Comments on: Canon 400D details

By: paradicephotography.com

paradicephotography.com — Mon, 19 May 2008 12:40:02 +0000

Yeah, it’s UTTER crap – total waste of time and when I tried to take it back, the shop were having none of it – the guy even took some shots with it and said it was fine – I told him he was an absolute moron in that case and told him to flick the settings so he could see the histogram – he shut up a bit when he saw how skewed it was to the left, but still wouldn’t take it back.

Just bought myself a 5D, although I was tempted to change to Nikon (I would’ve done if I didn’t have a few L-series lenses). Using the 5D has made me realise just how unbelieveably crap the metering on the 400D was. As for it being an entry-level camera and the underexposure being a safety feature – that’s absolute RUBBISH. It’s an SLR – if it can’t behave like one, then what on earth is the point?? If people want snappy cameras, let them buy snappy cameras – if you buy an SLR, you want decent metering. I had to “overexpose” 2/3 of a stop in nearly every picture I ever took and as for the claim that it supports E-TTL, well that’s completely laughable – I had to manually set the power on my 580EX Speedlight constantly – the auto settings are TERRIBLE.

Avoid this camera – get the Nikon if you haven’t got any investment in lenses – from what I’ve seen, it’s MUCH better. I have NO idea why on earth all the photo magazines gave this camera such high ratings – I heard that Canon sent out a load of “special” ones when they were being previewed and reviewed – don’t know how true that is but, if it is, it’s a complete joke!! Apparently you CAN send them back to Canon to get them reconfigured but why on earth should you have to??

I’ve had nothing but problems with this piece of crap and, despite the “entry-level” price tag, it’s still a fair bit of cash to be spending on a piece of rubbish!

By: Elizabeth

Elizabeth — Sun, 16 Mar 2008 13:45:16 +0000

I’m considering purchasing the 400d, but now i’m extremely worried.
Are there really huge underexposure problems? i havent heard this anywhere else
im a novice, will the problem affect me, or is it only an issue for professionals?

By: Kearsley

Kearsley — Mon, 21 Jan 2008 16:06:02 +0000

I’ve just had the underexposure problem on a two month old 400D – some images are completely black – with the added problem that the flash had stopped working in automatic mode in any light conditions. The retailer agreed it was a manufacurers problem so exchanged the kit for a new one. No problems so far with the new kit but I’ll keep an eye on this thread.

By: Rod Puckey

Rod Puckey — Sun, 19 Aug 2007 15:11:58 +0000

I have just got back from a 6 hour photo session with my new400D and can only say that I wish that I had found this site before I made the purchase.

I haveonly been taking SLR photos for about 19 years, digital for about 7 years, DSLR for about 3 years and find that the exposure on the version of the Canon 400D that I have is so unpredictable that it will be going back on Monday. I cannot batch process the results of today to get something viewable to start with, I am having to edit each one and each one, even on continuous shooting is different.

Is this typical or have I rogue camera?

By: paradicephotography.com

paradicephotography.com — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 04:39:02 +0000

Granted, I can understand – it’s a novice camera and I understand underexposing it SLIGHTLY to stop blowing out highlights, but 1 stop???????? Totally unnecessary and it’s a total pain!

By: Donncha O Caoimh

Donncha O Caoimh — Wed, 21 Mar 2007 07:56:27 +0000

My brother has a 400D and it's fine. Read this post which explains some of the reasons why you might think it has an exposure problem.

By: pocura

pocura — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 10:53:51 +0000

There is a major metering problem with the CANON 400D. The photographs are very dark and underexposed. My 400D camera is virtually unuseable. The problem is widespread and Canon are not interested in resolving it. In my experience Canon customer service is useless and so is the camera. NIKON have just gained a new customer.

By: paradicephotography.com

paradicephotography.com — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 22:10:15 +0000

This camera DOES have a metering problem – there is ABSOLUTELY no doubt about that – you have to push it by about 2/3 – 1 stop to get the correct exposure and it’s a pain in the ass.

If it is an intermittent problem, then a hell of a lot of people have it!

By: Donncha

Donncha — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 08:20:38 +0000

Subho – there’s nothing wrong with the metering on the 400D, it has to be either the specific camera you have or some setting on the camera is wrong because I’ve used it and it works as well as any other Canon camera!

By: Subho

Subho — Wed, 29 Nov 2006 23:28:10 +0000

Hi
I bought one and very disappointed. Most of my photo’s are coming dark. Basically the changed the metering and the pictures are underexposed. It also lost its sharpness.

I am looking someone to sell it.