What a Disappointment - Canon 50D Review

I now have a Canon 50D digital camera body and 4 (count em-4) of the Canon Premium L series lenses (A 70-200 L IS lens, a 70-200 L (non stabilized), a 28-70 non-IS, and a 28-105 IS L lens.)


I am extremely disappointed with all of them. The focus on all of these is spotty at best. To make things worse, the spottiness is the irritating thing over and above the bad focus itself, for on some occasions I shoot images that are razor sharp, but then, for the same conditions, the focus is just plain off.

The shutter speeds are fast 1/400 and above and the f-stop is f/9 or above, and the subject distances are anywhere from 15 feet to 175 feet - so it should not be a depth of field problem.

I have used all my lenses in strong light and low light. The strong light works better than the mid to lo light, but for $1,000--$2,000 bucks of glass/ lens I frankly expected better.

BTW- For the life of me I cannot understand why the camera manufacturers on these expensive bodies force us to use an "autofocus" and do not supply as standard a split screen focus. Using just the ground glass to get things in focus is a pain as there is not enough definition. In short, one cannot get these lens "in tack" enough unless one has a split screen - or a perfect autofocus.



Some final notes:
Yes, I know that these Canon premium lenses have a way to do a micro adjustment for the focus, but WHY should I have to do that. It seems like THAT was just a work-around to cover up for something wrong in the lens itself, or its focusing algorithms. And to make it all worse - the micro adjustment is only good to a particular focal length. So you will get tack and one focal length, but possible blur at the others ... Sheeesh, my $400 Sony point and shoot takes better pictures.

Also, is it to much to ask for Canon to give us a split screen on a Canon 50D?? Also, is it too much to ask for the manufactures to program into the software the algorithm  - and actually display on the screen -  the actual distance that the lens "thinks" the subject is at - and the darned depth of field???

Quite frankly I am really disappointed.