Sunday, October 24, 2010

Help! (camera question)

Notice how I have not been blogging much lately?  It's because I have been having camera woes.  I am not very camera savvy, so I am hoping that someone who reads my blog can point me in the right direction. Three and a half years ago, we purchased a new, not reburbished, Nikon D40x.  It has had its quirks along the way, but mostly it has worked well for what I use it for, which is basically point and shoot.  A week and a half ago, we were working on our Goodnight Gorilla project.  When I first started taking pictures, I noticed nothing unusual.  Then, I snapped a picture and it came out like this.

It surprised me to say the least.  I tried turning the camera off, taking out the battery and the memory card, putting them back in and turning it back on again.  I got a couple more white pictures.  Then, I started getting pictures like this, that were really dark.  Again, I thought that was odd, but figured the flash bulb must have burnt out.  Not so!  The flash still works.

So now, it is random.  I will get a picture like this.

The next may look like this.

The next may look normal, like this. 

But, right after that, I may get one that looks like this (the lighting looks different, though I haven't changed anything)


There really is no pattern to it.  I have changed lens and have had the same problem, so I am guessing it is a body issue.  The ISO is on Auto, but does this seem like a sensor needs to be cleaned?  Can I clean it myself?  Do I need to take the camera to a camera shop or is it an easy fix that I can do?  Is there still hope for my camera? Thanks!

5 comments:

Mike said...

That camera may have 'auto bracketing' turned on.
It would take 1 photo normal, 1 over exposed, and one underexposed.

There should be a setting to set it back to normal. Check the manual?

Peterson Party said...

Thanks, Mike! There really is no pattern to the normal/over-/under-exposed pictures and it happened suddenly, but I will look and see if that is the problem. Thanks!

jasnjoj said...

Wow, no help here...but I sure do hope you get it figured out, Cara!

Michelle Gibson said...

Something very similar happened to my old camera and it was a light sensor or something, but I can't remember! I had to send it in to be fixed. Is yours covered under a warranty? I bought mine at Costco and it was still covered under their warranty, thankfully! Hope you get it figured out/fixed soon ~ I so know what that feels like!

Peterson Party said...

Thanks for the suggestions with my camera problems. The day after I posted this, I used my camera again and as quickly as the problem started, it also ended. So far, I have had no more issues with the excessive over/under exposures. Not sure what the issue was, because I did nothing to fix it. Perhaps it was some dirt?