At just $1,300, the RP is Canon’s least expensive full-frame camera yet, but surrounded by high-end, high-cost, and bulky RF lenses, it will have trouble making a home for itself. The camera trades power for portability, and may be a success in the long-term as the EOS R system evolves.
It was over 70 degrees in New Orleans by the time I ate breakfast. It would crest 80 before lunch. Having left Oregon’s below-freezing temperatures (and a dusting of evanescent snow) the day before, it may as well have been 100 — not the type of weather in which I want to lug around a bunch of camera gear. Fortunately, the event that had drawn me to the Big Easy was the unveiling of the smallest and lightest full-frame camera Canon had ever made, a model that — with the right lens — I could comfortably carry without breaking a sweat.
That camera was the EOS RP, a low-cost model in Canon’s mirrorless EOS R system designed for portability and ease of use. It takes the 26-megapixel sensor from the 6D Mark II DSLR (introduced in 2018) and puts it into a body measuring just 5.2 x 3.4 x 2.8 inches (it would be even thinner were it not for the ergonomic grip). But the best part? It starts at just $1,300 for the body only — the cheapest ever for a new full-frame camera at launch.
Like the EOS R, the RP is built on the RF mount, which is considerably shorter compared to the EF mount of Canon’s DSLRs. Along with foregoing the bulky DSLR mirror box, this is what allows the RP — and any mirrorless camera — to slim down to such small dimensions.
Thanks to rumors and leaks leading up to the event, the 20 or so camera journalists Canon had gathered in New Orleans already knew many of the details before arriving. We weren’t expecting anything earth-shattering, and those expectations were met. The RP offers little in the way of new tech and is far from the high-end, professional R-series model that Canon has promised (and which, they reassured everyone, is still coming).
There are many things I find lacking or even downright frustrating about the RP, but I can still recognize that it has an important role to play in the growth of the nascent EOS R system. Maybe this isn’t the camera we tech journalists want, but it might just be the one Canon needs. This is the cheapest full-frame model Canon makes, mirrorless or otherwise, and it may give more casual photographers a gentle nudge to make the move up from smaller formats (or their phones, which really aren’t much cheaper these days).
It’s an interesting approach in a market segment that has moved increasingly toward higher-end cameras and away from lower-margin, consumer-focused models. Nikon’s first two models in its mirrorless Z series came in at $2,000 and $3,400; Sony’s full-frame Alpha line also starts at $2,000, although it does keep older models around for less; Panasonic’s brand-new S series starts even higher, with the Lumix S1 coming in at $2,500.
But Canon is banking on drawing in new users at the other end of the spectrum, and it’s a strategy that may very well succeed — even if it means the RP is not exactly exciting for tech enthusiasts.
The RP is a full $1,000 cheaper than the EOS R, and likewise trails it in most specifications. It uses a smaller battery, borrowed from the Rebel series, that’s rated for just 250 exposures. Electronic viewfinder (EVF) resolution is 2.36 million pixels; the LCD, 1.04 million. Those numbers are down from 3.69 and 2.1 million, respectively, in the R. The love-it-or-hate-it multi-function touch bar is gone, and a classic mode dial replaces the R’s top information display. Like the R, there is no internal image stabilization, but fortunately most of the RF lenses are stabilized.
I found the physical controls to be somewhat limited; the job of adjusting settings falls primarily on the touchscreen, which is responsive and generally easy to use. There’s no dedicated ISO button, but simply tapping the ISO display on the screen allows you to quickly adjust it. You can also map ISO control the multifunction lens ring, a feature unique to RF lenses (or adapted EF lenses using the Control Ring Adapter).
As with the R, there is also no autofocus joystick on the RP, but you can use the touchscreen to move the focus point around, even when looking through the viewfinder. You can also map the four-way button cluster on the back of the camera to control the AF point, but there is one glaring goof: The button in the center of that cluster, the one that definitively should reset the focus point to the center of the frame, brings up the quick menu. To reset the focus point, you have to instead press the delete button, which makes no sense and takes your thumb away from the other focus control buttons. You can remap that function to the quick menu button — but you can’t remap the quick menu to the delete button.
Maybe that’s not a deal breaker, but time after time I kept running into variations of this issue. (Another example: There’s no EVF/LCD button; you can map that control to the sole function button, but you’ve probably got a better use for that.) Overall, the RP is quite easy to use, but it becomes frustrating if you try to use it outside of the bounds established by Canon.
There are also some features that feel truncated without reason (other than to justify the R’s $1,000 premium). The most egregious example of this is that the silent electronic shutter is now only available as a scene mode. Like most scene modes, this forces the camera into automatic exposure. Let me make this clear: There is no way to shoot in manual, aperture priority, or shutter priority exposure modes using the silent shutter. A silent shutter is one of the core advantageous of mirrorless cameras, and yet here’s a brand new model that inexplicably locks that capability to a mode that any experienced shooter would rather avoid.
