Need help with my images - Not coming out sharp!

DonnieZ

Senior Member
I'm hoping I can get some advice here.

I'm working with a D7100 / Sigma 17-50mm f/2.8 EX OS DC combination and I'm having difficulty getting sharp images all the time.

I was beginning to think it might be the lens, but I know better - because occasionally I get a great shot that's tack sharp and I know my skills as a photographer have some room to improve. I seem to miss a lot of shots that aren't tack sharp - I mean, they're acceptably sharp to view on the web shrunk down, but when I get to a decent size view or print size I can tell that eyes are not sharp.

I've done the "dot tune" method on this lens/body combo. It's not exclusive to this lens, but this is my main lens I shoot with.

For example, I have these few images:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/25563675@N05/23251718394/in/album-72157660287858974/

https://www.flickr.com/photos/25563675@N05/23584176510/in/album-72157660287858974/

I'm unsure as to why they're not coming out sharp.

However, I do get a few images that come out pretty good:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/25563675@N05/23771555462/in/album-72157660287858974/

I have a feeling it's because I'm shooting wide open, but in most cases, neither face is sharp.

Help?
 

Scott Murray

Senior Member
I'm hoping I can get some advice here.

I'm working with a D7100 / Sigma 17-50mm f/2.8 EX OS DC combination and I'm having difficulty getting sharp images all the time.

I was beginning to think it might be the lens, but I know better - because occasionally I get a great shot that's tack sharp and I know my skills as a photographer have some room to improve. I seem to miss a lot of shots that aren't tack sharp - I mean, they're acceptably sharp to view on the web shrunk down, but when I get to a decent size view or print size I can tell that eyes are not sharp.

I've done the "dot tune" method on this lens/body combo. It's not exclusive to this lens, but this is my main lens I shoot with.

For example, I have these few images:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/25563675@N05/23251718394/in/album-72157660287858974/

https://www.flickr.com/photos/25563675@N05/23584176510/in/album-72157660287858974/

I'm unsure as to why they're not coming out sharp.

However, I do get a few images that come out pretty good:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/25563675@N05/23771555462/in/album-72157660287858974/

I have a feeling it's because I'm shooting wide open, but in most cases, neither face is sharp.

Help?
F2.8 is the issue, in two of the images I see the grey sweater as in focus nothing else.

The first image is soft maybe because the 1/60 SS ? Maybe the F stop. Who knows.

PS turn off auto ISO if you are using it with flash.
 
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WayneF

Senior Member
I suspect it is handheld camera shake. The last two seem better, but the first one says 44mm at 1/60 second. The old general rule of thumb to help hold camera shake says a shutter speed of 1/focal length, which would imply 1/44 second in that case. But it is a 1.5x cropped sensor, so the rule changes to x1.5 or 1/66 second. It says 1/60 (default minimum), but this is still borderline, considered a minimum, and still implies much conscious attention to hold the $#@# camera still. :)

First one says ISO 2500 and "flash fired". Speedlight flashes help speed a lot, if at low ISO.

But Auto ISO meters for the ambient (newest models vary if with a hot shoe flash), and boosts ISO for the ambient, and the internal flash merely becomes fill level then. Plus the flash is white, but incandescent ambient is surely orange. Mixing the light is a big problem.


Faster shutter speed could help.
Careful "hold it steady" attention could help.
A tripod to hold the camera could help.

The most help of all would be, instead of high ISO and the tiny built in direct flash, to get a bigger speed light flash and use bounce flash at maybe only ISO 400 and f/5.6. Better lighting (gradient tones on faces instead of flat light), better ISO, better aperture, better WB color, and more motion stopping ability, etc. Better all around. Sufficient light is always a good thing.

In Auto mode, you have very little choice about anything. Auto ISO will be on.

Auto or P modes surely always set the lens wide open indoors, but you can always set aperture directly in A or M modes. M mode works really well with indoor flash. A mode indoors will always use the 1/60 default minimum shutter speed, but you can set it directly in M mode.

Speedlights are speedlights because their light is much faster than the shutter speed can be. IF it had been a hot shoe flash, then the recent D7200 would have limited Auto ISO to only 2 stops of increase with flash (only to ISO 400), and you would have been way ahead. But using Bounce flash too can add a tremendous amount of "better".

You would still need camera A or M mode to get aperture off of wide open indoors.

The flash need not be the most expensive model. The signature link below has reviews of these two, for $50 or $80 from Amazon:

Amazon.com : Neewer VK750 II i-TTL Speedlite Flash with LCD Display for Nikon D7100 D7000 D5200 D5100 D5000 D3000 D3100 D300 D300S D700 D600 D90 D80 D70 D70S D60 D50 and All Other Nikon DSLR Cameras : On Camera Shoe Mount Flashes : Camera & Photo

Amazon.com : Yongnuo YN-565EX ETTL Speedlite Flash for Nikon (Discontinued by Manufacturer) : On Camera Shoe Mount Flashes : Camera & Photo
 
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Horoscope Fish

Senior Member
I'm hoping I can get some advice here...
Yup... I'd say the first thing you need to do is increase the shutter speed. The old rule of thumb is the Reciprocal Rule which simply means we use the focal length to get the MINIMUM shutter speed, but for DX cameras we need to use 1.5x the focal length. I prefer to double it, personally, when using a DX body but that's me. The over-arching idea here is keeping your shutter speed high enough, based on the focal length of the lens you're using, to eliminate camera motion.

For instance, if you're shooting at 35mm on a DX body, your minimum shutter speed should be about 1/60 (35 * 1.5). I would prefer to be shooting at 1/125 in that instance, but again, that's just me. If shooting at 135mm, the Reciprocal Rule tells us the minimum shutter speed should be 1/200, or higher; maybe 1/250 just to be on the safe side.
 

Scott Murray

Senior Member
Sharp areas.

Screen Shot 2015-12-22 at 4.49.10 AM.jpgScreen Shot 2015-12-22 at 4.49.35 AM.jpg

Not sharp anywhere really (1st image). Maybe sharp edge hair.

Screen Shot 2015-12-22 at 4.49.54 AM.jpg
 

DonnieZ

Senior Member
The most help of all would be, instead of high ISO and the tiny built in direct flash, to get a bigger speed light flash and use bounce flash at maybe only ISO 400 and f/5.6. Better lighting, better ISO, better aperture, better WB color, and more motion stopping ability, etc. Better all around. Sufficient light is always a good thing.

Forgot to include that I was using my SB-600 for these shots - had it pointed at the ceiling and slightly backwards. It gave a nice soft light that way rather than harsh shadows behind the subject.

I had the max ISO set at 2500 - It's possible I had it set at ISO2500, not auto/max 2500. I'm slowly trying to work more manual settings in to my shooting and it seems there's much more to forget to check before taking the picture.

Horoscope Fish said:
Yup... I'd say the first thing you need to do is increase the shutter speed. The old rule of thumb is the Reciprocal Rule which simply means we use the focal length to get the MINIMUM shutter speed, but for DX cameras we need to use 1.5x the focal length. I prefer to double it, personally, when using a DX body but that's me. The over-arching idea here is keeping your shutter speed high enough, based on the focal length of the lens you're using, to eliminate camera motion.


I'm somewhat familiar with the reciprocal rule, however I thought that the OS on the lens would allow me to shoot a few stops lower handheld and still get fairly sharp images - the whole point of OS. Maybe the OS on the Sigma 17-50 isn't the best. I generally shoot with OS on when I have the camera off tripod. 1/60 doesn't seem unreasonable given the OS - or maybe I'm asking too much from the OS?
 

Horoscope Fish

Senior Member
I'm somewhat familiar with the reciprocal rule, however I thought that the OS on the lens would allow me to shoot a few stops lower handheld and still get fairly sharp images - the whole point of OS. Maybe the OS on the Sigma 17-50 isn't the best. I generally shoot with OS on when I have the camera off tripod. 1/60 doesn't seem unreasonable given the OS - or maybe I'm asking too much from the OS?
I prefer not to use VR/OS unless I really think it's needed and, when I do feel it's needed, I turn it on only as long as required. If I can acceptably adjust one leg of the exposure triangle to get a high enough shutter speed, that is definitely my preference. VR/OS is not something you simply turn on and forget about in my experience and I've found it can cause me about as many issues as it solves if I don't use it correctly.

In short, I would suggest you experiment with your gear to find out what works, too what extent it works and what doesn't work.
 

WayneF

Senior Member
Forgot to include that I was using my SB-600 for these shots - had it pointed at the ceiling and slightly backwards. It gave a nice soft light that way rather than harsh shadows behind the subject.

I had the max ISO set at 2500 - It's possible I had it set at ISO2500, not auto/max 2500. I'm slowly trying to work more manual settings in to my shooting and it seems there's much more to forget to check before taking the picture.

So much ISO is not necessary with the larger flash. A direct flash exposes the subject and the room behind is generally left dark. But if bounced up, then the flash tends to better fill the whole room (a regular size room anyway).

You must have set the ISO 2500 as Minimum. The Exif says Auto exposure mode, so it would have been Auto ISO on, and the recent models (D7200) should have limited Auto ISO to 2 stops increase from minimum. But I suppose we can still set the Minimum to be high. If you had left minimum at 100, then Auto ISO would have stopped increasing at ISO 400 (if with a hot shoe flash). There is good reason for that. :) Using flash instead.

So you are using bounce, great. There is a little shadow under chins, I should have noticed, but 1) ISO 2500 really increases the ambient exposure, and 2) the lack of shadow gradients on the faces suggests considerable forward fill. Which does cause good forward catchlights in eyes, which is good (some forward fill is good), but I was looking at the highlights on the faces, which suggest a bit too much forward? Maybe just ISO, or maybe the bounce card, or maybe the back wall was reflecting a lot of it... Anyway, that becomes arbitrary, about lighting, subject to personal opinions.


I'm somewhat familiar with the reciprocal rule, however I thought that the OS on the lens would allow me to shoot a few stops lower handheld and still get fairly sharp images - the whole point of OS. Maybe the OS on the Sigma 17-50 isn't the best. I generally shoot with OS on when I have the camera off tripod. 1/60 doesn't seem unreasonable given the OS - or maybe I'm asking too much from the OS?


1/60 is MINUMUM based on 1.5x cropped focal length at 44mm. Not optimum, but MINIMUM. The speedlight would help a lot, except ISO 2500 lets the ambient butt in. Also, Auto, A or P modes will always set 1/60 second MINIMUM with flash (or rather, it is the default Minimum in the E2 menu). Indoors with flash (dim where we need flash), automation will always set a wide open lens at 1/60 second. We can choose other settings.

I believe you can set the D7200 Auto ISO minimum shutter speed to a value called Auto, which should use the 1/focal length rule as minimum (in auto modes). But indoors, that minimum will always be the value used for all pictures activating Auto ISO. Except the E2 menu minimum can always override if flash in A, P, or Auto.


One time, try a similar test, camera M mode (indoors, where ambient exposure is far down, so does not matter), with ISO 400, f/5.6, and 1/200 second shutter speed. This does not affect the flash, the flash does what the TTL camera meters it needs to do at the settings discovered to be in effect. The speedlight stops the motion, the 1/200 second merely keeps the ambient out, which keeps the orange incandescent out (rear walls in room). 1/60 second in camera A mode would allow a bit of the orange in, giving it a bit more warm color, which some do like. But keeping ISO lower reduces risk of the metered ambient being able to blur motion that the speedlight would have stopped.
 
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DonnieZ

Senior Member
One time, try a similar test, camera M mode (indoors, where ambient exposure is far down, so does not matter), with ISO 400, f/5.6, and 1/200 second shutter speed.

Took a few shots over the holiday and gave these settings a shot, save for I went with 1/100 vs 1/200 - bounced the flash off of the ceiling with the little built-in diffuser plate over the flashbulb.

The images came out great - Nice, even lighting and such. For the most part unless the subject was really close the flash, these are some of the best images I've taken with the flash indoors outside of using "Auto" (and even better than some inside.)

I'll post a few samples once I get them off the camera in hopes that I can get some feedback on them vs. the shots I posted prior.

Thanks for the advice to all!
 

WayneF

Senior Member
Took a few shots over the holiday and gave these settings a shot, save for I went with 1/100 vs 1/200 - bounced the flash off of the ceiling with the little built-in diffuser plate over the flashbulb.

The images came out great - Nice, even lighting and such. For the most part unless the subject was really close the flash, these are some of the best images I've taken with the flash indoors outside of using "Auto" (and even better than some inside.)

I'll post a few samples once I get them off the camera in hopes that I can get some feedback on them vs. the shots I posted prior.

Thanks for the advice to all!


Bounce flash is hard to beat, and easy to do. You don't need or want the flip down diffuser plate for bounce. It will only just cost substantial flash power, and we can't spare too much power for bounce. :) The flip down diffuser just gives a wider angle of flash, but the longer bounce path, up and back from the ceiling, already makes it wider.

You might instead want the pull out bounce card for bounce, to give a small frontal direct flash fill, or more specifically, to add some catch lights in the eyes to make the eyes look alive, instead of dark and lifeless.
 
I believe you can set the D7200 Auto ISO minimum shutter speed to a value called Auto, which should use the 1/focal length rule as minimum (in auto modes). But indoors, that minimum will always be the value used for all pictures activating Auto ISO. Except the E2 menu minimum can always override if flash in A, P, or Auto.

Did a lot of testing on this with my D7100 and the auto in the mid position will actually set it t 1.5/focal length rule as minimum. It actually takes into account the effective focal length since it is a DX body. This is a really nice feature in these cameras. The D7000 does not have the auto shutter speed feature but the D7100 and D7200 do. My new D750 has the feature and it does use the 1/focal length rule as minimum since it is FX
 
Yup... I'd say the first thing you need to do is increase the shutter speed. The old rule of thumb is the Reciprocal Rule which simply means we use the focal length to get the MINIMUM shutter speed, but for DX cameras we need to use 1.5x the focal length. I prefer to double it, personally, when using a DX body but that's me. The over-arching idea here is keeping your shutter speed high enough, based on the focal length of the lens you're using, to eliminate camera motion.

For instance, if you're shooting at 35mm on a DX body, your minimum shutter speed should be about 1/60 (35 * 1.5). I would prefer to be shooting at 1/125 in that instance, but again, that's just me. If shooting at 135mm, the Reciprocal Rule tells us the minimum shutter speed should be 1/200, or higher; maybe 1/250 just to be on the safe side.


If you use the Auto minimum shutter speed feature in Auto ISP then you can move the slider up to one notch over the mid point and it will set this faster shutter speed. Again, this is a great feature that you can set to suit your shooting style. Try it, you will like it. Also it you really want to control your ISO more you can set the minimum and maximum to very close to the same and get the minimum shutter speed feature. I often set mine to ISO 100 and the maximum at 200 ISO
 

voxmagna

Senior Member
I realize this in an older thread but I also had similar issues since getting my D750. I cut my teeth assessing HD TV high quality images and I'm climatized to what a sharp image should look like. But my D750 has always puzzled me over its apparent lack of sharpness and I've seen similar questions asked on other forums . All the contributions to this thread are relevant and I've been through most of them. But when I take shots and hit the 'OK' button on preview to zoom, I expect to see better sharpness from a Nikon camera and prime lens. I've tried near, far, tripod, fast shutter, several apertures and ISOs and the in camera previews all have the same foggy sharpness when zoomed in to check focus.

I think I have now solved my 'problem'. When I bring RAW images into post and apply what seems like a lot of sharpness, I start to see image sharpness I would have expected. I think this is Nikons correct conservative approach, as long as you realize you need to add a lot of sharpness compensation (60-70 in PS). I know the saved image preview is in-camera corrected JPEG and I have my shooting option set for JPEG +FINE and RAW because on the road it is useful to have JPEGs. I don't use the special picture control settings but hadn't realized the D750 defaults to FLAT scene mode with no additional sharpness applied. The lcd screen has limited resolution so they must downsample the saved JPEG. When you start from a JPEG fine image there will be an overall look of softness because the amount of in-camera correction is conservatively limited for post processing JPEGS and not optimized for the LCD screen. Since I went into the photo and shooting menu and set picture control FLAT, sharpening 5, clarity +1, I'm now seeing 'sharper' previewed images. My test pictures were woodlands, grass and trees against a neutral sky. It never occured to me that I should fix the monitor preview. I read that picture control settings affect saved JPEGs but I'm not so worried about that as RAW is my post editing format. Applying picture controls to Movie mode needs to be tested and thought through but sharpening in the camera would reduce rendering load in movie editing. lcd monitors should not have corrections applied unless there is good reason, but I think I prefer to see more perceived sharpness similar to what I would apply in post on a RAW image.
 
Since I went into the photo and shooting menu and set picture control FLAT, sharpening 5, clarity +1, I'm now seeing 'sharper' previewed images.

You can actually up that to about +7 with good results for your JPEG

It took me a while to get my D750 to look as sharp as I thought it should coming from my D7100DX camera. What I have found is that it really likes a slightly faster shutter speed for one thing. And more recently I have noticed that my D750 tends to shoot a little lighter than I think it should so I shoot at -1/2 stop to start with on everything. In post (I only shoot RAW all the time) I have noticed the sharpness really looks a lot better if I increase the contrast just a little. I think the D750 tends to be a little flat. Once I learned what it likes my shooting has looked a lot better, at least to me it has.

04-02-16_0036-2_dxo-edit-edit_nikon_d750_55_mm_20.0_sec_at_f_-_16_iso_100.jpg
 

voxmagna

Senior Member
Thanks, I think it's Nikon being 'conservative' by not adding in too much camera processing which is fine when you can get it good in post. However, it can give a bad impression if you make comparisons with other cameras adding in more sharpness (which you can't remove).

I hate highlight clipping but accept there isn't the latitude yet from sensors to avoid it completely. Using the RGB highlight screen as a check I find -0.3 EV correction works for me, but I am looking at the JPEG conversion and when the 14 bit RAW image is in post, the highlights are not always clipped because you can drop the luminance curve at the top, bring it up at the bottom and still see detail.
 
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