Camera lens tune up for autofocus?

Canon will not repair your Tamron if it's defective -- though you might want to look into a body with AF Microadjust, like the 50D/5DII/7D, etc.

[quote name="sub50hz" url="/t/1288913/camera-lens-tune-up-for-autofocus#post_17836131"though you might want to look into a body with AF Microadjust, like the 50D/5DII/7D, etc.[/quote]

this is a life saver for shooters that need their gear to be spot on and finely adjusted every so often. with a tripod, the proper test charts, and maybe an angle protractor thingy you can easily micro adjust your camera at home but it can be a game of patience as it will get to a point where you are only off by a hair and still try to fine tune to make it perfect and can possibly make some go crazy lolz

being able to micro adjust yourself is a very cool thing but it is just micro adjust and there are slim chances that under circumstances that i dont fully know and whatever but basically if you try and micro adjust and you go all the way to the max then thats the point where you want to send it in. im not super knowledgeable on doing this but i was able to adjust my sigma 30 to my 7D and its pretty much spot on and only misses focus under rare circumstances usually also involving really low light where the camera even struggles to perfectly lock focus.

on a side note being able to do this is great but majority of the time most lenses do not require a lot of adjusting but its not uncommon to the best of my knowledge coming from video land every so often to get a lens that is slightly off but not by much. with most video gear we are able to fully calibrate everything in a shop rather than being limited to micro adjusting. im not going to get started on how much of a pain it is to try and calibrate the macro on a HDTV lens
Edited by Conspiracy - 8/1/12 at 6:51am

Yeah, what these two have said.

For Canon lenses, if you call and report the issue, they will (likely) request you send the lens and body in, and they can calibrate the lens to the body.

For the Tamron, they may require the same.

Unless you purchased either lens brand new (i.e. under warranty), in most circumstances, neither will be free, but it shouldn't be hugely expensive.

I think you may be confusing two things though; professionals may send their cameras in for cleanings/tune ups once a year, but unless you're putting 20-30k on the shutter annually, shooting in conditions which would cause above average dirt or wear or tear, or you have coupons to do it for free, which most Canon Professional shooters will have via Canon Professional Services, then it's not really necessary to do so.

When you say it's slightly off, is it ever slightly off when shooting on a tripod? Is it at larger apertures or any range?

are you using the center AF point (generally the most accurate AF point) or auto af point selection?

If you're missing at f/16 or f/22, you have either a major problem with your technique or the camera.

Very, and I mean very, few times the AF is really off and needs calibration - when having a camera with micro-adjustments is simply amazingly handy.
You might play around with it and find that you need like a tiny bit here and there, but most of the times it is human error - either you are selecting the wrong point or the picture is shaken and not miss-focused.

In rare cases that the lens is what you would call a lemon and the micro-adjustment range is not enough to bring him back to acceptable precision levels, sending him to the service center with your camera is probably the only choice (other than returning the lens if its new).