Auto fine-tune feature

Blade Canyon

Senior Member
On my D600 and D800, lenses needed fine tuning. With the D850, I tried the auto fine-tune feature. It works very fast, but ALL of my lenses are showing ZERO adjustment. That's hard to believe. And yet, I cannot prove that is wrong based on normal testing for back- and front-focusing.

Is the D850 auto focus system so good that it conquers the normal deviations which require fine tuniing of AF for different lenses?
 

Blade Canyon

Senior Member
I think you can get zero if you dont quiet get it right in the timing of actions.

Ugh, that's what I was afraid of. I thought I went through every step just as Steve Perry did in his Youtube video and as set out in the instructions. But, the focusing does seem accurate.

I'll do them again tonight. All zeroes is just too good.
 

Blade Canyon

Senior Member
On some the ruler number 20 definitely is sharper in the Live View. But no other number is sharper in the AF view, either, so I'm wondering if you got a little mirror smack blur going on. No EXIF so I don't know the shutter speeds.

That quiet Live View shooting is great on the D850!
 

Chucktin

Senior Member
Hi,

I spend quite a lot of time, fighting (??) with my AF Fine tuning.
Auto AF tuning didn’t work quite a lot.
Maybe it is because I don’t have Nikon lenses, 2 Tamron (24-70 F2.8 and 28-300 PZD) and 1 Sigma (150-600 C).
I tried several ways to fine tune my AF, it was a lot more difficult as with my D750.
With my D750 I only used the “Dot method” and it was okay.
With my D850 I finally compared the results from pictures taken by live view AF and view finder AF.
One method:
DS0_1630 by Ad v.d. Biggelaar, on Flickr
DS0_1631 by Ad v.d. Biggelaar, on Flickr


My Tamron 24-70 F2.8 VC:
1 Tamron 24-70 24 mm by Ad v.d. Biggelaar, on Flickr
2 Tamron 24-70 70 mm by Ad v.d. Biggelaar, on Flickr

My Sigma 150-600 (+with extenders):
5 Sigma 150-600 150 mm by Ad v.d. Biggelaar, on Flickr
6 Sigma 150-600 600 mm by Ad v.d. Biggelaar, on Flickr
7 Sigma 150-600 + 1,4 ext 840 mm by Ad v.d. Biggelaar, on Flickr
And just for the fun:
8 Sigma 150-600 + TC1.4 ext + Kenko 1.4 ext 1200 (1176) mm by Ad v.d. Biggelaar, on Flickr

I’m satisfied now, I spend quite some time and pictures on it.
Now I have a lot of confidence in my D850 (my Beast) and going to enjoy my cam even more.
Huh. I looked at my stuff from last weekend and (with AF-C, 9 spots) it looks like my 850 with the Nikon 24-70/2.8 is focusing short. Most of the DOF is between the camera and the subject. Drat.

Sent from my Pixel XL using Tapatalk
 

Blade Canyon

Senior Member
Only at the pics of the Tamron 24-70 at 70mm the number 20 isn't super sharp.
Every zoom lens is a compromis…

My point is that the ruler is less sharp in general in the AF view than in the Live View, and that particular photo is the one I meant. Even the bottom of the ruler is clearly much blurrier in AF view than the Live View shot.

Hey, you're a Moto Guzzi fan!
 

ed4banger

Senior Member
On my D600 and D800, lenses needed fine tuning. With the D850, I tried the auto fine-tune feature. It works very fast, but ALL of my lenses are showing ZERO adjustment. That's hard to believe. And yet, I cannot prove that is wrong based on normal testing for back- and front-focusing.

Is the D850 auto focus system so good that it conquers the normal deviations which require fine tuniing of AF for different lenses?

No its not that good. There will almost always be some minor deviations within the tolerances allowed. I'm working on this issue now with Nikons newest 400 f2.8. I have two D850 bodies, and one dials in at "0" and the other at "-7". I've not been using the built in tuning, but have been using the Reikan FoCal system. My back yard birding photography is typically at a distance of maybe 30', and it was pretty clear right away that focus was a little soft. Using FoCal data dialed it right in. If UR using any fine tuning program, I believe your target and lighting are critical. Very good target well lit. I would think about my target and lighting, and run the test again. JMO.
 
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