Landscape Advice? - DPChallenge Forums

Canon EF 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 DO IS USM

07/04/2006 04:58:36 PM · #1

I took this terrible image today along with about 50 other of Land Scapes that ALL stunk...

I was wondering how to take this shot and make it sharp all the way through or look good in some way. I tried f11 1/200 sec. ISO 320 (focal point:the statue in the fountain) but almost no other settings got me a good shot.

I know the lens can take a sharp shot but my trees and all other detail, taken every which way I could looked like total crapola. At 12mm complete garbage...better at 24mm but nothing I'd post with pride.

Other images taken with the lens (12-24mm f4 Nikon)

Message edited by author 2006-07-04 17:02:08.

cpanaioti

Canon EOS-40D

07/04/2006 05:00:34 PM · #2

What aperture?

Nikon AF-S DX Zoom-Nikkor 18-70mm f/3.5-4.5G IF-ED

07/04/2006 05:02:24 PM · #3

f 11 ...but it looked terrible from f4 - f22.

No distant greenery looked sharp unless it was close up

Message edited by author 2006-07-04 17:04:13.

Tycho

Nikon D70

07/04/2006 05:04:48 PM · #4

These might help with the sharpness issues:

Hyperfocal Distance
Understanding the hyperfocal distance

cpanaioti

Canon EOS-40D

Canon EF 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 DO IS USM

07/04/2006 05:05:55 PM · #5

At that aperture on a wide angle focal length everything should be in focus unless...

You focused at infinity. Doing this will strip the foreground of sharpness.

Focusing about 1/3 of the way into the scene (this varies with aperture) and shooting at f16/f22 will get you everything in focus.

What I see in the first shot is tilted horizon and too much empty space in the foreground (grass). Zooming in slightly I think may help.

Canon EF 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 DO IS USM

07/05/2006 08:12:08 AM · #6

thanks for the advice...and if anyone else would like to chime in on how exactly to take that first shot of Bethesda Fountain with a 12-24mm or any wa lens please do...

The lens...or my skills have me a bit worried on the landscape, ability side....close up, things seem to be fine.

Message edited by author 2006-07-05 08:15:38.

cpanaioti

Canon EOS-40D

07/05/2006 08:31:43 AM · #7

Steve,

If you get no further responses you may want to PM Bear_Music and point him to your image. He has a current learning thread going for landscape photography.

Colette

Neil

Fujifilm X-T30

Nikon AF-S NIKKOR 24-70mm f/2.8G ED

07/05/2006 08:38:36 AM · #8

Hi Steve! The focus comments are right on. I left you some other suggestions on the image.

Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM

07/05/2006 10:17:22 AM · #9

Neil-Got your comments. Thanks
Collette-I'm more of a loner when it comes to this stuff but I will without question read throught that thread for info.

f8 1/125 sec.

It seems like I do better when I focus up front than when I attempt to focus in the middle or back.

I need to hit a museum and see what this lens can deliver in a wide open indoor space.

one more 1/60 sec at f14

Message edited by author 2006-07-05 10:29:12.

Ben

Canon EOS-30D

07/05/2006 10:28:06 AM · #10

Completely off topic here, but i've just had a look through your portfolio Pawdrix and i'd like to say your street shots are fantastic. Really inspiring to me. Great work.

Sony 24-70mm F4 Vario-Tessar T* FE OSS

07/05/2006 10:33:45 AM · #11

Originally posted by Kerm:

Completely off topic here, but i've just had a look through your portfolio Pawdrix and i'd like to say your street shots are fantastic. Really inspiring to me. Great work.

Ben that's always music to my ears. Cheers!

I'll be in London around the 19-23rd of July and I'm looking to set up a mini gtg. If you're around the area feel free to PM me. I hear that London has a lot of streets, let's give it a whirl ... ;P

Bear_Music

Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra

07/05/2006 12:42:04 PM · #12

A couple of general observations:

1. DOF is basically 1/3 in front of, and 2/3 behind, the point of focus. So when shooting a landscape, you basically need to focus on the mid-foreground area and stop down however much you need to to attain infinity focus. If you focus on infinity, you are seriously impairing your ability to have foreground sharpness.

2. With extreme wide-angle lenses, DOF should not be a problem; you can focus very close and still have infinity in focus. Once you get past a certain distance, that's effectively infinity. The longer the lens, the more critical this becomes.

Examples:

A. Canon 20D, 10mm lens, focused at 3 feet, f/8.0, DOF extends from 1.26 feet to infinity. INFINITY FOCUS IS NOT A PROBLEM AT 10MM

B. Canon 20D, 22mm lens, focused at 3 feet, f/8.0, DOF extends from 2.34 feet to 4.17 feet. INFINITY FOCUS IS MORE DIFFICULT AT 22MM

C. Canon 20D, 22mm lens, focused at 12 feet, f/8.0, DOF extends from 5.6 feet to infinity. INFINITY FOCUS ATTAINED BY MOVING FOCAL POINT 9 FEET FURTHER INTO IMAGE. 4 feet of near-subject sharpness, more or less, have been sacrificed

D. Canon 20D, 22mm lens, focused at 6 feet, f/16.0, DOF extends from 2.81 feet to infinity. NOTE THAT BY STOPPING DOWN WE CAN ATTAIN INFINITY FOCUS WITH GREATER DOF, BUT IT'S STILL LESS DOF THAN WE HAVE AT 10MM.

Canon's 10-22mm lens begins to have diffraction issues at f/16 at the 22mm end, so stopping down any further doesn't really help perceived DOF, as it gets softer looking. At the 10mm end, we can only stop down to f/11, and f/8 is better. These are very tiny apertures, diffraction becomes a real problem.

3. Working with extreme wide angle, you will NEVER be satisfied with how sharp the image looks on the computer screen. It will actually print sharper than you can view it by a significant amount. If you take a properly-sharpened, extreme WA image and zoom into it on the screen, it actually looks sharper the more you blow it up. Images shot with these extreme WA lenses of landscapes with significant detail NEVER look sharp at 640 pixels. You can emulate sharpness to some degree by oversharpening the 640-pixel image, but there's a harshness that comes with that and it isn't very pleasing.

The reason this is happening is that the details themselves are actually smaller than the screen can adequately resolve, whereas printers have much higher resolving power than computer screens.

*********

In any case, when I'm working with 10mm focal length and shooting "normal" landscapes, I don't ever use autofocus: I set the focus switch on manual and, choose Av mode or full manual mode, set the aperture at f/8 and the focus at 4 or 5 feet, and just fire away. I only will actually focus to subject if I am doing a WA closeup, where I am more concerned with excellent foreground detail and DOF than I am with infinity focus.

R.