5D Mark II Firmware Upgrade Coming Monday?[CR3]

I will, just send me your camera and i’ll test it for a couple of years :)

Wonder if the firmware will be related to what your ‘Serial Number’ is?

Canon 5D Mark II SN#03201xxxxx seems to show the ‘Black Dot’ problem. Canon 5Dmk2 with SN#02201xxxxx appears to be okay. I have SN#02201xxxxx and confirmed no problems. Thank goodness!

Chris L. – It’s interesting you say that because I have one with SN#02201xxxxx and we have one at work with SN#03201xxxxx. We’ve seen the ‘black dots’ (although its rare) on the one at work, but I’ve yet to see them on my personal. I had just assumed the reason I didn’t see any on mine was because I wasn’t shooting in the condition(s) that is prone to the ‘black dots’. Now that you mention that I’m thinking we should try to shoot the two at the same time to see if they are both affected or not.

Matt, not sure but will check.

Adam, it would be great if you can test the two out (in same senario) and let us know the outcome. This would hopefully confirm my theory. Then from the SN# we can target what Canon factor produce the bad apple.

Adam can you also check the firmware version? I have version 1.0.6 for SN#02201xxxxx.

i got #02301xxxx & it seems to be okay

02301xxxxx. I have dots.

Banding: My opinion is this is a shot where the tone curves have been pushed too far for the shadows. It appears worse because there are vertical elements in the photograph.

My view is that people have come to expect dramatic improvements in noise response over the years. Because of this people expect the next generation to have a noticable decrease in noise and process their images to try and extract more dynamic range at higher ISO’s.

However, we are now approaching the physical limitiations of technology as the counting of photon’s is already over 50% efficienty (around 65% I believe). That means it is impossible to improve sensor noise by more than one stop even in principle. Most improvements in noise are now due to signal processing. See Clark Vision web site for details.

Nikon eliminates these sort of low noise artifacts by applying noise reduction PRIOR to writing the RAW file. Check out the astro-photography web sites. This is one of the primary reasons astro-photographers all use Canon. I like Canon’s approach – let the end user decide.

Hi,

I am quite interested in whether the Batch/serial number of the 5D II cameras may have anything to do with the ‘Black spot’ issue.

The variants would be that people with cameras affected may not have noticed or been able to replicate the issue.

However, so far to my knowledge only people with cameras that have SN – 02301xxxxx have been able to observe the issue, whether by accident or otherwise. This does lead to the possibility of a batch problem.

I myself have one with SN 02301107xx and have observed the issue, not deliberatley I might add.

Posts from people that appear to have considerable knowledge in this technology have a forming consensus of opinion that the problem may due to read error, possibly the speed at which the data is being read or data loss/drop due to a hardware fault – a slighlty faulty batch of components on the main board (maybe).

My camera is with Canon at the moment as they requested it be sent to :

Canon (UK) RCC

Unit 130 Centennial Park

Centennial Avenue

Elstree Hill South

This was after they scrutinised the pictures I sent to them.

I guess the crux is whether it could affect all of the current 5D II’s or some of them, who knows. I am also waiting with reserved judgement about the fix that will ‘mitigate’ the problem. I have used that word myself before when issuing statements after company issues.

Ah well, time will tell.

Regards

Glen W

Sorry to say this, but mine is 02201XXXXX and does generate black dots under the “right” conditions. The reason some may be finding no spots is that they appear only under specific conditions–and are hard to spot (sorry…) I have not found this artifact to be very problematic as it is rare, would not be visible in most prints, and can be removed with a Photoshop action. That being said, Canon should get the bottom of this issue and provide a firmware fix or hardware recall if required.

Fantastic camera BTW.

I have a mate who’s neighbor works for a chip shop that a Canon employee uses and *he* says the firmware update will let us use the 5DII with film.

Wow.

I’ve got the black plague: SN 02201xxxxx firmware 1.0.6

I’ve tested night cityscapes at ISO 50 through 3200 with in camera JPEG’s (no NR, no HL priority, no vignette reduction) and start to notice the appearance of the black dots from ISO 200 and above.

http://flickr.com/photos/flickravatar/sets/72157611372612862/

ISO 50 & 100 look clean.

Perhaps this weekend I’ll find time to bang out some tests in RAW with Lightroom but I since I know I have an affected camera and have a ticket in with Canon I’m currently working on mastering the positive offerings of this camera.

Hi,

Update.

I received an unexpected call just after 0900 from the Canon (UK) RCC about my 5D II.

Bottom line was that Canon have acknowledged the issue (we know) and it will be addressed shortly by firmware update (knew that bit as well).

Options for me – leave the camera with them and they do the firmware when it is available or return it now and I do it. He did hint that it may not be before Christmas but could not say for sure as it is dependant on how the testing pans out.

Got to laugh about that as all the trees and lights will be down if they wait unitl after Christmas – LOL.

Anyway, little bit of chat I managed to glean from his responses that there have been a number of reports to Canon UK, I am not too suprised bt that.

What was interesting is that I mentioned the straw pole I am doing reference serial numbers and what I had found out do date. He said from his dealings on this it is not a batch issue.

He went on to give his take/assurance that it will be fixed by firmware or other means if deemed necessary Canon cannot afford as a company to not correct this blah blah.

There is currently a littel script/action available for CS3 CS4 to correct the issue – whilst it is not quite 100% it does a pretty good job file called rft-5D2-v30.zip.

Regards and have a good Christmas

Glen W

ps dear Cupid Stunt – you really are!!

I can’t believe Canon have screwed up again after the fiasco with the 1D Mark 3. I’ll bet Nikon will have a fantastic Christmas this year.

I saw a post that said please don’t let the 5D Mark II be blended… sorry for my ignorance, what does blended mean? Maybe that was answered in a later post, just haven’t been able to read them all. Thanks!

Paul,

Regarding the blending. The makers of a super powerful comercial blender called Blendtec has a video series with the catch phrase/title “Will It Blend?” and each video features a different item being blended. The whole point, aside from the entertainment value, is to show the awesome powerfulness of their blenders.

Some of the items blended? iPhone, iPod, Marbles…

Search “Will It Blend” and you’re sure to find the videos.

Wikipedia has some nice info on the whole ad campaign: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_it_blend

Any sign of the new firmware yet? Anybody got it?

hundreds of Canon 5d mark2 users are requested for these changes in new upgrade. Still Canon is silent on this. I am using 5d to shoot promo tvcs. I love its look and feel but what lac is manual controls on video. Hope canon will do something on this