D750 Flare Problem Fix from Nikon

<p>Nikon has addressed the flare problem some D750 users have encountered. Here is a link:</p>

<p>http://support.nikonusa.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/19336</p>

<p> </p>

<p>As I have pointed out earlier, I have used two different D750 bodies fairly extensively, and I have yet to come across this problem once (although I have run into other issues on the D750, more on that in the future). Perhaps it only affects certain bodies or perhaps you have to have light coming in from a certain angle to get that effect.</p>

<p>It also remains to be seen that for those units that are affected, how effective Nikon's fix will be or some units may have to go in for repair multiple times.</p>

<p>That's unusually timely of Nikon - credit where it's due for doing the right thing.<br />

<br />

As I understand it (from sample images and analysis), the issue is with some components of the autofocus unit blocking some of the light which is bouncing around outside the image area. If you're shooting against the light, this means you get a band of image area that's shadowed, and the transition between the flare and dark area looks unnatural. Enough people shoot against the light for artistic reasons that this got noticed. It appears that the problem depends highly on the exact positioning of the components of the autofocus module, and that not all cameras are affected (Thom Hogan reports that his aren't). The offending hardware seems to vary between cameras - although I'm not clear whether it's just natural variation or a supplier difference. The reduced size of the D750 body, relating to the reduced area of AF coverage compared with the D4s and D810, happened to make this show up more than on other cameras. It sounds like an easy fix so long as nothing goes wrong.<br />

<br />

If you can't see it on your body, it probably doesn't affect it - but you do have to be shooting into the light to make it show up. Shooting upside down (with the light below the midpoint) appears to solve it as well, although not very conveniently.<br />

<br />

Here endeth the summary of reports from the internet. (I've no personal experience of the D750 other than briefly playing with one in a store.)</p>

<p>Learnt from the D600.</p>

<blockquote>

<p>That's unusually timely of Nikon - credit where it's due for doing the right thing.<br>

Learnt from the D600.<br>

</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Exactly. Personally, I think the way Nikon handles the D600 was ok, but then I didn't have a D600 at all, let alone one that has oil/dust issues. I would imagine those customers that were affected could be really frustrated as Nikon wasn't totally forthcoming about it initially.<br>

<br>

The two D750 I am/was using are not from the first batch, and most likely you need to shoot into some light source from a certain angle to get the effect. It is like the early D200 banding issue where there has to be a drastic light-to-dark transition inside the frame to cause the problem, and all of a sudden lots of people were shooting bare light bulbs (that are on) to check for banding. Very few people would take pictures of a bare light bulb under normal conditions.</p>

<p>After a <em>lot</em> of experimentation, I eventually managed to provoke banded flare from my D800 and D700. But I had to place a flash pointing into the camera to do so, immediately above a dark shaded background. The sun is too unreliable at this time of year, and also presents a slowly moving target.</p>

<p>The light source had to be just outside the top frame area in landscape orientation to get the broken flare, within an angle of (I'm estimating) +/- 2 degrees. And strangely the flare and banding was worse when the flash was off-centre with respect to the frame than when dead centre. When I say "worse" I really mean slightly more noticeable, since the effect wasn't that pronounced at all. I also noticed that the (un-banded) flare with the camera upside down was a bit brighter than when the camera was the right way up, and that with one particular lens I couldn't provoke any banded flare at all. Presumably it's image area is too tight to show a light source outside of the frame area.</p>

<p>The experiment was done to check the claims of nay-sayers, that <em>every</em> camera produces the kind of flare seen in the D750 - they don't! There was no way that the effect I got with the D700 & D800 was anywhere near as severe, or easy to get as what's been shown in the D750. I spent a good half-hour juggling the position of flash and camera to see any banding at all; and even then it was a pretty unspectacular effect. So, yes, there's an issue with the (or some) D750(s) that needs addressing, but I'm not sure that fiddling with the AF module is going to fix it without upsetting the AF alignment. There's already a moving baffle fitted over the AF module. Surely this needs to be adjusted in position or size to properly fix the problem. A black foam extension stuck on maybe?</p>

<p>This whole thing has raised questions about whether mirror-box flare couldn't be improved all round though. Because if it's possible to almost completely suppress flare across one area of the frame, then it should be possible to better eliminate it across the whole frame. Wouldn't you think?<br>

Mirrorless cameras with much better body flare characteristics might well be on their way if camera manufacturers take a lesson away from this - or not. But then again, a reduction in flare would increase image contrast and need at least a re-think of the tone-curve applied. Hmmmm, on second thoughts perhaps that can of worms might remain unopened.</p>

Joe, how easy do you find it to recreate the problem on your D750 relative to the other cameras?

<p>I don't have a D750 Andy. But in the discussion surrounding this issue, some people suggested that the sort of flare encountered in the D750 could be got with any DSLR. I was just curious if that was the case. Yes, I could get some degree of banded flare with both the D700 and D800, and no, it was nothing like as easy to get, nor half as bad as has been shown with the D750.</p>

<p>I've yet to see it in real-life shooting with either of my cameras.<br>

In fact I was shooting into the sun just today - see below - with no sign of banded flare from the D700.</p><div></div>

OH, from your post I thought you'd done a comparison. You can't really compare A to B and C if you only look at B and C.

I was curious whether this was a problem that happens often or some typical Internet freak out.

 

Those freak outs happen all the time with flare. There's the one where Fuji cameras are supposed to have a grid of flare

dots (or all mirror less cameras do that, depending on who you ask) and the one where iPhone 5's are supposed to have

a nasty purple flare, but I never actually get either of those in actual use.

Rodeo Joe seems to have a little too much time in his hands. I haven't bothered to check my D750 as I normally don't

shoot into a light source much (some people do, e.g. those shoot stage performances regularly) like I normally don't shoot

into bare light bulbs.

<blockquote>

<p>"Rodeo Joe seems to have a little too much time in his hands."</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Indeed I do, having recently retired. However, far from trying to stir up a fuss about banded flare, I was trying to disprove, at least to myself, that it's a widespread issue across many cameras.<br>

I've now done that to my own satisfaction, and was simply sharing my findings.<br>

Besides, if people didn't have time on their hands I don't think forums like this would last very long.</p>

<blockquote>

<p>"You can't really compare A to B and C if you only look at B and C."</p>

</blockquote>

<p>That would be true if there weren't many examples of A posted on the internet. Having not been able to get B or C to match other peoples results from A is, I believe, a valid experiment. Of course if someone wants to lend me a D750 (too new and unproven for me to want to buy - a philosophy now shown to be sound), then I'll gladly do a head-to-head comparison.</p>

 

Joe, if you search for iPhone 5 flare you will see a ton of examples. But you almost never see it in regular photos where

people weren't trying hard to cause the flare. There's a big difference between a possible problem and a likely problem.

Here, I'm sorry but your logic doesn't add up. You can't say that one camera is more likely to cause a problem than

another if you don't have info on both cameras to make a comparison.

 

Photography life dot com tried it on a bunch of cameras, but I can't post a link to that site.

<p>Personally, I'd like to congratulate RJ for having too much time on his hands, and thank him for sharing - the more information the better. There's a multi-camera comparison on <a href="http://www.imaging-resource.com/news/2014/12/24/nikon-d750-flare-problems-heres-why-and-what-to-do-about-them-its-not-lens">The Imaging Resource</a> site as well, for anyone wanting more.</p>

<p>I'll second the congratulations on RJ's retirement. Hopefully that means he'll have time to take more great images.</p>

<p>Four days ago when Lannie asked about some low-priced D750: <a href="/nikon-camera-forum/00d3sF">Nikon D750 below $2,000 on Amazon--but is the vendor trustworthy? </a>I found all sorts of D750 buying option on Amazon.com. All of a sudden Amazon has effectively removed the D750 purchase from their web site. Meanwhile both Adorama and B&H are showing out of stock. Reading comments on other forums, maybe Nikon USA is repossessing the D750 bodies that have not been sold and recheck them to make sure that they are free of this issue before they sell any more of them.</p>

<p>I am a registered owner of a D750. I still haven't seen this flare problem myself, but I haven't tried very hard to generate it. And as a D750 owner, at least so far I haven't received any e-mail from Nikon USA directly on this issue.</p>

<p>[[Reading comments on other forums, maybe Nikon USA is repossessing the D750 bodies that have not been sold and recheck them to make sure that they are free of this issue before they sell any more of them.]]</p>

<p><a href="http://www.dpreview.com/articles/4170563047/nikon-usa-addresses-disappearance-of-d750-from-retailers">http://www.dpreview.com/articles/4170563047/nikon-usa-addresses-disappearance-of-d750-from-retailers</a></p>

<p>RJ - can you share images where you were able to create banded flare on the D700 + D800?</p>

<p>I had one of the first d810's that had to be recalled. Nikon could not have done a better job in terms of speed of both service and shipping the camera back to me. </p>

<p>There have been no additional problems.</p>

<p>-O</p>

Haven't seen it, not gonna look

for it. If I find it I'll let you

all know.

<p>The D750 has a new problem to deal with, firmware focus problems when switching lenses. Don't know how big the problem is but it is a problem.</p>

<p>Nikon service advisory with the option to enter serial number to find out if camera is affected:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.nikonusa.com/en/Service-And-Support/Service-Advisories/i4xzkqns/Technical-Service-Advisory-for-Users-of-the-Nikon-D750.html">http://www.nikonusa.com/en/Service-And-Support/Service-Advisories/i4xzkqns/Technical-Service-Advisory-for-Users-of-the-Nikon-D750.html</a></p>

<p>Note: the advisory in the OP has also been updated to the same text as in the link provided above.</p>

<p>Nikon Europe: <a href="https://nikoneurope-en.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/63592">https://nikoneurope-en.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/63592</a></p>

According the link above my camera is affected, however I have not seen the issue and I am not going to search for it. I am not going to send it in unless I see it, since it seems risky to have techs monkeying with the mirror and sensors and whatnot if its not necessary.

<p>Thanks Dieter. Earlier, I read this new info on DPReview: http://www.dpreview.com/articles/6803028878/nikon-provides-instructions-for-flare-affected-d750-owners</p>

<p>People have quickly figured out that for US D750, with serial numbers that start with a 3, serial number 3026253 and 3026254 seems to be the cut-off point. Any serial number smaller than and up to 3026253 needs repair. Anything from 3026254 and above doesn't. Both my own D750 and the test sample from Nikon USA to photo.net are in the affected range.</p>

<p>The problem is that at least I haven't seen any one of the service advisories from Nikon, anywhere, showing sample images indicating the problem. There are merely descriptions in words. Therefore, I can only depend on the Imaging Resource article Andrew mentioned above: http://www.imaging-resource.com/news/2014/12/24/nikon-d750-flare-problems-heres-why-and-what-to-do-about-them-its-not-lens</p>

<p>I have captured literally thousands of images with the two D750. A few days ago I even deliberately captured images with lights coming from right above and below the frame, and I can't even once produce an image with problems, until I ended up using live view and shone a flash light into the lens. From a certain angle, I could see a band above. But then, I could get a similar effect with a D810.</p>

<p>Otherwise, as far as I am concerned, my D750 is working perfectly within its design limitations. So exactly what is Nikon going to fix and is there any chance the camera will be worse afterwards? As I have said before, I am a firm believer of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." And I may never sell the D750, ever, so resale value or difficulty is not a concern.</p>

<p>I am going to sit on this a bit and may just ignore the service advisory. I would like to see how the repair works out for those who are sending their D750 in immediately.</p>

<p>What is the experience from other D750 owners? Have you seen this banding/flare problem in your images?</p>

<blockquote>

<p>So exactly what is Nikon going to fix and is there any chance the camera will be worse afterwards?</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Someone claims that Nikon Europe answered that the entire mirror box will be exchanged - I am certain that this information will soon either be verified or proven false.</p>

<p>Puzzling that they recalled the stock from dealers - are they all in the affected serial number range? Or will all Nikon D750 now show the black dot - regardless of whether or not it was within that range?</p>

<p>My Camera has the issue. Serial number 300****. I never tried to create it and it has only shown up in two photos. A shot of my wife and daughter standing in a willow with very strong backlighting. 85 1.8G with the hood on. At the time I just thought the band on the top was a shadow from my left hand trying to fight the flare. The other shot a street light was the culprit (No band at the top that I remember), but my buddy shooting with a D610 was getting really bad flare there too. Both using 24-70 with hoods on. Two images out of several thousand. I will probably send it in after my trip to South Carolina this week. I hate to part with it even for a little while. It is an utterly fantastic camera and has peformed beyond my expectations. It is my fourth Nikon DSLR (D40x, two D300s, D7100) If this issue keeps people from buying one it is certainly their loss. </p>

<p>I think the black dot indicates that the camera was manufactured using the original parts and assembly procedure but has been inspected / modified at the factory to fix the problem if it existed in that unit. Cameras which were / are made originally with new parts and assembly procedure likely will not have the dot (and the serial number is indicated as not affected). At least that's how it seems to have been with the thermal noise issue with the D810; my camera is outside of the affected range but doesn't have a black dot.</p>

<p>I've read several people reporting that their D750 is within the range of serial numbers which Nikon indicates that are affected but the user can't reproduce the problem. I suspect it is a question of the exact alignment of parts whether it shows up or not. Not all cameras within the recalled range show the problem but Nikon has no way of knowing which camera is affected for sure so they can't exclude those serial numbers without inspection. A lot of reviews were published on the D750 without reports of anomalous flare which suggests it is a problem which rarely shows up even in the original production models or that it shows up severely only in some percentage of cameras.</p>

<p><em>If this issue keeps people from buying one it is certainly their loss.</em></p>

<p>That's one problem with the internet - small issues get amplified into a point where a casual reader who is not familiar with the forum behavior would think the world is about to end and millions of people will have died because of it. Some forums totally get clogged up with issues like this. It seems that the desire to own a perfect object is far greater than the desire to go out and take pictures. </p>