HELP! Intermittent remote

kliwks · Jul 4, 2009

I have a new Nikon remote for my D40. I have used it twice. Once at dusk, and last night practicing (sp?) for fireworks tonight in the backyard. the remote was very intermittent and then didn't seem to work at all. Also, the shooting mode seemed to switch back to single exposure rather the "quick response remote". But even when everything was set right, no luck. So I tried it this morning and it fires everytime. It seems like it doesn't like the dark. Also, is there another receiver besides the one on the front? It does work from behind but I don't see a receiver on the back.

paulk_68 · Jul 4, 2009

Did you have your lens on auto focus or manual? If it was on auto focus, that was most likely your problem.

kliwks · Jul 4, 2009

I was using manual focus. Very strange problem. It won't fail today. But last night...... Useless................

benlonghair · Jul 4, 2009

My D60 has a setting for how long it remembers to look for the remote. By default it's only 1 min. Has yours got the same setting?

Josh66 · Jul 4, 2009

Is it wired, or wireless?

If it's wireless, you may not be pointing it at the sensor, or something (your hand, camera strap?) may be blocking it.

LOL, I just re-read your post.

If it works from the back, it must not be IR (unless there is an additional sensor on the back). Probably radio or something.
Either way, darkness should not affect it.

How old are the batteries? They may be starting to die. That's the only thing I can think of.

EDIT
If the remote is RF, you could have been getting some interference - but that seems unlikely.

Does the remote have an IR LED on it? That will tell you pretty quick if it is IR or RF...

kliwks · Jul 4, 2009

No LED.It must be RF then? There is a sensor on the front. I tried the strap thing as well. the remote is brand new. (Amazon). I would assume battery is good. I will try to re-post tomorrow to let know how it went.

Thanks for the reply.

Josh66 · Jul 4, 2009

Your camera (not very familiar with it) must be capable of using both IR and RF remotes, if it has an IR sensor on the front.

With no IR LED on the remote (I'm sure you know what a LED looks like - look at your TV remote), it must be RF.

RF, I would think, is generally better than IR.

First, I would suspect the batteries - but remotes don't typically use a lot of power, so the battery should last a pretty long time.

Second, I would suspect interference. I think that is pretty unlikely, but I don't know what else it could be...

kliwks · Jul 4, 2009

Thank You BENLONGHAIR!!!!!! I think you nailed it. I found the remote duration and it was set at one minute. So I changed it to 10 minutes. I'll let you know how things go tonight.

Thank You.

doogan · Jul 4, 2009

I would like to help you with your remote troubles but
I can't - I have the same problem. I'm using a Nikon
infra red remote and Nikon D90 camera. It works off
and on, can't rely on it. I've had the battery changed.

doogan · Jul 4, 2009

paulk_68 said:
Did you have your lens on auto focus or manual? If it was on auto focus, that was most likely your problem.

I checked my manual for the Nikon D90 and it doesn't
mention that manual focus must be used. I'm not saying
you're wrong - I might have missed something along the way.
I sure would like to get to the bottom of this!

paulk_68 · Jul 4, 2009

doogan said:
paulk_68 said:

Did you have your lens on auto focus or manual? If it was on auto focus, that was most likely your problem.

Click to expand...

I checked my manual for the Nikon D90 and it doesn't
mention that manual focus must be used. I'm not saying
you're wrong - I might have missed something along the way.
I sure would like to get to the bottom of this!

The reason why I asked about auto focus and manual, is because the OP said that it was not working at night, and that it worked fine today. If the camera was having problems with focus (more likely to happen when it is dark out), it might keep the shutter from releasing.

I hope that made sense to somoene :lol:

Sherman Banks · Jul 4, 2009

doogan said:
I would like to help you with your remote troubles but
I can't - I have the same problem. I'm using a Nikon
infra red remote and Nikon D90 camera. It works off
and on, can't rely on it. I've had the battery changed.

The remote needs to have a good line of sight to the left side of the camera (the opposite side of the shutter button). Also, if your AF is hunting in low light and you have your AF mode set to AF-A, it will not shoot until it locks focus, which it may not do. You could try AF-C which will override the focus lock and shoot when you tell it to but also run the risk of getting a shot OOF. If I'm doing self portraits with the remote, I'll use the "auto area" mode and the camera is often pretty good at detecting what to focus on.

kliwks · Jul 6, 2009

Just wanted to follow up. The remote did seem to work better (obviously) since I changed the duration to 15 minutes. But it still seems to work fine when you test it during the day and not very reliable at night. I was set to manual focus. My work around was to reach around the front and point the remote at the front and it worked fine. I got some pretty good shots of the fireworks. I used my kit 55-200mm zoom. I was too lazy to switch to my 18-55 zoom to see how they would look. All in all I was happy. We'll try some more next year. Photography is a learning experience.

Thanks for the replies.

Figment · Jul 6, 2009

kliwks said:
Just wanted to follow up. The remote did seem to work better (obviously) since I changed the duration to 15 minutes. But it still seems to work fine when you test it during the day and not very reliable at night. I was set to manual focus. My work around was to reach around the front and point the remote at the front and it worked fine. I got some pretty good shots of the fireworks. I used my kit 55-200mm zoom. I was too lazy to switch to my 18-55 zoom to see how they would look. All in all I was happy. We'll try some more next year. Photography is a learning experience.

Thanks for the replies.

I also have a Nikon D40. I used my remote on the 4th of July, and it fired every time. I think you've stumbled upon your issue. To my knowledge, the D40 ONLY has a sensor in the front of the camera, not behind. That being the case, the signal isn't real reliable if the remote's behind the camera. I usually stand off to the side a little so that I'm out of lens range, but still have LOS (Line of Site) between the remote and the camera.

benlonghair · Jul 6, 2009

kliwks said:
Just wanted to follow up. The remote did seem to work better (obviously) since I changed the duration to 15 minutes. But it still seems to work fine when you test it during the day and not very reliable at night.

I find the eye sensor that turns off the LCD to be very unreliable in very bright or very dark conditions. Could be the same issue.