Accidental Lens Release

[michaelgirman]

  My 24-105L just fell off my 5D mkIII and rolled into the Seine.  The lens release button is way too sensitive and it is so easy to accidentally unlock without realizing it.  I went to twist the zoom ring and the lens rotated and dropped off.  Blogs are full of compaints of this occurance on mkii's.  

  This is definitely a design flaw.  It's not user error.  The button should be relocated or made to require more force to release  or have a detent position.  

  It's a shame that you have to gaffer tape a $2300 lens to a $2000 camera.  Be forewarned.  

[Edward]

Have only 3 cameras and 6 Canon lenses so the sample size is statiscally too small to have a valid result.

Spend an average of 90 days in the field a year and had happened particular with a long telephoto on a tripod when rotating from landscape to portrait or viceversa.   As I said before; wait until it happens to you and the statistics will not prevent it.

[Waddizzle]

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@Edward wrote:

Have only 3 cameras and 6 Canon lenses so the sample size is statiscally too small to have a valid result.

Spend an average of 90 days in the field a year and had happened particular with a long telephoto on a tripod when rotating from landscape to portrait or viceversa.   As I said before; wait until it happens to you and the statistics will not prevent it.

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I already posted earlier in this thread about the identical thing happening to me.  I had a large telephoto mounted by its' foot on a tripod.  When I went to rotate the lens to portrait, I wound up twisting the camera body right off the lens.  Imagine my surprise.

Instead of blaming the camera gear, which had never even occurred to me, I quickly realized that when I gripped the camera body with two hands to rotate the body, my finger must have hit the release button.  As I've said before, all it takes is a moment of inattentiveness, getting caught up in the flow, for an accident to happen.

[Edward]

When I rotate the lens I hold the tripod by the attachment point with the left hand and shift by rotating the camera body with the right hand...there is nothing touching the lens release button. Even if accidentally touched, the lens release should be more receded and with a stronger spring.  

While  speaking about accidental relases, I  also had issues with a converter untintentionaly releases between the lens and the converter. At  times the pins does slides out.  

[Ron2]

Type into Google accidental lens release don’t mention a make of camera and Cannon dominate the page mostly with the D5, more than one forum, its called the dreaded accidental lens release. Cannon successfully dominate this listing

[Edward]

Great info...is Canon paying attention?

[Waddizzle]

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@Edward wrote:

When I rotate the lens I hold the tripod by the attachment point with the left hand and shift by rotating the camera body with the right hand...there is nothing touching the lens release button. Even if accidentally touched, the lens release should be more receded and with a stronger spring.  

While  speaking about accidental relases, I  also had issues with a converter untintentionaly releases between the lens and the converter. At  times the pins does slides out.  

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If you need to hold your tripod to rotate the camera body, then you probably need a more robust tripod.  Most definitely so, IMHO.  

Frankly speaking, I could care less what a Google search might turn up.  There is only one certainty.  The lens is not going to release, rotate out of the mount, and drop to the ground all by itself.  PERIOD.  

I will give you the same advice that I posted yesterday, or other day before.  If you assume that the problem is entirely your own fault, then you will most likely no longer from dripped lenses.  As long you as you assume that there is some manufacturing defect, then only more dropped gear is in your future.  

In my decades of experience, I have learned it is human nature to reject that which we do not understand.

[Edward]

Noted...

[Ron2]

I will say it again too, This is not about you or me. This is about an issue with the camera. It is for Cannon. It did not happen before it is happening now on the 5D mark 3 and will affect many more people

[RobertTheFat]

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@Ron2 wrote:
I will say it again too, This is not about you or me. This is about an issue with the camera. It is for Cannon. It did not happen before it is happening now on the 5D mark 3 and will affect many more people

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You can say it until you wear out your keyboard, but the fact remains that it's easy enough to hold the camera/lens combination in such a manner that the zoom and focus rings are readily accessible but the lens release button isn't. (It's not the way the book tells you to hold it, but that's beside the point.) And if you don't touch the release button, it makes no difference how easy it is to push.

BTW, here's another point I haven't seen anyone mention: the harder you have to push a spring. the more likely the spring is to break.

[John_SD]

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@Ron2 wrote:
I will say it again too, This is not about you or me. This is about an issue with the camera. It is for Cannon. It did not happen before it is happening now on the 5D mark 3 and will affect many more people

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You keep harping on the notion that you have discovered some sort of "design flaw" with the 5D. 

Look, a false statement doesn't become true, no matter how many times you say it. There is no design flaw. It took me all of about 5 minutes on the web to find an exploded view of the 5D lens locking mechanism and confirm what I suspected. Without getting into the physics of the matter, there is a spring and pin assembly behind the lens release button. Like any phyical part, they can weaken or wear out over time. If the spring has weakened, become broken or comprimised in some fashion, it could leave the pin in an unlocked state, or partially unlocked. 

The solution? Get it repaired and stop the nonsense about a nonexistent "design flaw."