Canon Eye Control = eye surgery?

j-dogg · Jan 26, 2011

My professor and I were nerding out about 80's and early 90's Canon EF cameras in class today and we got to talking about his A2e. He mentioned that he never used it, and I talked about how useful it is on my Elan 7e for moving subjects and things of the sort.

He said something about professionals who had the A2e ended up having major eye surgery after using the Eye Control for an extended period of time. Is this why none of the digital Canons have the eye control? Is this actually true?

I use the eye control on the Elan 7e for trains and cars all else I just use the normal mode.

Poisson Du Jour · Jan 26, 2011

Rubbish.
The very low power near-IR LEDs were researched over several years prior to production inclusion in the EOS 5 / A2e (and later dramatically improved in the retro-styled, but short-lived EOS 50e). Their close proximity to the eye of course necessitated the very low burst of power that tracks the retina. Note of course that corrective eye surgery (even among photographers) is commonplace as part of normal ageing or corrective/revision work e.g. cataracts, macular degeneration, astigmatism ... lots of reasons. If the emitters were implicated and proven in widespread eye damage, Canon would have been literally train-wrecked by litigation. ECF has significantly higher power demand; this might go some way to explaining why Canon dropped it post-analog as it steamed full speed into digital.

hpulley · Jan 26, 2011

I heard it was simply difficult for the average user to set it up and not much of a selling feature so they dropped it. After that and having 5-45 AF points available most users still simply use the center point and focus and recompose so why bother they said...

Les Sarile · Jan 26, 2011

If that were remotely possible, there would have been lawsuits and Canon would likely not be around anymore. Used it on my EOS3 for over 6 years.

hpulley · Jan 26, 2011

Would have been recalled and at least disabled the eye control if true too.

perkeleellinen · Jan 26, 2011

Perhaps mistaking correlation for causation?

There may well be a correlation between many pros using A2e and then needing eye surgery. But that doesn't mean causation. I use the nice example of babies to show this to my students - the spurts of high birth rates in Sweden were always accompanied by higher than usual flocks of storks. A clear correlation between the two, but more babies wasn't causing there to be more storks to deliver them.

Jeff Kubach · Jan 26, 2011

Does the eye control work with who have Dyslexia?

Jeff

Markster · Jan 26, 2011

Maybe those with the weaker eyes prefer this type of system, thus the weak eyes lead to the need for surgery?

(in the line of the causality discussion above)

benjiboy · Jan 26, 2011

Jeff Kubach said:
Does the eye control work with who have Dyslexia?

Jeff

I like it Jeff, and can women who are not virgins go to the Virgin Islands.
The eye control focusing that Canon used was developed from the sight switches that helicopter gun ship pilots used in Vietnam to fire the armaments.

Markster · Jan 26, 2011

"Okay, now everybody hold a smile... Saaaaaay VC!!"

tonyjuliano · Jan 26, 2011

I'm callin' BS...

Used it on my EOS3 foir years now, and no ill effects.

Just like those rumors of all the young girls wearing UGGS who need foot surgery.

moki · Jan 28, 2011

Well, I hope not, since I absolutely love the eye control, even on the tiny EOS 50e with its three AF-sensors. In my opinion it's the best invention for autofocus cameras ever and the only sensible way to use AF... what good is it if you spend all your time selecting the right points with tiny buttons while you could be taking pictures?

Anyway, the amount of IR-radiation is even less than what you get from normal daylight or looking into the sun for a few milliseconds, so I don't believe it does any serious harm. Everyone's eyes age, no matter what the concrete circumstances are and the percentage may be a little higher for photographers, especially when they spend a lot of time staring into tiny viewfinders.

j-dogg · Jan 29, 2011

Good, then I'll keep using it.

Canon Eye Control = eye surgery?

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