E-410 - Black/blank frames?

[bmul]

Hi all,

I've noticed recently occasional 'black' or blank frames from my E-410.

These frames show up as black in the camera, and so don't appear to be a card reader issue.

The frames initially appear entirely blank, although the exif info shows aperture and shutter settings. As a quick and dirty check, boosting the 'fill light' control in Picasa to the maximum on an ISO400 black frame shows the following pattern (including the typical E-X10 banding):



A 200% crop shows the following pattern (from a different, ISO100 frame, similarly boosted):



Has anyone seen similar issues previously? The camera has a 2 year warranty so I'll be calling the shop I purchased it from tomorrow and discussing the best way of getting it back to Olympus if necessary.

I think (although can't be certain) that these were taken on a different memory card to similar frames first noticed several months ago (I thought I'd wait and see if it happened again before worrying too much...)

The fact that banding and somewhat regular patterns are visible would seem to indicate a camera, rather than card, fault, but I'd be interested in others' views.

To me it looks like a shutter fault resulting in a massively underexposed frame?

Thanks

Ben

[zuiko]

Was the lens cap left on.?

David

[beejaybee]

The fact that banding and somewhat regular patterns are visible would seem to indicate a camera, rather than card, fault, but I'd be interested in others' views.

To me it looks like a shutter fault resulting in a massively underexposed frame?

That's a possibility ... but I think you'd notice by e.g. finding one of these instead of an image you thought you'd taken.

The banding/noise looks typical of what I'd expect from any digital camera when pushing the "sensitivity" way up in an image processing package.

I suspect the shutter is firing whan your camera is bouncing around in its bag ... do you remember to turn it off? Might there be interference from some source e.g. a wireless garage door mechanism working on the same wavelength as a wireless remote on your camera, or a bluetooth linkage?

[bmul]

Lens cap is off! [img]/forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

These frames occur during the course of taking a whole series of other pictures - they are 'missing' from a particular set of photos, rather than unexplained frames which turn up having had the camera in the bag or similar. for example, I first noticed it when taking a series of tripod mounted shots of a full moon; the recent examples were during a day at a birds of prey centre - the camera was out and being used regularly and these frames were taken in the same way as all the others (which have come out fine).

Thanks for the thoughts anyway

[Craftysnapper]

As the exif of one of the images shows it was shot on aperture priority with a short shutter speed discounts the lenscap or bouncing about in the bag theories.

Lens cap is off! [img]/forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

These frames occur during the course of taking a whole series of other pictures - they are 'missing' from a particular set of photos, rather than unexplained frames which turn up having had the camera in the bag or similar. for example, I first noticed it when taking a series of tripod mounted shots of a full moon; the recent examples were during a day at a birds of prey centre - the camera was out and being used regularly and these frames were taken in the same way as all the others (which have come out fine).

Thanks for the thoughts anyway

If thats the case then a possibility is that the shutter is not opening on the occasionel shot.

[bmul]

Cheers - I've spoken to the retailer and to Olympus today, variously suggested checking firmware up to date and performing a reset, failing which I'll be sending it in later this week for a warranty repair.

Cheers all