Help!! Canon 7D problem

Big Red

I own a 7d and tonight, while getting ready to use the camera for a wedding reception, I saw that my LCD will not work when I am in any of the Manual modes. I am able to take a photo in those modes but the LCD does not display the taken photo(s). The only modes the LCD shows in is the Full Auto and the Creative Auto feature. In those modes the LD shows the photo as soon as it is taken.

I am at a loss on what to do and am hoping someone her has a suggestion. I am unable to used my Menu to do any changes because I cannot see them on the LCD.

Thanks

Jeff

ziggy53

The first thing I would try is to reset everything back to defaults.

Remove both batteries, the LP-E6 and the CR1616 Lithium backup battery, and turn the power switch for the camera to "On". Leave the camera alone for a few minutes and then move the switch to "Off".

Re-insert the batteries and turn the camera back on. See if the LCD display correctly shows the instant review of last image.

Big Red

7D Problems
Ziggy,
Thanks for the response. I followed your instructions but there was no change in the problem. Any other suggestions or am I needing to send the camera to Canon?

Jeff

divamum

Do you have the screen set to review shots in all modes? Dig around through the menus (can't remember where it is) to double check. If you can only see the screen in the auto modes, look through the menus while it's in one of those.....

ThatCanonGuy

Will it show the images if you press the review button? Or is the LCD just completely off?

Big Red

7D Problems
I can review photos in the Full Auto and Creative Auto modes, Pressing the Menu button in those modes gives me a limited menu (2 red, 2 blue and 3 yellow-if that makes sense) but is displayed on the LCD. In all of the other modes (P,TV,AV,M) nothing is displayed on the LCD when I push any of the buttons. The LCD for KLive View video works),

If I take a photo in Manual Mode, for example, I have to go to the Full Auto or Creative Mode to view the photo.

Hope this makes sense..

pmaxwell

I would try Ziggy's approach of a full reset. If that doesn't fix it, a trip to Canon is probably in order.

One last thing you could try is to load the newest firmware to the camera. If the firmware is already up to date, it may be possible to reload it, but I haven't looked into that.

Big Red

Canon 7d Problems
Thank you all for the repair suggestions. I tried the reset and it did not work. Today i removed the battery grip to pack the camera for shipment to Canon and all of a sudden the camera works as normal. I have not yet tried to replace the battery grip but I will. I am relieved that the camera seems to be fine now. It seems the issue is the grip.

Jeff

jhefti

Big Red wrote: »

Thank you all for the repair suggestions. I tried the reset and it did not work. Today i removed the battery grip to pack the camera for shipment to Canon and all of a sudden the camera works as normal. I have not yet tried to replace the battery grip but I will. I am relieved that the camera seems to be fine now. It seems the issue is the grip.

Jeff

Jeff, I had a related problem with my battery grip on a 5D2. The camera became flakey, refusing to take shots as if it were busy writing to the CF card, then went dead. Both times this happened while I was shooting a sports event (one of them rather major). Fortunately I had three bodies with me, so I could switch to a back up.

When I finally started looking at the problem, it was the battery grip. I think what happens is that it gets a little loose and fails to make adequate electrical contact. If I just periodically make sure it is snug and tight, and the contacts clean, I have no problem.

Johh

codrus

Is it a Canon grip, or a third party one?

The Canon grip on my 50D occasionally fails to register the shutter release button, which is pretty annoying. It doesn't seem to be related to tightness, though -- removing and reinstalling the grip (and cleaning contacts) made no difference. The weird thing is it happens in bursts -- it'll do it every 4th or 5th photo for a few days, then stop doing it for weeks.

--Ian

Big Red

Canon 7d Problems
The battery grip is a Canon grip. I have had problems with power also in the past when the grip was not making full contact but what was weird in this case is that the power was working for auto modes but no others.

Jeff

ziggy53

Thanks for sharing with us the grip removal revelation. Hopefully this will help others too.

Please do let us know what Canon says about this situation of the grip and these specific problems.

Rob Pauza

I actually came on here just to ask you guys about the same sort of problem and saw Big Red's thread.

My 7d also started doing something similar as of yesterday. I'm getting black image captures and Live View/video also shows up black. Other than that, the camera appears to be working perfectly... LCD menus work fine and images previously on the card show up fine... even the black image captures now show the focus points from the shots.... but they are blank images of course. If I crank up the ISO I can even see noise on my black frames.

No modes work on mine and it doesn't work with or without the grip. I've tried everything mentioned already plus different lenses/cards/batteries... ARRR! And yes, my lens cap is off.

CMOS sensor gone bad I'm guessing?

Anyway... any other suggestions would be greatly appreciated. I'm guessing it requires repair though. 4 months past warranty too!

Thanks,

-Rob

Big Red

In regards to Canon's response to my issue: They were very helpful as I spoke with them on two occasions. Each time they directed me through a hard reset, neither of which worked. After determining the issue was with the battery grip, I called Canon back to let them know in case they were presented with this issued again. Canon could only say they were surprised at the fix and said it made no sense to them but they were happy that the fix was made.

Jeff

Rob Pauza

Thanks Jeff for sharing your response from Canon. I'm really glad you got yours working and I'm happy to report good news on mine too.

I also shoot video with my 7d and I use an okii MC1 USB controller to remotely control ISO, aperture, shutter, etc... but most importantly for my jib... remote start/stop via the USB protocol. I'm not sure what happened, but it apparently turned off incorrectly or something (probably my fault) and locked the camera in some weird state. I'm surprised the hard reset didn't fix the problem, but when I tried plugging it back in and powering it up... Voila! I'm so happy right now! My cameras are my babies!

Anyway, thanks again and I'm glad yours is working as well.

Best wishes,
-Rob

bjpdotcom

I have intermittent BG issues as well. Be it with my 3rd party on the T2i or my Canon on the Elan7. It's the nature of the beast. I used to freak and now I just remove it, reinsert or use the body battery solo.

NeilL

New issue for me, so good to know!

Neil

sichodhury

i know all of you dealt with this years ago and probably moved on from 7D for sometimes now. I recently picked up used 7D as my back up camera, but I am having the same issues as Rob Pauza had "My 7d also started doing something similar as of yesterday. I'm getting black image captures and Live View/video also shows up black. Other than that, the camera appears to be working perfectly... LCD menus work fine and images previously on the card show up fine... even the black image captures now show the focus points from the shots.... but they are blank images of course."

I do not have the battery grip attached and I am using the internal battery only. I am not sure if i need to send it to Canon to fix it.

Please advise!

Rob Pauza

@sichodhury said:
i know all of you dealt this years ago and probably moved on 7D for sometimes now. I recently picked up used 7D as my back up camera, but I am having the same issue as Rob Pauza had "My 7d also started doing something similar as of yesterday. I'm getting black image captures and Live View/video also shows up black. Other than that, the camera appears to be working perfectly... LCD menus work fine and images previously on the card show up fine... even the black image captures now show the focus points from the shots.... but they are blank images of course."



I do not have the battery grip attached- I am using the internal battery only. I am not sure if i need to send it to Canon to fix it.



Please advise!

Sorry you're having the same issue. Mine started working after a lot of fiddling, but kept coming back to the point it wouldn't work at all. I ended up sending mine to Canon and they said the CMOS chip needed replacing. I can't remember exactly how much it cost, but I think it was $200-250ish. I didn't notice right away, but after mine was "fixed" I saw some horizontal banding in dark areas. It wasn't noticable as long as exposure was correct, but showed up when cranking up exposure in post. Overall though, my Canon repair experience was good and easy.

Hope you get it figured out. Or better yet... use this to warrant buying a new camera.

-Rob

Allen

My 7D started giving me blank black screens and then finally an error #30. I think it is the mirror not moving. remaining down, that is causing it. Live view did not work either. I found that going into the menu, Sensor cleaning, Clean Manually, and locking up mirror worked. First time through, camera off and back on I could shoot 3-4 photos before going bad. 2nd try and I could shoot 7-8 shots. After that I have not seen the error. Maybe flexing the mirror couple times cleared it?