topic Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED in EOS DSLR & Mirrorless Cameras

5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

beccacrawford — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 12:39:15 GMT

Hi! Ever since I started tethering my camera to my laptop for some photoshoots, when it isn't tethered, the screen on the back of the camera doesn't turn on / work, meaning I can't take any photos. It is just black. It doesn't always do this, but I am nervous that when I most need it to work (i.e. weddings etc), the screen just won't turn on / the shutter button is blocked.

Has this happened to anyone? I feel like it must be an issue with where the cable is inserted in my camera, should I just have it serviced...? Thank you 🙂

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

jrhoffman75 — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 13:09:53 GMT

Try resetting the camera.

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

beccacrawford — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 13:52:27 GMT

@jrhoffman75 wrote:
Try resetting the camera.

how do you reset it...? 🙂

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

beccacrawford — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 13:56:03 GMT

I can't even use the menu button on the camera..screen is totally dead..is there another way to reset?

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

jrhoffman75 — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 14:03:13 GMT

I can't help with that. Maybe a Mark III user will chime in.

Try removing battery and switching camera on. Then reinstall battery.

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

beccacrawford — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 15:00:34 GMT

thank you 🙂

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

jrhoffman75 — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 15:43:53 GMT

You could also give Canon a call at 1-800-OK-CANON.

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

RobertTheFat — Sat, 09 Jul 2016 13:41:40 GMT

@beccacrawford wrote:
I can't even use the menu button on the camera..screen is totally dead..is there another way to reset?

Unless there's something wrong with the camera, you must have blundered onto a setting that leaves the screen turned off after you disconnect. If you re-tether the camera, can you see it again via EOS Utility? (The way you described the symptoms suggests that you can.) You may at least be able to do a reset via the computer; if you're really lucky, you might be able to find the offending setting and change only that.

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

Waddizzle — Sun, 10 Jul 2016 14:57:35 GMT

@RobertTheFat wrote:
@beccacrawford wrote:
I can't even use the menu button on the camera..screen is totally dead..is there another way to reset?
Unless there's something wrong with the camera, you must have blundered onto a setting that leaves the screen turned off after you disconnect. If you re-tether the camera, can you see it again via EOS Utility? (The way you described the symptoms suggests that you can.) You may at least be able to do a reset via the computer; if you're really lucky, you might be able to find the offending setting and change only that.

I agree with Bob. I think it is more likely something you're doing, too. It is possible that it is not a setting, just circumstances.

When you untether the camera from the computer, do you turn off the camera before you disconnect? Many people do not think one needs to power down USB devices before disconnecting from a PC, but I do not. Don't just simply pull the plug, if that is what you're doing.

When you disconnect the camera, make sure that you reverse the steps you took to tether it. This means switching the EOS Utility out of tethered mode, so that the camera can disconnect from the live shooting mode. Be sure to turn off the camera before disconnecting, and waiting for the EOS Utility to shut down before unplugging the USB cable.

Hope this helps.

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

Buffdog — Thu, 14 Jul 2016 20:07:28 GMT

Try switching to auto mode and see if the menu pops up mine had the same problem

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

JonKline — Mon, 18 Jul 2016 20:03:35 GMT

Turn the power off. Take the memory card(s) out, take the battery out. Put the battery back in. Turn the camera on. Sometimes you can have issues when the boot flag is set on a memory card.

Are you using the HDMI port?

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

drjiimbarr — Sat, 11 Nov 2017 04:08:34 GMT

This worked. I spent all day trying to figure this out via manual, canon site and other blogs. This last comment was the finishing word. All of the other suggestions were valid and I did use them to troubleshoot the problem A Thanks for your comment Buffdog or JonKline

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

ClivePhoto — Fri, 01 Mar 2019 07:55:12 GMT

Well colour me shocked, the interwebs can be useful! My 5D III did this to me for no reason at all yesterday and I thought I tried everything. I guessed the camera was confused about something because metering and AF worked but not the back screen & the shutter wouldn't fire. New battery, card in and out & it would come back for a while then it was all the same after it was switched off.

Obviously I had not taken battery and card out and replaced battery before card which (fingrers crossed for the long term) seems to have done the trick. Many thanks.

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

ClivePhoto — Fri, 01 Mar 2019 07:55:39 GMT

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

FrostyOfTheNort — Thu, 14 Mar 2019 18:17:45 GMT

I'm having the same issue with a 5D Mark III:

- at a shoot the LCD screen went dark.

- I popped battery and memory card but that didn't solve the problem.

- I've tried different batteries and memory cards. No luck.

- I've tried with no memory card inserted. No luck.

- When I power off the camera, the "sensor cleaning" message appears just fine.

- Occasionally the screen comes back when I fidget with the memory card access door.

- The memory card door snaps into place as expected. It's not loose at all.

Any ideas before I send it to CPS?

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

ClivePhoto — Thu, 14 Mar 2019 18:51:04 GMT

That sounds very much like the symptoms I was experiencing except I didn't get anything from the screen at all. When the sensor cleaning message came up the shutter fired and the screen worked. Then it wouldn't next time I switched it on.

I thought I'd tried everything but you need to take out the battery and the card then replace the battery before putting the card back exactly as JonKline said above. This seems to reset the camera and so far all has been well for the last couple of weeks.

I checked the switch on the card door as I thought that might be the problem but if it were then there would have been no life at all in the camera. What was weird was the metering and AF worked but the screen and shutter release wouldn't.

Hope this does the trick for you.

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

FrostyOfTheNort — Thu, 14 Mar 2019 18:50:29 GMT

Based on what I read here, I thought maybe the card door switch might be the problem, but nothing there is loose. I'm going to try replacing the clock battery and updating firmware (now that the screen seems to be back), and go from there.

It's an odd scenario that I haven't run into before!

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

ClivePhoto — Thu, 14 Mar 2019 18:53:52 GMT

Out posts must have crossed. It seems to be important to remove the battery and card then replace them in the right order. I had removed battery and card, put in new battery, different card but when I followed the sequence exactly as given by JonKline above all worked fine and has continued to do so.

Can't do any harm to replace the clock battery and you should always keep your firmware up do date so it would do no harm to check that and update if necessary. Good luck.

Re: 5D Mark III Screen Will Not Turn On / Work when NOT TETHERED

FrostyOfTheNort — Thu, 14 Mar 2019 18:58:14 GMT

Thanks. I did follow that sequence before I posted here.

I'm just heading out to buy the replacement battery and will post back on what the result is.

Thanks.