Monday I had these weird black areas show up in photos. It cleared after a few minutes. But now I am seeing areas that are bright and dark in the same locations. Is this a sign my sensor is failing?
Do you have another lens to check? My feeling is there's some blockage in the lens and not the sensor. If the sensor was failing the edges wouldn't be as soft.
I suspect it is not a Sensor issue, but possibly an issue with the SD Card or the hardware/firmware that writes to the SD Card. I would start by trying a different SD Card that has been formated in that camera.
Definitely the shutter. At least for the straight black area, the angled problems are stranger, like the shutter only stops on one side. I would expect it to get stuck pretty permanently if it went sideways like that, but apparently not. Mirror problems also look a bit like this, but they pretty much have to be towards the bottom of the picture (top of the sensor) because that's where the mirror is attached.
With various things that could cause the problem, instead of guessing, start to eliminate some of possibilities.1. thoroughly clean the lens 2. clean the sensor 3. replace the memory card. If there is still a problem Have it serviced
Az, Like it was mentioned before, it definitely seems to be a shutter problem. Try shooting in single mode at first, and see if the problem happens again. If it does, try burst shooting at max speed a couple of times (x5 1-2 second bursts). If it clears after doing that, then it's definitely the shutter assembly.