[harleynitelite]

Hey all,

I just happened to run across someone with a k20d in mint cond who only used it for a photography course then stored it. I had a k20d in the past and always kicked myself for selling it. He accepted an offer to trade the camera for a surround sound system and an extra sub, needless to say I'm grinning ear to ear as I didn't use the audio equipment anyhow.

I took some test pics, loaded them into Photome to look at some information, but most of the pics were unstabilized. I read the manual that says to wait until you see the little green hand in the viewfinder to ensure stabilization. I go back out and ensure the switch is on to enable stabilization, go to focus and wait...and wait for the little hand to come up in the viewfinder that indicates the stabilization is effective and then take the shot. Sometimes this took a second, sometimes I stood there holding still for many seconds waiting for the little green hand to light up, sometimes it seemed to not want to come up at all (or I gave up waiting first).

With the k20d I owned before, I dont remember it taking nearly this long to achieve proper stabilization.

To other k20d owners out there, does it take a bit for the hand to light up for u when you have the shutter half pressed? If not, could there be a setting I am missing that could cause this? I understand the camera has to be able to identify the amount of zoom involved at that moment (ie 18mm, 40mm) and I'm wondering if the contacts could be bad, or maybe some other issue I'm not thinking of.

The firmware is 1.03 and the lens is a first gen. 18-55mm AL lens.

To those out there that will, please help me and offer me any insights that you can

Thanks everyone

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Last edited by harleynitelite; 09-25-2012 at 08:57 AM. Reason: Inaccurate information

[excanonfd]

Half pressing the shutter release button activates the stabilization almost instantly and remain active as long as the shutter release button is half pressed on my K20D. I don't suppose there is any recourse for you if the image stabilization only works intermittently but if you shoot at shutter speeds that is higher than the longest focal length of the zoom lens you have mounted, image stabilization may not be needed.

It's a good camera although I am in the market for a K-5, I may end up keeping the K20D as a back up anyways.

[harleynitelite]

Excanonfd,
When you half press the shutter to focus though, does the green hand light up in the viewfinder almost immediately on yours? On mine it doesn't.

[Buschmaster]

Excanonfd,
When you half press the shutter to focus though, does the green hand light up in the viewfinder almost immediately on yours? On mine it doesn't.

It does on mine. Let me do some quick tests and then quantify it in a completely made up term.

I'd say it took about a grintoinkin to show up or so.

Give or take 2 or 3 pulkorgins.

[Buschmaster]

I just shot a video real quick with my iPhone looking through the viewfinder. Would have been nice to have an extra hand... Back to the lab, I suppose.

Here is the video:

You Tube

You Tube

Sorry for the bad sounding focus, but it will make more sense with sound because you can see on the first one, it actually stabilizes before it focuses. This was with my super slow focusing Tamron 70-300, so sorry about that as well, but it was what was already on the K20D.

[harleynitelite]

holy cow thanks for that bushmaster, something is definitely wrong with my setup then b/c mine takes WAY longer than that. That was an excellent idea with the iphone, two thumbs up from me

[Buschmaster]

Glad I could help you

[cajun0518]

@harleynitelite Have you tried resetting the configurations to the defaults? I bought a used k20d and was having some issues with the LCD and was resolved by just resetting to the factory default settings

[harleynitelite]

No, i hadn't even thought of that and its a great idea. I'll have to look it up in the manual and give it a shot to see what happens. People out there like you guys is what really makes this forum so great. When I had a canon I never ever received the type of help I find here, it FAR surpasses any canon forum I've been on. Thanks guys

[Venturi]

The stabilization indicator should light up within 1 sec of the half-press. I have no idea if this has any bearing on SR, but the current version of the K20d firmware is 1.04. Download page is here

[harleynitelite]

Well I found the problem. I have the af function tied to the af button on the back only and the stabilization does not appear to be turned on by the button like it is when the shutter is half pressed to focus. I had the focus turned off when you half press the shutter button, and so I was not doing this since the focus was tied to the af button in the back only. The only way to enable the stabilization is by half pressing the shutter button, when I do this the green hand lights up almost immediately like in Buschmasters video.

Thanks to Cajun0518 as he suggested to reset the camera, and when I did it forced me to use the shutter button to focus, and thats how I found out how it really works. Thanks for everyones help ! Problem solved

[cajun0518]

Good to hear that you had it working harleynitelite!