MARK IV--Surprise- Surprise

Hi Paul,

That's great news. Any chance of some sample photos/crops when you have a chance and/or better shooting conditions? I'm curious to see how much better the results are.

I still plan to have my IV & 600 calibrated but wait until the Olympics are over (I assume many of the (better) techs are in Vancouver now)...

sounds like they found the bug, CPS here didn't. They did not acknowledged any kind of inconsistency in the camera...
I'd love to hear what they did exactly, might be a great help to me.

Glad yours works not Paul

Glad to hear it Paul! Now, if I can just get Canon to zero mine out LIKE I ASKED THEM TO DO WHEN I DROPPED IT OFF ALREADY I'd be all set.

Here's from yesterday. I accidentally shot everything in large jpg by mistake--shouldn't make a difference in viewing I wouldn't think. All pics below have been developed in DPP with no contrast, sharpening, or detail added. All other settings left at their defaults.

First a full frame so you can see the entire shot. Mark IV, 600/4, 1/1000 @ F5.6, ISO 800, AL SERVO, High speed continuous. Single point auto focus on the breast area just below the beak but not including the beak. Distance to subject--100 feet. Snow showers.

Wild male redtail hawk about ten years of age.

Next a full body crop. I wish I could post this at actual pixels but that would bust the 800 pixel rule--unless that sort of thing could be waived for the learning benefit of all. Normally I have found that with the six hundred if I shoot at F7.1 or greater the DOF is acceptable as far as getting the whole bird in fairly sharp focus. Here I didn't want to do that for the purpose of a better idea of where the plane of focus actually is being at 5.6. F4 would be better to do this, but then if I did get a rockin shot it would have very little DOF and that might hurt the shot a lot as to not be usable.
Next the talon area-full resolution:
And finally the head area-full resolution:
In a snow shower it should be kept in mind there is a lot of OOF snowflakes between you and your subject. Add the fact that it is about the most muted light you can get and at 100 feet away I thought these turned out great.

Here's one of his mate--Lady Hawk I call her--from every bit of 400 feet away. Nothin great about the shot just wanted to see how the AF might grab on such an obscured subject so far away. Focus point on her head. Same camera settings. This is a crop that is about 5-7 % full frame again at full resolution:
Even at this distance and almost total lack of contrast the AF found it's mark.

This next one shows that I might be front focusing ever so slightly and maybe to do a +1 in MA. The focus point is on his cheek, below and to the left of his eye. Clearly the plane of focus is back further on his body. I have much more testing to do before I know this for sure.

What I have seen all along with this Mark IV is a very good and consistent lock on the subject. From frame to frame only minor variation. The III and my old II would be all over the place. Clearly there has been an improvement.

Paul

EDIT: One more with just a little midtone contrast and mild sharpening at 90-.7-0 so as to retain that wintry feel:
more contrast and sharpening demonstrated great detail but does loose that look of winter--clearly the Mark IV can do the job if all is working right

Paul that's what I wanna see and expect of my combo, too!

I'd love to know what Canon tweaked in your Mark IV. It showed clearly the same behavior mine does. All my stuffed got zeroed the last time....

@ Jim, what happened to you happened to me three times in two years. Send it and get it back probably even unopened....

I called CPS today to find out Jan. Here's the explanation---Canon does not like to reveal the secrets of their expertise in testing, equipment, method, and so on. Those are my words,but reflect the discussion I had with the representative. This is why they only give us the vaguest notion of what they did. He confirmed they did work on the camera and they did work on the lens. I'll never know exactly what they did. We all will never know exactly what tests and equipment each facility may or may not have.

Jim and Jan--Are the both of you CPS members? You might have made that clear before but I just don't want to read through everything again. If not, you guys need to know the level and knowledge of support is like night and day as far as the tech support people. Jim I mentioned your problems to the guy I was talking to and he said he would wish you would call them. All the different support people I have talked to wish that anyone with problems needs to get it to them. I don't know how much a platinum member would have over the free silver member but maybe...

Paul

so sending stuff to Canon becomes kind of a lottery - you get a good guy you get perfect work, you get the average guy.....well we know what happens then....

es, Jim and I are CPS

I wish I could send my stuff to exactly that guy that worked on yours, but that's not possible

Paul, I'm a gold member. Normally not that much use needed at CPS over the years so just winged it. I have been CPS since switching to Canon about 10 years ago and was NPS with Nikon for many years before that.... think I still might be actually.

I'm a little confused now to be honest. Today it was windy as all get out so any real world testing was difficult at best. What I did find however was that with my very unscientific testing today things are actually better for sure. I shot a bunch of images at 0, +5 and +10 with the 800mm with and without the converter. I'm pleased to say that at least with the lousy testing conditions, the best were at 0. Like you there might be a slightly better tweak there but until I get better testing conditions, I'm at 0 and happy. I am going to see what I can do to aquire a stuffed bird though. Can't imagine a better test target for me to test with and limit most of the variables. Even a nice fake one with chicken feathers would be good I think.

Paul, what facility did your gear go to? If I find mine needs more work, I might just contact them but I did have a few discussions with one CAnon rep that seemed very resposive and caring.... we'll see. For what it's worth, others I've talked to that are using this body are mostly thrilled with it so I'm confident things will get sorted out. I'm so glad yours worked out!

Jim, would be nice to see whether your stuffed bird results will be better than mine I sent you

Did you guys read this?
http://www.robgalbraith.com/bins/multi_ ... 0048-10484

He also talks about that annyoing front focus.

Mine is still at Canon in NJ.. haven't heard from them but given the crazy weather (I have been stuck in Dallas ) I doubt anyone was in on Wednesday...

The info printed on you workorder seems to be canned responses as the wording is identical except for the focus finding.

Hopefully this time works for me too...

Lou

My experience with the Mark IV to this point has been quite good. I get the occasional OOF frame that I can't explain, but most of my images are either very sharp or OOF due to operator error. I haven't had much of an opportunity to get into the 500mm and beyond range yet, but hopefully I'll get to this weekend. I have not had to MA any of my lenses.

Doug Brown wrote: I get the occasional OOF frame that I can't explain, but most of my images are either very sharp or OOF due to operator error.

Doug ... regarding the OOF shots lacking explanation, are you talking about static or dynamic targets, thanks.

Regards,

Joe Kurkjian

jkurkjia wrote:
Doug ... regarding the OOF shots lacking explanation, are you talking about static or dynamic targets, thanks.

Regards,

Joe Kurkjian

Hi Joe. I guess you could call the photos dynamic (moving ducks on water with the 400 f/5.6, but not much flight yet). Also a bunch of low light gym shots at ISO 2000-3200 with the 85 f/1.8.

Hi Paul

thanks for taking the time to write this and it is very helpful, as well as hopeful
there is the issue of why a $5,000 camera and $8,000 lens need to be recalibrated - almost out of the box
there is the issue of tying up your gear and trusting (see Jim Zipp's post) to CPS
you would think CPS would be screaming that all this high end stuff is coming back for minute yet necessary adjustments
along with the issue that your buy in point to CPS (where the word professional is based not upon published work but how much you can afford) determines your additional cost for the fix
cC
I have been a CPS member since 1991 after dumping Nikon because of its AF system was inferior to Canon's.
I have maintained my membership to NPS because I teach (it helps with student camera repairs.)
It might be time to borrow some gear from NPS (after the Olympics) to see if its time to switch partners (again.)

.02 rant

Jim

Doug Brown wrote:

jkurkjia wrote:
Doug ... regarding the OOF shots lacking explanation, are you talking about static or dynamic targets, thanks.

Regards,

Joe Kurkjian

Hi Joe. I guess you could call the photos dynamic (moving ducks on water with the 400 f/5.6, but not much flight yet). Also a bunch of low light gym shots at ISO 2000-3200 with the 85 f/1.8.

Doug, thanks for the reply, I really appreciate it.

What REALLY bothers me with the reported AF issues is that up to this point I've not experienced "lacking explanation" OOF shots using either my 1DmkII or any number of xxD bodies when shooting wildlife (many moving ducks included). I mean you know, when the AF point (or in the case of the 1DmkII, AF assist points) moves off the target it's my fault ... I know it immediately and the fault is always confirmed upon review. Possible disclaimer - I don't look at every shot because most are tossed out for less-than-acceptable composition when looking at the thumbnails, but "to my knowledge" I've never experienced an unexplained OOF shot.

I'm hoping some hummingbird shooters will chime in regarding their 1DmkIV's performance; that application is REALLY demanding on a camera's AF system because the target's motion is very erratic and of course, losing AF lock is an easy thing to do.

Again, thanks for your input.

Regards,

Joe Kurkjian

Well, got to shoot some images yesterday and today. Yesterday when I tried shooting bobbing scaup on the water in very windy conditions I could see that the ducks eye was not sharp. For the heck of it, I dialed back to 0 MA and shot some more. To my surprise and delight, they were now sharp. I kept shooting at 0 with very good results. I have no idea why my initial testing with a rig etc showed front focus when in the field it does not. Must be flawed testing but it is clearly way better at 0 than when I first got it. Also shot some flying gulls just for testing with the 300. These were also sharp but with +10 MA. distant rafts of scaup were also sharp with the +10. I don't think that's right but it was fine for both close up and distant shooting. Today I had the opportunity to shoot some close up shots of bluebirds and also Red-shouldered Hawks with both the 500 and 800. The 800 at 0 and the 500 at +10 were perfect. I'm not happy with the 300 and 500 needing MA but the 800 seems to be performing perfectly with 0 adjustment after the trip to Canon. I'll still hold off final judgment but the image quality of this camera is very good and my limited flight shooting with the 300 was that nearly every gull and pigeon in flight were sharp. So, a big step forward but time will tell. Just glad I don't shoot Basketball!

Got a call from the CPS. They found a front focus of up to 12cm again!!! How crazy is that after the 3rd calibration!?

They said they fixed it now (hopefully) and mastered the camera again (whatever that means). They also cleared all MA values that were present in the camera, because I heard from someone that these vlaues will affect any calibration, even when they are deactivated. This fact would actually explain my problems and three unsuccessful calibration attemps. None of the Canon guys knew this fact or cleared them before.

Tomorrow or Saturday I will know more.

Mine got back late Wed PM.. Service Detail was "AF was shift on the camera body by 5cm to the back" which sounds like they move the focus back 5cm to deal with FF issue. No time to test today, but will try it under studio condition on Friday (puppies) and hopefully inthe field this weekend.. now I just have to find some birds.

Hopefully 2nd time is the charm...

Lou

IT WORKS !!!!

Finally. Made 35 GB of action and static stuff and I am stunned!!!

The problem is the following and Canon is NOT aware of it as far as I know. Or at least only a few tech people !!!

As long as you have MA settings in your camera NO MATTER if deactivated or not the calibration WILL NOT work.

I discovered this issue, which has been presents since the Mark III (!!!), when talking to a former CPS guy who now has his own shop.
I then called Canon and asked them to delete ALL MA and it works perfectly now.

I am stunned by the performance the camera made today.

Great news bud