My five year old canon rebel has developed a problem. When I'm shooting it appears to work fine but when I look at my negatives I've got severe camera shake. The film is properly exposed, I was shooting at 1/125th and 1/250th with my 35 to 80 mm f4.5 canon lens. Is this a camera problem or a lens problem. I need to find out soon, because I need it every day.

-- Mariah Nelson (nelsonriah@hotmail.com), July 12, 2001

Answers

I once had a cheap point & shoot camera that appearantly had a loose lens element in it. Most of the pictures I took with it exhibited what appeared to be camera shake that was caused by the shutter vibrating the lens element during exposure.

I don't see how this could be caused by the camera. Try another lens on it.

-- Jim Strutz (j.strutz@gci.net), July 12, 2001.

When conducting a test, you can eliminate the potential for camera shake by using a good tripod, or simply using a flat surface to stabilize the camera / lens combo. If the shake disappears when shot this way, then you know where the problem lies, (your hands). If the images are still a problem, then the lens has a problem somewhere in the optics, or possibly in the auto focusing system.

You say you are suffering "camera shake", but look at the photos... Is something in the image sharp? If something are sharp, but not the intended target, the camera may be miss-focusing. If nothing at all is sharp, then it is indeed shake or an optical malfunction, such as a lens element out of alignment.

Good Luck.

-- Al Smith (smith58@msn.com), July 13, 2001.