Testing the E10 - a favor, please.

[gregg69776]

This thread addresses the isssue I just brought up again. My "new"? exchange camera has the problem of inconsistent or incorrect distance readouts when focusing manually versus automatically. You said it better. But before I go on and start using this camera, I'd like to know if anyone can fill me in on what to do depending on what I find as far as how bad the problem is. If there really is a problem. Phew. Too much beer last night. Thanks.
Gregg Kuljian

If you have the E10 or E20 I would appreciate if you could do the
following test and email me the results at .

Reason for the test - ongoing discussion with Olympus about manual
focus.

Test:
1. Set up test chart (piece of 8.5x11 paper with one horizontal
black line and three vertical black lines which can be marker pen)
about 24" from camera that is mounted on tripod and illuminated
with any light that is bright enough to focus the chart. You do not
need to take any pictures.
2. Make sure your eye piece is set for the sharpest image with
your eyes. This is done by pointing the camera at a white piece of
paper and turning the diopter adjustment until the black rectangle
and circle are as sharp as possible.
3. Set focal length to 36mm and lens opening to f2.4 (shutter
speed not material) and no filters.
4. Turn on camera and LCD and get distance scale.
5. Set focus to manual and adjust focus until you have the best
possible image in the viewfinder. Note distance on LCD scale.
6. Close the viewfinder blind, switch to auto focus, 1/2 press
shutter while watching the LCD distance scale.

Please report if ANY (little or lot) or NO movement of this scale.
Repeat several times and see if same thing happens and is consistent

Serial number and firmware number would be appreciated but not
neccessary.

Thanks for your help and I will report the results and reason if
enough data comes in.

Ed Oliver

 

[Ed Oliver]

This thread addresses the isssue I just brought up again. My "new"?
exchange camera has the problem of inconsistent or incorrect
distance readouts when focusing manually versus automatically. You
said it better. But before I go on and start using this camera, I'd
like to know if anyone can fill me in on what to do depending on
what I find as far as how bad the problem is. If there really is a
problem. Phew. Too much beer last night. Thanks.
Gregg Kuljian

First - make sure that the camera is not operating as it should. Take pictures in Manual and Auto (as suggested in the form) and print out so that you will know how great the problem is. If it is not right - don't send it back before you try this.

My suggestion, write
Felicia Scarola - Service mangaer
Two Corporate Center Drive
Melville, NY 11747 3157

Explain the problem and that the refurbished has the same problem, etc, etc. and that you would like a new camera that has been checked for this problem. Chances are you will get a call from her delegate and you go throught he whole thing again and again ask for a new camera that has been checked for this problem. From this point on I can not tell you what will happed, but after three tries I got a good one.

From what I and others have found is that there apparently is no fix. It works or not and not correctable at the service department. The parts they are always waiting for are new cameras (that supposedly have been checked).

Good Luck,

Ed O

 

[Aron Hsiao]

Hello, Ed.

At 24" (measured with a yardstick) I get perfect focus (no movement from manual to AF) so no problems here. But I should mention that my distance meter also correctly reads 2' so I hope you really meant 24" in your post...

I see someone mentioning that their distance meter shows 1.3' and that their manual and AF don't match (i.e. movement occurs)... But 1.3' is also less than 2' and if I move my camera to 18" or less (where my distance scale also shows just over 1.3') and repeat the test, I do get a jump when I switch to AF. I assume this is normal, as it seems to me that 1.3' is macro range.

Supporting this supposition is the fact that if I place the camera at 18" but switch to macro mode and repeat the test, I (once again) get no focus jump.

So I think all is normal on my unit. Could it be that for what you are doing you need to be using macro?

-Aron

 

[Aron Hsiao]

By the way (forgot to mention)

• S/N 1099250
• F/W 1.20

Also, my MF does not have this "range" that some are discussing... It is very clearly in focus at only one "moment" and out of focus the remainder of the time.

-Aron

 

[gregg69776]

Oh man, thank you. I will start inspecting my shots to see how this camera is working. But your info is invaluable. Thanks again.
Gregg

This thread addresses the isssue I just brought up again. My "new"?
exchange camera has the problem of inconsistent or incorrect
distance readouts when focusing manually versus automatically. You
said it better. But before I go on and start using this camera, I'd
like to know if anyone can fill me in on what to do depending on
what I find as far as how bad the problem is. If there really is a
problem. Phew. Too much beer last night. Thanks.
Gregg Kuljian

First - make sure that the camera is not operating as it should.
Take pictures in Manual and Auto (as suggested in the form) and
print out so that you will know how great the problem is. If it is
not right - don't send it back before you try this.

My suggestion, write
Felicia Scarola - Service mangaer
Two Corporate Center Drive
Melville, NY 11747 3157

Explain the problem and that the refurbished has the same problem,
etc, etc. and that you would like a new camera that has been
checked for this problem. Chances are you will get a call from
her delegate and you go throught he whole thing again and again ask
for a new camera that has been checked for this problem. From this
point on I can not tell you what will happed, but after three tries
I got a good one.

From what I and others have found is that there apparently is no
fix. It works or not and not correctable at the service
department. The parts they are always waiting for are new cameras
(that supposedly have been checked).

Good Luck,

Ed O

 

[Ed Oliver]

So I think all is normal on my unit. Could it be that for what you are doing you need to be using macro?

I guess I just assumed that all would know that anything less than 31" is close-up or "macro setting. Sorry if not explicit on that point.

Also, my MF does not have this "range" that some are discussing. It is very clearly in focus at only one "moment" and out of focus the remainder of the time.

And in my estimation there should be no "range". I have used SLR and other ground glass focusing cameras for many, many years and never have I found one that has a range of focus. Either in focus or out.

Thanks for the input.

Ed O

 

[gregg69776]

Ed,

I just did your test and found af read out at 2 ft right on. Manual focus yielded a readout of approx. 1.7 ft.
Gregg

So I think all is normal on my unit. Could it be that for what you are doing you need to be using macro?

I guess I just assumed that all would know that anything less than
31" is close-up or "macro setting. Sorry if not explicit on that
point.

Also, my MF does not have this "range" that some are discussing. It is very clearly in focus at only one "moment" and out of focus the remainder of the time.

And in my estimation there should be no "range". I have used SLR
and other ground glass focusing cameras for many, many years and
never have I found one that has a range of focus. Either in focus
or out.

Thanks for the input.

Ed O

 

[Michael Burgess68354]

Ed

As someone with a similar experience I thought I would add myself to your list of people that have had a confirmed problem with the manual focus of the E-10.

After living with the problem for the best part of a year I finally decided to do something about it before the warranty ran out and took a series of test shots. Although, having been deterred from doing so by the likes of Dr Gonzo I found it was relatively simple to obtain a series of consistent and reproducible results.

The results of one such test are posted below.

http://www.m200.com/focustest.htm

Both pictures were taken in macro mode using a manual exposure of f2.4 and 1/100 sec. The camera was mounted on a tripod and a cable release was used to avoid shake. The first picture was taken using manual focus and the second using auto focus. I should also perhaps add (or the usual suspects will bring it up) that the diopter was set correctly.

As you can see there was a discernible difference between the manual focus and the auto focus image. This was both consistent and repeatable. Although macro mode was used for these shots similar results were obtained in normal mode.

Armed with example prints I returned the camera to Olympus in London. Contrary to expectations they were both helpful and eager to resolve the problem. Unfortunately, after the camera had spent several weeks in Portugal, I was called and told that it had been returned with new firmware but with the focus problem unresolved. I was also told that there was no simple fix for the focus problem and that the camera would have to be replaced.

Two days later, after some negotiation and after they had tested three other cameras, I was offered a replacement that seemed to be in similar condition to my own.

Although since then and for various reasons I haven't used the camera as much as I would have liked I can confirm that the manual focus, although still not completely perfect, is very much better than the original.

My advice, therefore, to anyone with a similar problem is to ignore those who say it is just a matter of technique (it isn't) and return their camera to Olympus. At the very least a constant stream of returns will focus their minds (no pun intended) while designing the next model.

Regards

Michael

Hi All,

My thanks to Bart, Mark, Ferenc, Mike, Frank, Tommy, Sean, John,
Jimmy, Alashi, Alan and Blokey. You all contributed to the forum
in the spirit I hoped would happen.

To me it seems an absolute that cameras that can not pass this test
will have focus problems, mainly in that the manual focus does not
operate in the manner intended.

I will be trying to get the attention of Olympus (if anyone has an
address of someone in management that might listen would appreciate
the input) to explain our concerns and the fact that currently the
service department (in my case anyway) seems to not be able to
remedy the situation. As an aside, when I called Olympus service
1/25 I was informed that they had " a bunch" all waiting for the
same service but parts were on the way. 2/1 I was informed the
parts were in and my camera would be serviced 2/4 or 5 and when I
received it on 2/8 it was a "refurbished" (which was filthy with
fingerprints of the infrared port, LCD and smack in the middle of
the viewfinder eye piece) unit that had greater manual focus
problems than the original. As of this time I have not received
the promised NEW camera, but I still have hopes.

Again, thanks to all. I will monitor this forum for a few days to
see if any new posts.

Ed Oliver

 

[Russ Yost]

I haaven't used your test, Ed, but have used comparison of MF and AF images of resolution test charts and 45 deg slanted ruler. I've sent in two E10's for repair of this problem. I've been sent replacements for them and now have the third E10 in my possession (replacement for the second). All have the problem.

The first one was SN 1052516, which had been sent back for replacement of a scratched lens (I blamed poor coating; Oly covered under warranty) and got firmware upgraded to 130. It had the MF problem as shown by MF and AF resolution chart images recorded at 36 inches.

The best tests were with slanted ruler, which I did with the last two:

SN 1010657, distance 48 inches, sharpest at 1.4 inches closer.
SN 1107175, Dist 48 inches, sharpest at 2.83 inches closer.
(Cos 45 deg allowed for in the above error distances.)

In the !!07175 test, after one test in which I determined that when manual focused on an object at 48 inches, the sharpest focus dist was 2.83 inches closer, I repeated the experiment, starting from scratch, but after MF'ing for a sharpest viewfinder image, I moved the camera closer by 2.81 inches. At this distance the image of the slanted ruler was sharpest where I had focused it. This showed I was consistent (at least for 2 trials) in adjusting the MF, proving which has always bothered me.

SN 1010657 had firmware 133; SN 1107175 had 130; I doubt this has anything to do with the MF problrm.

My guess is that Oly designed the E10 based on an original batch of CCD's, without any provision to adjust for variations of the distance from the CCD's light sensitive surface to its mounting surface. Subsequent batches of CCD's have apparently differed from the original batch in this parameter and OLY has found it difficult (or impractical) to adjust for the batch-to-batch differences.

I have found the AF to be quite precise. Note that it will only give a good result when the object enclosed by the focus rectangle is FLAT, all at the same distance from the camera. The slanted ruler test doesn't provide this, but I guess the AF averages over the focus rectangle and gives a satisfactory result. This requirement for good AF might not be met where the test object comprises a number of items at different distances, unless particular care is taken.

I'm going to call Oly again a bout sending in #3 and moan about my shipping and insurance costs (about $20 each time) and also their policy of replacing a defective camera with another defective camera! But I don't expect much response!

I don't know what the MF does; does it move the whole lens assembly, or only part of it? In the first case, since the problem appears to be caused by the discrepancy between the distances from the center of the splitter (that sends rays to the ground glass screen of the VF and to the CCD) to the screen and to the CCD, after getting a sharp image in the VF, the error could always (for any object distance) be compensated by then moving the lens a fixed amount before making the exposure. Dr Gonzo's method appears to accomplish this, for his E10, but I'm not sure it would work for other individual cameras. However, in the MF mode, the focus ring isn't mechanically connected to the lens, so attempting to move the lens a fixed amount by turning the focus ring a fixed number of degrees may not be practicable.

I'm glad you started this survey. I think Oly has thousands of defective E10's out there; it must be a nightmare for them! I received the last replacement (from NY) about 7 days after I sent in the defective camera (to CA). Too bad they don't seem to know which are defective!

Actually, I prefer to use spot AF. Digital SLR's have too much DOF to allow easy MF. (This is because of the small size of the CCD compared to 35 mm film.) But I want to sell my E10 and be able to assure the buyer this problem has been corrected. For my usage, snapping grandkids and informal groups, MF is simply not feasible. I have an E100rs and an E2040, which, together, cover my needs.

I apologize in advance for lack of clarity above; it would take 3 times as many words to make it all clear, plus some drawings!

If you have the E10 or E20 I would appreciate if you could do the
following test and email me the results at .

Reason for the test - ongoing discussion with Olympus about manual
focus.

Test:
1. Set up test chart (piece of 8.5x11 paper with one horizontal
black line and three vertical black lines which can be marker pen)
about 24" from camera that is mounted on tripod and illuminated
with any light that is bright enough to focus the chart. You do not
need to take any pictures.
2. Make sure your eye piece is set for the sharpest image with
your eyes. This is done by pointing the camera at a white piece of
paper and turning the diopter adjustment until the black rectangle
and circle are as sharp as possible.
3. Set focal length to 36mm and lens opening to f2.4 (shutter
speed not material) and no filters.
4. Turn on camera and LCD and get distance scale.
5. Set focus to manual and adjust focus until you have the best
possible image in the viewfinder. Note distance on LCD scale.
6. Close the viewfinder blind, switch to auto focus, 1/2 press
shutter while watching the LCD distance scale.

Please report if ANY (little or lot) or NO movement of this scale.
Repeat several times and see if same thing happens and is consistent

Serial number and firmware number would be appreciated but not
neccessary.

Thanks for your help and I will report the results and reason if
enough data comes in.

Ed Oliver

--Russell

 

[gregg69776]

I thought you might get a kick out of this. I have sn 1107173. Whoopie. Your post makes total sense to someone who's had to think about what to do when mf doesn't work. But compounded with the curved surfaces, you have a problem. Sliding rail and move the camera a few inches away or toward the subject? There are a few possible workarounds. I am starting to use the lcd distance readout for focusing. I hate to pester, but what was that about Gonzo's fix?
Best of luck,
Gregg Kuljian

 

[Russ Yost]

An inrteresting near coincidence! Good thing they weren't the same! I received 1107175 by two-day air on 1 March in Phoenix AZ. It was shipped from Hauppage, NY.

What "curved surfaces" are you referring to, Gregg, the focus ring?

My "move the camera closer" was part of my experiment with the 45 deg. slanted ruler, which I did on a picnic table. The E10 is very stable on a flat surface like that.

You can read Dr Gonzo's posts on this same thread 22 (IIRC) days ago. Instead of turning the focus ring back and forth "through" the point of sharpest VF image and settling at the mid-point, he settles at one end of the range of sharpest image. My eyes aren't good enough for that, though!

I thought you might get a kick out of this. I have sn 1107173.
Whoopie. Your post makes total sense to someone who's had to think
about what to do when mf doesn't work. But compounded with the
curved surfaces, you have a problem. Sliding rail and move the
camera a few inches away or toward the subject? There are a few
possible workarounds. I am starting to use the lcd distance readout
for focusing. I hate to pester, but what was that about Gonzo's fix?
Best of luck,
Gregg Kuljian

--Russell

 

[Ed Oliver]

FYI - One of the E10 owners, that is complaining long and loud to Olympus about this problem, got a reply from service that the problem is incorrect placement of the ground glass focus screen. My take (from looking at schematics, cut away, etc.) is that repair is probably not possible as the screen is cemented in, in a sealed housing. The only repair that (so far) has worked is to get a camera with out he problem, and as you all have found this may take several tries.

Why Olympus is not checking the cameras as they come off the assembly line is a big mystery.

If you read this tread you will see that I disputed Dr Gonzos "fix". The simple reason is that there is only one point of correct focus. There can not be multiple correct focus points. You may find that you can compensate (but not on a reliable basis) once you have found how much you have to put the image out of focus to make it record correctly but that is dodging the problem and it is still there.

I think the biggest problem people are having (in realizing there is a manual focus problem) is not getting the TTL screen adjusted for their eyes. The proper way is to point the camera at a PLAIN, light colored surface and adjust the diopter until the black circle and rectangle are as sharp and clear as possible. If you do this correctly you will find that each line is actually two lines. Once this adjustment has been made then there can be no other focus point. Any thing else is wrong. If you focus the image in the TTL screen and it is sharp and clear and the resulting images are OOF then you have the manual focus problem.

I personally feel (from monitoring 8 E10 forums) that this problem is greater than suspected, primarily because people get put off by not being able to get in focus images in manual focus so the just don't use it.

By the way - AF is dependent (in horizontal format) on lines of vertical contrast. The subject can be round or flat as long as it has these characteristics (or you can prefocus on similar object at similar distance). Don't forget when you turn the camera to vertical format the lines of contrast also turned. Many are finding that turning the ifrared assist off helps (except in low light). If you use any of the add on optics, MCON, WCON, TCON you have to turn the IR off anyway or you can have problems.

Sorry so long,

Ed O

 

[Aron Hsiao]

FYI - One of the E10 owners, that is complaining long and loud to
Olympus about this problem, got a reply from service that the
problem is incorrect placement of the ground glass focus screen.
My take (from looking at schematics, cut away, etc.) is that repair
is probably not possible as the screen is cemented in, in a sealed
housing. The only repair that (so far) has worked is to get a
camera with out he problem, and as you all have found this may take
several tries.

Ed,

It seems to me that since the E-10 and E-20 use the "fly by wire" focus ring rather than a mechanical linkage, fixing an out-of-whack MF should just be a matter of compensating for the offset in software (one of the advantages of a fly-by-wire system, really). I mean, it should be easy to allow the user to adjust the correlation between the position of the MF ring and the lens stepper motor by several "steps" in either direction to compensate for a badly placed focus screen.

Such an adjustment would require some trial and error work and thus maybe 20 minutes of effort on the part of the user, but it seems to me that something of this sort should be doable in firmware, unless the MF-to-stepper linkage is an isolated system which doesn't rely on the camera's firmware but uses a separate software component.

Or am I missing something obvious?

I wonder why Olympus hasn't looked into it... Could it be a simple case of not enough users even caring about MF to raise the issue?

Firmware 1.40 anyone?

-Aron

 

[grc]

My E10 is 'off' in manual focus but the E20 is spot on every time. Same user, same eyes - different cameras.

GRC

I think much of it is diopter adjustment, not focus itself. I have
20/20 vision, yet I had to adjust the diopter back a few notches.
The way I did it was autofocus on something, check the distance
meter, then manual focus on the same object and check the distance
meter again, then adjust the diopter back or forward and see if
manual focus distance is closer or further away from what the
autofocus says it should be. The problem in adjusting manual focus
is the extremely shallow DOF, many distances may look ok in the
viewfinder even when the diopter adjustment is not at the best
setting for your eye.

 

[gregg69776]

Did the test again, but this time there was no movement in the lcd distance readout. New batts too. Fairly low light. I don't want to be a devil's advocate, but I'm not sure that we can conclude anything valuable from doing this. I now wonder if we are combining a real focus problem with things like learning how to focus the camera. But does take practice at the 9mm end. (Thus the zoom, focus, zoom out routine.) I've never had trouble focusing a camera, even the old Argus C-3, although a split viewfinder doesn't count as focusing. I know the prints are the proof, but so far this camera, which showed signs on the first "test" has been sharp when printing mf'd shots (no pun intended) \:}. What do you make of the inconsistent results I got? It was two different focal targets for each test.
Gregg

PS If the problem affects my end, then I'll be back at this thread posting again. Meanwhile, I'm taking the advice other forum members and just shooting and having fun. "And away we go!"
Gregg Kuljian

 

[gregg69776]

I'm just adding this because I found it to be a contributor to my initial focal woes. It's obvious, but on the 9mm setting to see how difficult it can be to focus, depending on light, pattern of object, just focus on something and while looking thru the viewfinder, walk forward and backward. One's got to walk a long way before things get oof. Up, up and away.
Gregg

Did the test again, but this time there was no movement in the lcd
distance readout. New batts too. Fairly low light. I don't want to
be a devil's advocate, but I'm not sure that we can conclude
anything valuable from doing this. I now wonder if we are combining
a real focus problem with things like learning how to focus the
camera. But does take practice at the 9mm end. (Thus the zoom,
focus, zoom out routine.) I've never had trouble focusing a
camera, even the old Argus C-3, although a split viewfinder doesn't
count as focusing. I know the prints are the proof, but so far this
camera, which showed signs on the first "test" has been sharp when
printing mf'd shots (no pun intended) \:}. What do you make of the
inconsistent results I got? It was two different focal targets for
each test.
Gregg
PS If the problem affects my end, then I'll be back at this thread
posting again. Meanwhile, I'm taking the advice other forum members
and just shooting and having fun. "And away we go!"
Gregg Kuljian

 

[Jono Slack]

Right

I have firmware 130 serial number 1012495

I had done some testing with this last year - by taking photos of an oblique screen, you can actually measure the distance out - at 2 feet my manual focus was out by nearly 2 inches (too long).

I sent it back to Oly for this and the firmware upgrade

It now shoots perfectly (incidentally, an LCD monitor is a good way of testing focus - all those little squares!).

I just did your test, and there was no change to the distance

I also have an E20
firmware 29-1102 serial number 203002341

This also showed no change in the scale . . . . . .

However, it is worth noting that the two cameras showed one step difference between each other - shooting from the same position to the same position??

kind regards
jono slack

If you have the E10 or E20 I would appreciate if you could do the
following test and email me the results at .

Reason for the test - ongoing discussion with Olympus about manual
focus.

Test:
1. Set up test chart (piece of 8.5x11 paper with one horizontal
black line and three vertical black lines which can be marker pen)
about 24" from camera that is mounted on tripod and illuminated
with any light that is bright enough to focus the chart. You do not
need to take any pictures.
2. Make sure your eye piece is set for the sharpest image with
your eyes. This is done by pointing the camera at a white piece of
paper and turning the diopter adjustment until the black rectangle
and circle are as sharp as possible.
3. Set focal length to 36mm and lens opening to f2.4 (shutter
speed not material) and no filters.
4. Turn on camera and LCD and get distance scale.
5. Set focus to manual and adjust focus until you have the best
possible image in the viewfinder. Note distance on LCD scale.
6. Close the viewfinder blind, switch to auto focus, 1/2 press
shutter while watching the LCD distance scale.

Please report if ANY (little or lot) or NO movement of this scale.
Repeat several times and see if same thing happens and is consistent

Serial number and firmware number would be appreciated but not
neccessary.

Thanks for your help and I will report the results and reason if
enough data comes in.

Ed Oliver

--Jono Slack http://www.slack.co.uk

 

[gregg69776]

Hey, Jono, thanks for the lcd tip. I wondered about that. I'm glued to the eyepiece mostly. Actually affraid to use the lcd for focusing. Hey, focussing can have one OR two ss's. Wild ain't it.

Gregg

I have firmware 130 serial number 1012495

I had done some testing with this last year - by taking photos of
an oblique screen, you can actually measure the distance out - at 2
feet my manual focus was out by nearly 2 inches (too long).

I sent it back to Oly for this and the firmware upgrade

It now shoots perfectly (incidentally, an LCD monitor is a good way
of testing focus - all those little squares!).

I just did your test, and there was no change to the distance

I also have an E20
firmware 29-1102 serial number 203002341

This also showed no change in the scale . . . . . .

However, it is worth noting that the two cameras showed one step
difference between each other - shooting from the same position to
the same position??

kind regards
jono slack

If you have the E10 or E20 I would appreciate if you could do the
following test and email me the results at .

Reason for the test - ongoing discussion with Olympus about manual
focus.

Test:
1. Set up test chart (piece of 8.5x11 paper with one horizontal
black line and three vertical black lines which can be marker pen)
about 24" from camera that is mounted on tripod and illuminated
with any light that is bright enough to focus the chart. You do not
need to take any pictures.
2. Make sure your eye piece is set for the sharpest image with
your eyes. This is done by pointing the camera at a white piece of
paper and turning the diopter adjustment until the black rectangle
and circle are as sharp as possible.
3. Set focal length to 36mm and lens opening to f2.4 (shutter
speed not material) and no filters.
4. Turn on camera and LCD and get distance scale.
5. Set focus to manual and adjust focus until you have the best
possible image in the viewfinder. Note distance on LCD scale.
6. Close the viewfinder blind, switch to auto focus, 1/2 press
shutter while watching the LCD distance scale.

Please report if ANY (little or lot) or NO movement of this scale.
Repeat several times and see if same thing happens and is consistent

Serial number and firmware number would be appreciated but not
neccessary.

Thanks for your help and I will report the results and reason if
enough data comes in.

Ed Oliver

--
Jono Slack
http://www.slack.co.uk

 

[Aron Hsiao]

I'm just adding this because I found it to be a contributor to my
initial focal woes. It's obvious, but on the 9mm setting to see how
difficult it can be to focus, depending on light, pattern of
object, just focus on something and while looking thru the
viewfinder, walk forward and backward. One's got to walk a long way
before things get oof. Up, up and away.
Gregg

I don't know if this helps, but when I first got my E-10 and was looking to test it's MF (I'd heard of problems), I fount that sitting 3-4 feet away and shooting the tube of my 17" monitor with a completely white display was an ideal test.

The focus screen on the E-10 can be a little trying even on my eyes (20/20, checked every year) but on the monitor's tube, something about the properties of the light and the dot grille made finding the MF focus easy even with the difficult-to-use focus screen -- there was a moment at which the monitor's grille just "jumped out" in the viewfinder and made the focus obvious.

I was able to take test shots of what I thought was "perfect forus" as well as a little out of focus in either direction; when downloaded, the images demonstrated that my MF was spot on. I doubt whether this test would have been as definitive if I'd been shooting black lines on white paper.

I must confess that in my limited use of the camera so far I have from time to time taken an MF shot that I thought was "in focus" only to turn the focus ring ever so slightly more afterward and realize that the previous shot was actually out of focus and only now am I truly "in focus"... This tends to happen especially when shooting in dim or low-contrast environments, of course.

-Aron

 

[Ed Oliver]

Aron wrote,

It seems that since the E-10 and E-20 use the "fly by wire"
focus ring rather than a mechanical linkage, fixing an out-of-whack
MF should just be a matter of compensating for the offset in
software (one of the advantages of a fly-by-wire system, really). I
mean, it should be easy to allow the user to adjust the correlation
between the position of the MF ring and the lens stepper motor by
several "steps" in either direction to compensate for a badly
placed focus screen.

I can't dispute your input Aron but unfortunately we don't have that option.

I wonder why Olympus hasn't looked into it.

If such a fix is possible apparently Olympus is not aware of it. I really don't think this is a fix - consider, when you go from AF to MF the stepper motor starts at what ever place the AF left it so it would have to automatically compensate from that point. Seems this is rather a complex fix, but I don't know computer programing so I really can not say.

Could it be a simple case of not enough users even caring about MF to raise the issue?

I think this is part of the problem however Olympus is well aware of it now. I suspect that many E10 owners have tried MF and had poor results so they have just relied on AF. That is unfortunate as the ability to MF is one of the real advantages of the E10 (in my estimation).

Thanks for the input,

Ed O