Hark 2018
- Thread starter hark
- Start date
I made the mistake of only testing the lens at f/4 (long end) while I was at the store. Figured it would give me an idea of its sharpness. And it seems fine there. However, I didn't try it out at f/10 which is an aperture I use regularly. Nothing shot at f/10 is sharp. It isn't front or back focusing...it just isn't sharp anywhere in those images.
I've never experienced this. My main 3 lenses are all great at f/10 so it never dawned on me.
That's strange Cindy. I wonder if this could be caused by the VR... Have you tried it with and without the VR? On a tripod with delay in mirror up mode? I find that sometimes when I use VR at high enough shutter speeds, I forget it's on and don't give it time enough to settle. When this happens, I get the same... nothing seems really sharp. Keep investigating, or use it around f8. It should create less diffraction at f8.I made the mistake of only testing the lens at f/4 (long end) while I was at the store. Figured it would give me an idea of its sharpness. And it seems fine there. However, I didn't try it out at f/10 which is an aperture I use regularly. Nothing shot at f/10 is sharp. It isn't front or back focusing...it just isn't sharp anywhere in those images.
Keep us posted with your results.
I took it back to the store and tried out two other preowned models. Both were much sharper throughout. This one was their rental lens. There is some play in the manual focus ring. I keep bumping it since the zoom is on the opposite end of the lens than what I'm accustomed to. I'll have to work with it some more and see if that is going to be an issue.
Here are a couple more from this afternoon. Both of these and the previous photo were edited in ACR and PCC with Color Efex Pro 4. Both of these were stopped down furtner...the first at f/14 and the second at f/13. Wanted to see how this lens performs at some extremes. I'm very happy with its performance so far.
The first one I bought (then returned) was in pristine condition. Didn't see any internal dust--and looked immaculate--just no box or case. I imagine the camera store might have to send it out to get calibrated. Those first 2 images I took with it had quite a bit of post processing. The one with the trees and the paved path just couldn't be sharpened adequately.
I do like the longer range. My Sigma 24-70 f/2.8 (no OS) is an exceptional copy. This model lens didn't fare well in numerous tests, and when compared with the Nikon and Tamron versions, this one was always in last place. Yet this particular copy is as sharp as my best Nikon glass.
Need to do more testing with this lens though. I had several images from yesterday where the VR might not have been fully engaged. It was as if they were ghost images (double images). I've never experienced this previously. Maybe the VR takes longer to engage?
These are probably poisonous berries since birds don't appear to be eating them. Does anyone know the name of this plant?
View attachment 296945
Probably wrong, but it looks like some sort of grape vine.
One of my Facebook friends said it is Porcelain Berry, an invasive vine. It's quite unusual and rather pretty but when reading up on it, it can even take over a tree. So not sure how all the trees along that path are going to fare. There are several of these plants in the park. :concern: And it is related to the grape family.
This definitely wasn't planned! My Australian Shepherd almost got a hold of this possum before it reached the top of our 6' fence. It stayed put long enough for me to grab a camera. My D7200 was the easiest one to grab (albeit with a slow lens), and although I wasn't able to remove my CP filter (literally couldn't unscrew it--it's a slim one), I still managed to get a shot. ISO 10k. Not bad. First I opened the NEF in ACR and added a little noise reduction. Used ACR's 'Auto' feature to set the initial parameters of exposure, highlights, shadows, etc before tweaking slightly.
Then I headed over to PCC where I added some High Pass Sharpening on its face followed by Nik Dfine. I lowered the Contrast Noise and Color Noise in Dfine down to 45% each.
Overall, I was surprised the AF worked on my D7200 given how dark it was. It was right after 9pm. We have security lights around our property, but it was pretty dark. The light wasn't shining directly on it either. In fact, I had to hunt through the viewfinder to see it. The CP filter does darken the viewfinder, too. The camera overexposed which was fine since I wanted more detail. Then the exposure increased a little more in post. This D7200 keeps amazing me!
Then I headed over to PCC where I added some High Pass Sharpening on its face followed by Nik Dfine. I lowered the Contrast Noise and Color Noise in Dfine down to 45% each.
Overall, I was surprised the AF worked on my D7200 given how dark it was. It was right after 9pm. We have security lights around our property, but it was pretty dark. The light wasn't shining directly on it either. In fact, I had to hunt through the viewfinder to see it. The CP filter does darken the viewfinder, too. The camera overexposed which was fine since I wanted more detail. Then the exposure increased a little more in post. This D7200 keeps amazing me!
These are a few from today's car show. This was my first attempt at car photos, but I did quite a bit of research to find what I liked. I hadn't taken too many pics when it started to sprinkle. Earlier this morning I picked up a small Think Tank Emergency Rain Cover. It's a brand new product and is smaller than the rain jacket I currently have. It worked extremely well. :encouragement: https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/prod...740618_emergency_rain_cover_small.html?sts=pi
This first car is painted in a black matte paint.
This first car is painted in a black matte paint.
I am still working on the car show photos. There was a Corvette that received much love in its life. Most of the cars had signs stating Please Do Not Touch. The owner crossed out the Do Not and let people sit in his car.
When I photographed this car, the owner asked if I could make it look good. This one image took me over 2 hours yesterday. What I did isn't perfect, but since I'm using a mouse, I did what I could.
I shoot RAW + jpeg Fine. This is the sooc jpeg resized for the forum.
And after editing, this is the end result. This section is raised up from the hood. The biggest challenge was redrawing (redefining) those raised edges since I only edit with a mouse. I imagine using a tablet with a pen might have been more precise. The woman who organized the car show is going to create a book with the images. At least what I did should look okay. This image was one of the more difficult ones to edit. I decided not to do anything to the emblem itself. There just isn't enough to work with for cloning, and I really didn't want to spend any additional time working on this one image. I'm not getting paid. This event was held at my church, and I always try to help out when I can.
Hopefully the images I took from further back won't take as much time.
When I photographed this car, the owner asked if I could make it look good. This one image took me over 2 hours yesterday. What I did isn't perfect, but since I'm using a mouse, I did what I could.
I shoot RAW + jpeg Fine. This is the sooc jpeg resized for the forum.
And after editing, this is the end result. This section is raised up from the hood. The biggest challenge was redrawing (redefining) those raised edges since I only edit with a mouse. I imagine using a tablet with a pen might have been more precise. The woman who organized the car show is going to create a book with the images. At least what I did should look okay. This image was one of the more difficult ones to edit. I decided not to do anything to the emblem itself. There just isn't enough to work with for cloning, and I really didn't want to spend any additional time working on this one image. I'm not getting paid. This event was held at my church, and I always try to help out when I can.
Hopefully the images I took from further back won't take as much time.
I am still working on the car show photos. There was a Corvette that received much love in its life. Most of the cars had signs stating Please Do Not Touch. The owner crossed out the Do Not and let people sit in his car.
When I photographed this car, the owner asked if I could make it look good. This one image took me over 2 hours yesterday. What I did isn't perfect, but since I'm using a mouse, I did what I could.
I shoot RAW + jpeg Fine. This is the sooc jpeg resized for the forum.
View attachment 297577
And after editing, this is the end result. This section is raised up from the hood. The biggest challenge was redrawing (redefining) those raised edges since I only edit with a mouse. I imagine using a tablet with a pen might have been more precise. The woman who organized the car show is going to create a book with the images. At least what I did should look okay. This image was one of the more difficult ones to edit. I decided not to do anything to the emblem itself. There just isn't enough to work with for cloning, and I really didn't want to spend any additional time working on this one image. I'm not getting paid. This event was held at my church, and I always try to help out when I can.
Hopefully the images I took from further back won't take as much time.
View attachment 297578
Great job Cindy!
This possum came back tonight. I'm going to name it Jack. Jack be nimble, Jack be quick.... It barely escaped up the fence after I let our dogs out. I hadn't looked behind the shed. The light was even darker than it appears. Any shadows were from the security lights that were shining off to one side.
The light was even darker than it appears. Any shadows were from the security lights that were shining off to one side.
This possum came back tonight. I'm going to name it Jack. Jack be nimble, Jack be quick.... It barely escaped up the fence after I let our dogs out. I hadn't looked behind the shed.
View attachment 297850
We had a family of possums living under our storage shed. Haven't seen or heard them in a while. They would always root around at night.