XA11 Video blown out in sunshine, OK in darkness

[bradwrake]

I shoot video with a Canon XA11 camcorder, and I started having issues last week with the auto exposure. I can shoot fine in darker spaces with minimal lighting, but when I take the camera outside in sunshine, it no longer adjusts for brightness and the video is blown out. I can sometimes hear the camera clicking and see the video jumping on the LCD screen as if it's trying to close or open the iris. Manually adjusting the AGC has minimal effect. I reset the camera back to factory settings, but still have the same issue. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. 

[Hazel_T]

Hi bradwrake,

I'm sorry to hear your camera is having issues automatically adjusting exposure settings in sunlight. To trouble shoot this we would need a little bit more information. What auto mode is the camera in, and does the same thing happen in all of the auto modes? Are any error messages showing on the camera, and if there is an error message what does it say word for word? If you have the camera in manual exposure are you able to adjust the settings to get an even exposure?

[bradwrake]

Thanks for your response. The camera mode is in Manual, but I have the same issue if I flip it to Auto or Cinema. There are no error messages. If I manually close the aperture to F8, and increase the shutter speed I can generally get a more even exposure and a decent image, but just closing the aperture by itself doesn't seem to do enough, and higher shutter speeds are not ideal. I consulted over the phone a camera repair company that works on Canon camcorders, and they said it sounds like the aperture is stuck, or there's an internal connection malfunctioning. They said the worst case scenario would be a total lens replacement. Any thoughts?