Black smudge in middle of lens

J

jumpcut

New member
HELP!!!
Whenever I shoot in low iris, there is some kind of black smudge in the middle of my lens. I have thoroughly cleaned the exterior of the lens with kodak lens cleaner and wipes. To no avail.!!!

The smudge disappears when I'm irised up a little on the "hot" side.
Is this an anomoly of the DVX???

or

Is it possible that there is a smudge on the interior of the lens? If so, can I access and clean? or the factory has to do it? HEEEELLLLPPPP!!!
it's driving me crazy!!!

Has this happened to anybody?

I'd like to post a screen grab but how do you do it?

Thanks in advance everyone
 
Re: Black smudge in middle of lens

If you do in fact have something on the inside of the lense, you most definitely want to have an authorized service center take care of it. If you somehow scratched you lense (the inside of it no less, I think you'd wish you had only a smudge on it. :-[
 
Re: Black smudge in middle of lens

[http://www.zoomforce.com/dvxuser/photos/images//66030756.jpg]

notice the circled area. With further inspections, there are no scratches on the lens. If there was a scratch, it would be a huge one like the screen grab. But no scratches like it.

I will post a link to my webpage which will show actual moving video. Although it is visible in this screen grab, it is even more so visible moving. Especially when panning, or tilting.

Thanks all
 
Re: Black smudge in middle of lens

Hi,

What it looks like to me is that the camera has a shading problem. This is normally caused by getting into an engineering menu and doing a white shading adjustment against something other than an evenly lit white screen.

I think your camera needs to be sent to the repair facility. Closest to you would be in Kirkland, WA. Robb's Repair.

Good Luck,

Jan
 
Re: Black smudge in middle of lens

[quote author=Jan_Crittenden link=board=Events;num=1078639628;start=0#5 date=03/11/04 at 03:44:46]Hi,

What it looks like to me is that the camera has a shading problem.  This is normally caused by getting into an engineering menu and doing a white shading adjustment against something other than an evenly lit white screen.
[/quote]

Wow , what does that means ? Is it that dangerous to change factory setting ?
 
Re: Black smudge in middle of lens

If you work with the menus that come up when you push the menu butoon, those are not dangerous, it is encouraged.

But there are menus that are engineering menus that you can get to and some places on the internet have posted how to get to them and people get in and play. Not a good playground.

I don't know exactly what is wrong with his camera, but something definitely is. I only called it as I have seen a bad white shading error on the bigger camera. Much easier to get to this menu on the SDX900 and really screw up a $25,000 camera. None the less, it is a fairly simple matter for the repair facility to get it back to normal, if this is the problem.

Hope that helps,

Jan
 
Re: Black smudge in middle of lens

Yes kids stay out of those magic menus... there isnt anything in there that should be fixed :)
 
Re: Black smudge in middle of lens

If the engineering settings are not correct ,how can I access or just to even see if they are misaligned, how do I acces this menu?

Is there a link that displays the proper settings in the "engineering setup"?

Thanks
 
Re: Black smudge in middle of lens

Hi,
>If the engineering settings are not correct ,how can I access or just to even see if they are misaligned, how do I acces this menu?

What I said was it looks like there is something wrong, I can't tell for sure what that is, but it looks like white shading is caflooey. This could only happen with an inexperienced person diving into menus that are not easily accessable and they have hacked their way in. Only an experienced technician should approah these menus. I brought it up because there are some individuals that will go where they are not supposed to and then have a mess on their hands.

Send it off to service and it will come back good as new.

Best regards,

Jan
 
Re: Black smudge in middle of lens

But, what if Panasonic publish a manual how to do engineering setup properly by providing manuals, etc.
Just like a C++ programming or assembly language, even though they are HARD to learn but there are people willing to learn how to program.
If panasonic opens the doors, panasonic will have thousands of people who understand how to setup to correct malfunctions ( For example, you don't have to send your PC to Micro$oft , if you have problem. any computer shop or even one of your friend can solve it, right? )
 
Re: Black smudge in middle of lens

Pretty simple answer probally.. because if they told people a way to really screw thier camera up so bad you would need to send it back, many people would try and claim warranty.. and stick the bill to Panasonic. I looked in those menus for about 3 seconds, got scared and never touched them again.
 
Re: Black smudge in middle of lens

Now you guys got me wondering what "hidden treasures" may lie in those mysterious menus...

-Rodger
 
Re: Black smudge in middle of lens

Jarred, please correct me when i'm wrong, software problem won't be able to destruck hardware, right ?, Say you can format you system harddrive for instance, yes you loose the data, but is is easily recoverable
I think these utility programs must be given to us, so we can "tweak" the software, and if something bad happens, we just "reformat" using the utility disk, everything backs to factory setting and voila, "new" dvx :)
 
Re: Black smudge in middle of lens

Software/firmware is the driving force for hardware.  Although not usually destructive, it can absolutely damage hardware.  Just the same as if someone got behind the wheel of your car and start popping the clutch, shifting into R while going 20 MPH in D.  Simple comparisons, but there are limits which would have been set for mechanical things like zoom and focus, as well as limits set for things like gain, CCD over-exposer and controls that if opened too long or moved too much past limits could very well cause damaged to hardware.  

Control for these type of things may or may not be in this secret menu (haven't been there myself), but for sure if they are, you can damage your camera -- Unless other safeguards are built-in, which would stop this.

Regardless, I'm pretty sure (da!) Jan has given the right advise here.  Best to just leave the engineering settings to the engineers/techs who have been trained in their use.

-Rodger
 
Re: Black smudge in middle of lens

Its not that hard to destroy hardware. You could remove the CCD limits and blow out your chips.. mistime the capistans and wear out your heads... overclock your chip and fry the system board.... :)

Some of you probally know me by now and if there was something in there worth messing with I woulda posted it along time ago.
 
Re: Black smudge in middle of lens

;D
Overclocking DVX , hah .... WOW this is good idea ..... running progressive 100 fps...hmmm... will get really smooth progressive slow mo.... hmmm





No,no... don't do that, I'm just joking ;D
 
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