Auto Distortion Control

I've been researching on lenses .. 18-105mm vs 18-140mm vs 18-200mm vs 18-300mm .. leaning more towards the 18-140mm ( as noted by my prior posts around ).

in my reading, there seems to be a lot of discussion regarding 'barrel roll' or distortion regarding these types of lenses .. "Auto Distortion Control" came up a few times as well.

Since the D5200 has the capability of this feature .. is it really worth it to engage it and does it really make that much of a difference when shooting .. even with my other lenses? Or will adjusting the f-stop suffice?

Comments .. Suggestions?

Michael

Well just to correct one thing, it's "barrel distortion" not barrel roll and yeah, it's a very real thing and yes, it's worth turning on the auto-distortion control on your '5200 if you're going to be shooting JPG. Barrel and Pincushion distortion can be easily overlooked when correcting photos but most decent post-processing applications, like Photoshop and Lightroom, can fix it easily. That being said, the less there is to correct out of the camera, the better in my opinion.

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Thanks Fish!!! As Always!

I also heard/read that turning on the "Auto Distortion Control" slows down your fps if you shoot multiple frames. Not that I do that often, but there are times when I have .. looking for that "just so" shot ( IE: on whale watches wait for that breach or that water spout ). Is this one of the down sides of using this feature?

I've only had my D5200 for not quite a year and there is still so MUCH to learn!

BTW .. did buy that 'shutterbug' and you were right .. I Love It!

Michael

MPSanSouci said:

Thanks Fish!!! As Always!

I also heard/read that turning on the "Auto Distortion Control" slows down your fps if you shoot multiple frames. Not that I do that often, but there are times when I have .. looking for that "just so" shot ( IE: on whale watches wait for that breach or that water spout ). Is this one of the down sides of using this feature?

I've only had my D5200 for not quite a year and there is still so MUCH to learn!

BTW .. did buy that 'shutterbug' and you were right .. I Love It!

Michael

Click to expand...

You're welcome.

And, I suppose the issue you mention could be considered a drawback if it's true and I don't know if it is or not, too be honest with you. But then I don't worry about how I might miss the "Perfect Shot" because of this or that or the other thing; I focus on getting good shots and I let the rest go. If I miss a shot because my timing was off, then I work on my timing. I like to keep things simple... I establish my settings and I shoot; focusing on composition above all else.

The ShutterBOSS *is* awesome, yes. It's one of only a very few pieces of gear I consider to be, like a good tripod, absolutely essential. There's really no substitute.

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Do you shoot raw and use software such as Lightroom? If so, experiment with in-camera correction turned on/off. The correction for barrel distortion, pincushion distortion, and chromatic aberration should be relatively easy if the profile for the lens is in the release for your software. The processing software has to resample the entire image. Depends how much of the processing is done in hardware.

With a zoom- the level of distortion can change depending on the focal length in use, but all of this should be on a profile for the lens.

When I shot RAW it is off, Now I shoot JPEG and it is on. Great improvement.

In 'D-5100 For Dummies' it warns that the Auto Distortion Control will slightly crop photos as necessary to achieve results. The author isn't opposed to using it, but suggests working with the function before defaulting to it on every shot. I never given it much thought and have it off. I don't often use angles that are extreme, but it's nice to know that the functionality is there. The Retouch menu in the camera also has a Tool to fix distortion.