Canon

The EOS M mirrorless camera from Canon has never been a great success. Although it was a perfectly nice little touch-screen camera it just didn't grab the imagination as Canon imagined it would. Now comes a much more serious version, the M5.

There is no denying the Canon EOS was not a major success. I wrote about it last June and even bought a bargain-basement version just out of interest. I tried it with Leica lenses with some success. I liked the touch screen controls and I enjoyed using it with a a 35mm optical viewfinder matched to the rather good 22mm prime lens. But it didn't last. There were no compelling reasons to pick up this camera in preference to, say, a Fuji X-E2.

This gallery is work in progress. I am planning to review the Canon EOS M, not as an overpriced £800 mirrorless wannabe but as a cheap and very cheerful £199 APS-C camera that is actually very competent. The EOS was damned by reports of slow autofocus. But is a solid camera, built in Japan, and performs well. The touch-screen interface is one of the best. Even the autofocus actually isn't all that bad after the latest firmware update.

I bought the Canon EOS M because it was cheap. £199 for an APS-C compact with an 28-88mm (equivalent) zoom has got to be worth considering. As I explained a couple of days ago, this camera started off as a much more expensive beast but seems to have been unloved. Perhaps there are better competitors out there at the original £700-plus price. But at £199 it takes some beating.

So often in life we see what we want to see. I was aiming my new £199 Canon EOS M across a busy London road when, out of the corner of my eye I glimpsed what looked like a vintage camera, a Leica no less, on a bus advertisement. I punched the rear screen of the Canon right in the middle of poster as the bus passed. My eye registered the words Hector and Happiness at the same time.