D3s producing black frames :(

Zerodog

I noticed this shooting MX a few weeks ago. Occasional black frames. I thought this is no good but it was very random. Last weekend at a moto-trials I was getting them vey consisantly in a single burst of frames. I also saw a flashing ERR once. Both of these situations I was using a nikon 70-200 vrII.
I switched lenses an put on my 24-70 and shot lots of frames with not one black one. Last night I was doing some shots inside with the 24-70. I was using live view to dial in manual focus. I got an ERR message on screen while turning the live view on. It cleared when I released the shutter.
Another thing is this. The camera always sounds the same. It never sounds odd when I get the black frame?

Could this be a lens contact thing? Or is there a problem with the shutter?

SoCalAl

I had that happen on a 70-200 VRI and it was a sticking aperture diaphram in in the lens, also got a lot of frames with the exposure all over the place. Nikon repaired it under warranty. It worked fine after that. Inside the camera end of the lens is a lever that actuates the diaphram, move it gently with your finger. It should be totally free. Mine was sticking wide open much of the time.

Edit: Had my share of black frames also. Thought my D3 ate itself....

Matthew Saville

Time to clean your lens contacts, for starters. If the signal is bad, the lens could be giving you f/22 every now and then. (Usually if it's a mechanical problem instead, the issue is NOT stopping down and you get f/2.8 when you want f/8...)

Either way dude, if you're getting an ERR message then it's time for the camera to go in for service. Especially if you're shooting in a professional capacity. Cameras need regular service if they're gonna take a beating, even the flagships!

=Matt=

Zerodog

Yeah it sucks. Sounds like a trip to Nikon for my baby. If it is giving me f22, it is not showing f22 in the file. It is right on with the other settings in the set. Not sure how many actuations I have. I bet it is up toward 100,000. I just want to be sure it is the body not the lens. Testing has been inconclusive. It has been hard to reproduce. But it sure does happen.

SoCalAl

It does suck... It was over 2 years ago when mine acted up but don't believe the EXIF indicated an aperture problem. I did take the lens down to the Nikon repair center in Torrance, CA along with a CD full with strings of shots ranging from way under exposed to over exposed. Handed it to the girl behind the counter and she said "look here" and she showed me the little lever inside and it would stay in any position you put it, plus it was very stiff. It should instantly park wide open. Don't know how it worked at all. They didn't want the body at that point and my D3 only had about 20,000 frames on it then.

SoCalAl

Probably a good idea to have the body checked too as Matthew suggests. Mine now has about 125,000 frames on it and the rubber on the body has gone soft and starting to lift. It will be going in soon. I think that the sun screen I covered myself with got to it plus it's got lots of days on it out in the sun at 100+ ambient and several at 115+ ambient sometimes almost too hot to hold. No complaints! It has served me well and will continue to do so I'm sure.

Zerodog

Worried about how long it will be out for. I will look at my 70-200 to see. I think the aperture lever is snappy. And my exposure is consistent, that is, unless it is 100% black.

Matthew Saville

Zerodog wrote: »

Worried about how long it will be out for. I will look at my 70-200 to see. I think the aperture lever is snappy. And my exposure is consistent, that is, unless it is 100% black.

I believe that for the EXIF to read one thing and the actual exposure to be another, you'd need a mechanical failure not an electrical one.

And, even if you were accidentally getting f/22, a shot in broad daylight should only be a few stops under-exposed, NOT totally black.

I'm going to wager that it is either a problem with your shutter, or a problem with the data pipeline *after* the click...

If it's the shutter, then I'm betting that only the higher shutter speeds are causing the problem. Is this the case?

Even though flagship shutters are rated to 300,000 clicks, it's still probably prudent to get cameras at least checked out every 100,000 clicks. :-)

=Matt=

SoCalAl

Matthew is probably right. The only truly black frame I ever got was when I got hit and my 70-200 was ripped out of the mount. I've never had it take longer than 3 weeks for repair no doubt dependent upon work load & parts availability.

Zerodog

Could it be a memory card thing? Yes maybe it is the higher shutter speeds doing it. And that is why I am having trouble reproducing this in my house.

The lens aperture lever is smooth and snappy. Doubt that it is the issue.

SoCalAl

Doesn't sound like a memory card error but no first hand experience there.

ziggy53

Zerodog wrote: »

Could it be a memory card thing? Yes maybe it is the higher shutter speeds doing it. And that is why I am having trouble reproducing this in my house.

The lens aperture lever is smooth and snappy. Doubt that it is the issue.

Please post a link to one of the black frames with full EXIF.

Zerodog

Here is a black one. Looking at it at 1:1 in LR it has purple and blue spots. It looks like a galaxy. I just exported to SM. How do I do it to keep all the EXIF intact?

Also here is the link to the image on my SM page. http://www.theinfinitymachine.com/photos/i-hPrWw6J/0/O/i-hPrWw6J.jpg

Zerodog

I also tried cranking the exposure and brightness all the way up. Nothing changed at all. There is nothing there. Like a lens cap.

ziggy53

Zerodog wrote: »

I also tried cranking the exposure and brightness all the way up. Nothing changed at all. There is nothing there. Like a lens cap.

I concur that there is absolutely nothing of image data in that image file. However, unlike using a lens cap, this cannot normally occur.

When you put a lens cap on the lens, or a body cap for that matter, the camera will still record "something", even if it's just sensor noise. (You can try this if you wish by recording a "dark frame" with the lens cap on and in a dark room or closet at night. If you leave the lens on then just use manual focus and manual exposure, with a high shutter speed.)

If you take the resulting dark frame and process it in Photoshop with Auto-Tone, Auto-Contrast and Auto-Color, and several iterations of Brightness and Exposure boosting, you'll get something in a visible pattern of noise or hot pixels. You'll get something.

This frame is devoid of any data. It's a true "black frame", as opposed to a normal camera "dark frame".

Since the camera cannot normally do this, even a broken shutter will produce at least a dark frame, I suggest that something else is at play. If you notice that this only occurs with a single memory card, that's a likely cause. If it happens with all memory cards, it's more likely something to do with the camera itself.

*******If you tried the dark frame file generation, remember to revert the camera and lens to your normal settings.

Zerodog

This frame does have micro random noise. Blue and purple is what I see at 1:1 in LR.

MGRPhoto

I've had this exact thing happen twice. Once was caused by a bad D90 the other was a pile of bad Transcend flash cards.

ziggy53

Zerodog wrote: »

This frame does have micro random noise. Blue and purple is what I see at 1:1 in LR.

I just repeated my test of:

Import through ACR as 32 bit, boost Brightness and Exposure to the maximum.
Photoshop with Auto-Tone, Auto-Contrast and Auto-Color, and several iterations of Brightness and Exposure boosting.

I'm not seeing anything at 1:1, 100 percent magnification.

I also reviewed the file as data (in a hex editor). All I see are 20 and 0A in the image data, which is consistent with "no data". I do not believe that you can create a "capped capture" dark frame with those results. I'm not sure why Lightroom is showing blue and purple but I am fairly confident that it is not representative of the data from the image file. (I suspect a rounding error somewhere in Lightroom.)

I still recommend checking to see if the problem is limited to a single memory card.

Zerodog

This is goodish news. I know which card it is. I will test with a good one and the possible problem card and see what I get.

Zerodog

Ran through about 200 frames on 2 different cards. Didn't miss a beat. ??????
Guess I should just get it in for service and send a few sequences with the black frames on a disk.

Zerodog

This weekend I decided to take the D3s backpacking. On the 3rd shot.......black frame. Using a different card and my 20mm 2.8. Got multiple black frames on the trip. 1 Err message too. I guess I am not crazy, and there really is some sort of problem.

Pictureline, the big camera store in SLC is having Digital Fest this coming friday. Nikon sales reps and 2 Nikon techs will be there. I am bringing it in and hopefully getting some great customer service.

Zerodog

Went back to Nikon today. I sent a disk along with it to show these frames. Hope to get it back soon!

jww

I've had this happen on one of my D3's. Just curious, see if the exif has F0 as that is what I found when it happened to me. Cleaning the pins in the lens mount did wonders for the issue and had no other failures.

Also had it happen while using my 1.7x as it tended to be a bit sloppy in the mount. I stopped using it (the 1.7x) long ago as I just didn't feel like trusting it and haven't taken the time to send it back for repair.

Zerodog

Nope it reads the correct f stop. It also has done this with many lenses.
It is at Nikon now. Hoping I get it back soon.

jww

Zerodog wrote: »

Nope it reads the correct f stop. It also has done this with many lenses.
It is at Nikon now. Hoping I get it back soon.

Wow... that is quite different then.

Glad you have it getting repaired. I am curious to see how fast your turnaround is on it.

Zerodog

I will post back when I hear from them.

Zerodog

So here was the verdict. Camera was out for a little over 2 weeks. Nikon replaced the shutter and assembly. New grip, full tune up and cleaning too. It is like new on the inside. All for a whopping $15 for shipping from Pictureline (camera store in SLC) . My sales guy at Pictureline and the Nikon Western sales rep helped push this through faster for me. It was also a little bit out of warranty, but, Nikon covered it as a warranty. This goes to show that having a good relationship with local store, or at least a good store helps a ton. If this was some squirly online deal from amazon or something I would have been on my own. I might have saved a few bucks up front, maybe. But when it comes down to support you can't beat a good local vendor pulling for you.

I need to look at some old files and see what my shutter count actually was. All good now. It even sounds different.

ziggy53

Zerodog wrote: »

So here was the verdict. Camera was out for a little over 2 weeks. Nikon replaced the shutter and assembly. New grip, full tune up and cleaning too. It is like new on the inside. All for a whopping $15 for shipping from Pictureline (camera store in SLC) . My sales guy at Pictureline and the Nikon Western sales rep helped push this through faster for me. It was also a little bit out of warranty, but, Nikon covered it as a warranty. This goes to show that having a good relationship with local store, or at least a good store helps a ton. If this was some squirly online deal from amazon or something I would have been on my own. I might have saved a few bucks up front, maybe. But when it comes down to support you can't beat a good local vendor pulling for you.

I need to look at some old files and see what my shutter count actually was. All good now. It even sounds different.

Fantastic. WTG Nikon. clap

angevin1

Zerodog wrote: »

So here was the verdict. Camera was out for a little over 2 weeks. Nikon replaced the shutter and assembly. New grip, full tune up and cleaning too. It is like new on the inside. All for a whopping $15 for shipping from Pictureline (camera store in SLC) . My sales guy at Pictureline and the Nikon Western sales rep helped push this through faster for me. It was also a little bit out of warranty, but, Nikon covered it as a warranty. This goes to show that having a good relationship with local store, or at least a good store helps a ton. If this was some squirly online deal from amazon or something I would have been on my own. I might have saved a few bucks up front, maybe. But when it comes down to support you can't beat a good local vendor pulling for you.

I need to look at some old files and see what my shutter count actually was. All good now. It even sounds different.

yAy! I kept thinking...just worry whether it gets a good fix! Sounds like you got it all!

Zerodog

Really it was the best case for me. New shutter=new camera in my book. Nikon rocks. And so does Pictureline. Now I need to work on getting my Nikon Professional services application. What a PITA. But, it sounds like it is worth the trouble for future service.

ImageX Photography

Zerodog wrote: »

So here was the verdict. Camera was out for a little over 2 weeks. Nikon replaced the shutter and assembly. New grip, full tune up and cleaning too. It is like new on the inside. All for a whopping $15 for shipping from Pictureline (camera store in SLC) . My sales guy at Pictureline and the Nikon Western sales rep helped push this through faster for me. It was also a little bit out of warranty, but, Nikon covered it as a warranty. This goes to show that having a good relationship with local store, or at least a good store helps a ton. If this was some squirly online deal from amazon or something I would have been on my own. I might have saved a few bucks up front, maybe. But when it comes down to support you can't beat a good local vendor pulling for you.

I need to look at some old files and see what my shutter count actually was. All good now. It even sounds different.

Awesome. Congrats going from worrying to a brand new camera in lighting speed. Worked out very nice for ya.