C200: My C200 is DOWN!

puredrifting

puredrifting

Major Contributor
Yeesh, shooting interviews yesterday with crew outdoors, in the middle of our second inteview, I get a "Fan Error" message that pops up and C200 promptly shuts itself down. I reboot, error pops up again immediately, we were done for the day. Unfortunately, still had a lot of interviews to shoot. Fortunately camera behaved for the entire morning of shooting races so we got the main reason we were at the event and the interviewees we missed yesterday will be at the next race so not the end of the world.

Just looked at my receipt and we took delivery of our C200 one year and one day ago so technically out of warranty. I am visiting Canon Burbank tomorrow so I will report back if they will cover it under warranty, estimate of repair time and what the techs tell me. I am not mad, a bit inconvenienced, my C100 and C300 never broke down once in years of shooting but stuff happens and shooting on this documentary has been harder and more grueling for the gear than most of our previous projects of the last few years. Lots of sun, spray, being on boats, etc. which I know is much harder on gear. I don't have CPS, I may get it after this experience.

Wish me luck, we have a lot of shoots scheduled for the next two weeks, hopefully I won't have to rent cameras to cover them.
 
That sucks, brother. That's one of the things that scares me about so many modern cameras, if they start to overheat or have fan issues, you're dead in the water. I doubt a lot of our modern mid-grade and below "cinema cameras" could take some of the punishment that our ENG cameras of a few years can take.

I have CPS gold for my still gear, but I just can't justify the ridiculous $1,000/year cost for the cinema level. And read the fine print: Next Business Day Turnaround repairs on the Cinema level CPS Membership does not include Cinema Products(Cameras, Lenses and accessories). So you're basically paying $1,000 up-front on the chance that you'll need service on cine equipment and get 30% off of the repairs and able to get demo loans of cine gear.

http://cps.usa.canon.com/about_cps/about.shtml
 
puredrifting said:
Yeesh, shooting interviews yesterday with crew outdoors, in the middle of our second inteview, I get a "Fan Error" message that pops up and C200 promptly shuts itself down. I reboot, error pops up again immediately, we were done for the day. Unfortunately, still had a lot of interviews to shoot. Fortunately camera behaved for the entire morning of shooting races so we got the main reason we were at the event and the interviewees we missed yesterday will be at the next race so not the end of the world.

Just looked at my receipt and we took delivery of our C200 one year and one day ago so technically out of warranty. I am visiting Canon Burbank tomorrow so I will report back if they will cover it under warranty, estimate of repair time and what the techs tell me. I am not mad, a bit inconvenienced, my C100 and C300 never broke down once in years of shooting but stuff happens and shooting on this documentary has been harder and more grueling for the gear than most of our previous projects of the last few years. Lots of sun, spray, being on boats, etc. which I know is much harder on gear. I don't have CPS, I may get it after this experience.

Wish me luck, we have a lot of shoots scheduled for the next two weeks, hopefully I won't have to rent cameras to cover them.
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Same error message popped up on my C300MKII two weeks ago. Camera does not shut down, just a thermometer icon pops up on the left hand side that is green. My dealer said it should be safe to continue using camera but to keep eye on the temp. Is going to take over 5 weeks for replacement parts - WOW??????? 5 weeks Canon? Would be a disaster if it just shut down on a shoot.

I wish you all the best puredrifting, I have always read your posts with interest and normally learn something from your observations.
 
puredrifting said:
Yeesh, shooting interviews yesterday with crew outdoors, in the middle of our second inteview, I get a "Fan Error" message that pops up and C200 promptly shuts itself down. I reboot, error pops up again immediately, we were done for the day. Unfortunately, still had a lot of interviews to shoot. Fortunately camera behaved for the entire morning of shooting races so we got the main reason we were at the event and the interviewees we missed yesterday will be at the next race so not the end of the world.
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Was it only used on shore while XF400 was getting all the ocean spray?

My opinion is that air intakes in camera are a bad design choice on multiple levels, which couldn't be solved easily just by using maglev fans in the future.
 
Uggh, that's tough. Fans are the Achilles heal of any system, having a low MTBF compared to electronics. It makes me wonder if yours is a fluke or if there will be a rash of C200 fan failures over the next year.
 
Update: Dropped off the C200 with Canon Burbank yesterday. I brought my sales receipt which showed I bought the camera one year and three days ago and the tech said that they "add two months onto the date it was bought" so it will be covered under warranty.

In the email they sent me to verify receipt of the camera, the emails says "Any damage due to liquid, sand, corrosion, battery leakage, or accidental damage is specifically excluded from warranty coverage. In the unlikely event that any internal or external damage is found due to any of the above mentioned conditions, a revised estimate will be sent for your authorization." My camera has been used on shore but definitely right at the water line, on the sandy beach, handheld and on tripod so hopefully there is no corrosion. I don't know how sand would have gotten into the fan other than wind, it has been windy on some of our shoot days. Yes, it's been XF-405/400s out on the boats. I am betting it is just a defective part hopefully. The tech did say they have seen a few C300s and C300 MKIIs with the fan error but mine was the first C200 they had seen with it. They checked the OPLF/cover and removed some dust particles and a large smudge and did say that they will update the firmware for me. I am supposed to get it back early next week so I will update you all with what I find.

FWIW, none of the Canons I have used with the possible exception of the C700 FF are built to the same levels of ruggedness as my Betacams, F900 or original Varicam. But to be honest the only cameras I have used that seem to be built to that level are the Panavision and Arri cameras. The REDs, even though they are largely metal with little plastic, have proven to not be reliable, at least for me (The MX-1 was built really badly and the Epic that I had on loan had to be swapped out before our first shoot as it went defective, my producing partners Scarlet is constantly malfunctioning and breaking down). While I like the Canons, they are built closer to a prosumer level IMHO, too much plastic and many of the connectors like the DC in and the handgrip port are very unreliable and consumerish. Same with the FS7/FS5, definitely prosumer feeling. I would have glad paid an extra $1,200.00 on my C200 if it could be proven that build quality was demonstrably superior to what it is, better DC input, better hangrip electronic connection, heavier duty LCD touchscreen cable connections. The XLRs seem great and thank goodness it has a metal headphone jack so it's not all bad but some of the connectors and bits and parts are too fragile. Like the touchscreen itself seems to scratch really easily, even if you baby it.

If it lasts me another two years, I'll be happy, it'll be time to get whatever the next thing is then. Hopefully I will be in 100% producer mode by then and can hire DPs and camera ops and then none of this will matter :-)
 
puredrifting said:
FWIW, none of the Canons I have used with the possible exception of the C700 FF are built to the same levels of ruggedness as my Betacams, F900 or original Varicam. But to be honest the only cameras I have used that seem to be built to that level are the Panavision and Arri cameras.
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For top level production after owning the C300 II, the only cameras I'd consider are the Canon C700 FF, Sony VENICE, and Alexa LF (all full frame). On the low end the Sony A7S III with VENICE color will likely be very useful (have a pretty good idea how to make Sony A7x cameras look good for skin tones after owning the A7S I and II. Should be even easier with VENICE color science (ideally no post color work needed for great skin tones)). And as you say, story/content is most important once camera/visual quality is equal to or above Canon (still camera raw) level color.

Predict zero charge for Canon to fix your C200 :)
 
Glad to hear about the warranty but you are not out of the woods yet! I had a smudge inside the lens of my XF300 camcorder and Canon said it was not covered. So I hope it works out for you. Sad comparison if the much lower priced XF400s hold up just fine while being in tougher conditions.
 
pureD- I did some searching online and found where C300 owners had the fan issue come up and the problem was debris in the internal fan.

I've read of camera owners using projector filter material when they know they are going to be in extreme conditions, in order to keep material from entering into the camera's internal fan. I assume they place the material over the filter intake, how they affix it I do not know. They did not elaborate. Maybe some tabs of velcro placed on the camera body just to the sides of the intake, with corresponding tabs of velcro on the filter material, would do the trick.

This is the sort of material they were using:

https://www.amazon.com/Pura-Computer-Air-Filter-Polyurethane/dp/B000FJU8BC

Should any of this be required on a "professional" camera? No, it should not. But it is what it is. And I do not know for a fact that, despite anecdotal evidence, that these new cameras have a higher failure rate than did the betacams and such. Betacams when down as well. Remember how often something would go wrong with the tape-transport and how many times you ejected a tape only to find it tweaked, twisted in the tape-transport mechanism, or pinched? Remember the camera that had a reset-button built into the underside of the camera body and you've have to hit that button after the camera's power tripped the breaker?


This is pure speculation on my part but it seems logical that Sony cameras would be better in the elements than Canon cameras if for no other reason than Sony has decades of experience designing and producing professional-level video cameras that operate out in the elements while Canon does not. Canon is a relative newcomer when it comes to producing professional level video cameras. Or when it comes to producing video cameras that are going to be doing "ENG-style" work. And it does seem that I see less complaints about the Sony Fs7 and Fs5 going down than I see about the C300 and C200 failing.
 
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Hey Puredrifting. Sorry about your c200.. My c100 experience similar to yours. Had it on boat, beaches, docks, etc. -- even got splashed with salt water a few times and kept on ticking. Good luck with your cam...
 
Update:

Picked it up from Canon today. Good news, no charge for "repair". Bad news, when I went over it with the tech, they said that "they couldnt replicate the Fan Error or the camera shutting down" that I experienced. So all they did was "clean out the exhaust fan." Hmm...makes me a little paranoid to use it on professional shoots so I am testing the heck out of it, I have had it recording all day, shooting Cinema RAW Light at 60fps with proxy, the same settings I used when it was shutting down. It's about 82F in my office and I have it in the sunlight near the window. So far, it has recorded six 256GB cards worth of Cinema RAW Light without a fan error and without shutting itself down. When I first started, the fan was set to auto and I could feel the hot air from the exhaust. The thermometer came on and the fan symbol stayed on so I went into the menus and switched it to the fan on all of the time, then the thermometer went out. For shooting outdoor, the fan is a non-factor but for hot interiors without a lot of AC going, hmm....

They supposedly cleaned the OPLF/glass in front of the sensor and said the sensor itself was dust free but the swabbed some from the OPLF/glass. They updated the firmware so now it can do the .MXF. Interesting note wondering if any of you with older C200s notice, with the older firmware, the camera would erase and format a 256GB Cfast really quick, like one second. With the new firmware, it now takes closer to five to ten seconds to format the same CFast 2.0 card. Anyone else notice this when you switched?

So I am cautiously optimistic, perhaps there was some debris in the fan that they blew out that was impeding cooling? If it happens again, I will insist that they replace the fan but so far, fingers crossed, seems to be working. I will report back after I torture test it some more, I am going to keep on cranking cards through it to see if I can get it to give me the Fan Error or shut down again. I am glad I took my C100 MKI to the Sahara Desert a couple of years ago and not the C200. As we all know, 4K cameras tend to run hotter than 1080 only cameras, I am not sure if the C200 could stand up to the heat of 137F in the Sahara or the ridiculous humidity I encountered in the jungle in Brazil last year? The C100 was a rock. The C200, up until now has been a rock but my confidence in it's reliability under adverse conditions will have to be built back up.
 
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JPNola said:
pureD- I did some searching online and found where C300 owners had the fan issue come up and the problem was debris in the internal fan.

I've read of camera owners using projector filter material when they know they are going to be in extreme conditions, in order to keep material from entering into the camera's internal fan. I assume they place the material over the filter intake, how they affix it I do not know. They did not elaborate. Maybe some tabs of velcro placed on the camera body just to the sides of the intake, with corresponding tabs of velcro on the filter material, would do the trick.

This is the sort of material they were using:

https://www.amazon.com/Pura-Computer-Air-Filter-Polyurethane/dp/B000FJU8BC

Should any of this be required on a "professional" camera? No, it should not. But it is what it is. And I do not know for a fact that, despite anecdotal evidence, that these new cameras have a higher failure rate than did the betacams and such. Betacams when down as well. Remember how often something would go wrong with the tape-transport and how many times you ejected a tape only to find it tweaked, twisted in the tape-transport mechanism, or pinched? Remember the camera that had a reset-button built into the underside of the camera body and you've have to hit that button after the camera's power tripped the breaker?


This is pure speculation on my part but it seems logical that Sony cameras would be better in the elements than Canon cameras if for no other reason than Sony has decades of experience designing and producing professional-level video cameras that operate out in the elements while Canon does not. Canon is a relative newcomer when it comes to producing professional level video cameras. Or when it comes to producing video cameras that are going to be doing "ENG-style" work. And it does seem that I see less complaints about the Sony Fs7 and Fs5 going down than I see about the C300 and C200 failing.
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Interesting. It would be kind of a drag to have to pre-filter the air on a C200 but that could be a factor to debris getting in there.

I agree about Sony, in general, they have a TON more experience building broadcast kinds of cameras than Canon, Canon really has only made consumer, then the EOS Cinema Line which are not really built to hardcore pro specs, although to be fair, the FS7 and EVA 1 both have relatively flimsy builds too. In the end, it seems to mostly come down to price. The C700 FF seems to be built much better than the C300 MKII and C200 and the F55 F5 seems to be built like tanks compared to their little cousins, the FS5/7, Varicam LT in comparison to the DVX200/EVA 1, no comparison.
 
And its situations like these that makes one caution to by expensive gear used and without warranty? I actually don't think it's a bad idea to by extended warranties when purchasing new and expensive gear. Could save a lot of money in the long run. At the same time a company proving as much past reliability as canon would not cause one to think something like this would happen so soon. Hope they the care of you.
 
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