New xha1 owner, lens coating problem?

futureman

futureman

Active member
Hello everyone, well i made the plunge and bought an xha1. It arrived in the mail yesterday, and i could not be more thrilled with the performance and styling... it is extremely cool looking!

However, as soon as i got it i noticed several spots on the lens, that appear to be places where the lens coating did not adhere, or fell off. But i thought, "ok no big deal".

The problem got worse today when i watched some footage on my computer monitor and notice, to my horror, several light spots, a few of which appear to be "wiggling" in the image, which leads me to believe that they are defects on the image stabilizer lens element!!!

Please help, any input would be greatly appreciated... i have never had so much as the slightest problem with my previous consumer grade minidv cams, which both cost one tenth of the price of the Canon!

Here is a quick video file i grabbed of the problem:

HTTP://www.filefactory.com/file/ed4b84

when you click on the link, scroll half way down the page and there will be a tiny link which says "download file". it is a straight .mpg file grab from the cam... so sorry about the size!

I have also attached an image file of the problem!
 

Attachments

  • xha1 problem.jpg
    xha1 problem.jpg
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I would definitely contact Canon technical support and see if they can have a look at the grabs. You may need to have your camcorder repaired or replaced.
 
I had similar issues with my XH-A1. I used some lense cleaning solution and lense tissue to clean the lense and the spots were gone. Hopefully that is all it is. I believe the blue dots you are seeing is caused by spots on your lense and will go away when you cure the problem.
 
Hopefully that's all it is. I can't imagine a defect of that magnitude making it past QC.
 
I had a friend who used to spit on my lense when he talked, and when I focused as close to the lense as I could go, that's how the spots looked. Fortunately I got them off and never let him near my camera again.
 
Thanks guys for your input, i tried cleaning the lens with some windex, and all seems to be good now... disaster averted! I then went straight over to the local camera store and got a uv filter.

otherwise the camera is amazing, i plugged it in to a large hd flat panel tv, and with gain set to zero, 24f and cine-v color setting it was much more cinematic than i was expecting!

Now i just have to get shooting!
 
For future reference. Don't ever use windex to clean a Multi coated lens or any lens for god sakes. Only use good lens cleaners made for cleaning photographic lenses...........
 
Yes, I believe repeated use of windex will destroy lens/glass coatings. Ideally you don't even want to use it on a CRT monitor.
 
This is definitely a problem. Maybe not a problem, but an issue. My A1 showed the same sort of spots and Zeiss lens cleaner solved it, but it took some elbow grease and several of the pre-moistened cleaners to do the job.
 
Guys may I implore you, that if you pull a camera out of a box and it isnt 100% even a small thing that can be cleaned fro mthe lense, let Canon know. If a number of people report the same issue, QC Person No. 1205\XXX will have to start doing his job properly.
 
Two stubborn smudges when we first unpacked the A1. Used the free Rosco Lens Cleaning Kit and it was OK. Maybe there's a Smudge Mole in Canon QC? oops, been watching too much "24"!
 
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