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Getting it Sharp

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Getting it Sharp

  • Eavesdropper
    Participant

    I was out this afternoon and took some shots at a local waterfall. Cloud and darkness of the glen plus ND filter enabled a 3 second shot to slow the motion. ISO 100, f13, VR off, tripod used. Grand, until I came home and looked. Still grand until I zoomed in and found that the detail disappeared and things got fuzzy. Not as sharp as I would like. I read about mirror lockup being helpful but my camera says it is not available in that mode (manual). Any thoughts on improving sharpness? Still very much a learner.

    miki g
    Participant

    Hi Eavesdropper.
    Did you use a cable release or self timer? The slightest movement of the camera will effect the sharpness. Your tripod will also need to be very stable & vibration kept to a minimum. I don’t know if f/13 is the best aperture to use to get the best sharpness from your lens. You might need to experiment to find the aperture that will give the best results. Also the lighting might lack contrast & give a soft appearance to your shots.

    jodal1975
    Participant

    Reading your post you seem to have done everything correctly eavesdropper…. The one thing is you don’t mention a wired/remote shutter release or using the 2 second timer to actually take the shot. You may just have forgotten to mention it but if its a case of you didn’t use either and actually pressed the shutter button at the point of taking the shot , that would almost definitely be the cause of your problem. If you did use the above , maybe a bit of wind or soft ground under you ? (your movement may affect the ground if its soft). The last thing is , how far are you zooming in ? If its 200 or 300 % it is going to look bad ( less even if you have already cropped the pic ).very worst case scenario it’s just the quality of the lens , maybe it’s bad or maybe your just expecting too much from it ….. But remember if your only printing a normal size pic (8×10 , 5×7 etc ) it might not even show up. Hope you solve it anyway … There’s nothing worse than getting home and realising you have nothing due to sharpness or focus issues !!! … Believe me , I know !!!!

    jodal1975
    Participant

    Ha … I must have been typing at exactly the same time as miki g

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