SD500 Focus Assist Lamp

[sveet]

I was playing with my SD500 and noticed that the focus assist lamp lights a area way off center. When the lens is at full zoom it is practically outside of the view finder.

The camera seems to have a pretty difficult time achieving focus in low light, I believe, because of this.

Just windering if everybody's elses seems to be pretty centered??

I guess it back for a return and another try.................

[JTL]

I love these posts, because any excuse to play with the camera is welcome...

O.K....just was trying mine (also at full zoom) in some VERY low light situations (a narrow hallway with no lights) and it's focusing spot-on. Mind you, I have AIAF turned off. I actually have found no need for it...I suggest turning AIAF off and re-testing. If you get the same result as before, then take it back...

[sveet]

I love these posts, because any excuse to play with the camera is welcome...

O.K....just was trying mine (also at full zoom) in some VERY low light situations (a narrow hallway with no lights) and it's focusing spot-on. Mind you, I have AIAF turned off. I actually have found no need for it...I suggest turning AIAF off and re-testing. If you get the same result as before, then take it back...

Same result with AIAF off. I just get the yellow rectange and single beep almost everytime, even at less than full zoom.

I tried it with a flower arrangement onthe kitchen table and the light actually completely misses the flower (centered on the screen) and hits the wall to the side behind it. Camera can't focus on the arrangement, which is filling 80% of the view finder, at low light.

It is back to the store I go for another try........................

[JTL]

Same result with AIAF off. I just get the yellow rectange and single beep almost everytime, even at less than full zoom.

I tried it with a flower arrangement onthe kitchen table and the light actually completely misses the flower (centered on the screen) and hits the wall to the side behind it. Camera can't focus on the arrangement, which is filling 80% of the view finder, at low light.

It is back to the store I go for another try........................Wow! That is bad! Well, I must say that I consider myself lucky, since there have been reports of various problems with a number of SD500s. I wonder if this is by region or what. I bought mine in NYC...and I can honestly say it has been problem-free.

[gary_hendricks]

I suggest taking it back to the store ... I've heard of such problems before in the SD500.

[Lewiedude]

Mine is dead-center from side to side and a tad lower than center from top to bottom. However, I did some test frames and it is focusing on the correct center of the frams, AiAF is turned off...no use for it either.

I love these forums as I have been able to really test my SD500 with all of the concerns and additional, extremely useful, insight!

Keep it coming! Thanks to Jeff for his hard work....you go dude!

[yonika]

Mine is dead-center from side to side and a tad lower than center from top to bottom. However, I did some test frames and it is focusing on the correct center of the frams, AiAF is turned off...no use for it either.

I love these forums as I have been able to really test my SD500 with all of the concerns and additional, extremely useful, insight!

Keep it coming! Thanks to Jeff for his hard work....you go dude!

Well, I on the contrary think that not reading all these posts is better :)
Why's that you ask ? After reading the post quoted above, I went right away to test mine. here are the results:
Side to Side - Centered allright !
Top to Bottom - The center of the light spot is somewhat at 25% to 33%
height from the bottom of the screen - that is wide angled -
when zooming into full telephoto, the light spot is almost
out of the frame.
All this, is making it really hard to focus on the center of the frame while in a dark room in full zoom. in a wide angle situation though, the AIAF is pretty much of a help because it searches an object to focus on the whole frame and not just on the center of it, and of course, the light spot is'nt centered.:)

So ? now that it seems that I have a problem I was'nt aware of untill now. what do I do ? take it back ? live with it as I would have if I had'nt read this post ? do all SD's have this slight deviation to the bottom ?
Has the end of the world arrived ?

Jonathan

[sveet]

Well, I on the contrary think that not reading all these posts is better :)
Why's that you ask ? After reading the post quoted above, I went right away to test mine. here are the results:
Side to Side - Centered allright !
Top to Bottom - The center of the light spot is somewhat at 25% to 33%
height from the bottom of the screen - that is wide angled -
when zooming into full telephoto, the light spot is almost
out of the frame.
All this, is making it really hard to focus on the center of the frame while in a dark room in full zoom. in a wide angle situation though, the AIAF is pretty much of a help because it searches an object to focus on the whole frame and not just on the center of it, and of course, the light spot is'nt centered.:)

So ? now that it seems that I have a problem I was'nt aware of untill now. what do I do ? take it back ? live with it as I would have if I had'nt read this post ? do all SD's have this slight deviation to the bottom ?
Has the end of the world arrived ?

Jonathan

I went and got another SD500. It did exactly the same thing, low targeted Focus Assist lamp, with a dead pixle in the display to boot! Nice bright blue spot on the screen.

So I went back again, this new one targets low, too, but everything else works fine.

I have decided to now live with this as a "quirk" of this camera. I love everything else about it, and I will just not be able to zoom in at all during a low light shot, which really shouldn't be that big of a problem.

I have also found that it works better with the AIAF on, since it will focus on something in the beam of the assist lamp. With the AIAF off, the light is below the focusing rectangle and thus it never hits the focus.

I am sure Canon figures most people won't use the camera to this degree or even understand why it won't focus.

I guess what bothered me is that my 3 year old S110 hits the low light focus dead spot on everytime.

Since I want the camera now, and I have figured out how to "work around" this shortcomming, mostly, I have decided to lower my expectations.

[jwalling00]

Off course if the AF assist is not comming directly from the lens, or cover a very wide area (none do unless they use the flash like Canon DSLR) it is be off center. It's just physics. Where you are most likely to see this is shots really close of of small items (flower should are a classic example. My advice, and I seriously am not trying to be funny here, is carry a compact flashlight..

[sveet]

I exchanged my misaiming low light assist for a new SD500 with an autofocus low assist light that was perfectly centered.

The camera was perfect. Pictures were perfect. Everything was perfect, little bit of hum in movies, but otherwise perfect. Up until it fried. It made it thru about 50 pictures then it just turned off, during a shot. Lens retracted, it is simply shut off. I turned it on, the low battery light was on, and it shut off again.

I thought nothing of it. I simply figured the battery was dead. I charged the battery overnight and this morning, it was freaking out. The pictures were all striped, and after about 5 pictures it craped out.

So.........I returned it and plan on waiting about 2 months and trying again. I I absolutely love the camera, but after 4 tries, I figure Canon has to let other people be the human QA/QC. I can't keep trying.