EOS R8 Manual focus in remote live view in Camera Connect?

[cantregister]

Hi, I am using Canon Camera Connect's remote live view feature to control my EOS R8 with a RF 100-500mm IS USM lens mounted. I'd like to use manual focus -- but for the life of me I can't figure out how to do that.

My body is in Manual mode, and that is reflected in the app. If I have the lens's physical switch in MF, I see an MF option in the app, next to AF, but it is grayed out and taps do nothing. If I have the lens's physical switch turned to AF, the MF option disappears (as one would expect). The lens's physical focus ring works fine. Anybody have ideas about how to do this? I am on v. 3.4.1.9 of Camera Connect, running on IOS. 

[Waddizzle]

Change the IS mode switch on the lens to “MF”.

Manual shooting mode on the camera means the photographer is completely in control of exposure settings, instead of allowing the camera to automatically set exposure. 

Manual exposure mode in the camera is completely independent from Manual focus mode on the lens. 

[cantregister]

If by "IS mode switch on the lens" you mean the physical switch on the lens, then, yes, I have done that. I can verify that the Camera Connect app sees that by the appearance of a grayed-out MF button in the app. But what I can't do if enable that button in the app. Anyone have ideas?

[Waddizzle]

“ If by "IS mode switch on the lens" you mean the physical switch on the lens, then, yes, I have done that. I can verify that the Camera Connect app sees that by the appearance of a grayed-out MF button in the app. But what I can't do if enable that button in the app. Anyone have ideas? “

Manual Focus means that you don’t use the app to focus.  It means that you must use focus control ring on the lens.

If you wish to control focus from the app, then the AF/MF switch on the lens must be set to AF.  

The AF mode on the lens allows focus to be controlled remotely, either through the camera button controls or through an app on a computer or smart device. 

[cantregister]

A few more details on this issue from my research and emails to Canon technical support.

Elaine from EOSMirrorlessSupport told me that in order to have manual-level focus control with the Camera Connect app, (1) The lens itself must be in "AF" mode via a physical switch, (2) "continuous AF" must be disabled in the camera's menu, and (3) "movie servo AF" must be disabled in the camera's menu. This matches what I've read elsewhere, e.g.,  

However, with my body and lens, there isn't a "continuous AF" setting in the menu. This is with v 1.4.0 firmware on the body and v. 1.1.0 firmware on the lens. I wrote back with my roadblock. This time, Gwen wrote back and said this functionality is only available with specific lenses. At this point, I tried this with the RF 24-50mm IS STM lens, but still didn't get anywhere. So I wrote back, and asked which specific lens were supported for this scenario.

Now Eric wrote back and said: "Manual focus can not be controlled through the Canon Camera connect app. Some lenses such as the new USM Z series lenses can have the optional Power Zoom Adapter PZ-E2 attached to them and have the focus or zoom manually controlled through the buttons on the power adapter, however manual focus can not be adjusted in any way using the Camera Connect app." Given the experiences in the links above, I think this is not a complete answer. But at this point I don't have a lot of faith that I will be able to get a comprehensive answer from Canon technical support.

My conclusion is that Elaine's advice works for some subset of Canon lenses, but there is no documentation about which lenses it works for. In the meantime I have verified that manual focus control with my body and lens works in the v. 3.19.0.12 EOS utility for Windows, and presumably other computer-based control programs as well. So that's the road I will go down.

[deebatman316]

Your camera has renamed "Continuous AF" to "Preview AF".

[cantregister]

Hi, thanks for the reply. My camera does indeed have "Preview AF", but all my (failed) experiments have been with that option disabled.

[stevet1]

cantregister,

You wrote, "Now Eric wrote back and said: "Manual focus can not be controlled through the Canon Camera connect app."

Eric is right. Manual focus means that you have to physically turn the focus ring. It's not Auto, as in AF, anymore; whether it's in the camera, or by way of the Connect app.

Steve Thomas