UA935 wrote:
If Canon do identify a fault with the AF I think they will have a S*** Storm on their hands.
I for one would not be happy having an item which I purchased brand new repaired due to the fault of the manufacturer.
If a fault is acknowledged, under the sales of goods act Canon would have suipplied an item which is not fit for purpose.
Why should we have to have our cameras taken apart and reassembled?
As I side note I only shoot aviation and to date have not noticed any issue with my AF but that could be down to the subject I shoot....Show more →
At this point, I don't care if they take it apart and throw a parade for the pieces by driving them around the city square for a couple hours on a float. As long as they put it back together and send it back to me and it works, I'll be happy.
jlacasci wrote:
I will be buying a MK III once the issues are resolved. I need the low light abilities for night football. I chatted with a rep from B&H PHoto and was told that they can't get any more at the time as Canon isn't shipping them any longer.
Joe
May be Canon finally starting to ship the (defected) 1DMK3 to Canada I was at our local camera store and they had just received 6 cameras yesterday.
Bruce Sawle wrote:
First they have to find the issus and admit it. And under US law we get screwed.
Canon's probably looking at a painful class action suit at some point. When 35-50% of a professional class is saying any given product has a problem it is hard to argue user incompetence and you really don't want to try to defend yourself in court.
For what it is worth, mine performed much better at the local polo pitch last weekend after updating the firmware. The images still suck but at least they are bad pictures that are in-focus. Progress comes in small steps sometimes.
In going through the files and checking the focus points, the majority of errors are clearly from my inexperience. The remaining question that a friend brought up is did shooting from a different positon relative to the sun as well as the variation in cloud cover from one shoot to the next have an impact on my results and could it have been the increase in contrast rather than the firmware upgrade that made the difference?
Thanks for that update, Jeff. 98% is a pretty high success rate. I wonder how many they have serviced for that issue. Too bad we can't get some more official information on what they're doing.
I'm under the impression that most owners have not sent their cameras in, figuring the service centers have not been instructed on how to correct the problem anyway. Still being under investigation.
There were some messages here and in other forums from people who were told by the service centers not to bother sending it in, because they didn't know what to do yet. They were waiting for clarification from Canon Japan.
That's basically where I am too, waiting for some kind of an announcement from Canon (if there ever is one). But it sounds like that service center may have discovered something that helps. At least interesting.
Two issues in AI Servo,
1. The center AF point seems "larger" than on the 1DmkIIN; when photographing distant birds that don't cover enough of the center senor, the focus always jumps to the background.
2. A new one for me, shooting in AI servo with the 500/4 stacked 1.4 & 2X extenders, center focus point, no expansion, on a sunny afternoon, trying to photograph a lesser scaup at 60 meters, the mk3 could not attain focus, it would get close, very close and then jump completely OOF. So I tried disabling hunting for focus thinking this would stop the problem. No, same thing, got close, very close and then bang, completely OOF. Only with hunt for focus disabled it would not even begin to search for focus again. Finally had to resort to one shot and focus point expansion left & right. For those of you that think this expecting too much of the mk3, the same setup worked in cloudy weather on the same birds at 120 meters two days earlier. With better conditions the focus failed.
The pictures compaing conditions can be found here: http://www.pbase.com/kingfisher/image/84185971
Other than these extreme case problems the camera performs well and I am still very pleased with the high ISO performance and AI servo performance with birds that are closer.
Two issues in AI Servo,
1. The center AF point seems "larger" than on the 1DmkIIN; when photographing distant birds that don't cover enough of the center senor, the focus always jumps to the background.
2. A new one for me, shooting in AI servo with the 500/4 stacked 1.4 & 2X extenders, center focus point, no expansion, on a sunny afternoon, trying to photograph a lesser scaup at 60 meters, the mk3 could not attain focus, it would get close, very close and then jump completely OOF. So I tried disabling hunting for focus thinking this would stop the problem. No, same thing, got close, very close and then bang, completely OOF. Only with hunt for focus disabled it would not even begin to search for focus again. Finally had to resort to one shot and focus point expansion left & right. For those of you that think this expecting too much of the mk3, the same setup worked in cloudy weather on the same birds at 120 meters two days earlier. With better conditions the focus failed.
The pictures compaing conditions can be found here: http://www.pbase.com/kingfisher/image/84185971
Other than these extreme case problems the camera performs well and I am still very pleased with the high ISO performance and AI servo performance with birds that are closer....Show more →
I can duplicate what you describe in #1 100% of the time. Slide a 1/3 to 1/2 off the subject and boom it is focusing on something else. I wonder if the "electronic fix" we occasionally hear about aligns / realigns the actual sensor area with the AF point as seen by the user.
I have noticed an anomaly when checking focus points in zoombrowser. In one shot, if you half depress the shutter button, then re compose the image before fully pressing, then the focus point is shown in zoombrowser as the centre of the newly re composed shot and not where the original POF was made [ thats not very helpful ]. Now in AI SERVO, because of camera movement following moving subjects, and because of a " lag " before the camera fires, could viewing focus points in zoombrowser be misleading ? I was scratching my head in disbelief while looking at focus points in ZB, but have abandoned that practice until some one more experienced chimes in to clarify this matter
At least I have stopped making camera setting changes until I understand it better.
deadeyedick wrote:
... Now in AI SERVO, because of camera movement following moving subjects, and because of a " lag " before the camera fires, could viewing focus points in zoombrowser be misleading ? I was scratching my head in disbelief while looking at focus points in ZB, but have abandoned that practice until some one more experienced chimes in to clarify this matter
At least I have stopped making camera setting changes until I understand it better.
It is not a matter of camera movement. I can and have duplicated the same thing on a tripod. You can watch it live in the VF w/o ever going into Image Browser.
[PS: Had a chat with Canon Service this morning, and they indicated (as others have said) that there is no official 'fix', but for the cameras that are being sent in, they are doing some electronic tweaks, it sounded like outside the firmware. He also indicated that tweaking C.Fn settings fixed many peoples issues. Not that it means a dang thing, but the individual was well aware of the 'problems reported on the internet', and said that 98% of the time the camera was repaired to the owner's satisfaction. Of course, he could not/would not say exactly how, other than the above.] ...Show more →
I spoke with the Canon Service facility for Ontario yesterday morning. The 1st person I spoke to mentioned receiving the tools and parts from Japan necessary to fix the AF problem. He then said that I should speak with the 1-800 Support number first. I called Support and found them to be useless. I called the Service Facility again, got someone different, and they didn't know anything about "tools or parts". They went off to talk to someone for more details, and then told me to call Support. I waited until the afternoon, called the Service Facility again (hoping to get the first guy) but then got the same run-around as above. In both cases, I strongly felt as if they knew a whole lot more but weren't allowed to provide any details other than follow the standard script "check this, check that, call them, bring it in, etc.".
My sense is that there are a few issues - some but not all people affected by "faulty" hardware or hardware that needs "tweaking" and other issues requiring another firmware update.
I also get the strong feeling that the Techs and Reps are being muzzled by Canon. Sure, some of the techs are ignorant to the problem, but when they go off and speak to someone about it, they come back on the line.... sounding different somehow. My paranoia? Perhaps.
Thanks for reporting Tim. It's a little intriguing.
I'm just speculating, maybe the first tech was right and they're not supposed to say anything, or at least not yet. Or the first tech was just pulling your leg. That doesn't seem likely though.
A big question yet to be answered is the result from the investigation at Canon Japan. To me, it seems too early for them to have shipped out tools & parts at this point. Even RG has had nothing further to report from Canon. But who knows.
Maybe you can keep hammering them for an answer! Somebody there knows the truth! lol
I to have been talking with Canon Ontario. I had sent my MarkIII in to service. It had focus issues but it kept giving me ERR99 and would only take 3 to 4 pictures before locking up.
This was three weeks ago, second week phoned them asking what was wrong, did not really get a straight answer. I had indicated that I needed my camera back by today's date. The said they would put a rush on it, call again next week. Beginning of this week, called, again now the answer is yes there is something wrong and they are waiting parts......hmmmm. My answer was that I needed the camera and they had promised me it would be in my hands Friday of this week. My second response to them was if it is not fixed, please replace, ok they would talk to their supervisor. It is now Wednesday (2 days ago), again talked with them, answer was they don't have the tools to fix they would replace the camera. Ok, when will that be. You will have it on Thursday by courier or they would deliver it to me on Friday.
Way to go Canon, I got it on Thursday a brand new body.....now to test it this weekend. They kept their word, but never really got any answers as what was actually wrong. Went from serial # 504xxx to 53xxxx.
I received body # 531005 from Hunt's Photo this last Wednesday. I ordered on Feb 18, so I guess I don't recommend Hunt's....won't be ordering there again, that's for sure. There have been a few rumors on the intertubes that Canon are no longer shipping this camera - well, mine just came in this week, and I finally got tired of Hunt's and called around - my local shop called me two hours after UPS came, and said they had gotten a body in if I wanted it! - So, that's shipments to the East Coast (Hunt's - Boston) and the left coast (Ventura, CA). Guess Canon are still shipping.
Camera seems fine, I haven't voted on poll yet as I am still checking....autofocus definitely different from my 1D2, best as I can recall - I traded it for a 5D last December.
What a relief to be shooting a 1-series again! Focus accquisition is twitchy, but it may just be more sensitive...the center focus overlay I agree does seem to represent a smaller area than the sensor covers - I have been shooting both One Shot and AI Servo, and using center AF point, selectable AF (various) and auto-select. Shooting conditions are very much varied, from sunrise to overcast to mixed clouds/sun - I have been shooting at the beach, shorebirds mostly.
Beautiful looking files, but it is too early for me to get a sense of what is or is not working. I have the camera mostly set up to Art Morris' recommendations. It does seem that the camera has difficulty starting autofocus when it is asked to target a subject that is grossly out of focus - a quick twist of the manual focus ring to get it started in the right direction seems to help. Of course, this is because I have CF III-5-1 set - I don't think there was anything like this CF on the 1D2? Just an example of how the AF parameters on this camera are different.
A lot of you seem to be mentioning focusing issues as in it being a general problem to the camera itself. Focusing above f4 seems to be about 100% accurate for me, are there bodies out there that are having trouble with AI focus even above f4?
Yesterday my 1DIII was calibrated. I had an appointment and could wait for it.
I brought it in with my 400DO (calibrated 2 weeks ago) and a slightly front-focussing 50/1.2.
It took them 6 hours to calibrate (Ouch).!!! This morning I did the same test as a couple of weeks ago and sadly with the same results (slightly better). Half of the focus sequence was OOF! The one-shot AF is perfect though.
Next week I'm heading off to Africa so I don't know what to do.
The camera is "already" one month old so there's my dealer won't take it back (they have enough bodies on stock, I counted 14 or so).
Tomorrow I'm calling CPS to hear if they have an idea.
Edited by Chris Dees on Aug 25, 2007 at 08:15 PM GMT
The authorized Canon dealer that I'm getting them from here in the US is still receiving Mark III's. The last one I purchased was serial # 5312_ _ .
Cheers, Scott
I got my second Mark III from Amazon yesterday (directly from Amazon, not one of the other resellers). I had to send the first one back a month ago because of AF problems. That one was serial number 520xxx. This one is serial number 529xxx. I just got back in from testing it outside today. It doesn't get much hotter than it is today - 101F air temp and 45% humidity. This one has an AF that actually works. I ran the exact same test (had my daughter running at me multiple times at different speeds at the exact same spot) and the difference is amazing. The first copy I had would take three to five frames with reasonable accuracy and then the next one or two would not have anything in the frame in focus. I'm happy with this one, but a little disappointed that it's taken me this long to get a good one. I placed my original order April 17th.
I was at our local camera store and they had just received 6 cameras yesterday.
