Forums - Photography - 5D Mark II Black Dots....Problem?

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Posted Fri Dec 5, 2008 4:49PM

Found some more info on the Fake Chuck Westfall (the real Chuck Westfall is a Canon marketing executive) who was talking about the black spots in my previous post.

September 14, 2008
The Colbert Report for Canon: The Fake Chuck Westfall

We first saw mentions of this site at the Imaging Insider. If you are a hardcore Canon fan or a frequent forum reader or participant, you may enjoy the parody, satire and silliness of the Fake Chuck Westfall. Those who went through the 1D Mk3 AF issues will especially appreciate (or scream at) the G@lbraith post.

fstop123

Posted Fri Dec 5, 2008 6:18PM

lovely shot

FilipMakowski

Posted Sat Dec 6, 2008 1:39AM

Posted By jtyler:

Maybe if we all sent a message that we are cancelling orders unless there is a definitive statement from Canon we might get one. I sure don't want to go through the hassle of paying for a camera I have to send back and then wait 6 months to have returned. I am seriously disappointed.

You don't suppose this is a confederacy of Nikon users trying to hold up anyone getting the camera do you? LOL

Not a bad idea. That would really mess up Canon's sales forecasting. Pre-orders going through the roof, them diverting all production capacity to just churn out as many as possible, and suddenly most pre-orders cancelled and they have all this inventory weighing down on their cash flow! I guess that would spurn them on just a little to resolve the problem. Do you have an email address at Canon to send it to?

swilmor

Posted Sat Dec 6, 2008 2:38AM

I cancelled my pre-order with WolfCamera yesterday and I sent Canon an email telling them why. I don't want to deal with the hassle of getting a camera just to have to ship it back for repairs etc. I'll wait until I hear something official from Canon about a fix. Hopefully it's just a firmware thing but I'm not taking my chances.

Kind of stinks because I was really looking forward to getting it so I can start submitting to Getty.

wdstock

Posted Sat Dec 6, 2008 8:24AM

Posted By swilmor:

I cancelled my pre-order with WolfCamera yesterday and I sent Canon an email telling them why. I don't want to deal with the hassle of getting a camera just to have to ship it back for repairs etc. I'll wait until I hear something official from Canon about a fix. Hopefully it's just a firmware thing but I'm not taking my chances.

Kind of stinks because I was really looking forward to getting it so I can start submitting to Getty.

Also having cancelled my order; My sentiments exactly!

Vasko

Posted Sat Dec 6, 2008 6:15PM

Just tested out my 5Dmk2. no problems here. Images are crisp and clean. Even shooting directly into bright lights and crating blowouts on purpose. no issues. Maybe some cameras are lemons?

jtyler

Posted Sat Dec 6, 2008 6:28PM

Posted By Vasko:

Just tested out my 5Dmk2. no problems here. Images are crisp and clean. Even shooting directly into bright lights and crating blowouts on purpose. no issues. Maybe some cameras are lemons?

Thanks for the info Vasko. There seem to be a number of people who are getting good results with no problems. I hope I get one of the non-lemons.

NuStock

Posted Sat Dec 6, 2008 6:30PM

Did a search on Flickr to see if all the night images were displaying this problem, some did and some didn't so maybe some are lemons.

Seems that any new camera that comes out has one or two bugs!

Glad I usually wait a year before upgrading to a newer body, pitty I just upgraded to the 40D and now its obsolete

Will probably upgrade soon to a 50D until bugs are sorted out on 5D MKII

Vasko

Posted Sat Dec 6, 2008 6:55PM

I wonder if the problems are caused by the in-camera noise reduction software? I always keep my camera set to "faithful" and noise reduction setting to low or off.

For people getting the black dots try shooting with the noise reduction setting at full and then completely off. see if you still get the dots.

Check out the the images in the viewfinder on your camera see if you can the black dots there. It could also be that your RAW converter doesn't know how to handle the conversions. I mean these raw fils are massive and they are relatively new. maybe the programs are not set properly??? I'm using CS4 and had to download the new Camera Raw 5.2 plugin to be able to convert the CR2 images to tiffs.

just some thoughts.

jtyler

Posted Sat Dec 6, 2008 7:07PM

Posted By Vasko:

I wonder if the problems are caused by the in-camera noise reduction software? I always keep my camera set to "faithful" and noise reduction setting to low or off.

For people getting the black dots try shooting with the noise reduction setting at full and then completely off. see if you still get the dots.

Check out the the images in the viewfinder on your camera see if you can the black dots there. It could also be that your RAW converter doesn't know how to handle the conversions. I mean these raw fils are massive and they are relatively new. maybe the programs are not set properly??? I'm using CS4 and had to download the new Camera Raw 5.2 plugin to be able to convert the CR2 images to tiffs.

just some thoughts.

Some interesting thoughts. I just ordered CS4. I heard somewhere else the CS3 was not equipped to deal with the larger files, but I can't remember where I read that.

dcdp

Posted Sat Dec 6, 2008 8:06PM

Posted By Vasko:

Check out the the images in the viewfinder on your camera see if you can the black dots there. It could also be that your RAW converter doesn't know how to handle the conversions. I mean these raw fils are massive and they are relatively new. maybe the programs are not set properly??? I'm using CS4 and had to download the new Camera Raw 5.2 plugin to be able to convert the CR2 images to tiffs.

The people getting the problem have got the same problems from multiple raw converters (ACR, DPP, etc) and also with the "out of the camera" JPEGs. They have the same problems with and without noise reduction and with and without sharpening. It is not a RAW converter issue.

As usual Canon's response is that the problem does not exist. The fact is, that it does exist and it even exists in photos in their our marketing material (see the Vincent Dafloret photos). They can go on burying their heads in the sand as long as they want just as they did with the 1Ds MIII sub-mirror assembly problem for which Rob Galbraith had to hammer them about week after week after week in his blog taking literally thousands of photos before they eventually did anything about it. One would hope Canon would learn from that debacle, but it doesn't appear they have.

wdstock

Posted Sat Dec 6, 2008 8:53PM

Posted By Dvorjakusan:

Posted By Vasko:

Check out the the images in the viewfinder on your camera see if you can the black dots there. It could also be that your RAW converter doesn't know how to handle the conversions. I mean these raw fils are massive and they are relatively new. maybe the programs are not set properly??? I'm using CS4 and had to download the new Camera Raw 5.2 plugin to be able to convert the CR2 images to tiffs.

The people getting the problem have got the same problems from multiple raw converters (ACR, DPP, etc) and also with the "out of the camera" JPEGs. They have the same problems with and without noise reduction and with and without sharpening. It is not a RAW converter issue.

As usual Canon's response is that the problem does not exist. The fact is, that it does exist and it even exists in photos in their our marketing material (see the Vincent Dafloret photos). They can go on burying their heads in the sand as long as they want just as they did with the 1Ds MIII sub-mirror assembly problem for which Rob Galbraith had to hammer them about week after week after week in his blog taking literally thousands of photos before they eventually did anything about it. One would hope Canon would learn from that debacle, but it doesn't appear they have.

I don't see how they can hide from this one very long. The evidence mounts day by day that there are at least a significant number of cameras exhibiting a predictable, static and obvious problem.

My guess is they are working feverishly to understand it, characterize it, and come up with a practical solution. They probably want to have a plan of action ready before saying anything. Standard corporate stuff.

(Edited on 2008-12-06 21:38:34 by wdstock)

LeggNet

Posted Sat Dec 6, 2008 9:26PM

Posted By jtyler:

Posted By Vasko:

I wonder if the problems are caused by the in-camera noise reduction software? I always keep my camera set to "faithful" and noise reduction setting to low or off.

For people getting the black dots try shooting with the noise reduction setting at full and then completely off. see if you still get the dots.

Check out the the images in the viewfinder on your camera see if you can the black dots there. It could also be that your RAW converter doesn't know how to handle the conversions. I mean these raw fils are massive and they are relatively new. maybe the programs are not set properly??? I'm using CS4 and had to download the new Camera Raw 5.2 plugin to be able to convert the CR2 images to tiffs.

just some thoughts.

Some interesting thoughts. I just ordered CS4. I heard somewhere else the CS3 was not equipped to deal with the larger files, but I can't remember where I read that.

For handling the RAW files from the Mark II (with Photoshop), you do have to have CS4.

It's not that CS3 couldn't handle the large files (it did fine with the 1DSmarkIII files), it is just that Adobe stopped updating the CS3 raw converter (ACR 4.x) prior to the 5DmkII being released and thus by default made CS4 required for converting the Mark II's RAW files.

sjlocke

Posted Sat Dec 6, 2008 9:52PM

Posted By RapidEye:
Hey sjlocke, aren't you feeling better about your overpriced 1Ds Mark III now? I know I am.

Ummm, I have one on order ...

sjlocke

Posted Sat Dec 6, 2008 9:53PM

Posted By LeggNet:
It's not that CS3 couldn't handle the large files (it did fine with the 1DSmarkIII files), it is just that Adobe stopped updating the CS3 raw converter (ACR 4.x) prior to the 5DmkII being released and thus by default made CS4 required for converting the Mark II's RAW files.

Oh, really? I didn't know that. Are people yelling about that too?

slobo

Posted Sat Dec 6, 2008 10:44PM

Posted By sjlocke:

Posted By RapidEye:
Hey sjlocke, aren't you feeling better about your overpriced 1Ds Mark III now? I know I am.

Ummm, I have one on order ...

So you are selling MkIII?

sjlocke

Posted Sun Dec 7, 2008 7:10AM

Maybe, maybe not. I really wanted to use it as a video camera, but I didn't realize you couldn't set the aperture and ISO to what you want.

Vasko

Posted Sun Dec 7, 2008 8:40AM

So far my opinion of the 5dmk2 video is that it is very limited. Not in quality but functionality. have to fool around with it some more.

wdstock

Posted Sun Dec 7, 2008 9:30AM

Posted By sjlocke:

Posted By LeggNet:
It's not that CS3 couldn't handle the large files (it did fine with the 1DSmarkIII files), it is just that Adobe stopped updating the CS3 raw converter (ACR 4.x) prior to the 5DmkII being released and thus by default made CS4 required for converting the Mark II's RAW files.

Oh, really? I didn't know that. Are people yelling about that too?

I think that's just Adobe's SOP of planned obsolesence.

ETA: ficks spelling

(Edited on 2008-12-07 09:32:37 by wdstock)

LeggNet

Posted Sun Dec 7, 2008 10:15AM

Posted By wdstock:

Posted By sjlocke:

Posted By LeggNet:
It's not that CS3 couldn't handle the large files (it did fine with the 1DSmarkIII files), it is just that Adobe stopped updating the CS3 raw converter (ACR 4.x) prior to the 5DmkII being released and thus by default made CS4 required for converting the Mark II's RAW files.

Oh, really? I didn't know that. Are people yelling about that too?

I think that's just Adobe's SOP of planned obsolesence.

Exactly. It is only because of the Adobe Camera Raw update to handle the 5DmkII raw files that I plunked down $200 for the upgrade.

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5D Mark II Black Dots....Problem?