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Trouble Connecting EOS R8 to EOS Utility on a Mac

tjdowling
Contributor

I am having issues connecting my R8 to my Mac via the EOS Utility. I have the latest software and have gone through the user manual. The message I keep getting is:

"Communication with the camera via USB cannot be established.
Start EOS Utility after closing all the apps that communicate with the camera, and then turn on the camera again."

I am unaware of any apps that I have that would be trying to communicate with my camera in the background. Anyone know what's going on? Thanks in advance.

1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION

jrhoffman75
Legend
Legend

@tjdowling wrote:

I am having issues connecting my R8 to my Mac via the EOS Utility. I have the latest software and have gone through the user manual. The message I keep getting is:

"Communication with the camera via USB cannot be established.
Start EOS Utility after closing all the apps that communicate with the camera, and then turn on the camera again."

I am unaware of any apps that I have that would be trying to communicate with my camera in the background. Anyone know what's going on? Thanks in advance.


It is a problem that seems to have developed with the 13.4.1 update to Ventura.

I was able to sync my 1D X MkIII prior to that update and now I get that error.

If you are only looking to download images you could get a card reader. If you are wanting the tethering features then we have to wait for Apple to fix the problem.

John Hoffman
Conway, NH

1D X Mark III, M200, Many lenses, Pixma PRO-100, Pixma TR8620a, Lr Classic

View solution in original post

67 REPLIES 67

Turn off the computer. Turn on the camera. Turn on the computer. Boot in safe mode... 🤦🏻‍ All this gymnastics looks way weird. I've just checked on my Mac Mini M1. That bash command works just fine for tethered shooting even with EOS Utility 3 v3.18.0. No fuss, no muss.

Awesome command. You saved me a lot of time investigating this issue.

I improved it a bit for my needs script.sh:

 

 

#!/bin/bash

# Create the ~/R7 directory if it doesn't exist
mkdir -p ~/R7

# Start the endless loop in the background
{
  while :; do
    kill -9 $(ps aux | grep "[p]tpcamera" | awk '{print $2}')
    sleep 1 # Adding a sleep to avoid high CPU usage
  done
} &

# Store the PID of the background loop
LOOP_PID=$!

# Open the EOS Utility 3 app and wait for it to close
open -W "/Applications/Canon Utilities/EOS Utility/EU3/EOS Utility 3.app"

# Kill the endless loop
kill -9 $LOOP_PID

# Function to move files recursively
move_files() {
  src="$1"
  dst="$2"

  for item in "$src"/*; do
    if [ -d "$item" ]; then
      # If item is a directory, create the destination directory if it doesn't exist
      mkdir -p "$dst/$(basename "$item")"
      # Recursively move files from the source directory to the destination directory
      move_files "$item" "$dst/$(basename "$item")"
      # Remove the empty source directory
      rmdir "$item"
    else
      # If item is a file, move it to the destination
      mv -f "$item" "$dst"
    fi
  done
}

# Move all folders and files from ~/R7 to ~/Google Drive/My Drive/LightRoom/
move_files ~/R7 ~/Google\ Drive/My\ Drive/LightRoom/

# Remove any empty directories left behind in ~/R7
find ~/R7 -type d -empty -delete

 

 

To allow running this script:

 

 

chmod +x script.sh

 

 

 
This script creates a background task that kills processes that block camera access. Then run EOS 3 utitlity.

I configured the EOS3 utility to download photos into the ~/R7 folder automatically.
When it's done and EOS is closed, the script kills the loop that allows connection to the camera.

Then, it copies all folders from ~/R7 into the Google Drive folder because the EOS3 utility doesn't want to use it even with Full disk access.
Since I was preparing everything for my wife, I created an app using Macos Automator.

To create an app on macOS using Automator that runs a `script.sh` script, you can follow these steps:

1. **Open Automator:**
   - Go to your Applications folder.
   - Open Automator.

2. **Create a New Document:**
   - When Automator starts, you will be prompted to choose a type for your document.
   - Select "Application" and click "Choose".

3. **Add a "Run Shell Script" Action:**
   - In the Library on the left side, find "Run Shell Script" by typing it into the search bar.
   - Drag the "Run Shell Script" action into the workflow area on the right.

4. **Configure the Shell Script:**
   - In the "Run Shell Script" action, you will see a text box where you can enter your script.
   - Enter the following code to run `script.sh`:
     ```sh
     #!/bin/bash
     /path/to/your/script.sh
     ```
     - Make sure to replace `/path/to/your/script.sh` with the actual path to your script file.

5. **Save the Automator Application:**
   - Go to `File` > `Save`.
   - Choose a name for your application and save it to your desired location.

6. **Run the Application:**
   - Navigate to the location where you saved the Automator application.
   - Double-click the application to run your `script.sh` script.
 
P.S.
I hope it can help, but Canon is very irresponsible. I want to use an EOS utility to copy my photos to Google Drive without killing processes or using a third-party "image Canon" service.

Thank you for further improvement. It really might be helpful in this form!

divella
Contributor

I did sort of fix this issue by starting my Mac in safe mode and disabling image capture. The only problem is when shooting tethered I always have to use safe mode.

Have you tried the bash command I mentioned on the previous page? No safe mode is required. Why extra inconveniences?

Krugerela
Apprentice

Hello.

I came across the same problem. When connecting the camera to the Mac, the program began to show the same message, until that moment everything worked. I have a P5 camera and an M3 Mac. I tried 3 different wires to connect my Mac and Camera and the last one worked.
Just try to change the wire 

al_hovan
Apprentice

Same problem here. MacBook Pro 2019 (Intel-based), macOS Sonoma 14.6, EOS Utility 3.18.5, two cameras - EOS 77D and EOS 90D. 
Using the proposed workaround with killing ptpcamera process I was able to connect camera, but still cannot download images - EOS Utility just hangs trying to enumerate images on camera (to make a clean experiment I formatted memory card and made few photos, so it is not about thousands of files).
  
The only working solution is to reboot before each launch of EOS Utility (or use cardreader).   

With macOS Catalina EOS Utility worked like a charm. Seems that Canon software developers were not ready for some Ventura-specific changes 😞 .  

billg02176
Apprentice

I was having issues as well and had older versions of my EOS Utility on my MAC. I am using a MAC AIR 2021 M1 and am at Sonoma 14.6. 
I deleted the older version of the EOS Utility and with my new R8 and newer links to software, decided to use the new versions of the software.
At first ti did not work and I thought it was that I did not have an 'authentic Canon EOS interface cable'' but read where others did not enter. 
I tried several time, rebooting the computer, because I wanted to make sure the new software was recognized. When I determine it was,  I tried again and then noted a 'disclaimer' which said even with the cable connection if WI-FI is on (on your computer, it would not be recognized.  Here's the exact ''

With a Wi-Fi connection established, the camera cannot communicate with the computer even if they are connected with an interface cable from this link https://support.usa.canon.com/kb/s/article/ART182389#Reference_0020_1
I put the camera (R8) on Airplane Mode which automatically disables the WiFI and turned-on the canon Eos utility opened on it's own and I know at that point it would work. 
I've been using EOS Utility for 15 years with a CANON DSLR 50D and it has always worked and is my preference for transferring photos from my camera to my computer. I don't want to use wifi, I just want to enjoy the R8 as I had with my old DSLR.  Pehasps at some point, i'll test out the WiFI but now there's enough new stuff to learn with this computer rather than taking on more!  😉 
Billg02176

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