Anyone Had a bad Canon 1000D?

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Dirty Shoe

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Terry
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Sorry this might get a little long winded so I will outline the basics in this first post. I bought mine new from Argos in late October, its the £499 deal bundled with Canons own 18-55 and 70-300mm lens. On first use I must say I was dissapointed with its performance and on anything other than people shots, it seemed to struggle. The images seemed blured or out of focus and certainly had trouble in tracking moving objects and even scenery shots with the larger lens, I thought it was down to me as I was only using it in the preset Auto/Close up or Sport modes and well meaning friends and big Canon fans kept telling me to persivier with it and ditch the auto settings, I tried all things but just got depressed as more and more immages just didnt seem to come out right. I the end I took it back to Argos on new years eve, who said that as I had had it 2 months and because of its value it would have to go back to Canon, so they sent just the body back. It arrived back nearly two weeks ago with a report from the engineers stating that there had been adjustments to the Auto Focus and 'Other' ?? that had been done. I used it for a few general shots, where it seemed to be a little better, but it was when I went out with it last week to take some shots at our local airport that the dissapointment of the images hit me again. So I took it up on a bank and tried to shoot moving cars at speed in the sport mode however even at its 3fps maybe only one of the shots from a panned burst seemed acceptable. Any comments please guys?
 
Post some of your 'disappointing' images, preserve the exif data if possible.
Then people can see what you mean.
 
Yes, post some please.

I agree with completely avoiding any auto settings and JPEG. This should improve things (also read up some generic photography books if you haven't done so).

On the other hand don't expect miracles from the entry level body and the cheapest lenses. My midrange 40D and L lenses do a very poor job tracking a runner or a dog. There must be a reason for 1D series (*** CANON I SO HATE YOU FOR THIS ***).
 
Colin I will post pics when I find out how mate! Ian it is my first DSLR but I had many years with trusty old Minolta X300 to master my panning skills. However even my Kodak Z650 will do a good job, and here lies the main problem, should a hybrid costing a third of the price take better pictures than SLR? The Kodak Z650's images knocks spots off the 1000D I own but that wasnt in the script, lets be honest even in its auto setting the Canon should be superior shouldn't it?
 
What AF mode were you using? The dial may possibly come up with an appropriate shutter speed in auto or sport modes, but if you're haven't got your AF mode set to AI Servo you'll have a hard time tracking anything.
 
Dirty Shoe said:
Colin I will post pics when I find out how mate! Ian it is my first DSLR but I had many years with trusty old Minolta X300 to master my panning skills. However even my Kodak Z650 will do a good job, and here lies the main problem, should a hybrid costing a third of the price take better pictures than SLR? The Kodak Z650's images knocks spots off the 1000D I own but that wasnt in the script, lets be honest even in its auto setting the Canon should be superior shouldn't it?
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1. You could open / use photo sharing site account : flickr, webshots, google picassa, smugmug and others. Then you can paste links using insert image icon.

2. I had a similar feeling about 400D and kit lenses vs Canon A95 over 2 years ago. I solved most issues by upgrading lenses, and getting 30D body. Tracking is still a pain, but there are workarounds from film and manual focus era. Also try to use only the centre AF point, as more points can easily confuse the camera (unless you know exactly how to use them). Decoupling focus from shutter release also helps.
 
I must say I had no problems with my 1000D with the kit lens and 55-250 IS lens. Always used mine in Tv for motorsport though, never bothered with the auto modes. Have you tried with the IS turned off? I found that it sometimes got confused with panning and could give poor results.
 
dhdev said:
I must say I had no problems with my 1000D with the kit lens and 55-250 IS lens. Always used mine in Tv for motorsport though, never bothered with the auto modes. Have you tried with the IS turned off? I found that it sometimes got confused with panning and could give poor results.
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I don't think OP has IS, at least not for the price paid. It must be the old 70-300 non-IS.
Mode 2 IS is exactly for panning, and really helps.
 
Dirty Shoe said:
Colin I will post pics when I find out how mate! Ian it is my first DSLR but I had many years with trusty old Minolta X300 to master my panning skills. However even my Kodak Z650 will do a good job, and here lies the main problem, should a hybrid costing a third of the price take better pictures than SLR? The Kodak Z650's images knocks spots off the 1000D I own but that wasnt in the script, lets be honest even in its auto setting the Canon should be superior shouldn't it?
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You could have a dodgy body (in the nicest possible way) My first 5DII had to go back because of a focussing issue. :|
 
daugirdas said:
Yes, post some please.

I agree with completely avoiding any auto settings and JPEG. This should improve things (also read up some generic photography books if you haven't done so).

On the other hand don't expect miracles from the entry level body and the cheapest lenses. My midrange 40D and L lenses do a very poor job tracking a runner or a dog. There must be a reason for 1D series (*** CANON I SO HATE YOU FOR THIS ***).
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Yup im with you on this. You just cant expect miracles from a entry level camera, however im sure if you stick with it, your results will improve.
 
Ukkor said:
Yup im with you on this. You just cant expect miracles from a entry level camera, however im sure if you stick with it, your results will improve.
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hmmm I have the older 30D and find the AI servo to be fantastic...:thinking:
 
I've not shot any motorsports, but I've shot plenty of tennis and an airshow in AF Servo mode and haven't any problems either, using a 450D.
 
I've had a 1000D for the past year until recently, and I have had no problems at all either.....although I did have the 18-55mm IS version......and also I had the 28-135mm IS USM........it seemed IS improved image quality a lot especially using handheld. It may just be that your lenses aren't up to what you're trying to shoot ?

Edit: On a seperate note, I also had a problem with my AF screen......AF points wouldn't light up red. This was fixed under warranty though fortunately.
 
Many comments here are refering that the lens arent up to much, not what I want to hear when I've just spent £500 on a camera is it! Any way here is a couple of shots.
Picture017.jpg

This was taken on a hazy day shot in Landscape mode at 300mm, the ISO came out at 125, ap was F7 at 1/400. Not one single thing here is clear, not the huts, not the man, not boat or the sign, not even the stones!
Picture057.jpg

Now this shot of the van (and this was one of the better shots) doing around 70mph was taken in sport mode but I'm disapointed with the results here too as the cars I will be taking shots of will be doing a lot faster, the specs are ISO400, F5.7 @ 1/1250 at 130mm.
100_7277.jpg

Now this one was taken on my Kodak set at 5.3mp. Now I know its not perfect but IMHO better than the Canon, taken in Kodaks sport mode the stats came out at F3.7@1/630 the focal length was 388mm (image has been cropped) and the car was doing around 120!

P.S. I'm not being funny but the last poster said he had no problems with his at all, then went on to say his 1000D had to go back and be fixed under warranty! BTW neither of my lens have IS, cheers.
 
Im far from an expert but..

1) I think the aperture was too wide. A bigger version of the picture would be useful but it seems to be sharper behind the person, to their right is a white board ? that looks okish.. I think the dof is too shallow, I reckon f10 @ 1/200th would of been better.

Far as the van shot goes, you probably lost focus as the vehicle was moving at quite a rate and you aren't that far away, so the time it took between focus & shutter opening meant the van was closer and no longer in focus... I appreciate you were probably just testing, but instead of using sport go to Tv mode, use AI Servo, shutter of 1/200th or so and pan with the vehicle, that way you get the sense of speed, be prepared for loads of throwaways until you get it right. My biggest crime in doing this is a shutter speed too low and trying to use AI Focus
Maybe 1/320th or even higher to begin with would be good.
 
I'd suggest that to figure out where the problem lies you would need to do a couple of things. First, you need to take some test shots in controlled conditions. Camera on a tripod, remote release, single focus point selection and 3-4 exposures, with focus reset for each photo. Try at various distances. Then post here both the full size version (resized to 800*800) and a 100% crop of the important part of 1 or more of the images.

When testing the camera it's only fair to the camera to eliminate yourself and skill level from the equation. After doing baseline tests with different apertures you can then start to look at panning shots and what not.
 
bomberman said:
Duh!
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Thanks for your input! Did you even bother to look at the image? Prehaps I should have said a bright day but with a distant haze if one wants to get picky.

Thanks Craft for your constructive response, but even in Hi res the image is not sharp anywhere, I just feel that the Camera in auto settings should out perform the Z650 but it doesnt apear to, I have taken over 15,000 shots with the Kodak in the last 3 years and must have binned only around 5%. I guess I was hoping for too much from the 1000D. Oh before someone posts "If the Kodak is so good why did you feel you had to change it" type stuff, it has an absoloutely horrendous fire up time and will insist in showing you what a wonderful picture it has just taken stopping you firing the next shot:lol:. Cheers.

Sorry Squawk your post apeared while I was replying, I take what you saying onboard, but if the camera cant sort out a decent shot in auto modes then why do they bother to put these feaures on the camera in the first place?
 
To be honest i thinks thats about as good as it gets with that lens - its not known as a sharp lens and that first shot is a 300mm which is only going to make things worse, there are three focus points active all locked onto buildings on the right hand side of the image, using the center focus point only and a smaller aperture may have given a sharper image.

The second image has 7 focus points active all on the van and the camera is tracking using AI servo - again i think is just down to the lens.
 
Just a small point but your lens is a EF75-300mm f/4-5.6 (shown in the Exif), not a 70-300mm.

I have not seen any particularly good reviews on this lens - some describe it as 'mediocre' so I think the problem lies within the lens and not the 1000D.
 
Dirty Shoe - I hate to say it, but both of your lenses are not really up to scratch, and wont produce images that are near the limit of the potential of the 1000D. The good news is the camera itself is more than capable of very good results!

The shot taken with the Kodak does indeed look slightly better, but thats down to sharpness which can be resolved on the 1000D very easily.

Firstly, by using manual settings. Its very easy to just stick it in auto mode (sports) and forget about doing the hard work - this wont get best results as at the end of the day, the camera still doesnt know what you want it to do. Use TV mode (shutter prioriy), and depending if you want to pan or simply freeze the action, select the shutter speed you need (ie 1000 sec above to freeze, between 80-125 for panning) and make sure you only use the centre focus point as the camera will think you want it all focused. It cant do that. Sport mode is not ideal.

Your first shot is not focused. One of the main reasons for this is that there simply isnt a subject to be focused on! Also, the aperture was open, you need to narrow it down (increase the aperture value) to get more in focus throughout the whole image.

Lens wide, dump the 75-300 - its rubbish. Replace this with a 55-250 IS for starters which is very good (£160 new), and think about replacing your kit lens with the much better IS version.

Its easy to jump from a compact/bridge and expect miracles from a DSLR but in reality they need more guidance than a fully auto camera - you need to work harder with these, but when you do you get much better results!!

Also, do you do any post processing?
 
To be honest these shots look like some shots I used to get from my 300D when I first got it and left it shooting JPEG on Auto or P, with a mediocre lens. I think that it's worth trying again before giving up or getting too upset.

Anyway, I think that the best thing to do is to try and improve things with the kit that you already have so that you can at least evaluate things before possibly maybe moving on. I don't know how much you know about the various settings and technique to get the best out of things so please don't be offended by anything I say here...

I'd do the following...

I'd select aperture priority and an aperture to suit the dof I wanted (if you are unsure about the effect of aperture settings a quick dive into the camera manual or a quick Google may help) but I'd avoid extremely small apertures.

I'd keep an eye on the shutter speed and keep it well above the zoom length of the lens. For example with a 300mm lens I'd keep the shutter speed well above 1/300 sec.

I'd select the lowest ISO possible keeping in mind my aperture and shutter speed selections.

I'd select "one shot" and the centre focus point and I'd shoot RAW and process the shots with the software that came with the camera or whatever third party package I had on my pc.

If you don't feel that you fully understand the implications of focusing on one feature in a scene will have on other scene elements it might be worth Googling and studying depth of field tables.

Assuming for a moment that you kit isn't actually faulty I hope that you can have another go and perhaps see an improvement. I was initially disappointed with my 300D but I soon managed to take some shots that I'm still happy with to this day, with a mediocre lens too.

Good Luck.
 
I know it is hard to swallow spending £500 and getting completely rubbish lenses with it. Canon is really good for making overpriced entry level lenses with horrible bottle glass and probably polycarbonate elements. You will have to dump these lenses, as well as all auto modes to get any better results. It is not a point and shoot anymore. It needs work, and it need decent optics.
You probably would wonder why there are so many people selling up their complete entry level kit on ebay? Well they get rubbish glass like you, can't get good results with it and just give up - Thank you Canon!
Many people go 2nd hand just like for cars. £500 would have bought you 20/30D with tamron 17-50 f/2.8 with some leftovers for a better telephoto. You can get some in as new condition with minimal use.
 
Ask if some one can land you a decent lens, them carry out some tests, shot RAW and take your time at editing, I love my "Ficher-Price" DSLR

Low Budget 50mm (canon 50mm f/1.8)
IMG_4510Capt_Assuno.jpg


L glass (70-200mm L)
IMG_4549Capt_Assuno.jpg


17-85mm, great walkabout, but very poor IQ
3761632776_77197e7548_o.jpg
 
Terry, sadly the 75-300 [rather than the 70-300] is a poor lens - I know, I've got one.

It's generally soft at all apertures. That's not to say it's incapable of the occasional decent shot, but it's deemed to be about the worst lens Canon make. Here's about the best shot I've taken with it for tennis, and even that isn't especially sharp anywhere: http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2435/3626344344_6d010ed628_o.jpg

Sorry to break it to you but the 55-250 IS would have been a much better buy.
 
Ok I get the picture (or not!) I've shot hundreds of shots now with this 1000D and lens issues aside, I still maintain that something is not well with this camera. I'm going to take my chances and try to get a replacement or this is heading for the recycling bin! Thanks for your input though guys!
 
where are you based mate?

Maybe someone local to you will also own a canon 1000D, you could both take the same photos and compare.
 
Dirty Shoe said:
Ok I get the picture (or not!) I've shot hundreds of shots now with this 1000D and lens issues aside, I still maintain that something is not well with this camera. I'm going to take my chances and try to get a replacement or this is heading for the recycling bin! Thanks for your input though guys!
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I think you need to borrow some decent glass before you write off the camera.

As suggested above whereabouts are you?
 
As above, if you're based near any big tracks see if there's a meeting or event on, there's usually a TP member or 2 around who if asked nicely, might let you borrow a lens, or use your 1000D on one of their lenses. Give it a go, if it's still not performing with an experienced user, good technique, and good glass, then you can say there's definitely something wrong with it!

Chris
 
If you can afford to drop £70-£80, get yourself a 50mm f/1.8 - if you can't get a sharp shot with that, I'd agree that the camera is dodgy. The Nifty Fifty is well worth having anyway :)

A.
 
Yep, the body was dodgy, Argos agreed to take it back, bearing in mind it had already been returned once to Canon and the first shots taken with the new one are, well a huge improvement even in the auto modes. But thanks to everyone who have given advice and I have shot some moving aircraft in very poor light today in manual settings. If anyone is interested I will post some pics, but to be honest I still feel a bit miffed that so many of you slagged the lens or my inexpeirence before doubting the camera body itself.
 
Dirty Shoe said:
but to be honest I still feel a bit miffed that so many of you slagged the lens or my inexpeirence before doubting the camera body itself.
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Sorry to hear about the problems with your Canon, and good to hear that you've got a replacement that's working as it should.

To be fair to people who've posted comments, it is pretty unusual to hear of a camera body causing slightly blurred shots - it's far more likely to be a faulty lens or (dare I say it) operator error!

As regards the disparaging comments about kit lenses - sure their optical performance isn't going to be top-drawer compared to an L lens, but they can't be any worse than the lens on your average point'n'shoot digital compact. As ever, pixel-peeping has a lot to answer for - it's very easy to find fault with a lens in a way that just wouldn't have been possible in the days of film.

Enjoy your 1000D, and be sure to post some pics :)

A.
 
Dirty Shoe said:
Yep, the body was dodgy, Argos agreed to take it back, bearing in mind it had already been returned once to Canon and the first shots taken with the new one are, well a huge improvement even in the auto modes. But thanks to everyone who have given advice and I have shot some moving aircraft in very poor light today in manual settings. If anyone is interested I will post some pics, but to be honest I still feel a bit miffed that so many of you slagged the lens or my inexpeirence before doubting the camera body itself.
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Why should you be miffed :thinking:

You asked to hear what people on here thought and that's exactly what you got - peoples thoughts about what the problem might be...!
 
Dirty Shoe said:
Yep, the body was dodgy, Argos agreed to take it back, bearing in mind it had already been returned once to Canon and the first shots taken with the new one are, well a huge improvement even in the auto modes. But thanks to everyone who have given advice and I have shot some moving aircraft in very poor light today in manual settings. If anyone is interested I will post some pics, but to be honest I still feel a bit miffed that so many of you slagged the lens or my inexpeirence before doubting the camera body itself.
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No one was doing any 'slagging off', we were just offering advice on possible solutions to your problem, and now that you have a properly working body I hope some of the advice is still useful in relation to improving your skills.

The fact is the 75-300 isnt a very sharp lens, and sharpness was an issue for you so naturally the two were thought to be connected, and I'd still recommend replacing this with the 55-250 IS!
 
Ditto. I'm glad to hear that you've got it sorted!

However, the 75-300 is a poor lens as I mentioned. I can vouch from personal experience, but if you don't believe me look around the net. Like here for instance: http://www.the-digital-picture.com/Reviews/Canon-EF-75-300mm-f-4-5.6-III-USM-Lens-Review.aspx (bear in mind that the USM and micro motor lenses are optically identical) or here: http://www.fredmiranda.com/reviews/showproduct.php?product=18&sort=7&thecat=27s

At any rate, happy shooting.
 
Originally Posted by Dirty Shoe but to be honest I still feel a bit miffed that so many of you slagged the lens or my inexpeirence before doubting the camera body itself..[/QUOTE said:
As has been said you asked for probable causes and the 75-300mm lens is a big cause of soft images (on any body) many reviews give that conclusion and so do a lot of owners

see here
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