Cost efficiency of the EOS M + ML setup

[Wannabe]

So, in theory all you need is $200 for a used EOS M (with kit lens included).
Sounds affordable and very lucrative. However, then you will be forced to spend at least $350 more on a nice, sharp, wide angle lens in order to compensate for the heavy crop in higher resolutions.
And then you will need some extra $120 for a SanDisk Extreme Pro, as the EOS M + ML setup cannot use cheap SD cards.
That is a total of $670 that you simply have to spend on a rather alternative and experimental system...

For that same money (or even less) you can buy a second hand Sony a6300 (with kit lens included) that can shoot in real 4K without extra crop at 24 fps, and that will have 425 phase detection auto focus points at 0.05 sec AF speed, and will offer continuous shooting capabilities. The Sony will also perform way better in low light conditions, it will be much more stable than the EOS E + ML setup and will not cause you any headaches like pink frames or crashes.
The a6300  will also have a S-LOG profile, so you will be able to color grade all you want.

Maybe I am wrong or maybe my calculations are messed up, but the only advantage that the EOS M + ML setup has over the Sony a6300 is its capability to shoot RAW video. And that advantage can actually be a disadvantage for people who do not want to fiddle with format conversions in post.

Don't get me wrong, I am still going to get myself an EOS M, because I love the idea and because it will allow me to upgrade gradually and not throw a larger sum of money all at once.
I am just thinking if there is a way to cut the total cost of the EOS M setup down.


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[Walter Schulz]

YMMV depending where you start.
I was too slow for an 60 Euro offer for EOS M (without kit lens).
I turned down an 150 Euro offer because I thought it was quite too high. Included kit lens + spare battery. I don't need a kit lens -> waste of money spending money on things I don't need.
Got mine for 79 Euro (including shipping) without adapter in March, 2021.
If you already have a decent wide angle lens your calculation will look different, too.
ATM you can purchase a 400 GB Sandisk Extreme Pro R170/W90 for 60 Euro. At least around here.


From my starting point price is not even a third of your calculation.

[Wannabe]

I can see your point, Walter. You are probably a photography enthusiast who already had a few lenses laying around.
In my case, I am starting from ground zero. I don't own any equipment and have yet to buy everything that will be needed.

By the way, where did you get your 79 Euro EOS M from? They go for around $200-$250 on eBay now, no lens included, body only.
Alternatively, you can buy at $180 from Japanese sellers and then pay extra 20% VAT plus 5% of customs tax, which creates extra hassle and makes the price go even higher than $200.
A 512 GB SanDisk Extreme Pro goes for $110-$120 on Amazon these days.

[Walter Schulz]

If you are going to start video making from scratch: EOS M is no video camera.
ML added some cool features and options never intended to run in this tiny cam.
But take a decent video camera and you will see the difference: Buttons, knobs and they are everywhere. They are designed to be mounted to rigs and for things mounted to them: Matte boxes, microphones, additional displays, battery packs. Outlets to external recording media. And they usually don't suffer from overheating issues.

So: Asking if this all make sense is a proper question. And today is today and now there are several choices for RAW and non-RAW video makers. You may better be off getting something like Blackmagic Pocket or some capable video camera.

Your question: Photogs in Germany wondering about ebay a lot and for more than a decade. We saw biddings for used items above market price (from the shell, untouched) not only once.
Most used gear I get via german speaking camera forum(s). Pick any big one. Sellers are mostly long term members.
Amazon is not always the best source when it comes to fast cards. Happens quite often a big company is offering a limited sale and Amazon will follow after some hours. I use a site monitoring deals (mydealz.de) and/or geizhals.de or idealo.de. Last ones are normally too slow to trace short-time offers. But they offer some tools to compare prices and long time trends. And you can compare ratios like Euro/GB to find out your 512 GB card is not a good deal:
400GB microSD: 0.15 Euro/GB
512GB microSD: 0.215 Euro/GB
512GB SD: 0.225 Euro/GB

I don't know why you want to refer to Amazon to compare prices. This makes no sense to me.

[Wannabe]

Thanks, Walter. Your posts are always very helpful.
I will check out the price sniping tools that you recommended.
Who knows, maybe there's a deal waiting for me to complete it in Germany.

[Skinny]

I think it is absolutely different experience with ML-camera and any other cameras.

You can find capable ML-enabled cameras such as 650D maybe even cheaper than EOS M, especially on local market places, and then use some vintage lenses which can cost anywhere from $3..$5 to $60+ or even for free if you have old SLR cameras.. and this way build really inexpensive setup. Way cheaper than anything else.


But I think the main difference is the workflow.
With ML you can probably achieve more beautiful and "cinematic" picture if you know how to do it, but the process is slow. You need time, patience and practice a lot, it is not as convenient and you can even lose some of your footage if it was recorded with pink frames or something was not set properly. And processing RAW is slow and files take a lot of space on cards/HDD. And HDMI preview not always working and so on.
While any other camera will just work out of the box, without any problems

ML raw won't be true 4k, although there are 5k modes but they are 1:3, not 1:1. But they are very close to 4k. And what is more important - the color information and ability to push your footage in post-processing is amazing with RAW.

If you like this concept - you will like shooting ML RAW, and if not - then any other camera would be 10x better

[Wannabe]

Thanks, Skinny.
I decided to go for a used Sony a6300 for my film making project. Can't risk out of focus or pink framed takes.
Will still get myself an EOS M, though. Just for the fun of it. It's cheap, it's small, it's capable and it can take nice still pics too.

[Skinny]

But don't get me wrong, shooting ML RAW is awesome. It is just not as user friendly. Personally I do love it and enjoy working with it.
And if you know your camera and settings that work, then it can be reliable enough..


Main limiting factors for more or less serious work could be:

Card full, because sometimes you can forget how much free space left.. free card space indicator only show you the real number after you reboot the camera. So if there is no space left, recording will just stop, but file saved.

Sometimes recording can stop for various reasons, but it is rare unless you are trying to push it to the max resolution/write speed, etc.

Playback of recorded raw files in camera is very slow and low resolution.

Experimental builds can sometimes crash, rarely but it can happen, and sometimes you will need to format the card. If you have only one card with you, and no laptop - it will be completely useless. I don't know what camera/build/card combination can cause this behavior, maybe it is something very specific and you will never encounter this problem.

And obviously RAW footage takes a lot of GB so you probably need at least a couple of cards and maybe a laptop where you can copy everything.

HDMI preview doesn't work in all modes, so it is hard to share the screen with others. But it is a work in progress, maybe HDMI support will become better in the future.

And overall not so simple process, not really critical, but if you need to keep in mind 1000 things at the same time (lighting, framing, focusing, movement, and always check if everything is OK in the frame and on set) it is not so easy