Focus question

jrs146

Senior Member
Hi all,
I've taken the plunge into trying to shoot in manual mode. I'm a beginner so this is a big step for me. I've noticed that sometimes my focus seems to be slightly off with faces. I was actually having a harder time in auto mode and it seems to have gotten better yet not perfect. I've played around with the various auto focus settings but I can't seem to get it just right. My issues is normally when shooting pics of my kids. Here is one for example. The face looks good, but not great. Any advice would be much appreciated!

D71_8579.jpg
 

Horoscope Fish

Senior Member
Hi all,
I've taken the plunge into trying to shoot in manual mode. I'm a beginner so this is a big step for me. I've noticed that sometimes my focus seems to be slightly off with faces. I was actually having a harder time in auto mode and it seems to have gotten better yet not perfect. I've played around with the various auto focus settings but I can't seem to get it just right. My issues is normally when shooting pics of my kids. Here is one for example. The face looks good, but not great. Any advice would be much appreciated!
Aperture for this shot was f/5.3, shutter speed was 1/250 and the ISO was arguably a tiny bit on the high side at 1400, but that's a trifle. What I noticed right away is that nothing, at least nothing to my eye, appears to be sharp. That leads me to believe the problem is probably camera shake. A few things to help combat this would be keeping your elbows tucked in tight while pressing the shutter, pressing the shutter smoooothly and using Quiet Shutter mode (my default shooting mode for this very reason).

I ran your shot through the "Shake Reduction" filter in Photoshop was able to get decent results without any manual tweaking. That's not exactly concrete proof the soft is shot due to camera shake but I think it bolsters the theory.
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Your Original:
attachment.jpg


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After Shake Reduction (and a contrast adjustment):
attachment-shake reduction.jpg


.....
 

lokatz

Senior Member
Hi there, Some info about camera and lens might help. In your picture, it is hard to tell the sharpness of the face, but parts of the jacket seem to be on the same plane and appear to be reasonably sharp, so not sure sharpness is off. I'd say the primary issue here is that part of the face is too bright and nearly washed out. Either shoot the whole picture a little darker (for instance by setting the exposure compensation to -1 or so), or, if your camera supports it, try shooting in HDR mode, in which the camera automatically does a better job brightening the darker parts and darkening the brightest parts of the shot. The latter affects only JPEGs and makes no difference if you shoot RAW, but you also have the option to make similar adjustments manually in an image editing program.
 

jrs146

Senior Member
Aperture for this shot was f/5.3, shutter speed was 1/250 and the ISO was arguably a tiny bit on the high side at 1400, but that's a trifle. What I noticed right away is that nothing, at least nothing to my eye, appears to be sharp. That leads me to believe the problem is probably camera shake. A few things to help combat this would be keeping your elbows tucked in tight while pressing the shutter, pressing the shutter smoooothly and using Quiet Shutter mode (my default shooting mode for this very reason).

I ran your shot through the "Shake Reduction" filter in Photoshop was able to get decent results without any manual tweaking. That's not exactly concrete proof the soft is shot due to camera shake but I think it bolsters the theory.
.....
.....
Your Original:
View attachment 267617

.....
After Shake Reduction (and a contrast adjustment):
View attachment 267618

.....

Thanks for the advice. I hadn't thought of camera shake as being the issue. It certainly could have been. I seem to have this problem a lot as my pics don't seem to be as focused as I'd like. The sharpening tool did seem to make an improvement.

Hi there, Some info about camera and lens might help. In your picture, it is hard to tell the sharpness of the face, but parts of the jacket seem to be on the same plane and appear to be reasonably sharp, so not sure sharpness is off. I'd say the primary issue here is that part of the face is too bright and nearly washed out. Either shoot the whole picture a little darker (for instance by setting the exposure compensation to -1 or so), or, if your camera supports it, try shooting in HDR mode, in which the camera automatically does a better job brightening the darker parts and darkening the brightest parts of the shot. The latter affects only JPEGs and makes no difference if you shoot RAW, but you also have the option to make similar adjustments manually in an image editing program.

I shot with my D7100 using my NIKKOR 18-200 lens. I actually had it stepped up +.7 EV as I thought it seemed a bit underexposed in previous pics. Maybe that was a big part of the problem to begin with. If I'm looking at my histogram to determine if my exposure is good what should I be looking for?
 

Horoscope Fish

Senior Member
Thanks for the advice. I hadn't thought of camera shake as being the issue. It certainly could have been. I seem to have this problem a lot as my pics don't seem to be as focused as I'd like. The sharpening tool did seem to make an improvement.
I just want to point out that Shake Reduction is different from Sharpening.

Also, the exposure of the shot is fine. It could be tweaked to personal taste's but there's nothing technically wrong with the exposure of the shot you posted. The histogram shows full dynamic range with no blown out highlights or crushed shadows; neither in the Luminance values nor in the discrete color-channels.
 

jrs146

Senior Member
I just want to point out that Shake Reduction is different from Sharpening.

Also, the exposure of the shot is fine. It could be tweaked to personal taste's but there's nothing technically wrong with the exposure of the shot you posted. The histogram shows full dynamic range with no blown out highlights or crushed shadows; neither in the Luminance values nor in the discrete color-channels.

Here's another from the same time. This appears to be sharper but still not perfect.

285497a7f191023dbf6a105dd993e4ac.jpg



6ad3d46cafacc90f2d60303418098a8b.jpg



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Horoscope Fish

Senior Member
Here's another from the same time. This appears to be sharper but still not perfect.

285497a7f191023dbf6a105dd993e4ac.jpg
Yes, that's much better; but I also think it's a bit soft. This could be a lens issue, possibly a Front/Back Focus issue.

Let me ask... Do you normally shoot in JPG, or do you shoot raw and process your shots? If you shoot JPG primarily, have you adjusted the Sharpness setting in the Picture Control menu for your D7100? This setting will ONLY affect your JPG photos, so if you shoot in raw there's not point in making the adjustment. If you do shoot in JPG primarily, and you haven't adjusted this setting, I strongly suggest you do so. It will have a big impact on the overall sharpness of your shots right out of the camera.
 

jrs146

Senior Member
Yes, that's much better; but I also think it's a bit soft. This could be a lens issue, possibly a Front/Back Focus issue.

Let me ask... Do you normally shoot in JPG, or do you shoot raw and process your shots? If you shoot JPG primarily, have you adjusted the Sharpness setting in the Picture Control menu for your D7100? This setting will ONLY affect your JPG photos, so if you shoot in raw there's not point in making the adjustment. If you do shoot in JPG primarily, and you haven't adjusted this setting, I strongly suggest you do so. It will have a big impact on the overall sharpness of your shots right out of the camera.

This specific image is a JPG. I started using the setting where it will save in RAW & JPG at the same time, so I have a NEF file of these images. But i just realized I can't open the NEF files using Adobe Photoshop CS5 which is what I normally use. I'll have to either download the Nikon software or upgrade to a newer Photoshop I guess. I believe my sharpness setting is set to the default middle setting. Perhaps I can adjust it upward and see if that helps.
 

Horoscope Fish

Senior Member
This specific image is a JPG. I started using the setting where it will save in RAW & JPG at the same time, so I have a NEF file of these images. But i just realized I can't open the NEF files using Adobe Photoshop CS5 which is what I normally use. I'll have to either download the Nikon software or upgrade to a newer Photoshop I guess.
Well if you want to process raw files, yes; that's correct.

.....
I believe my sharpness setting is set to the default middle setting. Perhaps I can adjust it upward and see if that helps.
If you haven't adjusted the Sharpness setting, it's sitting on the abnormally low setting of around 2 or 3. I suggest using 7. Some people max it out to 9 but I don't think that's required, nor do I think it's optimal. Still, try it if you want, you can always go back and change the setting to whatever you want at any time. I would try adjusting this setting first since it's completely un-doable and may get you where you want to be with your shots -- easy-peasy, lemon squeezy -- and I'm all about the easy fix.

If this doesn't bring things up to snuff, I think you're next step would be putting the camera and lens on a tripod and doing some test shots using similar settings. The question then becomes, "Do *those* shots look soft?" If not I think you have to assume it's your technique that's causing the softeness. If they are still soft, then I think you're looking at needing to test the lens for front/back focus.

Your D7100 supports Auto-focus Fine Tuning, so that's good; but testing for and correcting front/back focus is kind of a PITA in my opinion, so I'm hoping you can avoid that. Still, the Nikon 18-200mm is capable of delivering much sharper shots than what you're posting here, so I'm thinking something, somewhere, is off. It could be you, it could be the lens, it could be a camera setting, it could be a combination of factors.
 

lokatz

Senior Member
There is no EXIF data on the last two images, but the first one was shot at 1/250s at a focal length of 95. That should be fast enough to produce a sharp shot. Camera shake cannot be excluded, but if most similar shots come out soft, IMHO it is unlikely to be the primary issue.

See this link for an idea how to detect front or back focus. Alternatively, you can conduct this simple test: take a series of shots of something, say, 10 in a row. Next, set AF fine-tune (in the set-up menu of your camera) to +10 and shoot the same series again, now compensated a bit for front focus. Compare the two and see whether the second series is sharper on average. If it is worse, then try the same thing with a -10 setting to compensate for some back focus. Amazon sells this simple tool if you'd like to measure and adjust more precisely.
 

jrs146

Senior Member
Well if you want to process raw files, yes; that's correct.

.....

If you haven't adjusted the Sharpness setting, it's sitting on the abnormally low setting of around 2 or 3. I suggest using 7. Some people max it out to 9 but I don't think that's required, nor do I think it's optimal. Still, try it if you want, you can always go back and change the setting to whatever you want at any time. I would try adjusting this setting first since it's completely un-doable and may get you where you want to be with your shots -- easy-peasy, lemon squeezy -- and I'm all about the easy fix.

If this doesn't bring things up to snuff, I think you're next step would be putting the camera and lens on a tripod and doing some test shots using similar settings. The question then becomes, "Do *those* shots look soft?" If not I think you have to assume it's your technique that's causing the softeness. If they are still soft, then I think you're looking at needing to test the lens for front/back focus.

Your D7100 supports Auto-focus Fine Tuning, so that's good; but testing for and correcting front/back focus is kind of a PITA in my opinion, so I'm hoping you can avoid that. Still, the Nikon 18-200mm is capable of delivering much sharper shots than what you're posting here, so I'm thinking something, somewhere, is off. It could be you, it could be the lens, it could be a camera setting, it could be a combination of factors.

My gut says it's the camera. Perhaps the auto-focus fine tuning will help. I'm looking back over pictures I've taken with my 18-200 and my 35mm and most of them look soft. So that leads me to believe it's the camera. Also, I used to own a D5100 until I broke it lol. Since getting the 7100 I've noticed that the pictures seem to be more soft compared to the 5100 with the SAME lenses. I've always chalked it up to being that the 7100 is a more complicated camera and I'm not doing something right. I'm starting to wonder that although that may be part of it, perhaps there is more to it.

There is no EXIF data on the last two images, but the first one was shot at 1/250s at a focal length of 95. That should be fast enough to produce a sharp shot. Camera shake cannot be excluded, but if most similar shots come out soft, IMHO it is unlikely to be the primary issue.

See this link for an idea how to detect front or back focus. Alternatively, you can conduct this simple test: take a series of shots of something, say, 10 in a row. Next, set AF fine-tune (in the set-up menu of your camera) to +10 and shoot the same series again, now compensated a bit for front focus. Compare the two and see whether the second series is sharper on average. If it is worse, then try the same thing with a -10 setting to compensate for some back focus. Amazon sells this simple tool if you'd like to measure and adjust more precisely.

Thanks for the advice. I'll give this a try and see where I land. This seems like some serious homework!
 

Horoscope Fish

Senior Member
My gut says it's the camera. Perhaps the auto-focus fine tuning will help. I'm looking back over pictures I've taken with my 18-200 and my 35mm and most of them look soft. So that leads me to believe it's the camera. Also, I used to own a D5100 until I broke it lol. Since getting the 7100 I've noticed that the pictures seem to be more soft compared to the 5100 with the SAME lenses. I've always chalked it up to being that the 7100 is a more complicated camera and I'm not doing something right. I'm starting to wonder that although that may be part of it, perhaps there is more to it.
Bear in mind the D7100 has a pixel density ~50% greater than the D5100; it demands good, consistent technique.

I discovered this for myself when I moved to the D7100 from a D5100.
 

jrs146

Senior Member
So I put the D7100 on a tripod and shot some pics of a flower. I used AF-S with one sensor focus right in the middle of the flower. I still seem to get pics that are not entirely sharp. My sharpness setting is set on 7. I tried to play around with the AF fine tuning but wasn't really having much luck with that too. I'll post some pics when I can transfer them to my computer. I'll also try my other lens and see if I have any better results. Unfortunately it seems that most of my pics just aren't that great for whatever reason it is.


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Horoscope Fish

Senior Member
So I put the D7100 on a tripod and shot some pics of a flower. I used AF-S with one sensor focus right in the middle of the flower. I still seem to get pics that are not entirely sharp. My sharpness setting is set on 7. I tried to play around with the AF fine tuning but wasn't really having much luck with that too. I'll post some pics when I can transfer them to my computer. I'll also try my other lens and see if I have any better results. Unfortunately it seems that most of my pics just aren't that great for whatever reason it is.
Interesting... Well I'll be curious to see your shots. Hopefully we can pin down a solution.
 

jrs146

Senior Member
I downloaded these directly to my phone so it may not have the data but they were all shot with a tripod.

66f893f9f319a20852b8771c50331d80.jpg


9c95127545bfcd0dfa805b46fbce4695.jpg


To compare. These were taken with my 35mm 1.8

178ca706ebd500916563a6b672eb546e.jpg


05dd83d8296e6bc843e3412a7f421769.jpg


7f71fa449382e84d9e78a6e39d89d0a1.jpg





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Horoscope Fish

Senior Member
I downloaded these directly to my phone so it may not have the data but they were all shot with a tripod.

To compare. These were taken with my 35mm 1.8
I can't really do any serious comparison of sharpness when looking at such small files but I will tell you all of these shots look soft to me when viewed at 100%. I'm curious, though, if Tapatalk compress images prior to uploading? I don't use it so I don't know but your uploads seem small even for JPG's that are 1,000 pixels on the long edge and I'm wondering if that's possibly part of the problem. I would expect to see compression artifacting before softness but who knows these days. My point here being; if you want to properly judge sharpness I really think you need to be looking at full-resolution images on your computer, straight out of the camera.

EXIF data is also crucial since it tells us things like aperture and shutter speed used in relation to focal length, which is really important to know.
 

jrs146

Senior Member
I agree. I'll repost when I have a chance to download the full images. Thanks for the help!


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hark

Administrator
Staff member
Super Mod
Contributor
I'm following along reading the comments and suggestions and am pretty surprised with the overall softness. The D7100 lacks a low pass filter which makes it a little sharper to start with. Did you buy the body new, pre-owned, or refurbished?

By the way, what an adorable kid!
 

jrs146

Senior Member
I'm following along reading the comments and suggestions and am pretty surprised with the overall softness. The D7100 lacks a low pass filter which makes it a little sharper to start with. Did you buy the body new, pre-owned, or refurbished?

By the way, what an adorable kid!

I bought it refurbished from Adorama. I'm way out of the warranty period so that's not an option to return. I've just kind of always assumed that I wasn't using the camera properly which still may be the case. But looking back I've always been surprised how soft the photos looked compared to my 5100 or even my previous 3100.

Here's my other kiddo. This was also the D7100 with 35mm 1.8. I did have a SB700 fire for this shot.

504cfffaed8e3285bfbcf6b896656cd1.jpg



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