Messages

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EOS Bodies - For Stills / Re: Lens for European Trip

« on: Today at 02:47:06 PM »

If you care about DOF, take the 2.8 zoom or maybe even a prime. Otherwise the 24-105L is not a bad choice either I guess. Personally I dislike that lens with a passion. Every time it gets used, I end up unhappy with the results.

If I was to travel and only 1 or two lenses would fit into my kit, I'd take a 35mm 1.4 and maybe the 100L. Tomorrow I'm going for a fishing trip and in addition to these 2 lenses I packed a wide angle 2.8 L zoom, which I most likely won't be using.

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EOS Bodies - For Stills / Re: Autofocus speed (6D vs 5DIII)

« on: May 17, 2013, 04:19:18 AM »

This is for the middle AF point I assume as you mentioned that you use it for birds. If so, it only matters when you frame subjects in the middle of the frame I guess. If you recompose, fast side AF points should be a better solution.

That being said... My experiences with 5D3 have shown that when using servo and continuous shooting, the 1st frame tends to be slightly OOF. Haven't really found settings to cure this, but then again the 2nd shot is razor sharp already, so...

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EOS Bodies - For Stills / Re: 5D Mark III focus points off center

« on: May 16, 2013, 12:41:24 AM »

I had exactly the same problem and it was real.  After three service visits they exchanged the mirror box. Atfer that repair the AF points' misplacement was corrected however since then I struggle with AF system. Since almost a year from purchase the camera is being serviced all the time without any good solution. My guaranty is almost over and the camera is like piece of crap. I can only suggest you to push the store to exchange it as probably any service will not fix that. I checked 3 canon services and every time if one thing was corrected the other one was not working properly. Right now center and left points are backfocusing and right points are focusing in opposite direction. One year of frustration without taking photos. Unfortunately IMHO if you think your AF points are misplaced-you are probably right. In my camera when I focused on the edge of any target it focused far away. And it was obvious that it happened only in one edge of focus point. It is normal that the real focus point has more area than its layout in viewfinder however not only in one direction. As I said-they fix this but camera probably lost all factory tolerances and now AF is just useless.

Sounds scary. I guess I'll have to discuss the issue once again with the service. They suggested that they'd move the viewfinder inside the body so that the points get aligned. To me this sounds like fixing a problem with another one and most likely doing more damage than anything else. If they mess up the AF, a serious problem is created to replace the possibly cosmetic one.

Now that I checked the issue again, I can also see (with the grid on) that the grid lines are longer on the right than on the left side of the frame. This tells me that the viewfinder might actually be in place but the indicated points are off center. ... Well, I don't know. I use cameras to take photos. Someone else can repair these things, but I hope that the someone also knows what he/she is doing while at it.

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EOS Bodies - For Stills / Re: 5D Mark III focus points off center

« on: May 15, 2013, 03:01:59 PM »

Thank you guys for explaining! I guess I can just cancel the scheduled repair then.

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EOS Bodies - For Stills / Re: 5D Mark III focus points off center

« on: May 15, 2013, 01:57:51 PM »

Yes but it sounds like he is comparing the viewfinder square with what is displayed on the LCD screen on the back.  They are two different things not linked together...at least not on the 5D3.

The red AF point markers on the rear LCD are not tied to the point in the viewfinder...though they attempt to show you which AF point was activated during the shot, they are not calibrated to the PD sensor.

So if I mount the body on a tripod, live view and viewfinder focus on different spots even when both for example use the middle AF point? Is that what you are saying, or is one of them just indicating a false AF point position? The middle points are not on the same targets.

The sensor remains in the same spot, framing is therefore the same. I doubt that these two modes have separate AF systems with different AF point locations.

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EOS Bodies - For Stills / Re: 5D Mark III focus points off center

« on: May 15, 2013, 05:23:55 AM »

Update - tired again with the 50 1.4 and focus on some keys on my MacBook Pro. Focusing at the closest distance on the ?/ key i focused is from the right at a low angle around 30degrees and nailed the focus on the ? and when reviewing its deffo in focus on the ? although the red af point shows it moved slightly down to the / symbol.
So from what I can see it seems the view finder AF point is accurate and when reviewing the images with AF point displayed its slightly off on one of the bodies which I guess isn't a real issue if the images are focusing ok.
Thoughts?

Interesting! In the end all that really matters is that the photos have no flaws because of the issue. It is annoying though to constantly know that something is off.

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EOS Bodies - For Stills / Re: 5D Mark III focus points off center

« on: May 15, 2013, 04:48:35 AM »

You do realize that the AF point itself is not (1) pixel.. It is an array of many pixels in that given area, however during autofocus the camera can determine best focus based on the contrast in an area of just a few pixels depending on the actual subject/scene.

Basically what I mean is lets say under each focus point there is a grid of 100 pixels - and when focus is achieved under the selected focus point it happens to be on the right side of the 10x10 grid of pixels - then attempting to place a marker that represents the square/dot seen in the viewfinder precisely over the actual focus point in an image it is going to be off to the right of the super-imposed point in the viewfinder.

Well, let me give you another example. If I place the small focus point on someone's eye ball using the LCD & then check the viewfinder and see the point on his/her nose, which one am I focusing on?

I'd say that the LCD is more likely to be accurate. Therefore if I use the viewfinder to focus, I will not place the focus point on the target I was aiming for.

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EOS Bodies - For Stills / Re: 5D Mark III focus points off center

« on: May 15, 2013, 03:56:12 AM »

Interesting observation, how have you determined that the smaller focus points don't hit the target? Have you done some tests? I'd like to check my 5d3.

Haven't really done any real tests. The ~½ focus point width difference, however, is enough to place the small focus point off target.

I know the focus points shown are never supposed to be actual focus area, but just an indication. I would expect them to be pretty close. Are you finding you can't focus on what you want to get spot on?

I haven't really noticed any problems in photos that I could say are because of this issue. If I switch focus points on in PP or on the 5D3 LCD, they light up in somewhat "wrong" places. Taking pictures using live view on the other hand places the focus points exactly as intended.

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EOS Bodies - For Stills / Re: Do you trust your camera?

« on: May 15, 2013, 01:33:46 AM »

I usually take multiple shots. Single shots could work well too at times, but in the end when I take multiple shots I tend to find some of the shots better than the others. So basically, with single shots I could get great pictures, but might at the same time miss the perfection.

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EOS Bodies - For Stills / 5D Mark III focus points off center

« on: May 15, 2013, 01:05:43 AM »

I noticed that the focus points seen in the view finder are slightly off center. Photos on the display show the used focus points slightly in different positions in comparison to the intended spots (~½ focus point width to the left). Is it the same for any of you? I checked two 5D3 bodies at a local store and noticed that the focus points were all over the place on them too.

I brought my 5D3 body to warranty repair and they told me there is nothing wrong. When I showed them what I meant, they noticed it too. Now I have yet another repair scheduled, but I would like to know if anyone else has had the problem and if it was possible to fix it. I would not really like to get unnecessary repairing done on the body. The body doesn't get any better if the problem still exists after additional repairs.

My thoughts:
1) Focusing screen not correctly in place?
2) Focus point display off center?
3) The issue has been there from the beginning. Now it bugs me as the smaller focus point doesn't hit targets.

What do you think?

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EOS Bodies - For Stills / Re: M RAW or "full" RAW on a Canon 6d?

« on: May 14, 2013, 06:24:30 AM »

Also, why would full raw, with larger files sizes be faster in burst mode than M RAW?

Because M RAW is processed from the full RAW?

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Software & Accessories / Re: Adobe to Stop Making Packaged Software

« on: May 13, 2013, 01:53:07 AM »

I'm not really sure why this matters though. Can't people just use CS6? I bet that most people could do their photoshopping using the old & now free CS2.

If Adobe is not willing to bring offline software like Photoshop CS6 Extended on the market and enables the download for the new camera raw updates then I change to another product.

Why? Why not just use CS6? Is there something superior offered by another company?

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Lenses / Re: 100mm f/2.8L with a diopter?

« on: May 11, 2013, 09:56:39 AM »

Extensions work well indeed, but may require additional light that can end up ruining everything. I can't think of a more effective way to ruin macro shots than using a ring flash. Be ready to miss some shots too, when interesting objects appear 1 meter away.

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Lenses / Re: 35 & 85 or 50 & 100 for photographing kids

« on: May 05, 2013, 12:23:52 PM »

35 beats the S___ out of a 50 indoors in my opinion. You can't always get far enough with a 50. Is there even a decent 50 out there? The 50L isn't really sharp at all and the 1.4 is crap too.

85 or 100? I don't really know. I currently use the 100L in that spot, but 2.8 does not really do the trick when you want DOF magic. It's a really good lens anyway though. Very versatile too. The 85L II would be great I guess, but I'd claim it's more a niche lens since it's slow focusing, big & almost a one trick pony. Slow AF does not go too nicely together with kids, but the bokeh definitely is nice.

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Lenses / Re: Do you still love 24-105L?

« on: April 26, 2013, 02:39:56 PM »

I don't like it at all. If it rains heavily and I need pictures, I grab this garbage lens.

The image quality is quite bad, the AF is kinda slow and inconsistent & on top of that f/4 is not going to help with busy backgrounds.