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Indoor pictures intermittently dark

annhackler
Contributor

I have a T6i that is just over a year old.  I shoot inside in normal room light often, using the auto setting.  Recently the shots are intermittently dark and the level of darkness varies.  Sometimes you can barely tell there is any image, other times you can make it out.   When it starts happening, there will be maybe three dark shots in a row then all of a sudden a perfectly lit shot.

 

 

1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION


@annhackler wrote:

The problem only happens inside. And it only happens when the flash is supposed to be working--to compensate I have been shooting either in "sports" or with the "flash off" setting inside. Diver hank suggested that the problem might be that I had moved the ISO to a fixed setting from auto and he is right, I did do that. I've moved the ISO back to auto, so I'll see if that solves the problem.  But I more often than not shoot in Intelligent Scene Auto--so there is no option on the ISO---and the problem remains.  It seems that about every third shot is dark.


As others have suggested, there is a high possibility that you are under the flickering effect of the LED lights.  Luckily the T6i has the "Anti-Flickering" option so you should activate that.  While there is no guarantee that it will fix the problem, it will 1. lessen it and 2. it will tell you that there's a flickering problem (FLICKER! is shown on the viewfinder).

 

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Diverhank's photos on Flickr

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17 REPLIES 17

diverhank
Authority

Wow...there is not enough data in your description to do more than hazarding a guess but I'll do it anyways.  Since you described that everything used to work fine and now sometimes the pictures are too dark and sometimes perfect and your flash is also acting up...like buzzing and flashing in burst...

 

What mode are you shooting with?  Is it the green square or P when you mentioned Auto?

 

My wild guess would be that somehow you have inadvertently set your ISO from Auto to a fixed setting.  The camera sets itself to the correct lighting conditions by varying 3 things: speed, aperture and ISO.  With Auto ISO, the camera will auto adjust to the varying conditions using all 3 things and for something modern like a T6i, it can handle most of the lighting conditions.  If you set the ISO to a fixed value...the auto mode can only adjust 2 things: the speed and aperture to a certain values and the camera would literally runs out of light without being able to vary the ISO.  That might explain why sometimes your pictures are too dark and then OK (depending on available light).  When the camera runs out of light. one problem would be trying to focus by using the flash as the focus assist...

 

First thing you should check is to see the ISO is not set to Auto.  As I said, this is a wild guess.

 

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Diverhank's photos on Flickr

It sounds like flickering indoor lighting to me.  The flicker is normal, and too fast for the human eye to see.

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"The right mouse button is your friend."

I think either:

 

1.). Wadizzle is right and you have flickering fluorescent lights fooling the cameras meter, or

 

2.). Your well lit shots are with flash and the dark ones were taken without the flash firing, before the flash could charge or recharge up. 

 

Does it it happen outside in sunlight or only indoors?  Does it happen indoors in other places with different lights or just in the one house?

Scott

Canon 5d mk 4, Canon 6D, EF 70-200mm L f/2.8 IS mk2; EF 16-35 f/2.8 L mk. III; Sigma 35mm f/1.4 "Art" EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro; EF 85mm f/1.8; EF 1.4x extender mk. 3; EF 24-105 f/4 L; EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS; 3x Phottix Mitros+ speedlites

Why do so many people say "FER-tographer"? Do they take "fertographs"?

The problem only happens inside. And it only happens when the flash is supposed to be working--to compensate I have been shooting either in "sports" or with the "flash off" setting inside. Diver hank suggested that the problem might be that I had moved the ISO to a fixed setting from auto and he is right, I did do that. I've moved the ISO back to auto, so I'll see if that solves the problem.  But I more often than not shoot in Intelligent Scene Auto--so there is no option on the ISO---and the problem remains.  It seems that about every third shot is dark.


@annhackler wrote:

The problem only happens inside. And it only happens when the flash is supposed to be working--to compensate I have been shooting either in "sports" or with the "flash off" setting inside. Diver hank suggested that the problem might be that I had moved the ISO to a fixed setting from auto and he is right, I did do that. I've moved the ISO back to auto, so I'll see if that solves the problem.  But I more often than not shoot in Intelligent Scene Auto--so there is no option on the ISO---and the problem remains.  It seems that about every third shot is dark.


As others have suggested, there is a high possibility that you are under the flickering effect of the LED lights.  Luckily the T6i has the "Anti-Flickering" option so you should activate that.  While there is no guarantee that it will fix the problem, it will 1. lessen it and 2. it will tell you that there's a flickering problem (FLICKER! is shown on the viewfinder).

 

Capture.JPG

================================================
Diverhank's photos on Flickr

Thanks so much for trying to help me with this issue. I do have a T6i but unless I am missing something it doesn't have the anti-flicker shoot feature. On my menu I have one camera icon, one view finder icon, two right pointing arrow icons and 3 wrench icons (if that helps).


@annhackler wrote:
Thanks so much for trying to help me with this issue. I do have a T6i but unless I am missing something it doesn't have the anti-flicker shoot feature. On my menu I have one camera icon, one view finder icon, two right pointing arrow icons and 3 wrench icons (if that helps).
What I had shown came straight out of the T6i manual page 144.  The Flicker detection is from page 63.



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Diverhank's photos on Flickr

I just realized that I was looking at the menu when it was in the Scene Intelligent Auto setting which is why the other two menu pages were gone.  Sorry about that.  I enabled the anti-flicker mode and so far so good.  Thanks so much!

I just wanted to report that enabling the" anti-flicker" feature helped only for a short time.  I am back this summer with the same problem.  I think I'll just give in and get an external flash.  Will report back if that fully solves the issue.  Thanks to all for trying to help. 

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