Canon SLR Troubleshooting and Comments

[jlgurr]

Are you able to post any of the pics you're telling us about?

Ronnie

Yes, I will get a couple and share them.

 

[jcummins]

Yes, I will get a couple and share them.

Please do. I have the same camera. Use to be a lot more picky of my photos, these day, not so much. BUT I've notice my images don't seem quite as sharp as I remember them, and your thread has brought that to the surface. I need to take some specific pictures for analysis is I've got a problem too.

Question for others, without all the research, I notice some cameras have wi-fi for pictures transfer. Does anyone here do that? And what cameras do that? Have SLRs do away with the mirror??

 

[IslandTractor]

I have a Fuji XT-1 that has wifi. It works but I rarely use it. Only practical use for me is the rare shot I want to email before I get to a computer. I can download a file to my iPhone and then email it. Occasionally useful when traveling but not a must have.

 

[westcliffe01]

If it is a SLR it basically has to have a mirror. But if you were to get one of the 4/3 cameras, they do not have mirrors and that is one of the reasons why they are so compact and another reason why the lens systems are so optically excellent, since the rear lens element can be 1/16" off the CCD chip without risk.

Question for others, without all the research, I notice some cameras have wi-fi for pictures transfer. Does anyone here do that? And what cameras do that? Have SLRs do away with the mirror??

 

[IslandTractor]

There is a relatively new mirrorless camera class that uses an electronic viewfinder instead of the mirror based viewfinder of a classic SLR. Sony, Olympus, Fuji, Panasonic, Samsung, Canon and Nikon all make them now. There are pros and cons for mirrorless. They are typically smaller and lighter. They don't focus as quickly as SLRs. Image quality is essentially the same as SLR for a given sensor size. My Fuji XT-1 has the same size sensor as my Canon D50 DSLR and produces as good or better image quality. It doesn't focus as fast.

 

[jlgurr]

The girl holding babies is a 2013 photo, the railroad water tank and kids was just two weeks ago.

 

[westcliffe01]

Railroad tank was a 1/200th exposure at 135mm focal length. ISO 100. I'd say that is getting close to the point that one can expect camera movement to create unsharpness. Back in the old days when not everyone had telephoto lenses, a lot of photography was done with 35 and 50mm lenses that has apertures of 1.4 or 1.8 and a camera can focus those lenses a lot better than they can a zoom lens with an aperture of 4.0 or even 5.6. Get yourself a cheap 50mm F1.4 lens and see how that works for you. Why not run ISO 400 ? that would be 2 stops more safety or an exposure time of 1/800 and then I think the image will be sharper. Modern digital SLR's do not suffer nearly as much from noise at higher ISO values than the old ones.

The image in front of the water tank is clearly out of focus and nothing behind the water tank is critically sharp either. So to me this does not look like a focusing problem.

Crank up the ISO value all the way to 1600 on a contrasty subject and see what you get. Use a tripod and focus critically (manual focus) and then take the image with a remote or the self timer.

 

[MarkF48]

Check your lenses that they are on AF (Auto Focus). I opened the images below in Canon's DPP and turned on the focus point indicator (the boxes in the AF matrix). Your older image shows the red AF points where camera grabbed focus at. The newer "tank" image has no AF points illuminated and the shooting info shows the focus mode is "Manual" for that image. I'm not sure that the AF can be put manual within the camera, so if the lenses are set to AF, then it's likely the camera may be at fault or the camera is not receiving the lens focus status correctly.
You had said you cleaned the contacts and those do convey the focus status to the camera. Perhaps try cleaning them again, both the on the lens and camera body if the lenses are indeed set to AF.

 

[IslandTractor]

Agree with Westcliffe. You'd need very steady hands or bracing to get a sharp photo at 1/200 at 135mm focal length. I cannot see the exif data on the other photos with my iPhone but it could possibly be a similar issue as nothing appears in focus in any of them.

Modern DSLRs generally do fine with ISO up to 800.

Another test shot you might try to distinguish focus problems from some other issue: In bright light, lay a ruler or yardstick on a table about two feet away and perpendicular to the camera. Focus on a mark about halfway (6" or 18"). Take the shot with shutter speed of 1/500. Check the image and see if a) anything is in good focus b) if the number you focused on or some other mark is in focus.

 

[IslandTractor]

Good catch on the MF issue Mark48