Anyone had front focusing successfully repaired?

[droosan]

My 10D front focuses a couple millimeters. It isn't normally a problem, except in portraits. I was hopping mad--until I discovered that if I focused on the back corner of the eye, the ball and lashes were usually properly focused.

I have heard stories of people sending cameras to have focusing issues fixed, and the camera coming back the same or worse.

Tell your story and give suggestions.
Thanks

[msvadi]

are you sure it's the camera and not the lens?

[droosan]

are you sure it's the camera and not the lens?

It behaves pretty similarly with my 50/1.4 and my 100/2. Also to a certain extent with my 28-105--of course focusing is a lot less critical at f/5.6 or smaller. I should test my 200/2.8.

Also, those lenses never had a problem with my EOS-3.

[msvadi]

are you sure it's the camera and not the lens?

It behaves pretty similarly with my 50/1.4 and my 100/2. Also to a certain extent with my 28-105--of course focusing is a lot less critical at f/5.6 or smaller. I should test my 200/2.8.

Also, those lenses never had a problem with my EOS-3.

I'm asking because I see front focusing on my Drebel with 50 1.8 and 135 2.8. However, the AF is very accurate with tamron 28-75. Well, it's possible that my primes are okay, the body is front focusing and the tamron lens is backfocusing ;) but I had the camera checked some time ago by Canon. They were supposed to check the AF too, so I assume that the problem is with the lenses.

[robertwgross]

This isn't a solution to your problem, but a thought anyway.

Why are you trying to control the depth of field so tightly to the eyeball? I think when most of us shoot a portrait, we try to get everything in from the front of the nose and chin all the way to the back of the head. I understand that we don't want to have a huge depth of field so that we can leave the background fuzzy, but I normally leave the background a long way behind the back of the head.

---Bob Gross---

[defordphoto]

Show some samples.

[Tom W]

My 10D front focuses a couple millimeters. It isn't normally a problem, except in portraits. I was hopping mad--until I discovered that if I focused on the back corner of the eye, the ball and lashes were usually properly focused.

I have heard stories of people sending cameras to have focusing issues fixed, and the camera coming back the same or worse.

Tell your story and give suggestions.
Thanks

I'm not sure that a couple of millimeters of accuracy is even noticable, except in tight macro photography. How far away are you, what lens, and what aperture?

[droosan]

This isn't a solution to your problem, but a thought anyway.

Why are you trying to control the depth of field so tightly to the eyeball? I think when most of us shoot a portrait, we try to get everything in from the front of the nose and chin all the way to the back of the head. I understand that we don't want to have a huge depth of field so that we can leave the background fuzzy, but I normally leave the background a long way behind the back of the head.

---Bob Gross---

I get the whole face in decent focus but the sharpest part has to be an eye, not the nose. You want to see individual eye lashes, not nose hairs. :D

[Mike H]

My 10D front focuses a couple millimeters. It isn't normally a problem, except in portraits. I was hopping mad--until I discovered that if I focused on the back corner of the eye, the ball and lashes were usually properly focused ...

I'm not sure that a couple of millimeters of accuracy is even noticable, except in tight macro photography. How far away are you, what lens, and what aperture?

Actually, when I read this I was sure it was a joke. A couple of millimeters? Glance at a metric ruler and tell me that a couple of millimeters would matter (or that you could even be sure that you were measuring the error that precisely on a portrait). :D

Honestly, I don't mean to sound like I'm slamming anyone, but sometimes we demand more from our equipment than is reasonable. If you do focus exactly on the eye, and have such a tiny depth of field, the eye may end up out of focus because either you or the subject moved just a small amount between the time you focused and the time you released the shutter. This can especially be the case if you focus and then recompose as many people do.

Mike H

[paulhurt]

Oh, I would be *overjoyed* if my focus was accurate to a couple of millimetres.

My two-day old 10D front focuses by about a foot and a half with my previously trusty 300mm 2.8L.

Not funny, since I shoot sports.

Hoping to get it fixed this week - I'm covering a week-long World Championship sports event in Finland in a week's time. And it only happens every four years. I don't get a second chance at it for quite a while!

Mild panic.

Paul

[Chris1le]

My Sigma 70-200EX was front focusing by about 2 to 3 centimeters. Sent it in they replaced the flat board. Whatever that is. It seems to be focusing much better now. The exif even show's the proper lens focal length now. :)

[Mitch]

Hi there,
I am glad someone asked the question. I had a severe focusing problem with both my 10D cams and all four of my lenses, some more than others. 50mm 1.8, 17-40L f4, 28-135 IS, 70-200L f4. I tested and retested until I was sure. Each of the lenses tested differently on each of the two cameras. By deduction, the cameras were both front focusing, one worse than the other. The lenses were all over the map. I bought most of the equipment from B&H and Adorama.
I sent both the cameras and all the lenses to Canon at the Irvine, CA facility. There were attentive, earnest, and returned the equipment to me within 4 working days. That was fabulous.
Now the equipment works better and more consistantly. HOWEVER, the lenses still test slightly differently on both cameras, but within usable ranges (unlike before), now all the lenses front focus somewhat (within acceptable improvement ranges over prior-to-repair performance), but still within usable and improved tolerance levels. For example, most of the lense/camera combinations will front focus about 1/2 to 5/8 of an inch from three feet away at wide apertures. This is much better than before.
After reading and reading and reading posts on this issue of 10D focussing problems and learning that the 10D is officially a "consumer" lense, Canon stipulates that the focusing spec (for the 10D or any of Canon's consumer SLR digital cameras) is limited to a focus point "anywhere" within the depth of field. The spec for professional cameras is within 1/3 of the DOF. Huge, huge diffference!
Think about that. "Anywhere" in the DOF. That can mean, for example, that a spec 10D with a 50mm lenses from 8 ft away from the subject has a 20 inch DOF, which means that your actual focus point can be anywhere within that twenty inches! Trust me, that can cause all kinds fo havoc.
I fully suspect that the reason some people will rave about a given lens and another person will say that they think its performance is mediocre at best is half because of the foregoing limited accuracy of our cameras (and lenses) and half becasue they are not cognizant of the exact DOF for given distances and focal lengths and aperture settings. I will bet many enthusiasts are getting soft images because they are shooting (unknowingly) with very narrow DOFs where it is a game of inches where a subject sway or photographer sway of a few inches taken together with the lack of precision of focusing spec being anywhere within the DOF (e.g., at either end of the DOF). (That's another topic)
The bottom line is this, Know your camera and lenses. Test them and keep rigorous records so that you can define exactly how each lense will perform on each camera. Then, shoot accordingly. I don't expect my cameras or lenses to ever focus properly. I can live with that so long as the lenses and cameras are reasonably close to what they should do and perform consistantly. This is why I am saving for a 1D Mk11.
I shot a wedding last weekend and all my shots, 573, came in sharp - because I made "adjustments" and allowances for my equipment's lack of exacting precision.
Final point: Never trust that your cameras or lenses will be performing properly when you buy them. In fact, I believe a good policy is to presume that they don't. Test all cams and lenses when you get them before you use them for something important, send in the ones that need adjusting. Also, change your flash unit's batteries frequently (i.e., after every 60-75 shots), but that's another topic.
Mitch

[Mike H]

After reading and reading and reading posts on this issue of 10D focussing problems and learning that the 10D is officially a "consumer" lense, Canon stipulates that the focusing spec (for the 10D or any of Canon's consumer SLR digital cameras) is limited to a focus point "anywhere" within the depth of field.

Where did Canon make this statement?

Incidentally, I have happy news to report. Over the past twenty-five years I've shot the Canon AE-1 (manual focus), EOS 630, A2, Elan II, D30, D60, 10D, and Mark II cameras, and I've NEVER had a focusing problem. I was also lucky enough to own and shoot the Minolta 9Xi, Hassleblad 501C, Pentax 645, and Pentax 645 AF, with assorted lenses for each, and never had problems with any of them.

It feels good to be the luckiest photographer on Earth. :D

Mike H

[xuxu1]

Isn´t that weird?

Even tough i followed the advice of that "L" Sign (only take pics with a L-lens 8) ) as seen in the grass, the left part of the photo is way out of focus :shock:

And i´m sure that huge bright dot on the planes nose must be a nasty bad "dead pixel" :shock:

http://members.aon.at/aircanon/g5pics/oof.jpg

Guess i´ll have to do some ruler shot´s now :P :roll:

Ed

[droosan]

I don't know whether I am expecting too much of the equipment. I would like to get near the focusing accuracy my EOS-3 gave me.

I don't have time to adequately respond to this at the moment. It is a few millileter problem at f/2-ish quite close. The further away I am from the subject the larger the problem becomes. I have basically given up trying to auto-focus at anything wider than f/5.6. I am getting ok results by manually focus bracketing and taking ridiculous quantities of pictures. I am hoping people will respond to my original question. Have people had good or bad results sending their cameras to Canon for focusing repairs?

Thanks.

[Belmondo]

I had two 10Ds and never had the problem. A number of people who felt they were experiencing difficulties, and who sent their cameras to Canon apparently were largely satisfied with the 'fix' because we haven't heard back from many of them.

Sorry, though, because I have no personal information and can only conclude based on the reasoning above.

[Pekka]

With Mark II focusing to eyelashes when you focus to the eyeball with e.g. f/1.4 is NORMAL. The center focus point is so sensitive it may easily pick tips of eyelashes as preferred contrast points because it sees a lot of them on same DoF plane. I see this often with 85/1.2 and the remedy is to use visual confirmation (viewfinder) and then more forwards just a little after focusing. Or focus to eyebrows or somewhere else on level of eyeballs.

If you suspect a calibration problem with your lens then get it checked.

[drisley]

Hi there,
Canon stipulates that the focusing spec (for the 10D or any of Canon's consumer SLR digital cameras) is limited to a focus point "anywhere" within the depth of field. The spec for professional cameras is within 1/3 of the DOF. Huge, huge diffference!


I find that very interesting and quite believable. When I shot my last bodybuilding show, I took about 130 pictures. Most of them were decently focused, and look very good when printed and viewed on the screen websized. However, there were 2 pictures that were stupifyingly sharp and detailed! After seeing these 2 pictures, the others actually looked quite soft. All were taken with the 85F1.8 and 300D at the same settings.
On Thursday I had to shoot some portraits of 2 bodybuilders, and again, they all seemed fine... but then I found 1 shot that was just amazingly sharp, which made me look again at the others and conclude they were not focused quite as well, even though the same settings were used.

This got me to measurebating today. I pulled out a sheet of paper, made a big red X on it, positioned it horizontally, and then put a "ruler" angled at 45 deg beside it... the way you are officially supposed to measure focusing. Well, I never got consistent results. I tried 50F1.8 II, 85F1.8, and the kit lens. Sometimes I would get a backfocus, sometimes front, sometimes dead one. But like Mitch mentioned, it was always within the limits of the DOF.

[blackviolet]

Isn´t that weird?

Even tough i followed the advice of that "L" Sign (only take pics with a L-lens 8) ) as seen in the grass, the left part of the photo is way out of focus :shock:

:lol: ROFLMAO!!!! :lol:

[droosan]

Hi there,
I am glad someone asked the question. I had a severe focusing problem with both my 10D cams and all four of my lenses, some more than others. 50mm 1.8, 17-40L f4, 28-135 IS, 70-200L f4. I tested and retested until I was sure. Each of the lenses tested differently on each of the two cameras. By deduction, the cameras were both front focusing, one worse than the other. The lenses were all over the map. I bought most of the equipment from B&H and Adorama.
I sent both the cameras and all the lenses to Canon at the Irvine, CA facility. There were attentive, earnest, and returned the equipment to me within 4 working days. That was fabulous.
Now the equipment works better and more consistantly. HOWEVER, the lenses still test slightly differently on both cameras, but within usable ranges (unlike before), now all the lenses front focus somewhat (within acceptable improvement ranges over prior-to-repair performance), but still within usable and improved tolerance levels. For example, most of the lense/camera combinations will front focus about 1/2 to 5/8 of an inch from three feet away at wide apertures. This is much better than before.
After reading and reading and reading posts on this issue of 10D focussing problems and learning that the 10D is officially a "consumer" lense, Canon stipulates that the focusing spec (for the 10D or any of Canon's consumer SLR digital cameras) is limited to a focus point "anywhere" within the depth of field. The spec for professional cameras is within 1/3 of the DOF. Huge, huge diffference!
Think about that. "Anywhere" in the DOF. That can mean, for example, that a spec 10D with a 50mm lenses from 8 ft away from the subject has a 20 inch DOF, which means that your actual focus point can be anywhere within that twenty inches! Trust me, that can cause all kinds fo havoc.
I fully suspect that the reason some people will rave about a given lens and another person will say that they think its performance is mediocre at best is half because of the foregoing limited accuracy of our cameras (and lenses) and half becasue they are not cognizant of the exact DOF for given distances and focal lengths and aperture settings. I will bet many enthusiasts are getting soft images because they are shooting (unknowingly) with very narrow DOFs where it is a game of inches where a subject sway or photographer sway of a few inches taken together with the lack of precision of focusing spec being anywhere within the DOF (e.g., at either end of the DOF). (That's another topic)
The bottom line is this, Know your camera and lenses. Test them and keep rigorous records so that you can define exactly how each lense will perform on each camera. Then, shoot accordingly. I don't expect my cameras or lenses to ever focus properly. I can live with that so long as the lenses and cameras are reasonably close to what they should do and perform consistantly. This is why I am saving for a 1D Mk11.
I shot a wedding last weekend and all my shots, 573, came in sharp - because I made "adjustments" and allowances for my equipment's lack of exacting precision.
Final point: Never trust that your cameras or lenses will be performing properly when you buy them. In fact, I believe a good policy is to presume that they don't. Test all cams and lenses when you get them before you use them for something important, send in the ones that need adjusting. Also, change your flash unit's batteries frequently (i.e., after every 60-75 shots), but that's another topic.
Mitch

Very helpful Mitch. I am coming to the conclusion, as well, that my solution is a 1D, (or the 3D I just know is coming). I was spoiled by my EOS-3. You can't beat the 10D for convenience, and its pictures are usually good enough, and excellent when not relying on precise focusing. Precision focusing, in low light for example, was so easy with my EOS-3, I come to expect it. When you know that the picture you are pressing the shutter for, is the picture that is going to print, you don't have to take very many pictures, 'cause you know they'll all be excellent. With my 10D I am a trigger happy fool, hoping to catch that great shot. And the shots aren't free 'cause I have to take the time to review them.