5dm2 tethered shooting control
 

Has anyone successfully used EOS Utility to stop & start recording while tethered? I know you cannot record footage through the USB, I just want to control the camera since it will be mounted high on a C-stand as a 'B' camera. Everytime I attempt this the Utility freezes up my entire MacBookPro (I have actually had to pull the battery out to shut it down). I have the current version of the Utility (2.5.1) and I am running it on a MBP with 2.4 Ghz Intel with 2GB RAM on OS 10.5.6. Are there any other software solutions....LightRoom or Capture One maybe? Thx.

same here
 

The same thing happens to me while running basically the same set-up that you are. Force-Quit works for me though. I know there is some kind of work-around for shooting tethered in one or both of those app's in still pic mode, but never saw anything for getting footage. Aperture has a "Tether" under File in the Menu selection. Tried it to no avail, still or video.

Force quit sometimes works, but often I have to go drastic with the battery removal. This just is not robust enough to use on location with clients present. Hopefully there is a solution out there............

I would try using the infra red controller like a Canon RC-1 instead. If you have a live view hdmi monitor you can make sure its recording and I've found it pretty reliable. In the past I've used a fibre optical cable to build a 'cabled' version of an IR transmitter by jury rigging it to the camera at one end and the transmitter at the other, this should work with the 5dmkII but I've not tested it.

Dan

I know this doesn't help any, but I shot about 40 video clips today using EOS utility on my windows laptop. Works great. Maybe some pressure one Canon can get the Mac problem fixed.

I am not having any problems shooting stills with EOS Utility. Did a big studio shoot last week with no probs. It all seems to arise when I hit the Live View button and then the record button on my laptop.

Their Mac software must have a bug. On XP, I open my live-view from EOS, turn on video mode from EOS, and hit the record button from EOS, and everything works fine.

Their is a one second delay though and you can't get rid of that stupid white square. It is always a high resolution version of what is on the camera's LCD, including the gray bars. It works well for my fashion video shooting though.

No bug
 

The Mac simply does not recognize the 5DM. Perhaps someday.

My MacBook Pro definitely recognizes the 5DM2 thru EOS Utility, I have gotten it to start recording, but that is when it gets buggy and freezes. Hopefully in a future update this will be addressed.

It may not be the Canon software. I know nothing about the Mac, but on Windows I would try things like temporarily removing all the other codecs, uninstall, reinstall, etc.

Don't forget that a Codec can be written to make everything buggy, on the Mac or Windows. Codecs can insert themselves into video chains and wreak havoc. The whole concept of allowing apps to use arbitrary codecs without telling you is inherently flaky. Not that I know of any other way to do it.

What am I not understanding about the EOS Utility? I can boot it up, no crashes or anything scary that's been reported above.

When i go to LiveMode, I get shuffled to full auto of course, but at least I can shutter the camera.
However, my Record button is grayed out. I thought you could record movies (to the CF card) via the Utility.

Also, shouldn't I be able to get Live View that is NOT full auto so I could watch my exposure and control that while shooting stills?

Last question, is there a way to lock exposure from Utility?

Thanks very much.

It's a bit tricky to start recording video. You have to hit the little square symbol to enable it before you hit the record button.

If you put your camera in M mode, you can fully control it from EOS. Other modes also allow appropriate control. You right click on a value to control it. (Which sucks as a user interface idea).

I don't think you can lock exposure. You'll have to read to the manual on that one.

I too had problems with the EOS Utility on my MacBook Pro. I could start it recording video but then had to do a Force-Quit to exit the program.

The good news is that there is an update for the Canon software (2.6.1) that was released recently that appears to fix this problem. At least I can operate the camera from my MBP now without problems. Canon EOS 5D Mark II Digital SLR Camera

I also have an MSI Wind that is running a retail version of OS X 10.5.5. When I tried to install the EOS Utility I needed to attach an external monitor as the installer complained about the screen resolution being too low. The minimum is apparently 1024x768 but once installed it works OK on the 10" 1024x600 display. It's a little sluggish in responding to changes in the Live View but is usable. Even on the MBP the Live View display doesn't come anywhere near the responsiveness of the LCD on the camera. All in all it works OK for me as I will be using it on top of a 7m (22') pole for elevated shots of buildings & scenery. The Wind is a lot more convenient to carry about in the field too.

What I like about using a laptop is the built-in battery. Do any monitors have that?

I've used the utility on my MacBook Pro 233 with 2.5 gig Ram Mac OS 10.4.11 and no problems at all.
Just my two penneth…

Avey