Chromatic Aberration When Shooting Lunar Eclipse?

I got my camera back from Sony from the second repair attempt 2 hours ago - and guess what - it returned in even worse condition. Now the backfocus is horrible even with ND OFF. The camera is unusable now.
This sucks big time! I´m so p*ssed!
I bought the camera 5 weeks ago and it did never really work!
 
Gerald, you got your EX1 back from repair in less than ten days? Or was it already in repair when you posted your test frames on the 7th? Which repair facility did the work? You didn't send it to California by chance?

2nd repair attempt and still not corrected? That's not good!

I myself am having to pass up numerous "local shooter with EX1 needed to do wedding" jobs because they don't pay much more than the day rental fee on the EX1 and would not be worth doing once gas money/travel cost is figured in. I could be out earning $400-500/day just as a second shooter with the demand out here, but also--I have no camera! And this wave isn't going to last much longer, as more shooters are buying the EX1, which means I'll lose my exclusivity in this geographic region.

I just called and left a message with Sony in CA. I hope I hear better news. I need a loaner!
 
This time it took less than a week to return it, I was very surprised when the UPS guy called me this morning, but it worried me at the same time...
It was sent to the Sony repair center in France. (I´m in Austria/Europe).
They totally messed it up. They probably only hit the menu button for FB adjustment once and thought they fixed it.
Sony support in France always says they will have to talk to their engineers and would call me back, but they never do.
So I furiously called Sony in Austria and my dealer and demanded that they finally find a solution or send me a new camera. My dealer is short on supply and wont get the next cameras before the end of April!!
I hope to hear back from either of them until tomorrow, otherwise I will call them every five minutes until they have an acceptable solution for me. They obviously are not able to fix my crappy camera. I bought it 5 weeks ago and could not use it for a single job till now. I finally have to make some money with it, thats what I bought it for. The loaner camera is crap too - all I can use it for is as a paper weight.:furious3::furious3::furious3:
Normally I´m a very relaxed guy, but now I´m really really really angry and boiling!
 
And you SHOULD be angry. Two trips to repair and not fixed. That's unacceptable, and warrants a letter to Sony's CEO. You need to voice your complaint to Sony's upper management, perhaps all the way to Japan.

I myself got off the phone with the supervisor at the San Jose repair facility an hour ago. Here's what I've learned:

The chromatic abberation was measured and found to be within Sony specification.

They are asking up the chain to Japan about CA compensation circuits and whether the EX1 has this rumored feature. The supervisor was unaware that such a circuit is in the camera, but he is researching it and will call me back in a few days with an answer.

The battery drain down issue will take a few months to resolve. Sony Japan is working on it. When a solution is affected, they will call me to send in the camera for that repair.

The backfocus issue: Sony has just released a firmware update to fix this. My guess is that it's an adjustment to the LUT for focal lengths/zoom distances and that they have added new data to compensate for ND filter. Bottom line, fixed with a firmware update.

My camera should be shipped out to me later this week. I may have it for the weekend and will be able to test it and verify that the firmware fixed the backfocus. As for CA, I guess Sony expects us to live with that. Or buy an F23 at 30X the price for a perfect picture.
 
Mark (or perhaps its Mary Ann),
Who did you talk to at Sony? I tried to reach Chuck through Steve at the number you sent me but he left town today. If you ahve another number let me know.

I have spoken to Wing Tseung but he was far from that clear about the situation. He did tell me about the software upgrade but I was not clear that he really understood my problem. There is a bit of language problem interacting with Wing though so that could be part of my lack of assurance. He does want to be helpful . He did not comment on the CA issue.

I think we need to make noise about the CA thing on these boards though if they consider it acceptable and perhaps send them frame grabs comparing a Sony and an HVX200. I still don't know if they all have it or not. I don't like it one bit though.

Lenny
 
Lenny, this situation is far from ideal, with only 2 of 3 issues *maybe* to be resolved, but it is better than nothing.
I myself have been speaking with Wing who is the supervisor for that group and he's been making an honest effort to get answers to my questions. (I can only imagine they must be DELUGED with calls from the increasing numbers of EX1 owners now discovering the ND filter affects backfocus).
I never got a direct number for Chuck. The way I reached him was by calling the general number ending in 8282 and getting the next available rep. Then I was transferred to Chuck. I spoke with him only once, last week.
The CA is a tricky issue because a lot of the folk at Sony don't see it. I only recently got Wing to confirm that he understands what it is, when he described it as a "prism effect".
I'm afraid that the CA problem is going to end up much like the audio problem on the HVR-V1U--few will care and Sony won't acknowledge its existence. I became a one-man army, fighting to get that problem fixed, and all it got me was banned from several video forums in the past 8 months.
What it boils down to is if you can't live with a problem with a product, either find a competing product you CAN live with, or get out of the business and do something low tech, like raising rice patties. ;)

In the case of backfocus, I have a sense that it is indeed a firmware LUT issue and that this firmware upgrade will indeed fix that problem. The rest is wait & see. No garantees there. I could turn around and buy another EX1 tomorrow, but this CA issue has really given me cause to wait.
 
This thread makes me really sad and it's because the camera seems so freakin' Killer.

And, here you go, quality control issues. It makes me shake my head because I've become a convert but refuse to put my money into something that people have to send back TWICE within the span of a few weeks.

You don't hear this kinda stuff happening with Canon and Panasonic. But, you also aren't hearing Canon or Panasonic releasing a 1/2" Sensor beast Solid State Sub 7k BEAST either.

So very sad.
 
I look at it this way: even if Sony didn't fix all of the problems, it's still a camera worth having at this price point. Maybe Sony priced it this low because Sony realized it would have these issues. Imagine if they priced it at $39,000 and it had these problems? That should put things in perspective. At $6500, we have less to complain about. It's better than an HVR-V1U, Z1U, FX1, etc., but not as good as and F23. Oddly, the lens is the weak link.
 
Firmware does not fix backfocus problem!

Firmware does not fix backfocus problem!

All the talk about the new firmware version made me check what version my camera coming back from repair has.
It now has V1.05-0405 whereas the loaner camera has V1.03-0351.

It looks like they already used the new software for the repair, and it did not fix it at all...

regards,
Gerald - still boiling!
 
Chuck just called me and confirmed that there is a software fix for the backfocus issue. Newer cameras are shipping with it repaired but he couldn't say when they changed. maybe a while ago already though. If they corrected this awhile ago though why didn't they send out a bulletin asking for recalls? Maybe it took longer to create a fix for the old ones? Or maybe they just don't give a s__t.

Chuck told me an engineer would call me later to discuss the CA. I think sending & posting comparative stills is the best thing we could do.

Basspig - did you post those moon shots? If its a clear night I'll do a comparison of the HVX200 and the Ex-1.

Gerald - What exactly is your backfocus problem now. Mine is that its fine with no filter then goes bad when the filters are engaged.

I'm expecting a call from a Sony engineer later today and will run that software version number by him to see if that's the fix.

Any other questions to ask him?

Lenny
 
Sony kept me busy all day long.
They wanted to have some clips they could show their technician. So I uploaded them to my server.
Then they could not open it on their PC but they also seem to have a MAC and eventually they could watch the clips. They were kind of stunned by the amount of my cameras problem. It looks like my camera has the newest firmware which they installed when my camera was in for the last repair. I also sent them an AVI file which they can use for internal reviews.
It looks like I will get a new camera - I do not believe it until its in my hands. If everything works out well I´ll get one of their 5 brand new loaner cameras from the Netherlands. They will send it to me if they find a way to install the new firmware there.
I hope this will solve my problems with the EX1 forever. I finally have to earn some money with it.
The camera now has a backfocus issue with and without ND filter.

cu,
Gerald
 
Guys,

Please keep me updated about the situation cause I´m having the same problems with my camera and I´m hoping to find some fix for them...

Thanks,

Jony
 
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Lenny, I think the lunar eclipse footage was lost in a RAID hard drive failure 3 weeks ago. I'll see if I can find it, but I suspect I had temporarily dumped it to the RAID a day or two before the drive failed. All that exists is what's online now.

Gerald, that worries me that you got the new firmware and your camera still isn't focusing properly.

I am happy to see that several have spoken to Sony about the CA. However, I think that's a lens quality issue that cannot be rectified without turning this into a much more expensive camera.

My $700 HV-20 has almost no visible CA under any conditions, but it also does not have 3 imagers and a prism, which, I understand is much more complicated to make work without CA at all zoom levels.
 
Actually it was Steve who called earlier and now I just spoke to Chuck. He said the same thing about CA, so I think its up to us to complain.
He did confirm that the software upgrade is v1.05. That's what Gerald says he has and it doesn't work for him. Akk!

Gerald can you give us more info on your continuing backfocus problems.

Lenny
 
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Maybe I should call Sony again and find out if they are actually testing the backfocus with all three ND filter settings, because if it doesn't work, then that means I've wasted enormous $$$ on rentals with no improvement in my own camera as returned. They're supposed to be sending it back to me this week, so if it's not really resolved, then they should not be sending it to me.
 
I received my EX1 back from Sony in San Jose, CA today. Before I begin, I'll mention that I had sent it in with it's original Sony packaging, inside a larger B&H provided box. I got back a smaller box about 15x15x13 and I was a bit concerned as the FedEx gal handed it to me, thinking "this can't be the right item". I accepted it and opened it. The EX1 was tightly wrapped in heavy poly plastic, and placed in a box that was filled with hot foam to create shape-conformed packaging. The camera arrived undamaged, except for a little scuff mark on the ext mic holder, but nothing major. I immediately called Sony and left a message asking about my original packing material, with the bar code for my SxS rebate, also explaining that I need that packaging when I sell the camera in a few years (the difference in sale price of my two VX2000s on eBay was $400--the one with original carton sold for the higher price). I am hoping that Sony can furnish me the original carton. I'd hate to lose that.

Now, on to the main story. It was night time by the time I got the camera home (I had to drive out to a FedEx terminal in another city to go fetch it because someone had mistyped the zip code at Sony when they prepared the shipment and they weren't able to get it on the truck for delivery today) and I was only able to test in-studio, but the results are very encouraging and it looks like the backfocus is working correctly now.
I did the same studio test as 2 weeks ago and compared them on a 30" display. The 2-week old tests showed loss of focus on all three ND settings, off, 1 and 2, when backed out to wide angle.
With the upgraded camera tonight, I repeated the tests and all three settings showed sharp detail when backed out to full wide. I also could easily see the jaggies in the backfocus chart that I printed at 600dpi, when zoomed in so that the chart filled 85% of the frame area.

So, looks very good. I'll do some shooting tomorrow, outdoors, to better test this out. It looks like whatever Sony did, was effective.

On another front, but related, a close friend of mine, who assisted with camera #1 operation at the GBSO concert earlier this month, has bought me a 16GB SxS card! He said he hated to see me not utilizing the full potential of this camera. Needless to say, I was stunned. A lot of people pretend to be a good friend, but this gentleman went beyond talk. No doubt part of that was because he's impressed with what I'm doing with these cameras--especially after I showed him the Blu-ray disc of the concert video that I produced last week.

And regarding a concert I shot last October, a very tough audiophile magazine editor gave my recording of the GBSO's Beethoven concert a shocking, positive review, stating that it was one of the best recordings he's ever heard (and that's thousands of discs ranging from vinyl, open reel, CD, SACD and more)--this, from a guy known for not mincing words if a product isn't up to his lofty quality standards. I've accomplished my goal when someone whom I'm not an advertizer with, writes that my recording is among the best he's heard. Wow...
 
basspig,
congratulations on the successful repair of your camera.
I have to agree on the concert footage you posted - the sound is excellent - and I often shot concerts and our sound guys rarely produce a sound that good.
Congratulations on the review you got!

Regarding my camera with the ongoing backfocus problem, the situation is the following:
A high Sony sales representative today came by to hand over a brand new EX1 to me, as Sony prime support does not have any exchange cameras and no more loaner cameras. They just cant find out what´s wrong with my cameras back focus.
To make the story short:
The new camera has the backfocus problem as well - and this time I performed the test in front of the Sony guy.
He was surprised and then pulled out one of the demo cameras he had with him, only to find out that it has the same issue. Nobody ever noticed this problem before. Looks like most people did not use the ND filter??
In the meantime I think that all EX1 have this issue, maybe people do not test good enough to see if their camera has this problem. In the last 7 weeks I had 5 cameras with the same issue going through my hands! This can´t be any coincident!
Anyways - he took all the cameras with him and will show it to his technicians and can hopefully present a working camera to me soon. Its now almost 7 weeks since I bought my camera.
It looks like they did not test their cameras closely enough.
I´m still boiling! This camera was the worst investment I have ever made, and I have always been a big Sony fan...

regards,
Gerald
 
Gerald
I think the same - I guess much more EX1 do have the backfocus problem and many users just test it without the ND because for them it doesn't make sense to test it three times - no ND, ND1, ND2 :undecided
A german friend got his EX1 back with the new firmware and the backfocus with NDs on is badder than before...
 
fixed!

fixed!

Today I fixed the backfocus problem for myself, just before I wanted to return my EX1 for another exchange.
I did the FB-adjustment procedure once again - but this time I used 12 backfocus charts side by side (actually 4 columns and 3 rows), which I attached to a white wall of my house.
I did the procedure for each ND - setting separately. Looks like only 1 backfocus chart was not enough to fix my problem. The camera was 3m away from the charts - aperture of course wide open.

Maybe this trick will work for others as well.
The sad thing is that Sony could not fix it in 3 repair attempts.
I hope it will stay like this now.

My camera has the new FW 1.05.

Maybe this technique will help others as well.

regards,
Gerald
 
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