Broken 450d

L-M

How do, my brother was using my camera and dropped it. The piece i the below image fell out when i took the lens off it.

Now, it won't take anything with the lens that it fell with, but if i put i another lens it takes the photo perfectly, just looking through the eye piece is constantly blurrly.

Does anyone know am i better off just buying a new camera?

i was looking at the 1100d and the 600d, would i notice much of a difference between the 450d and the 1100d quality wise?

Thanks

hbr

Limerick man wrote: »

How do, my brother was using my camera and dropped it. The piece i the below image fell out when i took the lens off it.

That looks like a contact strip from inside a zoom lens! It is difficult to imagine
a way for it to escape from the lens unless it was completely dismantled?

if i put i another lens it takes the photo perfectly, just looking through the eye piece is constantly blurrly.

The 450D has two completely separate focusing systems. Try using Live View
for focusing. If you find that the Live View looks clear and focuses accurately,
the problem is probably in the mirror, focus-screen or AF sensor.

A large stray component inside the camera mirror box could easily
have dislodged the mirror or focus-screen.

Does anyone know am i better off just buying a new camera?

Possibly. If it is just something knocked out of alignment, it could be a
simple and cheap repair. If anything is broken, a repair is probably not
worthwhile. Forum member zerohamster does repairs if you want
someone to have a look at it.

i was looking at the 1100d and the 600d, would i notice much of a difference between the 450d and the 1100d quality wise?

I don't think you would see much difference in image quality. Both have
12MP APS-C sensors. I would suggest that you consider a 5xxD instead.
The rear LCD on the 500D and 550D is a big improvement over the lower
resolution screen on the 450D and 1100D. The 550D is probably the best
camera in terms of price/performance. It is based on the same 18MP
sensor as the 600D, 60D and 7D. It has a few improvements over the
500D that are probably worth having. For example: it has an external
microphone socket for recording video.

zerohamster

The piece that fell out is from the kit lens and is part of the zoom brush. If that broke off I imagine there is probably more damaged inside the lens to have affected something right in the middle of the lens (the camera obviously dropped lens first right? that means the lens probably saved the camera from being trashed).

If that part is the only part damaged in the lens then it is also pretty cheap to replace as the part that broke off only lightly contacts the zoom contact strip and changes the diaphragm slightly as you zoom so wouldnt have taken much with it damage wise (provided it wasn't damaged by the zoom barrell breaking.


Basically in your camera the mechanism that allows for diopter adjustment has a little catch that connects to a ramped piece (the little dioptre wheel) so that when you turn the dioptre wheel the viewfinder optic moves back or forward. If the images taken with other lenses are sharp and in focus then that little catch has broken off effectively meaning that the camera is stuck at one extreme end of the dioptre adjustment scale (it is spring loaded so that it returns when the wheel is rotated the opposite way).

If that is the fault then it is definitely worth repairing rather than getting a new camera as funtionally the camera is pretty fine.

PM me for more details or if you are interested in repair.

zerohamster

hbr wrote: »

That looks like a contact strip from inside a zoom lens! It is difficult to imagine
a way for it to escape from the lens unless it was completely dismantled?

The 18-55mm kit lens has a pretty open space inside that would be enough for that part (about 2cm long) to fall out the back of the lens when taken off the body.

hbr wrote: »

The 450D has two completely separate focusing systems. Try using Live View
for focusing. If you find that the Live View looks clear and focuses accurately,
the problem is probably in the mirror, focus-screen or AF sensor.

From what he said about the images being ok with another lens except for the viewfinder being blurry points toward the diopter rather than other parts as this is the only part that could cause such a visual effect whilst not affecting the AF (mirror angle would affect normal AF as the sub mirror would direct light in the wrong direction to the AF sensor).

Live view AF is contrast based off the sensor so that would only mess up if the sensor and/or mount were not parallel.

If you ever hear of a camera behaving like this is will 99% be the diopter and as such is a relatively small fault thankfully.