Brand new D5100 FAULTY

Mark-Anthony

Mark-Anthony

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Absolutely gutted!

I bought a Nikon D5100 through here off mini0ne the other day. It is brand new off WEX. mini0ne (duncan) bought it on 11.3.2013. and for some reason didn't like it so sold it me. It's not been registered which i'm guessing is a good thing.

Basically, when i take a pic in manual mode with my speedlight the bottom half of the pic is pitch black. when i use the standard flash is improves but not very well. I pm'd mini0ne this evening and he said it could be a memory card fault. I've tried all 4 of my sd cards and it's still doing it. I even tried it without my memory card and yet again i still get the black on the pic. At first i thought it was my speedlight so used my sync cord to see if it helped but still the same result. I then changed my lenses and still the same result. I've just emailed wex asking for an exchange as I have the receipt here and it's originally 9 days old (I received it on 19.3.13)

heres some sample pics...fingers crossed I get an exchange

DSC_0010_zps55309fba.jpg


DSC_0097_zpsd61a7bf4.jpg
 
Looks like the shutter speed is too fast, for the flash sync speed. Try slowing to around 1/100 and try again.
 
That was on 1/80 and f5

I've typed it into google and apparently it's a common fault with the mirror lock up mechanism failing.
 
OK, how about NO FLASH and reasonable exposure at let's say 1/1000s?

When you take the lens off, and take a longer exposure, does everything look right? ie. the mirror moving fully out and shutter raising full out.
 
I've just opened the lens cap on the body and checked. mirror is releasing fine. It's really baffling me. this is my fourth nikon dslr and I've never had any trouble
 
Does your speedlite have a ttl setting? How about F4 and 160/sec?


Heather
 
That is about totally black images.

Yours looks like shutter sync. How is it at F8 160th and 200th sec?


Heather
 
Last edited:
Hi Heather. I reset the camera again and found that it's the shutter speed and my speedlight clashing. On settings like 1/500 f/4 it does it but on 1/250 it's fine. Anything higher than 1/250 it does it.
 
Little_duke said:
Hi Heather. I reset the camera again and found that it's the shutter speed and my speedlight clashing. On settings like 1/500 f/4 it does it but on 1/250 it's fine. Anything higher than 1/250 it does it.
Click to expand...

Th flash sync speed of the D5100 is 1/200 of a second, so you cannot use flash with shutter speeds faster than this or else you'll get photos that are only half illuminated as in the original post.
 
I'm guessing the sync speed is 1/250th then?
 
Little_duke said:
Hi Heather. I reset the camera again and found that it's the shutter speed and my speedlight clashing. On settings like 1/500 f/4 it does it but on 1/250 it's fine. Anything higher than 1/250 it does it.
Click to expand...

Which is what you'd expect as 1/250 (maybe only 1/200) is the highest speed on this camera where the sensor is completely exposed at once. At higher shutter speeds the rear curtain starts moving before the front curtain has travelled the full distance, hence the black band in your images.

What is the speed light that you're using? I ask because whenever I have a Nikon speedlight attached then I can't set a shutter speed higher than the maximum flash sync speed unless I use the high speed sync option, which effectively strobes the flash to avoid the banding.
 
Last edited:
Little_duke said:
Hi Heather. I reset the camera again and found that it's the shutter speed and my speedlight clashing. On settings like 1/500 f/4 it does it but on 1/250 it's fine. Anything higher than 1/250 it does it.
Click to expand...

This is how the D5100 works, yo will get the black out at 1/250 and faster.
Max shutter sync speed 1/200 with flash
 
Little_duke said:
Hi Heather. I reset the camera again and found that it's the shutter speed and my speedlight clashing. On settings like 1/500 f/4 it does it but on 1/250 it's fine. Anything higher than 1/250 it does it.
Click to expand...

That's great Mark. :thumbs:

My D90 does the same. Just set the shutter speed to 160th or 200th and you will be fine.

User error then! :lol:

Heather
 
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