Pixels..? blur..?

[sbug_adam]

So I recently did some studio work and here are some of the results.. my concern is with the blur. is it normal to have this much blur when blown up 100%? I was shooting at full rez with a 20D. Shutter was fast, 1/125 at about F-13. Is this just how photos are always going to be when I shoot? I have the focusing centered and I focus directly on her face. here are two versions of it.



400x600. you cant see blur or anything.. no editing has been done!

and then you have this, when you zoom to 100 it looks blurry in the face.. is this normal?



know what i mean?

Adam

[mattchow]

er. trying to interpret the cameranese. are you on the center AF point, pre focus then re-composing?

also 1/125 isnt fast enough sometimes, camera shake, subject shake etc all come into play.

[dminton]

Matt is absotivley right on the money. 1/125 is the problemo.

[evil4blue]

Although increasing the shutter speed won't hurt, I can't imagine that 1/125 would cause that much motion blur. If the studio was kinda dark, 1/125 wouldn't have allowed enough ambient light to affect the sharpness of the shot. Based on his EXIF info, the shot was at 50mm + 1.6x crop =1/80s as the minimum shutter for handholding. Adam is well enough above that.

Personally, I would check my focus location first (remember the don't focus/recompose thread, this could be a perfect example of why you shouldn't do it). Also, the EXIF says you shot this at f/16 not f/13, you may be getting some light defraction at f/ 16 which could lead to some softness (less likely, but could be).

Any way, it's all pretty easy to test. Set a higher shutter, check your focus spot, and reduce your light and shoot at f/8ish. See if any of this helps.

[DEMDeepEllumMusic]

Look at her hair, that will give you a better judgement if blurred or not.
Were you hand holding or using a tripod with cable release?
f16 should give you a decent depth of field in focus.
What lense were you using?

[jeffkohn]

I think camera shake or motion blur is unlikely, particulalry when shooting with strobes where your "effective" exposure is only as long as the flash duration (assuming not much ambient light which at that aperture I think is safe to assume). At f/16 it's probably diffraction more than anything else, though depending on the lens you may also just be seeing that the 20d is better than your glass.

I can't imagine why you would need to shoot at f/16; even at f/8 ambient light should be pretty much out of the equation unless it was very bright in there. And you'd still have plenty of DOF at f/8, not to mention being in the lense's likely sweet-spot.

[bullsparade]

I am still curious about the focus point. My expereince with my 50mm has been that the depth of field is very slim even at higher fstops I am still looking at inches making the difference between tack sharp and soft.

Since you cropped and showed a picture of her nose, was the nose your focus point? I generally focus on eyes but thats me.

[Gordon]

They look exceedingly soft. It does look like the camera just wasn't focused - though it also looks pretty dark/ underlit.

[Nevyn]

Was this a RAW capture or jpg?
If it's RAW, then it may just need some USM.

[Gordon]

Originally Posted by Nevyn

Was this a RAW capture or jpg?
If it's RAW, then it may just need some USM.

It shouldn't be that soft, even if it is an unsharpened RAW file.

[jeffkohn]

Even at 5 feet (and I'm guessing subject distance was at least that much), you've got almost 2 feet of DOF at f/16 for 50mm; for this to be a focus/DOF issue you'd have to be way off in focusing.

[evil4blue]

Originally Posted by jeffkohn

Even at 5 feet (and I'm guessing subject distance was at least that much), you've got almost 2 feet of DOF at f/16 for 50mm; for this to be a focus/DOF issue you'd have to be way off in focusing.

I agree Jeff, there has to be some other issue. I'm now leaning more towards defraction. I noticed this with my old tamron 28-75. At f/22 and higher the image would get noticeable softer. Usable, but not what I know the lens was capable of.

[Gordon]

I honestly doubt it is defraction either - certainly not at f13 or f16. You should be about at the sweet spot for the lens.

Put the camera on a tripod, aim at something stationary. Focus and shoot. If the picture is still soft, then it is either a lens or a camera issue. If the picture is sharp then it is user error, one way or another - either in the camera holding/movement or focusing or the subject moved.

Good way to narrow down the problem.

I'm tending towards the user error answer though from what little I've seen.

E.g., this was handheld, at 1/90s at f4- lens mostly wide open (where it is soft and with shallow DoF). It is also unsharpened, just resized with bicubic sharper.
I'd expect to see similarly good shots from most current DSLRs

http://www.pbase.com/gordonmcgregor/...22919/original

[sbug_adam]

Originally Posted by evil4blue

Although increasing the shutter speed won't hurt, I can't imagine that 1/125 would cause that much motion blur. If the studio was kinda dark, 1/125 wouldn't have allowed enough ambient light to affect the sharpness of the shot. Based on his EXIF info, the shot was at 50mm + 1.6x crop =1/80s as the minimum shutter for handholding. Adam is well enough above that.

Personally, I would check my focus location first (remember the don't focus/recompose thread, this could be a perfect example of why you shouldn't do it). Also, the EXIF says you shot this at f/16 not f/13, you may be getting some light defraction at f/ 16 which could lead to some softness (less likely, but could be).

Any way, it's all pretty easy to test. Set a higher shutter, check your focus spot, and reduce your light and shoot at f/8ish. See if any of this helps.

I dont think 1/125 can cause that much problem either.. Thats what I've been told to use since F-stop determines the amount of light when it comes to strobe.

My focus location was her face.. nothing specific on her face, just her face. LOL so I dont think the difference between her nose and rest of her face would be an issue here... as someone mentioned.

But I would have to say, the room was a tiny bit too dark. maybe i should UP my modeling lights a bit more to get a better focus on her face.

but evil, what i do, since my focusing point is in the center is focus on her face, then without taking my finger off the shutter, i recompose like you said.. I'll try to avoid that next time!

adam

[Gordon]

It didn't look like much of anything was really in focus on that shot - if you are shooting handheld, are you swaying/ moving closer/ further away before shooting ?