adam3 Posted January 17, 2006 Share Posted January 17, 2006 Well, I have a Casio EX-S100 in addition to my 300D for easy, family shots. Recently it's been showing funny circle things--and they don't just look like dead pixels or whatever, it almost looks like flare, but it isn't... here are two pictures with the thing. They actually show up to a certain extent in all my pictures, and you can even see them in the preview screen. What is it? Can someone help?<br /><br /> Examples:<br /> <a href="http://www.aerofive.com/examples/1.jpg">Example 1</a><br /> <a href="http://www.aerofive.com/examples/2.jpg">Example 2</a><br /><br /> Those are images straight from the camera, so it may take a bit to load.<br /><br /> Thanks,<br /><br /> Adam Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
david_s5 Posted January 17, 2006 Share Posted January 17, 2006 I think that you're seeing small specs of dust floating in the air near your camera, which are illuminated by the flash. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stephen hazelton Posted January 17, 2006 Share Posted January 17, 2006 Maybe dust IN the camera? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gluteal cleft Posted January 17, 2006 Share Posted January 17, 2006 They're too exactly similar in shape to be dust, I believe. This looks a LOT (almost exactly) like a problem that an old point-and-shoot of mine has - every once in a while, it would deliver anywhere from a few of those to a TON of them. Attached is one of the most extreme examples. Looking at both of your photos, I can see areas where reflections of the flash are very strong, so it's very likely the same thing happening in your camera. The shapes that appear are actually the shape of the aperture as light bounces around inside of the lens, as it shouldn't. It always happened when a very bright light entered the lens at just the wrong angle, often caused by the flash reflecting off of something - in the attached example, the flash was reflecting off of raindrops in the air. Because there were a good number of raindrops, there were a lot of the reflections, and hence there are many of these little UFOs. If you look, you'll see that the shape of them distorts as you get to the corners of the image. There's a term for that sort of distortion, I saw it mentioned and pointed out in the leica forum a little while ago. Overall, while I don't know the technical name or terminology, this is the result of a poor lens. :-( steve<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jennifer valencia Posted January 17, 2006 Share Posted January 17, 2006 hi Adam, I'm guessing there may be dust somewhere in the camera - on the lens, inside the lens, or on the sensor. Can you do a thorough cleaning and see if the spots go away? BTW, your dorm room looks EXACTLY like my freshman dorm (Carman Hall) when I went to Columbia U in NYC. Oh, the fond memories... Jennifer Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
adam3 Posted January 17, 2006 Author Share Posted January 17, 2006 Thanks all for your help. My pictures at home don't usually show it as much for some reason, just maybe a couple small circles off to the side. Interestingly, though I couldn't see it earlier, I just now notice it in my first photos too w/ the camera. I've only had the camera since late this summer. I mostly use the flash, so it is hard to tell whether it only occurs with the flash, but I may have found a photo w/ no flash and the circles. <br /><br /> A couple more shots if you realllly wanted them. These two are interesting since the circles are clumped together:<br /> <a href="http://www.aerofive.com/examples/3.jpg">Example 3</a><br /> <a href="http://www.aerofive.com/examples/4.jpg">Example 4</a><br /><br /> But more importantly, the shot that doesn't look like I used a flash (circles on the edge of the left drawer under the bottom bed).<br /> <a href="http://www.aerofive.com/examples/5.jpg">Example 5 w/o flash</a><br /><br /> And yes this is my dorm, I'm a freshman at Grove City College... Maybe I should send the camera in? I don't know how to tell if it is dust, but the front element doesn't look dirty. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
briany Posted January 17, 2006 Share Posted January 17, 2006 Adam, given that the spots move from one picture to the other (please double check that this is the case), I would guess it isn't dust in the camera or on the lens. It looks like you used flash. As Steve showed, small points (such as raindrops or snow flakes) can reflect flash, and the more out of focus they are, the larger the circle they make. It is Not a function of a poor lens -- it's simple optics and would happen with any lens. However, bigger lenses, such as those used on DSLRs, have much less depth of field than point-and-shoot digitals, so little specks like dust near the camera get completely blurred out. My guess is that you're using a point-and-shoot camera with flash and b/c of the extremely large depth of field, they show up in the shot. There's not much solution for this, unfortunately -- vacuum more, don't use flash, or shoot your 300D, which has much less depth of field. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mark u Posted January 17, 2006 Share Posted January 17, 2006 GO here: http://www.vanwalree.com/optics/dof.html Find the word "ghosts" on the page (it's a long way down), and read what follows. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
adam3 Posted January 17, 2006 Author Share Posted January 17, 2006 Thanks, that makes me a little more relieved that I don't have to send my camera in, however annoying it is. I can deal with it. I'm still a bit puzzled as to how example #5 shows up with ghosts... I'll try to use my 300D as much as possible. It's weird, I never realized how many little (and sometimes big) differences there are between digicams (at least mine) and dslrs aside from image quality. I appreciate my 300D more than I ever realized (my 300D was my first digital camera and I was surprised at first to find it wasn't tack-sharp). I really appreciate all of your help! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phule Posted January 17, 2006 Share Posted January 17, 2006 Stephen H, Steven Wolfe and Jennifer Valencia are incorrect, but that's been established by Brian, David S, and Mark U. For more info see a couple hundred other photo.net threads on "orbs" or "spots" and "digital" in a photo.net search. As for your image #5, your camera did fire the flash. The first obvious clue is in the EXIF data of the image file where is says: Flash: Fired(Auto) The other clues are: The shadow line below the dark pillow, the shadow from the jacket hanging on the bed, the bright reflections from the lamp, the bright reflection from book bag on top of the bed, the small reflection from the poster, and lastly, the shadow of the door/closet frame on the right-side of the image. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
david_s5 Posted January 17, 2006 Share Posted January 17, 2006 The Exif information embedded in Example 5 indicates that the flash did indeed fire when you took that picture last November. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
adam3 Posted January 17, 2006 Author Share Posted January 17, 2006 I know people often get frustrated when members don't search, but I assure I did as many places as best as I knew how (I didn't come up with the word "orb", but searching for variations of "spots" or "discs" or "circles" didn't come up with anything for me). I guess having a flash fired answers my last question then. I didn't know it was fired because I don't know how to view exif info. I'll have to look that one up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phule Posted January 17, 2006 Share Posted January 17, 2006 << but searching for variations of "spots" or "discs" or "circles" didn't come up with anything for me). >> In many ways, learning how to search is more important than the search itself. In this case, "spots" is such a big category (that could cover both film and digital in dozens of different areas) that limiting your search to "spots digital" (without the quotes) returns good info in link #2 and which could give you a basis for deeper searching. You knew to post the question in the digital camera forum, so you were on the right track. If you had applied that idea to your search, you would have had better luck in finding those old threads. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ed_littleton Posted January 17, 2006 Share Posted January 17, 2006 Adam, Thanks for the post and the many answers it generated. I'd just bought my wife a new P&S camera for Xmas and she took the grandkids to a dark climbing gym for a climbing photo shoot. Maybe now she'll understand that it isn't a lousy camera and it wasn't her fault either for all the UFOs. Horrors, guess I'll have to loan her the 20D next time!<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rjacksonphoto Posted January 18, 2006 Share Posted January 18, 2006 Man, those are orbs. I hate to say this, but your dorm room is haunted. You should get out now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yankfan Posted January 18, 2006 Share Posted January 18, 2006 Under the right set of circumstances this would be a hell of an effect. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
texastea Posted January 19, 2006 Share Posted January 19, 2006 those are dust particals in front of the camera flashing back from the flash. try to take two picts of the same scene, one with flash and one with a pice of paper over the flash...you will see a differance. if your camera has a manule adjustment for your camera...try to adjust your flash with a slow flash or rear flash to rid the problem of "orbs" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
christine_b Posted August 16, 2006 Share Posted August 16, 2006 Some people claim these are orbs (ghost things) but they can just be dust. I saw a thing on tv where sceptics proved that the "orbs" could very well be dust particals in the air. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaime_hartman Posted April 11, 2008 Share Posted April 11, 2008 Adam, I honestly do not think that they are dust circles because I have been taking pictures quite a bit and I didn't experiance those type of circles until my grandmother had past away on March 28th 2008 since then I have had those circles in my house. I would take a picture of the same thing 3 times and they would move. Some of them were darker then others. I am one to believe in ghosts and phinominon. I don't get them outside they are constintly inside my house. I would go to someone elses house to take a picture and they would not appear. Then I would bring their camera's over to my house and they would appear on their camera's.I guess it all depends on what you believe. Jaime Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phule Posted April 11, 2008 Share Posted April 11, 2008 [[i guess it all depends on what you believe.]] No, it doesn't. It all depends on understanding optics and physics. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
julie_densmore Posted June 1, 2008 Share Posted June 1, 2008 Hello. Can anyone help me with my pics? Several have a purple light (alomost looks like a flashlifht shape?) with 2 purple orbs underneath it. This is not in every picture I took, but it doesnt look anything like these dust spec orbs Ive seen in other pics? any ideas? I was using a Kodak digital camera.<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
julie_densmore Posted June 1, 2008 Share Posted June 1, 2008 Here is another example Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phule Posted June 2, 2008 Share Posted June 2, 2008 Julie, That is called lens flare. You can search here for other threads. It's caused by aiming the lens into the sun. One solution, depending on the angle of the sun to your lens, is to use a lens hood. Otherwise, change your composition or shade your lens with a hat or hand. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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