Canon film bodies with eye control

Paul Howell

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At the risk of posting in the wrong thread, Canon new pro level digital body with eye control, I know that later model Canons had eye tracking or eye control, don't recall which body or how well it worked. Anyone use one?
 

Anon Ymous

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I've used the EOS 30 and it worked well for me. Too bad my copy had front focusing issues, regardless of eye control or not. Apart from this model, the EOS 3, 5, 50E and 30V also had eye control focusing.
 

film_man

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I used the 30 and 3. The 30 works well. The 3 works well too if your reduce the number of AF points to 11. Otherwise it generally picks the one you didn't want.

Note that eye focus does not work if you are wearing glasses. My personal opinion is that it was more a gimmick, it picked the correct point most of the time but when it didn't the focus-retry-focus-retry to get to the right one wiped any time savings vs just hitting the crosshairs buttons to move to the right point. Then again I'm a focus/recompose person, those that change focus points all the time may have a different opinion.
 

Tony-S

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I have the EOS3 and it works well. The problem with the EOS3 is the damned magnetic release gets stuck occasionally and I have to bang it on the floor a few times to get it working again.
 

gone

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The EOS was a bomb for me too because I wore glasses, and as mentioned, it's not a good combination.
 

flavio81

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I had the EOS 5, the eye tracking was reliable.
 

Patrick Robert James

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I never use it but I have an EOS 5 and it works ok. I wear glasses too. I used to have an EOS 3 but I don't recall ever using it on that camera. Everybody is different but I found having to look at what you want in focus to be a distraction. I'd rather know where the focus is then I can look wherever. I usually just use the center point anyway. It is easy to change the focus point too. After all these years I pretty much do it without even thinking about it.
 

MattKing

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I have both an Elan 7E and an Elan IIE, and both work reliably for me, both with glasses and without (using separate calibrations).
But as I understand it, the feature was a retailer's nightmare, because one could never tell whether a customer would be able to make it work until after they had tried it for a bit.
Which meant that there were a small but significant number lot of customers who were disappointed and, in many cases, wanted to return their purchases.
 

G1DRP

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My EOS 5 (A2E) has eye control, but I tend to just use the centre AF spot and re-compose. The EOS5 has another spot, in the top left-hand corner of the screen, and it gives you the depth of field preview when you look at it.
 

throneking

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EOS 5 has an eye control, it has five focusing points. The focusing point can be selected manually, you will look at the desired focusing point to select it and the camera auto focuses at that point.
 

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I use only manual focus lenses, so this doesn't apply I guess? But when I did use AF cameras and lenses, or even now w/ the MF lenses, it's plenty hard enough to know where the focus point should be anyway using only one focus aid in the VF. The decision making process of this eye control would probably slow me way down, but you'd have to try it and see in order to know.
 

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Feature I liked most on Elan IIE was DOF preview with eye control, but focus point worked fine too. No glasses here.
 

MattKing

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It really is amazing to be able to change the subject that is in focus in the viewfinder by simply looking at it.
 

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@MattKing At the time Elan IIE was introduced I was early onto it and that eye control was something. In the end I put the camera away (still have it though) and may have to dig it up just to remind myself what kind of different fun that one was in use. I was more stunned by that DOF preview when one has to flip eye ball towards the corner to see aperture closing down.

Is there any new on market now still doing eye control, or is it all dialed in ?
 

MWL

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The new Canon R3 has it.
 
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Paul Howell

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Canon R3, that's why I was wondering about the older film bodies, might look for a film body and a couple of lens, not sure why, when new was never that interested.
 

MWL

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Paul Howell said:
Canon R3, that's why I was wondering about the older film bodies, might look for a film body and a couple of lens, not sure why, when new was never that interested.
Click to expand...
I ran a couple of EOS 5 cameras back in the day. They worked really well, but I don't wear glasses. If I was to get one, I'm not sure if it would be a 3, 5 or 7s. 3, possibly because it was the closest to to 1s I have now, 5, just for nostalgia, or 7s, because it was the last and latest. Of course, there is the option of all three, just because.
 

ericB&W

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I have EOS 5 and eye-control works well even wearing glasses .
 
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