What it looks like at Jonny's end! Where is the "Add Manual Controls & Extra Frame rates button"?

When I first got wind of this, I was very, very interested! I’d always thought that surely as soon as the Canon 5D MKII Firmware Update that gave the user manual control over ISO, Aperture and Shutter speed came out, somebody would take up the reins and find a way to port that over to it’s baby brother the Canon 500D. It never happened. I guess by the time the Canon 7D came around, most people had seemed to forget about the fantastic little 500D.

Canon seemed to have forgotten about it, no firmware update with manual controls ever came and now with the release of the 550D, which has all that we wanted in the 500D and more, it seems it’s slipped totally from the program.

Enter Jonny Petts. A likeable lad from Kent in the UK. He’s a friend on Facebook and when I saw his status update that he was beginning work on a 500D Firmware Hack, naturally I thought I should suss it out and see just what was going on. I built this site around videos I shot on the 500D and there’s still alot of people out there who would jump at the opportunity to have manual control of their settings and shoot at different frame rates with this little gem, so good on Jonny eh? Three cheers!

So after having a bit of chat with Mr. Petts, here’s the deal, I’ve included the whole thing here because, quite frankly I understand about 16% of what he’s saying!

Ok, well i have a firmware from the 500d and the 550d. I am also comparing what Magic Lantern has done with the new 5D MK II firmware update to the new 5D MKII to see if I can see what they have done.

But what I am ultimately trying to do is use dissect_fw3_2 to expand the firmware into flasher/firmware then to reverse the flasher (after loading it into IDA to find out how to decrypt the firmware image). After I have done all of this, I will be able to attempt porting the desired functionality into the 500D firmware from the 550D’s firmware.

This is going to be a long and painful process and could mess up the 500d, but I am willing to do it for the sake of others, as it will benefit all of the 500D users out there and could save some people $200 instead of buying a 550D.

Did you get that?! You’d be forgiven if you didn’t get it all! So here’s the scooop. . .

Jonny’s first objective is the revered 24P. Many 500D users (myself included) have found dinky workarounds for the manual controls, but are still horribly crippled by that awful 30P and the useless 20P in 1080 mode! I believe he is also looking to implement the 60P and 25P functionality as well. No word on 50P, but we’ll see how that develops, I’m sure if it’s possible we’ll hear about it.

Next up is the manual controls, obviously the new 550D has full manual control over the Shutter, ISO and Aperture. It was such a pain shooting video with the 500D, this would really be a godsend!

Since the 500D doesn’t have a microphone input, the disabling of the AGC is not such a huge issue, but I think that Jonny plans to contact Trammel Hudson (Author of the 5DMKII Magic Lantern firmware) to get his take on things. I’d be interested to know whether people see this as an important thing considering they can’t connect external mics.

I’ll be following Jonny’s progress very closely here, so if you’re interested, stay tuned. If you have anything to add or know a thing or two about hacking the firmware on Canon camera’s and would like to get in contact with Jonny, leave a comment here and I’ll make sure he gets it! Wish him luck guys! I would have loved this to happen when I had one of these camera’s and I can’t wait to see how it goes!

Jonny would like to give a big shoutout to the Cinema5D Forum users. Apparently they’ve been instrumental in getting this project up and running. Smiles all round!

More soon. . .

**UPDATE** Want to catch the first update on Jonny’s progress? Here it is!

So desperate I'm taking shots with my iPhone. Come on SUN!!!!

I am hanging. . .

Like, flat out hanging for a hit maaaan! It’s been that bloody long since I was out in the sunshine having a great time shooting, I almost forget what it’s like. It’s a sad feeling.

I know I could go out and shoot some really morose, rainy, boring footage and peddle it off as ‘arty’ but there’s enough bloggers doing that kind of crap around the place. It’s depressing!

It’s a waiting game though and it seems we’ll be waiting a while. There have been rather decent storms complete rain and floods, gale force winds (with rain in them) and a hell of a lot of clouds. It’s uninspiring weather at the best of times and even though the surf has been big it’s so windy and rainy, there’s not much going on out there to shoot.

But what’s been going on? Well, the Glidetrack is going well. It’s alot of fun but I do get over having it on the tripod all the time. It adds weight and makes the whole thing pretty unwieldy. I am getting much more used to it and it’s already paid for itself. I love the shoulder mount function and use it quite a bit, takes out that horrible minute shake that seems to introduce some terrible jello. It’s also been great for using for Aerials, I straight up would not have been able to get some of the shots I got last time I went up without it.

I sold the 500D! It went to a chap in New South Wales. I hope he has as much fun with it as I did. He got a bargain! I would have been stoked with that deal! So the money is sitting in the bank and was supposed to go straight towards a 550D, but i am just not sure if that’s what I want to do. I’m seriously considering kicking the HVX and getting a 5D MKII when the new firmware comes out. Being able to record audio properly on that sucker is going to be killer! So considering that’s the only thing I keep the HVX around for these days, it’s possible she might be going to a new home. It’s done it’s time and really, somebody somewhere will give it a hell of a better life than it has now, sitting in the corner in it’s Pelican case. Probably going to sell it all as a kit.

Well, that’s about it for now. I’ll be doing a bit more around here in the coming weeks. It’s time to get back into the swing of things. Next up I’ll be bringing you some information on a group of unlikely lads who have got their hands on Firmware dumps of the 500D and 550D and will be doing their best to bend the 500D to their will, cracking it wide open and making it do all those cool things we want it to. We’ll be following their progress closely because if and when they succeed, there’s going to be a hell of a lot of happy campers out there!

More soon. . .

The Canon 550D - The 7D's little brother!

So it was that Canon announced to a mostly suspecting public that coming soon to store near them would be the latest addition to the Rebel Line, the Canon 550D or Rebel Ti2. This little beauty certainly does look the goods on paper and with it’s free and easy attitude towards video it’s sure to be a hit with all the boys and girls! What’s it’s deal, I hear you ask, well it’s basically a mini 7D. It’s a Digic IV processor, 18MP APS-C Sensor with pretty much the same video modes and frame rates (1080P @ 30, 25 & 24P, 720 @ 50 & 60P, 480 @ 50 & 60P). Am I excited, you betcha!

Let me tell you why. . .

Check out the Press release here for all the information, I’m not going to bother to regurgitate it all for you, but rather add some thoughts to ponder.

If the 500D had of been this camera, I don’t think I would ever have brought a 7D. . .end of story. . .Now I love my 7D, heaps and heaps and heaps, but I only brought it for the manual video controls, useable 1080P mode and $1000 price difference to the 5D MKII. At the time I was shooting mostly video and considering I really only needed those things, the 5DMKII, despite the luscious full frame sensor, seemed overkill for my purposes. So I jumped at the 7D as soon as it popped it’s head up, but now the 550D is on the horizon I’m looking at my neglected 500D on the shelf and wondering if I could maybe finally get my 7D auto focus looked at by Canon using the 550D as a backup. That my friends is a very alluring thought!

Now having said that, I’m sure there are a couple of things that the 550D will have that will really irk me. Going back to having only pre-set white balances will be agony. I shoot almost exclusively with a manual Kelvin white balance, adjusting it for nearly every shot. This is just me, it’s the way I like to do things. Having this ability for the first time on the D90 was a godsend. Losing it when I moved to the 500D killed me. Getting it back when I got a 7D was like slipping into your favourite old shoes. The prospect of going back to that with a 550D as a back up camera is almost a deal breaker for me. Once you get used to it to Manual Kelvin, it’s nigh impossible to go back.

I’m also left wondering if the noise apparent in the 500D image will be any different with the 550D. The 7D eats the 500D alive in this respect and to be honest, I’m not sure why. I see people making reference to the 2 processors, but I’m not sure how this makes a difference. I thought the two processors were there so you could crunch through 18mp stills at 8FPS. I’m not an expert on that though so I should stop pretending to be!

So am I going to get one? At this stage I’m not sure. . .but to give you an idea my 500D is now sitting on eBay, with I might add, a spectacular marketing video that I shot special for it! All I know is that no matter what happens, it will be missed and remembered dearly. . .the first HDSLR that I ever owned! *sigh*

More soon. . .