Strange circular anomaly on pictures. What could it be?

[Ghostman]

Hi all,

My better half is using a Canon 5 with my old (+- 5 years) 24-105 lens. The lens is in perfect condition and has only ever been used by myself.

Recently some strange anomalies started appearing on her pictures. On both the left and right of the pictures, although mostly left hand side, strange concentric circular lines are appearing. It is not on all pictures on a roll and it does appear on different rolls from slide to BW. I have attached a picture of the problem (see light circles on left of picture), but this one is not as pronounced. I will post more later that are extreme.

Some pictures are with a filter (red) and some without. The lens was bought about 4-5 years ago, new, for a digital camera. The Canon 5 that she has needs a CLA but there are pictures from another lens that are perfect. This problem appears to occur intermittently with the one lens, the 24-105.

Is it the glass? Is it the mount? Light leak?

Please can someone help me identify this?

[horacekenneth]

I feel silly but I can't see them at all

[Thomas Bertilsson]

I see it. If you bump up the contrast it's clearly visible. I would think that it's an internal reflection somehow, possibly the filter. It appears as though the light is very diffuse in this picture, but can you tell if the symptom is more pronounced in clear sunny weather, shooting into the light? If so, I would expect some kind of internal reflection.

[Ghostman]

Admittedly it's not the best example. I'll have to wait until I get home to find a more obvious one. The bands are actually more visible on the small image than the large one. I can see them because I know what to look for. Do check in later for an update.

[Ghostman]

I see it. If you bump up the contrast it's clearly visible. I would think that it's an internal reflection somehow, possibly the filter. It appears as though the light is very diffuse in this picture, but can you tell if the symptom is more pronounced in clear sunny weather, shooting into the light? If so, I would expect some kind of internal reflection.

Hi Thomas,

Yes, the light in this shot was very diffuse. Not all affected frames had a filter on. I have some shots on slide with bright blue skies where this anomaly occurs and no filter was used. I will post them later too.

[jeffreyg]

Out of curiosity, do the lines occur when you use the lens on the digital camera you bought it for?

http://www.jeffreyglasser.com/

[jnanian]

is it actually on the film? or might it be something that happened with the printing ( or skanning ) ..

[Worker 11811]

Since it is a zoom lens, does this problem occur more (or less) when it is zoomed all the way in or all the way out?

[Ghostman]

Out of curiosity, do the lines occur when you use the lens on the digital camera you bought it for?

http://www.jeffreyglasser.com/

Hi Jeff, no, the lens always worked well on the dslr. We can run another check though.

is it actually on the film? or might it be something that happened with the printing ( or skanning ) ..

I will check the film under a loupe this evening to eliminate scanning newton rings.

Since it is a zoom lens, does this problem occur more (or less) when it is zoomed all the way in or all the way out?

I can't say, I'm sure it was probably used on minimum zoom.

[Thomas Bertilsson]

Hi Jeff, no, the lens always worked well on the dslr. We can run another check though.

Sensor size on the DSLR means different coverage. The 'rings' could have been outside the image area with the digital.