I am tired of my 7D markII

[allpet]

I bought a 7d2 a year ago. Serial number starts with 055. No problems. Even no problems with my Sigma lenses. My Sigma 85 1.4 even got better. Tracked a train coming at me with 70 km/h from 100 meters until it filled the frame with a Sigma 50-150 2.8 OS HSM at 50mm with no problem. Use my Sigmas for indoor sports in bad light with no problem. My Sigma 18-35 1.8 has no problem at MFD or other distance. My Sigma 18-35 can AF in very dim light something like ISO 12800, 1/60 s. and f1.8. Yes, my Sigmas don't AF as well as fx a Canon 17-55 2.8 IS USM, but they are no worse than on my 7D.

 

[Bennymiata]

Those shots look a lot like vibration, but not from shaking the camera, but perhaps some sort of internal vibration.
This vibration could be a harmonic vibration somewhere in the camera (even the sensor) triggered by certain shutter speeds.
It could also be coming from the mirror actuator, and seeing as this is new item and not tested in the field for years and years (as sprung mirrors are), perhaps there is some binding or jerking that is causing the problem and this problem may have been fixed in later versions.

 

[Otara]

My take is we're talking 2 polar bear pictures roughly the same size, one APS-C, the other FF - in fact the FF shot is actually bigger. Which has to mean the FF is much closer than the crop if its the same lens? Edit
:700mm vs 500mm, so a crop with 1.4 vs a ff with no 1.4 and closer.

Secondly the FF is an improvement but still doesnt look all that sharp to me either given it should be a very straightforward pic with a very good lens. My impression is whatever is going on is influenced by subject distance and increased in effect by crop vs FF rather than crop alone.

Wind, moisture/condensation in/on the lens, not sure what. But something else is going on as well I suspect.

 

[Go Wild]

My take is we're talking 2 polar bear pictures roughly the same size, one APS-C, the other FF - in fact the FF shot is actually bigger. Which has to mean the FF is much closer than the crop if its the same lens? Edit
:700mm vs 500mm, so a crop with 1.4 vs a ff with no 1.4 and closer.

Secondly the FF is an improvement but still doesnt look all that sharp to me either given it should be a very straightforward pic with a very good lens. My impression is whatever is going on is influenced by subject distance and increased in effect by crop vs FF rather than crop alone.

Wind, moisture/condensation in/on the lens, not sure what. But something else is going on as well I suspect.

Yes, that is correct! Most of the times the feeling that i have is that the photos miss sharpness because motion blur or some kind of vibration. However, in all the situations I shoot with tripod and shutter speed above 1/2000 so motion blur is almost a non problem to considerate. I do get that feeling that something inside the camera is making that vibration and creating this problem!

My take is we're talking 2 polar bear pictures roughly the same size, one APS-C, the other FF - in fact the FF shot is actually bigger. Which has to mean the FF is much closer than the crop if its the same lens? Edit
:700mm vs 500mm, so a crop with 1.4 vs a ff with no 1.4 and closer.

Secondly the FF is an improvement but still doesnt look all that sharp to me either given it should be a very straightforward pic with a very good lens. My impression is whatever is going on is influenced by subject distance and increased in effect by crop vs FF rather than crop alone.

Wind, moisture/condensation in/on the lens, not sure what. But something else is going on as well I suspect.

Hello Otara in the FF shot i was closer to the bear than in the apsc shot. Yes, of course the image quality on the FF will be better in all situations. But that´s not the point here...if you see the photos taken with the aps-c we cannot even consider image quality because they simply doesn´t look sharp at all...And i got closer photos with the aps-c with the same problem.
But let´s forget the bears, i have this problem with this camera for over a year...I lost a big amount of photos because of this...In all the situations the keepers ratio is about 20%/25% Sometimes between 20 or 25 photos i get 2 good ones. But even those 2 good ones they are not sharp enough at least to my standards... I never noticed that the AF was slow, for me that problem never came and honestly i don´t think that the problem is in the AF sistem. I do think that the problem is somekind of internal vibration that makes the photo get that motino blur. If i see this photos without knowing the used settings my diagnostic would be "slow shutterspeed"!!
So in my opinion the problem is that, something internal is making that problem. If i got time this afternoon i will make some tests to see if i get any difference

 

[AlanF]

I tested my 7DII systematically with my telephoto lenses for shutter shock/mirror slap. There is feedback between some lenses and vibration at about 1/80 - 1/160s (it was different between my 2 copies of the 100-400mm II). Above 1/250s there was no vibration in the standard mode and the silent mode was fine at the slow speed speeds. So, I use silent mode as standard for both the 7DII and 5DS R unless I am at faster speeds and want to follow rapid action.

The Nikon 810 and other models have terrible vibration problems with lenses like the 300mm f/4 which cannot be fixed. The vibration problems are not confined to "mirror slappers". Olympus and Panasonic mirrorless have problems and require the electronic shutter at slower speeds and that includes the Panasonic G8 flagship. Panasonic has redesigned its shutter for the G80/85.

 

[Otara]

Yeah Im not saying you dont have problems, more that the examples arent great evidence of it being the camera.

As I said the odd thing for me is that the FF shot seems to have problems too, just not as extreme. I think its important to compare similar distances with the same lens, rather than what you're showing.

 

[Deleted member 369279]

Hi GoWild,

I had the same problems. I used it with the Sigma 150-600S. On the 5Dmk3 it was perfect. On the 7Dmk2 it was crap. I compared it with a 600D same lens, the image was better on the 600D. I have been told to AFMA, I did, I have been told it is because of camera shake... I don't buy that for all the images. Even on a tripod with fixes subjects the images were soft. I sold the camera and bought one of the last 1dx in stock (at a very good price) when the Mark2 was released. Problem solved.

Vincent

 

[pvalpha]

@Go Wild - A long shot but what version of the firmware are you running? The current version of the firmware for the 7D2 is 1.0.5 -- if you are significantly below that (1.0.2) then there have been a few improvements over the last year that might help some of the situations encountered. I'd contact canon or read their website to see if any of the lenses you use are covered by the firmware update. If nothing else works, as a last resort you can update the firmware to the latest version or request it if you send your camera in for service if you are uncomfortable doing it yourself.

I had not realized 1.0.5 had been released, and I updated just to make sure - it isn't likely to solve the problem I am currently having, but it should cause no harm either.

 

[Go Wild]

@Go Wild - A long shot but what version of the firmware are you running? The current version of the firmware for the 7D2 is 1.0.5 -- if you are significantly below that (1.0.2) then there have been a few improvements over the last year that might help some of the situations encountered. I'd contact canon or read their website to see if any of the lenses you use are covered by the firmware update. If nothing else works, as a last resort you can update the firmware to the latest version or request it if you send your camera in for service if you are uncomfortable doing it yourself.

I had not realized 1.0.5 had been released, and I updated just to make sure - it isn't likely to solve the problem I am currently having, but it should cause no harm either.

Hi GoWild,

I had the same problems. I used it with the Sigma 150-600S. On the 5Dmk3 it was perfect. On the 7Dmk2 it was crap. I compared it with a 600D same lens, the image was better on the 600D. I have been told to AFMA, I did, I have been told it is because of camera shake... I don't buy that for all the images. Even on a tripod with fixes subjects the images were soft. I sold the camera and bought one of the last 1dx in stock (at a very good price) when the Mark2 was released. Problem solved.

Vincent

Yeah Im not saying you dont have problems, more that the examples arent great evidence of it being the camera.

As I said the odd thing for me is that the FF shot seems to have problems too, just not as extreme. I think its important to compare similar distances with the same lens, rather than what you're showing.

Hello Otara, Vincent and pvalpha

Well Otara, thats the doubtd that have pursuited me for all this year...Is it me? Is it my mistakes? I don´t find any issue in the 5D3 photo, the crop you see is a huge crop! So it is normal that the photo shows some degradation of quality. But the sharp is there, definitly and without doubts we have a sharp photo. And this don´t happen with the 7D2 photos, they are inquestionable soft or even, they seem OOF. And that´s the point....If you see some vibration on the 7d2 but the photo was clearly well focused....well...it was ok, but it is not what happens and it happens all the time in every situations, so it is not an isolated case....


Hello Vincent, well it seems that it´s the only solution to make this problem disappear...but makes me sad because of 2 things...1st i really like the camera...aps-c, 10fps, good buffer and of course the price! And then the 2nd is the aps-c factor wich helps a lot working with wildlife....
If i have the money i woud not think twice, i sold this one and buy another camera, maybe the 1Dx even loosing the crop factor...but at this time i just can´t afford a new camera....

Pvalpha, i was running the 1.0.2 version and i upgraded to 1.0.5 i will test it but i don´t think this is the problem because the improvements they have made was nothing to do with my problems with the camera...But i will test this way and then i let you know the results...

 

[xps]

My 7DII suffers from the same problem. AF suchs in more than 50% of my bird shots. As my 5DIII is NACA 7, I rented one. and the AF works super fine on my 600mm & 1.4x combo. And on my 100-400 II as well. Even my 6D gets more Hits" and sharp pictures. Sent my 7DII two times to Canon Service with a lot of RAW files. But they just adjusted the AF, nothing else. Told me, the cam performs fine and the rejects are not extraordinary out of focus (but they were out of focus )
Colleagues of mine (1DX owner), say, the Cam is not working well. One their shots, also more than 50% are not sharp or the image is visibly out of focus (layer of sharpness varies). A neverending story....

So, I am looking for an new body. Maybe 80D (to bridge the time until the 5DIV appears), or an 5DSR.

 

[takesome1]

loosing the crop factor...

You are not losing as much as you might think, maybe 20% of your ability to crop or an additional 20% distance.
20% is optimistic, from everything I have tested it would probably be closer to a 15% advantage.

If you are going to compare the 5D III pictures to the 7D II you should do it with the same lens from exactly the same distance. It is the only way to be fair.

One thing that misleads people is that the 7D II pictures have less room to crop than a FF body. That is because they are already cropped. So when you are posting a 100% crop from a 7D II and a 100% crop from a FF body it is not a fair comparison. The fair comparison is the same picture cropped to the exact same framing.

To your issue a simple test is what you need to do.

Since you say it only happens at pictures at farther distances find a subject, perferably with enough texture in the photo that you can determine where the AF area is once you take a picture. Choose like an object in a grassy field that you can look at the grass afterwards to see if any is in focus. Then do this with your camera on a sturdy tripod:

1, Rack your lens af one way or the other and shoot a shot in AI Servo single point.
2, Rack the af lens again and in single shot, single point do another shot.
3, Take a shoot in live view, turn AF off and use MF, in live view zoom the lcd in to the maximum and manually focus your lens. Have the camera set to timer, 10 seconds. Once you are focused take the shot, get your hands off the camera while it counts down.

Rinse and Repeat a few times.

Picture #3 should be sharp and in focus. 1 and 2 may be but if your in the grassy field there should be some grass somewhere that is in focus.

Picture #3 in focus and 1 and 2 not. It is an AF issue and there are several alternatives for this. One is sending the lens and body to Canon to balance and adjust.
Picture #3 not in focus, send the body to Canon you got problems.

 

[xps]

loosing the crop factor...

You are not losing as much as you might think, maybe 20% of your ability to crop or an additional 20% distance.
20% is optimistic, from everything I have tested it would probably be closer to a 15% advantage.

If you are going to compare the 5D III pictures to the 7D II you should do it with the same lens from exactly the same distance. It is the only way to be fair.

One thing that misleads people is that the 7D II pictures have less room to crop than a FF body. That is because they are already cropped. So when you are posting a 100% crop from a 7D II and a 100% crop from a FF body it is not a fair comparison. The fair comparison is the same picture cropped to the exact same framing.

To your issue a simple test is what you need to do.

Since you say it only happens at pictures at farther distances find a subject, perferably with enough texture in the photo that you can determine where the AF area is once you take a picture. Choose like an object in a grassy field that you can look at the grass afterwards to see if any is in focus. Then do this with your camera on a sturdy tripod:

1, Rack your lens af one way or the other and shoot a shot in AI Servo single point.
2, Rack the af lens again and in single shot, single point do another shot.
3, Take a shoot in live view, turn AF off and use MF, in live view zoom the lcd in to the maximum and manually focus your lens. Have the camera set to timer, 10 seconds. Once you are focused take the shot, get your hands off the camera while it counts down.

Rinse and Repeat a few times.

Picture #3 should be sharp and in focus. 1 and 2 may be but if your in the grassy field there should be some grass somewhere that is in focus.

Picture #3 in focus and 1 and 2 not. It is an AF issue and there are several alternatives for this. One is sending the lens and body to Canon to balance and adjust.
Picture #3 not in focus, send the body to Canon you got problems.

Thanks for your advice, Mr. takesome1. My own 7DII suffers not from an AF issue at stationary objects, but when objects are moving. Then the sharpness level varies. Sometimes a point in front of the object is sharp, sometimes one behind it. and the third or fourth shot is ok. And this problem to simulate is a little bit difficult for me

 

[Loswr]

My own 7DII suffers not from an AF issue at stationary objects, but when objects are moving. Then the sharpness level varies. Sometimes a point in front of the object is sharp, sometimes one behind it. and the third or fourth shot is ok. And this problem to simulate is a little bit difficult for me

That sounds like something that could be corrected by altering/customizing the AF tracking settings.

 

[xps]

My own 7DII suffers not from an AF issue at stationary objects, but when objects are moving. Then the sharpness level varies. Sometimes a point in front of the object is sharp, sometimes one behind it. and the third or fourth shot is ok. And this problem to simulate is a little bit difficult for me

That sounds like something that could be corrected by altering/customizing the AF tracking settings.

Mr. Neuro, thanks. But I tried nearly everything in the menu to correct this. AFMA has been performed by Canon, I tried several combinations of AF customizations...
Some of my frieds think, there is an inconsistance of the AF system. Something like an floating AF point/AF layer/AF sharpneslevel in AI servo.
It is just frustrating.
Canon helpdesk told me to buy an 5D or 1D series. I know, that this will solve a lot. But I like the crop for birds. I am hesitant, if a 5DSR would be an good choice. Or waiting for the 5DIV (with just 24MP? and no better DR and IQ?)
I do not want to buy an1D series body, as I have to spend some money for daily life too - even I am an retiree

 

[jaredvs]

You are in luck sir!!! I am in need of a 7d MkII that someone is tired of!!! Feel free to contact me for my shipping address! I will pay for shipping, and that is about it 8) !

Please send me 1200€ to my bank account and i will be EXTREMELY HAPPY to sent it for you! That´s the cost of shipping!

Well played sir!

 

[picturefan]

loosing the crop factor...

You are not losing as much as you might think, maybe 20% of your ability to crop or an additional 20% distance.
20% is optimistic, from everything I have tested it would probably be closer to a 15% advantage.

If you are going to compare the 5D III pictures to the 7D II you should do it with the same lens from exactly the same distance. It is the only way to be fair.

One thing that misleads people is that the 7D II pictures have less room to crop than a FF body. That is because they are already cropped. So when you are posting a 100% crop from a 7D II and a 100% crop from a FF body it is not a fair comparison. The fair comparison is the same picture cropped to the exact same framing.

To your issue a simple test is what you need to do.

Since you say it only happens at pictures at farther distances find a subject, perferably with enough texture in the photo that you can determine where the AF area is once you take a picture. Choose like an object in a grassy field that you can look at the grass afterwards to see if any is in focus. Then do this with your camera on a sturdy tripod:

1, Rack your lens af one way or the other and shoot a shot in AI Servo single point.
2, Rack the af lens again and in single shot, single point do another shot.
3, Take a shoot in live view, turn AF off and use MF, in live view zoom the lcd in to the maximum and manually focus your lens. Have the camera set to timer, 10 seconds. Once you are focused take the shot, get your hands off the camera while it counts down.

Rinse and Repeat a few times.

Picture #3 should be sharp and in focus. 1 and 2 may be but if your in the grassy field there should be some grass somewhere that is in focus.

Picture #3 in focus and 1 and 2 not. It is an AF issue and there are several alternatives for this. One is sending the lens and body to Canon to balance and adjust.
Picture #3 not in focus, send the body to Canon you got problems.

Thank you, takesome.
This is the testing method I have been using also.
#3 is what happens when I done it. #1 and 2 are only showing small differences. afma should be the solution.
But what is your conclusion? When sending to Canon what would they do? Sure they will not test the same way...

 

[takesome1]

loosing the crop factor...

You are not losing as much as you might think, maybe 20% of your ability to crop or an additional 20% distance.
20% is optimistic, from everything I have tested it would probably be closer to a 15% advantage.

If you are going to compare the 5D III pictures to the 7D II you should do it with the same lens from exactly the same distance. It is the only way to be fair.

One thing that misleads people is that the 7D II pictures have less room to crop than a FF body. That is because they are already cropped. So when you are posting a 100% crop from a 7D II and a 100% crop from a FF body it is not a fair comparison. The fair comparison is the same picture cropped to the exact same framing.

To your issue a simple test is what you need to do.

Since you say it only happens at pictures at farther distances find a subject, perferably with enough texture in the photo that you can determine where the AF area is once you take a picture. Choose like an object in a grassy field that you can look at the grass afterwards to see if any is in focus. Then do this with your camera on a sturdy tripod:

1, Rack your lens af one way or the other and shoot a shot in AI Servo single point.
2, Rack the af lens again and in single shot, single point do another shot.
3, Take a shoot in live view, turn AF off and use MF, in live view zoom the lcd in to the maximum and manually focus your lens. Have the camera set to timer, 10 seconds. Once you are focused take the shot, get your hands off the camera while it counts down.

Rinse and Repeat a few times.

Picture #3 should be sharp and in focus. 1 and 2 may be but if your in the grassy field there should be some grass somewhere that is in focus.

Picture #3 in focus and 1 and 2 not. It is an AF issue and there are several alternatives for this. One is sending the lens and body to Canon to balance and adjust.
Picture #3 not in focus, send the body to Canon you got problems.

Thank you, takesome.
This is the testing method I have been using also.
#3 is what happens when I done it. #1 and 2 are only showing small differences. afma should be the solution.
But what is your conclusion? When sending to Canon what would they do? Sure they will not test the same way...

If you are not getting sharp pictures when it is in MF it is not a AF issue.

I would send it to Canon and tell them the images are soft even in MF and ask them to check the camera itself out and the AF as well.
If you had it less than a year it is under warranty and no charge.

You could also send the lens, if you bought either in the last year they do not charge to adjust the AF of the two together.

 

[Mancubus]

All these issues would have been "ok" if Canon admitted that some 7D2's are faulty.

I personally believe that there is some vibration in the sensor which causes photos in focus to not be sharp even at very high shutter speeds.

What Canon should have done was evaluate the first cameras reporting this issue and then publicly announce a mass recall for certain serial numbers and also make sure that all Canon service centres around the world were aware of the situation.

It is utter bull**it that faulty cameras are being returned without a solution or even acknowledgement of the problem. What the hell are those technicians doing? Taking a quick look on the camera screen? Any idiot with half a brain can take a photo, look at 100% in a computer screen and see if the image is sharp.

 

[Go Wild]

All these issues would have been "ok" if Canon admitted that some 7D2's are faulty.

I personally believe that there is some vibration in the sensor which causes photos in focus to not be sharp even at very high shutter speeds.

What Canon should have done was evaluate the first cameras reporting this issue and then publicly announce a mass recall for certain serial numbers and also make sure that all Canon service centres around the world were aware of the situation.

It is utter bull**it that faulty cameras are being returned without a solution or even acknowledgement of the problem. What the hell are those technicians doing? Taking a quick look on the camera screen? Any idiot with half a brain can take a photo, look at 100% in a computer screen and see if the image is sharp.

+1

I totally agree with you in every point you wrote. My suspicious is the same as yours, there is some problem with vibration. If canon tryed to fix the problem that was no sign of weakness, but instead, would make very, very pleasant the guys that splashes money year after year in this brand.
Instead...they prefer to believe that nothing happens and the fault is on the photographers, those poor guys that they don´t know how to use a semi-pro camera.....Unbelievable!

 

[weixing]

All these issues would have been "ok" if Canon admitted that some 7D2's are faulty.

I personally believe that there is some vibration in the sensor which causes photos in focus to not be sharp even at very high shutter speeds.

What Canon should have done was evaluate the first cameras reporting this issue and then publicly announce a mass recall for certain serial numbers and also make sure that all Canon service centres around the world were aware of the situation.

It is utter bull**it that faulty cameras are being returned without a solution or even acknowledgement of the problem. What the hell are those technicians doing? Taking a quick look on the camera screen? Any idiot with half a brain can take a photo, look at 100% in a computer screen and see if the image is sharp.

+1

I totally agree with you in every point you wrote. My suspicious is the same as yours, there is some problem with vibration. If canon tryed to fix the problem that was no sign of weakness, but instead, would make very, very pleasant the guys that splashes money year after year in this brand.
Instead...they prefer to believe that nothing happens and the fault is on the photographers, those poor guys that they don´t know how to use a semi-pro camera.....Unbelievable!

Hi,
If you can recreate the soft image under specific setting, then you'll have a case.

By the way, does it happen to all the lens you use on it??

Have a nice day.