So how are you all getting such sharpness in your photos? Is my prob that I only have a $300 Canon 75-300mm zoom lens? Does time of day have that much to do with it? I would just like my photos to get crisper. I've just posted my most recent attempt on the Avian board if you all would like to look. Thanks.
Posted by Terry Sohl on February 27, 2007 at 9:37 AM
Kyle,
Technique is part of the problem. However, you can use flawless technique, but the best photo from your 75-300 still won't match something like a Canon L series prime.
When I got my first SLR, it was a Canon Rebel (film). I wanted to try and shoot wildlife, but didn't have much of a budget, so also started with a 75-300mm. While my technique definitely improved from those early days, the quality of my photography also improved greatly after getting a 400 5.6L.
Despite the cliche "it's not the equipment, it's the photographer", from a technical side, the best photos from the 75-300mm won't match those from the higher-priced L primes.
Posted by Dan Borzynski on February 27, 2007 at 9:45 AM
The Canon lens you gave is a pretty decent lens. It is about midrange in the Canon lineup.
In the photo you posted, I can see a few places where sharpness might be affected by things unrelated to your lens. I am not sure how many of them apply, so I'll just start listing them:
Subject motion: Ducks can swim remarkably fast, especially if you are using a 300 mm lens with a digital body. The are a couple of ways of handling this, besides what I give below. Use panning, and try to keep the head, or at least the eye sharp. This will take practice and you will have a lot of failures. Don't worry. The other direction to give up completely on sharpness and go for a long motion blur exposure. Once again, the failure rate will be pretty high, even with practice.
Shutter speed: You will want to keep this fairly high. Shorter that 1/250 second would be ideal, 1/125 will work, more than that will take practice and again, lots of failures when the ducks suddenly move on you. Of course, that will only happen when you are about to press the shutter .
If you are using a digital body, don't be afraid to use ISO 200, or 400. Once you get up to 1600 and 3200, I have found that sharpness does suffer, but if it is the only way of getting a shot, then do it. M
If you can use a tripod, do so. Even with a ball head set with no tension, it is one way to remove a bit of motion. Barring a tripod, maybe consider a monopod. Again, you'll be a bit steadier.
Are you familar with the unsharp mask tool on the editing software you are using? That is you best friend in the post-processing world. If not, let us know and we'll help with that, but that will lead to a long, long post.
How heavily cropped is your image? It doesn't look too heavily cropped, but that will definitely affect sharpness, since every imperfection becomes greatly magnified.
Finally, if you are just getting started in photography, keep in mind the joke: A man is walking in New York, more than a little bit lost. Finally, in frustration, he asks one of the locals "How do you get to Carnegie Hall?" The immediate response, in that New York accent we all know, is "Practice, practice, practice!" A lot of the posters, especially in the avian group, have been shooting for years and you are only seeing the best of their work. Don't let that get you discouraged!
Posted by Guy Tal on February 27, 2007 at 10:25 AM
Kyle, equipment could have something to do with it but for web-sized images such as the one you posted, just about any lens can produce more detail than you'll need.
To get the "crisp" look online you will need to develop your skills in color and contrast adjustments, and applying sharpening techniques (starting with the most basic Unsharp Masking).
There are many good tutorials for a basic digital workflow online that will cover these topics.
Guy
Posted by Bill Chambers on February 27, 2007 at 12:13 PM
For web sharpening you might want to try Marc Adamus' technique. Very easy and works well after a little experimentation. Link is HERE
Posted by David Bostedo on February 27, 2007 at 2:40 PM
One addition to Bill's post - that method works best if your full size file is already properly sharpened. It's not going to save a soft image.
My theory is that our Avian photographers have all sold their souls to the devil.
Just thought I'd add that insight because most of your question is answered above.
Pete D.
Posted by Frank Winters on February 27, 2007 at 4:54 PM
Kyle,
There is another asking directions to Carnegie Hall joke: Someone asks a stranger in NY "How do you get to Carnegie Hall? -- The person responds -- 'Well first of all I wouldn't start from here.'
You might not want to be overly concerned with sharpness but rather look for the best light you can find, figure out how to compose a pleasing image from a subject that you find attractive and practice getting the subject in good focus. If you get good all these aspects of photography the sharpness will tend to take care of itself.
Frank
Posted by Alice Scoggins on February 27, 2007 at 5:08 PM
For what it's worth, I have a Nikkor 70-300 zoom lens, and rarely get extremely sharp images with it! All of the above advise is good. Certainly you need a good sturdy tripod. Keep practicing!
Posted by Ed Cordes on February 27, 2007 at 10:09 PM
To add to the sharpening info most of us add additional sharpening for the web. Suggestion is to sharpen your image for print. Then resize it for web. Remember to convert the color profile to sRGB so the colors will be correct on all monitors. Then I usually add additional USM of amount 30-50% Radius 1.0 and Threshold 0. This must be done due to the sharpness lost in downsizing for the web. I then go to "save for web" and select a file size of just under 200k.
Such good advice! Got a couple things verified for myself here, tonight, too. Avian is so fun and very difficult. Our talented group of regular avian shooters can convince you it isn't so hard. But Pete D speaks truth. Too funny. LOL! I figure it'll take me another 40 years or so to get every feather, beak and eye pupil so distinctly crisp with big glass. And I don't have that much time! I'll be tryin' tho. Wish I could upgrade my Nikkor 300/2.8 AFS to AFS VR, but that's such a painful pinch to the wallet...
P.S. For avian shots, another great place to see some awesome shots is on the UKNP forum. They're good, too!
Unsharp masking is a little crude especially on images with lots of fine detail, Unsharp masking works by finding edges of dark and light pixels and making the light ones lighter and the dark ones darker, basically just adjusting contrast on edges in photo's.
I use a totally different method of sharpning. Duplicate the layer in PS and then go to Filters/Others/High Pass, the image will turn grey. In the pixel box move the slider until you see the edges of the image, Around 1 pixel would be fine for a web image, Click ok. In the layers box click the layer you just made and change the little box that says normal to overlay. This will now show you your image again with the sharpening applied. Moving the Opacity slider on this layer can fine tune how much sharpening there is.
Now the neat part..
This applies sharpening to the whole image but you may only want to apply it to the ducks so click this layer to highlight it again and down the bottom of the layers window click add layer mask. Make sure the layer mask is highlighted and grab the brush tool. Brush the areas you don't want to be sharp, the water in this case. If it was a high res image you can make the brush very small and run around the ducks, this will make sure there is no halo around their bodies. Hit the \ key and the brush areas should turn red, this shows where you have brushed and where you have not. One finished you will have very sharp birds, still soft water and no USM halo's. This works beautifully with clean backgrounds, ie sky and mountains
Discussion
11 repliesTechnique is part of the problem. However, you can use flawless technique, but the best photo from your 75-300 still won't match something like a Canon L series prime.
When I got my first SLR, it was a Canon Rebel (film). I wanted to try and shoot wildlife, but didn't have much of a budget, so also started with a 75-300mm. While my technique definitely improved from those early days, the quality of my photography also improved greatly after getting a 400 5.6L.
Despite the cliche "it's not the equipment, it's the photographer", from a technical side, the best photos from the 75-300mm won't match those from the higher-priced L primes.
In the photo you posted, I can see a few places where sharpness might be affected by things unrelated to your lens. I am not sure how many of them apply, so I'll just start listing them:
Subject motion: Ducks can swim remarkably fast, especially if you are using a 300 mm lens with a digital body. The are a couple of ways of handling this, besides what I give below. Use panning, and try to keep the head, or at least the eye sharp. This will take practice and you will have a lot of failures. Don't worry. The other direction to give up completely on sharpness and go for a long motion blur exposure. Once again, the failure rate will be pretty high, even with practice.
Shutter speed: You will want to keep this fairly high. Shorter that 1/250 second would be ideal, 1/125 will work, more than that will take practice and again, lots of failures when the ducks suddenly move on you. Of course, that will only happen when you are about to press the shutter
If you are using a digital body, don't be afraid to use ISO 200, or 400. Once you get up to 1600 and 3200, I have found that sharpness does suffer, but if it is the only way of getting a shot, then do it. M
If you can use a tripod, do so. Even with a ball head set with no tension, it is one way to remove a bit of motion. Barring a tripod, maybe consider a monopod. Again, you'll be a bit steadier.
Are you familar with the unsharp mask tool on the editing software you are using? That is you best friend in the post-processing world. If not, let us know and we'll help with that, but that will lead to a long, long post.
How heavily cropped is your image? It doesn't look too heavily cropped, but that will definitely affect sharpness, since every imperfection becomes greatly magnified.
Finally, if you are just getting started in photography, keep in mind the joke: A man is walking in New York, more than a little bit lost. Finally, in frustration, he asks one of the locals "How do you get to Carnegie Hall?" The immediate response, in that New York accent we all know, is "Practice, practice, practice!" A lot of the posters, especially in the avian group, have been shooting for years and you are only seeing the best of their work. Don't let that get you discouraged!
To get the "crisp" look online you will need to develop your skills in color and contrast adjustments, and applying sharpening techniques (starting with the most basic Unsharp Masking).
There are many good tutorials for a basic digital workflow online that will cover these topics.
Guy
Just thought I'd add that insight because most of your question is answered above.
Pete D.
There is another asking directions to Carnegie Hall joke: Someone asks a stranger in NY "How do you get to Carnegie Hall? -- The person responds -- 'Well first of all I wouldn't start from here.'
You might not want to be overly concerned with sharpness but rather look for the best light you can find, figure out how to compose a pleasing image from a subject that you find attractive and practice getting the subject in good focus. If you get good all these aspects of photography the sharpness will tend to take care of itself.
Frank
Hope this helps.
P.S. For avian shots, another great place to see some awesome shots is on the UKNP forum. They're good, too!
I use a totally different method of sharpning. Duplicate the layer in PS and then go to Filters/Others/High Pass, the image will turn grey. In the pixel box move the slider until you see the edges of the image, Around 1 pixel would be fine for a web image, Click ok. In the layers box click the layer you just made and change the little box that says normal to overlay. This will now show you your image again with the sharpening applied. Moving the Opacity slider on this layer can fine tune how much sharpening there is.
Now the neat part..
This applies sharpening to the whole image but you may only want to apply it to the ducks so click this layer to highlight it again and down the bottom of the layers window click add layer mask. Make sure the layer mask is highlighted and grab the brush tool. Brush the areas you don't want to be sharp, the water in this case. If it was a high res image you can make the brush very small and run around the ducks, this will make sure there is no halo around their bodies. Hit the \ key and the brush areas should turn red, this shows where you have brushed and where you have not. One finished you will have very sharp birds, still soft water and no USM halo's. This works beautifully with clean backgrounds, ie sky and mountains
Have fun and hope this makes sense