Calibration, lens vs. camera, 50 F1.4 and 60D

I've been wrestling with a Canon 50 F1.4 on my 60D since the day I purchased the lens (about a year ago). I returned it to Canon, who stated it was calibrated, performing to spec, and was fine. They said if I continued to have issues to return my camera body.

If I send the body, is any adjustment(s) they make on the camera global, or is it lens specific? The reason I ask is I have a 24-70L, Sigma 70-200 F2.8 OS, and Canon 85F1.8 that are all TACK sharp wide open. My EF-S lenses also have no issues. I find that I'm shooting a lot of photos in the 50 mm range when the Brick is mounted, and I'd really like to have the shallower depth of field available.

This lens has produced photos that aren't acceptable printed to an 8x10, with aperture stopped down into the F4 range - with no cropping, and no recomposing. For the life of me I can't figure out what, if anything, I'm doing wrong.

My last course of action is to take some test shots in Live View on a tripod with manual focus and see what happens. As I said, even at smaller apertures it doesn't appear to be working properly but with lack of MA (which I'm not sure is the issue), I don't know whether to sell it, keep it until I get a body with MA, or what.

This is all portrait type settings, with greater than 1/200 shutter, Single point, manually selected focus points, and no recomposing. To date, I've just been trying to get a good picture with it and rule out camera shake, subject movement, etc. Its odd, on the computer screen, at full view, they seem to look okay, but go beyond 50% zoom and they are crap, and prints look "hazy". I cannot find anything in images that seem to be in focus. At 100% I'm amazed at the detail in both my Brick and 85 F1.8.

I may see if the camera shop where I bought it will swap it out, but its been about a year now and I've finally accepted that either I suck and will never learn how to use it, or something is wrong with it.

Strangely, photos I take from 2-5 feet, seem to have better detail, than something beyond say 8-10 feet...

Ideas or other things to look at as I continue to experiment?

I would for sure try an experiment where you use LV zoomed in 10x and manually focus as a control, then perform the same shots with the same settings using AF. If the LV-manual focused shot is significantly better than the AF one, I would suspect that the lens is in need of some MFA. As the 60D does not have this available to the user, it has to go in.

Mine is sharp at large apertures and AF is fine. However it overexposed by 1/3 stop. If your photos look washed out, try setting exposure compensation to -1/3 or -1/2.
I always do this on my cameras. It needs this for both of my bodies. This is the only lens that I have where I have this problem.
It works fine if I remember to set exposure compensation.

Buchinger wrote in post #15091429
..The reason I ask is I have a 24-70L, Sigma 70-200 F2.8 OS, and Canon 85F1.8 that are all TACK sharp wide open.

If you are perfectly happy with these lenses I wouldn't risk it. Just sell the 50, buy another, and try again and again until you acquire a good copy that agrees with your camera. Just my $.02 and I'm a nobody.

Chuck,
That was the plan, but I wanted to be 100% sure I'm not selling someone a bad lens, but I guess if Canon says its 100%, I should be able to sell it with a clear conscience. Its really had very little use.

Do you have anyone around with whom you could try the lens on their body?

I have been out of touch with photography for a LONG time and just getting back to it within the last 6 months. I can't say if it's true or bull*&it but I have read many times of people saying they had to work through several copies of a particular lens to finally get one that matched their body well. If Canon returned the lens and said it was good enough then I would think you can sleep well. Not to knock Canon or the rest of them but their "tolerances" seem rather wide.

i would think they would calibrate the lens to your body...and not calibrate the body at all...

and if that's not how they would do it, i'm sure you could ask...

I had a copy like this. Went back and forth to Canon more than a couple times, including twice with my body. They never could fix it, and finally replaced it with a new one. That one did the same thing and they couldn't fix it either so they gave me another new one. I sold that one without even mounting it to my body.

It was really confusing. The focus was so inaccurate, even stopped down. Never had this problem with any other lens.

While i cant really help i can sympathise. Ive had this lens for about 4 years and never really felt it was good unless stopped down quite a bit. This was on crops, my latest being a 60D.

Having recently got a 5DMKIII im now finding the lens is fantastic, even at f/1.8. Im not sure what this means but it does seem to indicate that the lens is fine.

As others have said, if you like the lens then give Canon a chance to make it work properly and send the body in. I dont think there is anything they will alter on the body itself, they just need to calibrate the lens to the body.