24L II: my problem child

I notice this as well if a lower contrast subject is causing some focus issues, it is quite inconsistent. I can shoot it several times in a row, and some will be in focus and some will be quite off. I am wondering if MatthewK's fixed copy is doing well in these scenarios.

I got my lens back from Canon for the 2nd time and it is much better now where most of the shots are hitting focus perfectly. But there are still those unexplainable misses. Back off to Canon.

I had quite a similar situation with my 24-70 on the wide end a few years back and it took quite a few trips to get it 100% resolved, and where I didn't have to chimp each shot to see if it is in focus. I won't accept anything less with the 24L.

Have you tried manual focusing with confirmation? I have once - a simple test with a subject 2 meters away and focusing from both extremes (MFD and infinity) until the focus was confirmed. I was really amazed to see the range in which the camera thought it had obtained proper focus. From a severe FF to an equally bad BF. Very strange... Does focus confirmation involve the lens in any way at all?

The 24L so far is performing exceptionally well, but it will sometimes still miss for no apparent reason, maybe one in 20 shots. Im ok with this, as I think I may be to blame for some misses Besides the much more consistent AF performance, the rendering/ image quality from the lens is completely different (read: amazing), so yeah, I'm happy.

I'm really curious if Sdiver's 24L came back corrected.

Tomdz- there is manual focus confirmation when using Canon lenses w/ autofocus? I just tried it with my 50L, switched to MF, and didn't get any confirmation. How do I enable it?

Matthew, just half-press the shutter button as you would normally do to start the AF. You will get the green dot and beep if you're focused properly. The other (or actually preferred) way is to keep the button pressed this way while you're focusing - the dot and beep should trigger when you enter the area of good focus.

tomdz wrote in post #12553278
Matthew, just half-press the shutter button as you would normally do to start the AF. You will get the green dot and beep if you're focused properly. The other (or actually preferred) way is to keep the button pressed this way while you're focusing - the dot and beep should trigger when you enter the area of good focus.

Greeeeeeeeeeaaaaattt advise !

Sweet, it really works, thanks Tomdz!

Do you back button focus?

Jdizzle: back button, yes. Just had to hold the back button for focus confirmation to work.

On a non-related item, discovered the custom function that let's me use the joystick to select focus point: I'm a thrilled 5D2 user today

MatthewK wrote in post #12414792
Of my 4 lenses, the 24L II has been a disappointment in terms of auto-focus consistency and mid to far sharpness. I've seen some amazing results in the sample thread that this lens is capable of, and I've occasionally glimpsed this in my number of walk-around results, but for the most part I've been let down by this lens performance. I've also come upon numerous user reviews talking about how people have had these same results, they've gone through 2 or 3 copies before getting a good one, and a few people have commented that they've heard that the lens has a known design flaw.

I'm not one to continually complain about a lens or keep swapping on barely perceived/imaginary problems, but at this point I am getting better results from my 24-105 @ 24mm, and my 50L, the purported king of softness and focus shift, is kicking the 24L's ass in focus lock, consistency, and sharpness at 1.2 and 1.4. I don't need the sharpest lens, it's not as big of a priority as having the lens perform in a consistent, reliable manner.

Here are some examples of the results I am getting. Is this normal for a wide angle lens, having better close in performance and mushy distant results? Or being at +15 MFA and still getting crazy front focusing? Oh yeah, and I have sent it in to Canon already, who did a repair and got it back to me in 5 days (pretty good for them, actually).

f/2.8, 1/100th, ISO 100:

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f/4.0, 1/200th/ ISO 100:

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f/4.0 1/200th, ISO 100:

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f/8.0, 1/125th, ISO 100:

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f/1.4, 1/500th, ISO 100:

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those targets are the ones that give canon AF particular fits and at f/1.4 give most canon bodies extreme fits

i always found leaves to tend to confuse canon AF, in particular, sadly

is it sharp when you focus well?

you can't compare f/1.4 to f/4 (24 vs 24-105)

anyway my 24-105 drove me crazy how bad at 24mm on 5D2 while my 24II 1.4 is just amazing soooooooo much better

ypras wrote in post #12415242
I have the same problem with my 24L II too! Even at 18 MA it finds accurate focus in about 10 percent of shots! What a disappointment for such an expensive lens. I have not sent mine to Canon yet

pretty much any f/1.4 lens will miss 10% at f/1.4 with canon AF
xxD and rebel models are especially bad at this
and the wider angle the lens is the more the AF is troubled

MatthewK wrote in post #12489715
No, just the lens. But I sent sample shots on a cd, the same screen shots as in this thread that I took from DPP. Send the unedited RAW files too. Not sure how much they helped, but it wouldn't hurt.

Have you tried to shoot the sort of stuff you shot the first times? The samples from the lens after calibration by canon are the sort that the AF system tends to have a much easier job with.

wombatHorror wrote in post #12559814
pretty much any f/1.4 lens will miss 10% at f/1.4 with canon AF
xxD and rebel models are especially bad at this
and the wider angle the lens is the more the AF is troubled

I don't think this is the case with my 24L II that too on 5D II.

wombatHorror wrote in post #12559806
those targets are the ones that give canon AF particular fits and at f/1.4 give most canon bodies extreme fits

i always found leaves to tend to confuse canon AF, in particular, sadly

is it sharp when you focus well?

you can't compare f/1.4 to f/4 (24 vs 24-105)

anyway my 24-105 drove me crazy how bad at 24mm on 5D2 while my 24II 1.4 is just amazing soooooooo much better

This lens works well on my 1Ds III.

wombatHorror wrote in post #12559828
Have you tried to shoot the sort of stuff you shot the first times? The samples from the lens after calibration by canon are the sort that the AF system tends to have a much easier job with.

Back in this post are samples from when I got it back from Canon:
https://photography-on-the.net …p?p=12479132&po​stcount=43

The AF performance is night and day difference compared to before. Pretty much wherever I point the lens, it locks on and delivers. I can see how a wide angle lens would get thrown off by miniscule detail, especially at distance though, but those first test shots were shot pretty close (vine, mud tracks), so should have at least been somewhat close.

MatthewK wrote in post #12560840
Back in this post are samples from when I got it back from Canon:
https://photography-on-the.net …p?p=12479132&po​stcount=43

The AF performance is night and day difference compared to before. Pretty much wherever I point the lens, it locks on and delivers. I can see how a wide angle lens would get thrown off by miniscule detail, especially at distance though, but those first test shots were shot pretty close (vine, mud tracks), so should have at least been somewhat close.

Looks a lot better.