or bitten by a shark. That's nice, but it doesn't mean there aren't tornados or sharks or that those who have been hit or bitten are doing something wrong. I'd encourage those who have not encountered the problem to simply refrain from hitting the "reply" button unless you have something of value to contribute.

 

[tron]

That’s the exact same issue I have. Relatively low light (indoors ambient daylight for example) nothing extreme, and one shot. I haven’t tried servo as I’m usually shooting static portraits. I first noticed it when shooting with a colleague in a studio setup and she had the exact same body and lens as me, an R5 and RF 50mm 1.2. Her camera was not having the issue and we tested from the exact same position and focused in the exact spot. So it seems to be an issue with a certain batch of R5 bodies and not by design. I took my camera in to the Canon Center in Santa Ana, CA and explained the issue and that my colleague didn’t have the issue with the same setup and exact conditions. I was able to demonstrate the issue to the person at the customer service desk and he agreed it was odd, but when he took it back to the technician the tech said everything worked fine. I should have asked him to bring the tech out and demonstrated it for him myself. I asked them to record my visit and take notes of my issue because my one year warranty was close to expiration and wanted to prove I brought it in prior in case the issue worsened or more people reported it and there’s a later fix. It’s not the lens either because the issue persists no matter the lens. I even swapped lenses at the time with my colleague to test if that was the issue.

It isn't a big deal for me: It looks like a low light focus helper when using one shot AF.

Keep in mind that when in AF Servo and Exp simulation when we use manual metering and we are way off the sensor doesn't get enough light to focus and it fails until we fix the exposure (or possibly turn off exp simulation).

 

[angelisland]

I don't understand why people feel compelled to post that they have never had a problem with the R5, R6 or R3 freezing up. That imparts no useful information. It's a bit like saying you've never been in a tornado or bitten by a shark. That's nice, but it doesn't mean there aren't tornados or sharks or that those who have been hit or bitten are doing something wrong. I'd encourage those who have not encountered the problem to simply refrain from hitting the "reply" button unless you have something of value to contribute.

It can be useful to know that not EVERY camera / EVERY brand of memory card etc are affected by an issue. Unlike some issues which *do affect every body.
But I'm not going to argue about it ;-)
As I noted above, if you know that every R5 body has the same issue, then replacing your current one makes no sense. Alternately, if it's only some of them, then a replacement may sort your issue.
Cheers.

 

[angelisland]

I believe we have to compare our camera settings.

Yes indeed.
But no combination of settings should cause the camera to crash/freeze up (obviously)...
Thus it's good to know some similarly configured cameras do not have the issue IMO.
In which case I'd be on the phone with CPS demanding a replacement ;-)

 

[tron]

Yes indeed.
But no combination of settings should cause the camera to crash/freeze up (obviously)...
Thus it's good to know some similarly configured cameras do not have the issue IMO.
In which case I'd be on the phone with CPS demanding a replacement ;-)

I have already deleted that post because I meant to answer to a different post sorry.

 

[unfocused]

It can be useful to know that not EVERY camera / EVERY brand of memory card etc are affected by an issue. Unlike some issues which *do affect every body.
But I'm not going to argue about it ;-)
As I noted above, if you know that every R5 body has the same issue, then replacing your current one makes no sense. Alternately, if it's only some of them, then a replacement may sort your issue.
Cheers.

That might have been valid a year or so ago. By now there have been so many examples and so much shared about the freezes, that simply having people say they have not experienced the problem doesn't serve any purpose at this point.

To be fair, sharing stories from those of us who have had freezes probably doesn't really contribute anything either. Although I think it is somewhat helpful to know that Canon's "fix" hasn't resolved the issue in at least some cases.

There is also a bit of a psychological aspect to it. Although the scale of the problem is in no way similar, It is a little like persons who are afflicted with rare and difficult to diagnose physical ailments. It can be comforting just knowing that what your are experiencing is real and is shared by others.

As for demanding that Canon replace a body. Well, that's simply not going to happen. Because it is relatively common and because it does occur randomly, Canon can't simply replace all the bodies that have suffered a freeze. We don't know the scale of the problem, but given the number of people on this forum alone who have experienced it, I think it is safe to say it is quite widespread. And, because it is so random and not easy to reproduce, Canon would be opening themselves up to tremendous financial risk if they just said anyone who claimed to have the problem could get a replacement body. And, of course many of those replacements would still have the problem since the root cause still appears to be unknown.

I give Canon credit for trying to find a solution, although I wish they had been a bit more forthcoming in acknowledging it earlier (as least with the R3, they seem to have learned a lesson there). The recent firmware fixes may be less than perfect, but I take it as a sign that Canon is on the trail of the problem and will eventually determine the cause.

I simply suggest that those who have been lucky enough not to have a problem might display a bit of empathy by enjoying their good luck in silence, recognizing that posting about their good fortune can feel to others as though they are, perhaps unintentionally, trying to invalidate the experiences of those who haven't been as lucky.