40D LCD soft & strange color cast?

I bought a 40D last week, and images played on the rear LCD are very soft, and seem to have a strange color cast. Image playback on my 5D seem much sharper and color accurate. Is this normal for the 40D, or should I consider exchanging it?

Thanks!
Tim

timnosenzo,
I had the exact opposite, my 5D LCD is not very color accurate vs. my 40D LCD is much better in color accuracy. Photos also show up sharper on the 40D LCD vs. my 5D LCD.

What you see on the LCD is directly effected by the Picture Style you have chosen in the menu, even when shooting RAW files.

The reason for this is that even when shooting RAW the camera has to create some sort of JPG thumbnail to display on the LCD, cannot directly show RAW files at all. It simply uses the chosen Picture Style in the menu as a guide.

Of course, when shooting JPGs, they are processed in the camera from original RAW files (all images start out as RAW) using the guidelines set up in the Picture Style menu. The difference is that when you file away a JPG that has been processed, these fairly broad parameters can no longer be changed. If shooting RAW and post-processing on your computer, all these settings can be modified before creating a JPG or TIFF from the file.

You can go in and look at the parameters preset in the Picture Styles, and can change them. You also have some customizable "User Defined" ones you can set up.

Using a "Faithful" Picture Style, one of Canon's preset, for example, reduces image sharpening to 0, and Contrast, Saturation and Color Tone all to the center position. "Neutral" is similar. "Portrait" dials in a slight amount of Sharpness at a setting of 2. Standard increases Sharpness to 3. And "Landscape" has the highest preset of 4. You can modify any of these, or set your own User Defined Style as high as 7 Sharpness (might cause JPG artifacts, though, if that's what you are shooting).

Check the Picture Style also for Contrast, Saturation and Color Tone. This may be the reason you are seeing an odd color cast during playback.

In general, viewing the image on the LCD is of limited value. You really can't use it (or even the higher resolution ones being added to some cameras) for critical image analysis. This is because the LCD ends up being viewed in a wide assortment of different ambient light conditions. Wait until you can view the image on a color calibrated computer monitor, before making final judgments. On the other hand, the histogram is very useful for accurate exposure analysis.

Thanks for the reply amfoto1, I appreciate it. I have the camera set to the Standard Picture Style--same as my 5D, so that shouldn't be a factor. I understand that too much faith shouldn't be put in the camera's LCD-however compared to other cameras I've had, the LCD on this one is definitely the worst looking. Even the LCD on my XTi that I just sold was nice and crisp. So I'm really just trying to see if my cameras LCD is unique or if more people are noticing the same.

John_B, that's very interesting!

I guess my best bet would be to try and find a local store or something where I can see another one.

Some people, including myself, have this "issue".
Doesn't bother me too much, but I can see a pretty drastic difference between the 5D's LCD and 40D's LCD.

Again, I never rely on the LCD, however obviously if I can get this fixed, then I would prefer something a bit more "accurate".

My 40D is too vivid and has some kind of overall cast to it as well.

I will probably send it in to Canon for evaluation.

But yeah, check out another one, and see if there's a difference. If you are still within return period, I would consider that as well.

nicksan wrote in post #4428971
But yeah, check out another one, and see if there's a difference. If you are still within return period, I would consider that as well.

Hm, I'll have to see if my local Best Buy has any 40D's. Probably worth a call to B&H to see what my options are as well. I'd just hate to do nothing only to find out that there is something wrong with it.

I returned my first one because of that after comparing to a friends that bought his the same place a day before. So yea, you can get a better one. The 40D I got today looks really good. Still has a different blueish/magenta case to it (compared to any other camera I have owned) but not that bad. But the first one was terrible!

https://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthre​ad.php?t=374486

My friend had an issue with her 580 Ex II and B&H didnt care at all that she HAD to have a flash in a few days for an event. They wouldn't rush her a replacement or even expedite her shipping on a new one... Not very good for customer service there...

My 40D screen is very bright, very clear, but colors dont seem to be very accurate. They seem over-saturated when i play them back, which is not the case on my computer screen...

I found this at the DPReview forums.

Anyone notice this?
I have to try this soon to see if it makes any difference.

Mine still has a bit of magenta cast, but I think there's some truth to the above post about the firmware upgrade. I did do mine a few days ago, and noticed a small change - or my eyes adjusted to that magenta cast. In any case, my screen is too bright and the images are darker. So I trust the histogram more.

Just pulled my 40D out of the box and was immediately disappointed in the screen. It doesn't appear nearly as sharp as my 40D. I understand it's just the display and not how the actual image turns out but come on...my 20D looked better. What's the point in a much larger viewing screen if it looks like garbage?

SurfKahakai wrote in post #4487925
Just pulled my 40D out of the box and was immediately disappointed in the screen. It doesn't appear nearly as sharp as my 40D. I understand it's just the display and not how the actual image turns out but come on...my 20D looked better. What's the point in a much larger viewing screen if it looks like garbage?

The point is that most photographer use their LCD screen not to enjoy in their own pictures, but rather to check camera parameters, general composition, highlights, histogram..
Larger LCD, even when it 'looks like garbage', helps a lot for that kind of activities.

Hermeto wrote in post #4488400
Larger LCD, even when it 'looks like garbage', helps a lot for that kind of activities.

Why does the email notification not work anymore for this site?

Anywho, I think the bigger LCD is nice and all, but I agree with SurfKahakai that I don't see the point if the quality sucks. I'd much prefer the slightly smaller, but much easier to look at LCD on my 5D.

nicksan, I updated the firmware on my 40D pretty much on the first day, and if it helped, it wasn't by much.

Keep in mind that although the LCD is a bigger screen, the resolution is the same as found on the prior models with smaller screens. So if you have a crappy resolution (fine for a small LCD), but then increase the LCD size, the image quality is going to go down. There have been 3 (maybe 4?) LCD sizes (1.8, 2.0, 2.5, and now 3.0), and they all share the same resolution. I believe that the LCD on the 30D/5D/XTi was probably the break-even size for the resolution, and now with the 3.0" screen, it is having an impact on what you see.

Also, if you zoom all the way in on the picture, keep in mind that you are past 100% view. I believe that in prior discussions, if you zoom back 1 level after full zoom, then you are at 100%.

As for the color cast, I don't.