WARNING Webcam Utility DOES NOT WORK with Mac M1 running Big Sur versions past 11.0

[reeceguida]

I want to save others the trouble: Webcam Utility will ONLY work for Mac M1 (AKA the 2020 models that don't have the Intel Chips) running Big Sur 11.0. Stop searching for a fix because there isn't one.

Canon: is adding support for this on your Webcam Utility roadmap? Can you PLEASE post a fix to your software? My only option is to revert back to Big Sur 11.0, and I can't do that because I don't have a backup.

I was so excited to use this beautiful camera for work/streaming and now I feel like I just put money in a paper shredder. I will glady return it for another if there's no promise of a fix.

[tokris]

I agree entirely!

[ecachucho]

Could not agree more. Canon software has always been about 5yrs behind the curve on Mac and even on Windows, so I don't think this is the case of blaming Apple - def with the impression that Canon doesn't prioritise this.
But otherwise thanks @sogrady ! Cascable Pro works flawlessly! Great to not have to wait for years for Canon to respond. (it will be years, might as well move on)

[beniiiii]

Can you imaging? I have invested in Canon lenses and cameras. What does it cost to Canon to upgrade software. I have already paid much more than it will cost them.

[robtain]

From my understanding, Apple gives developers plenty of time and documentation to address system-level changes that might break an application. It's incumbent on developers to respond to upcoming changes before they break. My experience with canon software for the Mac is checkered. They have been very laggard with updates for the EOS Utility and other driver tools for cameras and printers. They also abandon software on the Mac side long before they do the same on Windows.

[Waddizzle]

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@robtain wrote:
From my understanding, Apple gives developers plenty of time and documentation to address system-level changes that might break an application. It's incumbent on developers to respond to upcoming changes before they break. My experience with canon software for the Mac is checkered. They have been very laggard with updates for the EOS Utility and other driver tools for cameras and printers. They also abandon software on the Mac side long before they do the same on Windows.

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Your understanding of software development on the Apple platform seems incomplete and inaccurate.  

MS Windows has an "open architecture" while the Apple platform does not.  Software developers for the Apple platform must pay a licensing fee just to use the software development tools.  Apple controls the entire software development process, so don't be so quick to blame third parties.  

Canon is hardly alone when it comes to their software breaking following an Apple update.  Every company goes through this same cycle with Apple over and over, and over and over again.  Every major OS update from Apple usually means paying Apple new licensing fees to for the new software libraries to update your software.  

This business practice was behind the "Big Blue" lawsuit against IBM some 50 years ago.  Google it.  IBM lost, and rightfully so.

[EdMartin]

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@Waddizzle wrote:

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Your understanding of software development on the Apple platform seems incomplete and inaccurate.  

MS Windows has an "open architecture" while the Apple platform does not.  Software developers for the Apple platform must pay a licensing fee just to use the software development tools.  Apple controls the entire software development process, so don't be so quick to blame third parties.  

Canon is hardly alone when it comes to their software breaking following an Apple update.  Every company goes through this same cycle with Apple over and over, and over and over again.  Every major OS update from Apple usually means paying Apple new licensing fees to for the new software libraries to update your software.  

This business practice was behind the "Big Blue" lawsuit against IBM some 50 years ago.  Google it.  IBM lost, and rightfully so.

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I'm sorry to veer off the helpful content of this thread by going in the "whose fault is this?" direction, but @Waddizzle, your clear bias against Apple is just too much.  Enough so that I registered for an account so I could reply. 

Fine... you don't like closed systems.  Enjoy Windows, Linux and Android.  That's great!  But just because Apple prefers a closed system doesn't make it wrong. It's just not your preference.  Many people (deveopers & consumers) like Apple. You essentially cutting & pasting the same anti-closed-system rant is counter productive to the question(s) and helpful answers. We heard you the first time.

Before you go off on me with "Your understanding of software development on the Apple platform seems incomplete and inaccurate", I've spent the last 30+ years developing on many platforms through engineering, production and ultimately management and ownership of development studios.  Windows, Mac, iOS, Android... you name it. [Oh, and I even worked for IBM many years ago.]

As a developer, I can say that this is NOT Apple's fault.  This is Canon.  As pointed out by several people, Apple developers have early access to new OS versions months before public release.  In fact, the new macOS, Monterey, is available to developers right now... and it won't be released in final form until this fall. 

All Canon has to do is pay their annual developer fee (as low as $99... but to Canon the enterprise cost would be a whopping $299) and they have access to the code, libraries and support resources.  Canon has made the decsion to delay on this.  Big Sur has been out publically since last fall (and to developers since last spring).  Dev kits for M1 Macs have been around since last summer. And M1 Mac hardware has been publically released since late fall/early winter.

I'm sure that Canon looks at their install-base of users and make decisions based on priority.  But I still find it ridiculous that they continue to push off on M1 Mac and Big Sur support at this point.  We're talking about hardware that has been public for more than 6 months and an OS that has been available to them for a year.  Good God... Adobe has Photoshop and Creative Cloud running on M1's and Microsoft has all of Office running on M1's.  Canon can't get a simle camera pass-through app to work?  Yikes.

P.S. Huge thanks to @sogrady for mentioning Cascable Pro Webcam. I downloaded it on my M1 MacBook Air and it recognized my R6 immediately.  Now THAT is a great example of a productive reply to a question! [And betwwen the 2 of us, our purchases have pretty much paid Cascable's Apple Developer fee for the year!]

[Waddizzle]

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@EdMartin wrote:

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@Waddizzle wrote:

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Your understanding of software development on the Apple platform seems incomplete and inaccurate.  

MS Windows has an "open architecture" while the Apple platform does not.  Software developers for the Apple platform must pay a licensing fee just to use the software development tools.  Apple controls the entire software development process, so don't be so quick to blame third parties.  

Canon is hardly alone when it comes to their software breaking following an Apple update.  Every company goes through this same cycle with Apple over and over, and over and over again.  Every major OS update from Apple usually means paying Apple new licensing fees to for the new software libraries to update your software.  

This business practice was behind the "Big Blue" lawsuit against IBM some 50 years ago.  Google it.  IBM lost, and rightfully so.

---

I'm sorry to veer off the helpful content of this thread by going in the "whose fault is this?" direction, but @Waddizzle, your clear bias against Apple is just too much.  Enough so that I registered for an account so I could reply. 

Fine... you don't like closed systems.  Enjoy Windows, Linux and Android.  That's great!  But just because Apple prefers a closed system doesn't make it wrong. It's just not your preference.  Many people (deveopers & consumers) like Apple. You essentially cutting & pasting the same anti-closed-system rant is counter productive to the question(s) and helpful answers. We heard you the first time.

Before you go off on me with "Your understanding of software development on the Apple platform seems incomplete and inaccurate", I've spent the last 30+ years developing on many platforms through engineering, production and ultimately management and ownership of development studios.  Windows, Mac, iOS, Android... you name it. [Oh, and I even worked for IBM many years ago.]

As a developer, I can say that this is NOT Apple's fault.  This is Canon.  As pointed out by several people, Apple developers have early access to new OS versions months before public release.  In fact, the new macOS, Monterey, is available to developers right now... and it won't be released in final form until this fall. 

All Canon has to do is pay their annual developer fee (as low as $99... but to Canon the enterprise cost would be a whopping $299) and they have access to the code, libraries and support resources.  Canon has made the decsion to delay on this.  Big Sur has been out publically since last fall (and to developers since last spring).  Dev kits for M1 Macs have been around since last summer. And M1 Mac hardware has been publically released since late fall/early winter.

I'm sure that Canon looks at their install-base of users and make decisions based on priority.  But I still find it ridiculous that they continue to push off on M1 Mac and Big Sur support at this point.  We're talking about hardware that has been public for more than 6 months and an OS that has been available to them for a year.  Good God... Adobe has Photoshop and Creative Cloud running on M1's and Microsoft has all of Office running on M1's.  Canon can't get a simle camera pass-through app to work?  Yikes.

P.S. Huge thanks to @sogrady for mentioning Cascable Pro Webcam. I downloaded it on my M1 MacBook Air and it recognized my R6 immediately.  Now THAT is a great example of a productive reply to a question! [And betwwen the 2 of us, our purchases have pretty much paid Cascable's Apple Developer fee for the year!]

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I am a software developer, too.  I make no pretense of my dislike for Apple's business practices.  Their current business practices were once banned under federal law as a result of the "Big Blue" lawsuit decades.ago.  

Their licensing arrangement is not quite as simple as you make it out to be.  Every update requires a new license, and every product they sell requires a separate license.

[AdvocateUK]

I’m afraid it is YOUR understanding of Apple software development that is incomplete and inaccurate. 

Developing for MacOS on Apple hardware  is free, as is XCode, which is the development environment. As has been pointed out numerous times Apple has a robust developer beta program to give devs at minimum 3 months notice of future changes to MacOS AND allows devs to download beta versions of the OS to test against. 

Having said that, there are fundamental differences between Apple and MS and their approach towards maintaining back-compat, each with their own positives and negatives. But the blame for Canons software not working with M1 or Big Sur etc lies solely with Canon. 

[Solublepeter]

You seem to be the misinformed one. Apple provides a set of free development tools, in Xcode, (although as an iOS developer you do pay around $75 a year to be able to submit apps to the App Store.)

The reason things "break" with Apple is usually that they keep increasing security, to stay ahead of the people that wish to steal your data. If you don't think that's important, then you are wrong.

[deanojr]

Well kinda:

I have discovered today that EOS Webcam Utility DOES INDEED work with Mac M1 running Big Sur versions up to 11.2.3.  The caveat I have found is that applications that have been recompiled for Apple Silicon do not work.  I am running a Mac Mini M1 with Big Sur 11.2.3 with a Canon EOS 90D.  I am not running the EOS Utility (I have heard it causes problems and furthermore it is not a priority for me.  Will test later.) 

When I initially setup my M1, I did so from scratch.  I downloaded all fresh copies of software with a preference to those recompiled for Apple Silicon.  My experience was not good.  I noticed that it did work consistently with Blue Jeans but nothing else I needed.  No Google Meet, No Zoom, No Facetime etc.

Once I realized that the current version of BlueJeans was not recompiled, I uninstalled Google Chrome and installed the version for Intel Macs and VOILA!  Google Meet works!  Same for Zoom.  The version for Intel Macs works just fine and accesses the EOS Webcam Utility v1.0 without issue.

Clealy I have not tested all of the apps mentioned here but hopefully this approach will work for you guys until the EOS Webcam Utility is reworked for Apple Silicon.

BTW - Facetime, Photo Booth, etc still won't work.