Okay, everyone, I am just about ready to scream at my ineptitude with this canon s400. I simply cannot get things in focus with it. Take a look at this:
The body and lower wing are fine, but the back part of the butterfly is wretchedly soft. It’s not camera shake, wrong aperture (I don’t think), so what am I doing wrong?
My eyes are not up to the task… it just looks as if the larger wing portions have softer-edged patterns, to me.
Looking at the outer edge of the wings, overall, I don’t see a difference, and can see detail right down to the little flap of wing that’s hanging off at the back.
it just looks as if the larger wing portions have softer-edged patterns, to me.
Thanks, Bryon. That’s exactly it-they are just the same as the smaller wings, so why don’t they look like it in the photo? I’ve got tons of almost okay photos where something like this is going on.
I don’t think it’s a hardware problem because it doesn’t happen in the same spot every time.
Okay, everyone, I am just about ready to scream at my ineptitude with this canon s400. I simply cannot get things in focus with it. Take a look at this:
Barbara,
What was your point of focus in the shot? If it was the head, then I would expect to see what you are getting, more or less.
Are you shooting in Macro mode or regular mode?
You’d need an accurate set of depth of field tables to tell you whether that is normal or not.
Thanks, Dick. Aperture value is 3.0, f2.8, 1/320 of a second. That particular shot was in macro mode, but it’s really just there as an example. I’ve got tons of shots in all modes with woogly focus.
Like I’ve another one where I wanted a shot of a bridge over a pond. The water lillies in the foreground, the stuff on either side of the bridge and (which really confuses me) the plants in the distance behind the bridge are all sharp as a tack, but no amount of unsharp mask can hide that the bridge is out of focus in every single shot.
It looks like you are in Macro mode. Did you try turning AiAF off? Then you can focus exactly in the center of the butterfly. That may provide a better focus for the lower wing. Also, you may need to back off a little and possibly enlarge via cropping later. If you look at the leaves, even the nearby ones a slightly out of focus. That seems to indicate that the focus was set around the head area.
Thanks, Juergen. Actually that’s just a detail of a larger photo with many active, totally out of focus butterflies in it. That’s the only one that was resting.
I have tried all the different auto focus modes (although not on that particular shot–had to take what I had, pretty much) and I can take miserable photos in any of them.
I have tried all the different auto focus modes (although not on that particular shot–had to take what I had, pretty much) and I can take miserable photos in any of them.
Barbara, how I’m out of ideas, except that you might try some focus tests using a focus chart, if you can find one, or print out an 8 1/2×11 sheet with PSE2 shapes on it and mount it on a flat board.
Take pix of it with your Canon in different focus modes, keeping the camera and the board in the same plane and see if you get sharp images. At least that way you should be able to eliminate the camera itself as the culprit.
This one is not miserable at all. I think it actually, even if unintended to this degree, show wonderful depth perception. You can fix it with Elements, though. 🙂 I gave it a shot: http://home.carolina.rr.com/jdirrigl/butterfly1.jpg
Thanks for the kind words, Juergen. No this one is not so bad, but I have folders full of stuff that I won’t get a second chance at–like closeups of sandhill cranes–that are so close, but no cigar.
Barbara, fwiw, I also have a Canon s400 and thought I was getting great shots until I tried to take some close-ups of flowers while in Houston last week. I got the same miserable results that you speak of.
I’m a miserable photographer so I thought it was just me, but after reading about your experience, I’m thinking it’s something I might be able to adjust on the camera.
Hi, Margaret. I’ll let you know. For a long time I figured it was just that I’m used to a huge old SLR, but the longer I use this camera the more I’m beginning to wonder.
On the other hand, steve’s and dpreview show some pretty darn good shots made with it, so maybe it is just me. 😉
From what I’ve read on DPreview, the s400 is not as easy to use as some others for macro shots – mainly because of the aperture choice. At f2.8 you will have a pretty narrow depth of field – and focussing on exactly the right spot is crucial – you wouldn’t be able to get anymore than the butterfly head in focus – the wings are bound to be out. Even with the G3, (which has full aperture priority) while it can take good macro shots – you should see the number of duff ones I have to discard for each good one. Which is the beauty of digital cameras. (and explains why I have over 2000 on the shot counter of my camera!)
The AF system seems to take a lot of getting used to on these digitals – it is very different from SLRs. (mind you my SLR has no autofocus at all!) I’m not sure what options you have on the s400, but with the G3 switching the default continuous focus to single makes a huge difference – in continuous focus the camera seems to have a nasty habit of wandering off focus between half pressing the button down to lock focus and exposure and finally taking the picture.
My first week with a G3 I took a lot of out of focus pictures, (both macro and otherwise), but now I’ve got used to it with normal distance images i’m generally getting a very high success rate. With macro I’m still getting one in ten, and you really can’t see until you get the images at 100 per cent whether they have worked or not.
Thanks very much, Susan. I, too, never can tell till I get home how I did, and my old nikkormat dates from pre-auto anything.
I recently was talking to a photog for a local newspaper and he just couldn’t leave the s400 alone–he was so fascinated by the way the aperture was on the move the whole time the camera was on–he kept passing his hand around it to watch it shift and shift.
Barbara, if the aperture really was f2.8 you cannot expect a large depth of field; probably this is the problem. In macro the lens should be stopped down as much as possible, This f2.8 is full aperture with this camera and it can be stopped down to 4,9 which will give you an extended depth of field. Unfortunately this camera has no aperture priority setting as it was not designed for "serious photographers" but for people who want good quality snapshots. That’s why this camera chooses a fast shutterspeed to prevent camera shake.
However, I cannot explain why, when shooting a bridge, everything in foreground and background are in focus and the bridge itself out of focus; theoretically this should be impossible.
Susan and Leen have already stolen my thunder and told you the things I would. Kind of the problem with point and shoot cameras that make decisions for you. To get a deep depth of field you would normally opt to mount the camera on a tripod and stop down to a smaller aperture with a longer shutter speed. That is how our hero Ansel Adams gets those amazingly deeply foucussed images. His group was even called the f64 group because that was the smallest aperture that view cameras would stop down to.
On the other hand, a shallow dof with macro shots tends to isolate the subject against a blurry background and can be very striking.
At f/3.0, you’re dept of field is pretty narrow… I don’t know the distance at wich you were from the butterfly, but at 14 inches, you’d have had less than 1/2 inch of DOF.
To illustrate this effect, I’ve set up a small galleries of 3 pictures, showing the DOF. I was at 14 inches (more or less 1 inch), with a 28-105 zoom lense, set at 105mm length. As you can see, even at f/4.5, I had less than 3/4 of an inch of DOF (1/3 front, 2/3 back). The unit of this measuring tape are centimeters left, inches right.
Also, no camera can focus sharply, no matter how expensive it is. Canon is admitting a margin of error (as all other manufacturers) for all their cameras. The most precise of their camera (and it’s not even reaching 100% sharp) is their 1D. It’s an 11 Mp and it cost 75% a car… But, with this 1/3 front and 2/3 back DOF, almost all cameras escape the "troubled waters" easily. They show their flaw, though, in Macro mode, because DOF is almost inexistant.
In your precise case, next time, set the camera to Av and take a smaller apperture number (f/5.6 and up). You’ll get a greater DOF.
Yes, that’s the problem. The aperture wasn’t 2.8 because I wanted it to be, but because I had no choice. Although this camera must have 50 little menus in it, my only aperture control is macro/normal/inifinity mode.
I pretty much know what to do when I can do it by the numbers-it’s this "let us do it for you" part that is giving me grief. However, I see a lot of darn good pictures taken with cameras similar to this one, so I know it can be done–I just don’t know how.
I have a question though, …. for anyone; With my SLR the only time I use a macro is to get an extreme close up of something. That is what I learned a long time ago…want a close, up use the macro.
But now this discussion seems to indicate that with high end digitals you can adjust the aperture for more depth of field while in the macro mode? Or am I reading something in here that was not stated.
But if that is what is being said and you can make this adjustment, why would you want the macro setting to begin with? Because you obviously want an extreme close up using the macro, and that setting seems to void the need of any depth of field.
Pete, I’ll take a stab at this. I believe the macro mode merely shifts some lens elements a bit to provide for closer focus, much like a close-up lens or extension tubes can provide. In macro mode, I can get much closer to my subject and still attain sharp focus. The closer I can get, the larger the object appears in the image – so more pixels to work with and less cropping.
After shifting to macro mode on my Canon G2, I still have full control over aperture when in Aperture Priority mode. And since the objects I’m photographing (flowers and insects) are three-dimensional, I generally want the object to be in focus left and right, front and back.As Rich Coencas mentioned, to get the best depth of field (which is very limited in macro mode just based on how close the object is to the lens), I specify a small aperture and accompanying long exposure time. With Barbara’s butterflies, there’s a tradeoff; the blurring associated with wing movement is much worse with long exposure times. When taking flower pix, I’ve had to contend with wind movement – again, the tradeoff of depth of field for shutter speed comes into play.
To what Leen & Richard said about stopping the apperture way down to get good DoF for closeup shots, I would also suggest going with a single-purpose macro lens that stops down to f32, and keep a little away from the closest focusing distance. For 35mm SLR, you could propably get by with a f22 on 50-55mm lens if the object is not that 3-dimensional. For my old 105mm macro, it was almost always f32 for all closeups. Also, macro lenses tend to render normal range shots "flatter" than a regular lens of the same focal length. The "macro" mode of a zoom gives a literally paper-thin DoF that you pretty much have to line up the object in a parallel plane to get any semblance of having it in focus.
So the short answer is that Digital macro is basically the same principal 35mm. Even though this was likely the case, this is the first difinitive information on the forum about macro. (that I remember anyway). We did discuss it a little some months ago but no one had much experience using it back then.
Macro mode on my 10D, for example, can be described as a kind of a set of shortcuts to functions I would, ordinarily, set my self, like : One Shot focus (focus once, then don’t adjust), Single Drive (one picture taken no matter how long you press the shutter release button), Full Sensor meter for light, auto ISO selecting and Automatic White Balance. It’s recommended to use a dedicated macro lense, and to set a lense to its longer focal length (for a zoom) in order to acheive maximum background blurring.
In other words, it does all I do when I shoot manual.
For some P&S cameras (my previous Canon), it’s true that it made the lense move further out and trying to shoot a subject too far away in Macro mode resulted in a an error message being displayed on the LCD.
I find the Green Zone Modes to be useless, unless you’re in a hurry and haven’t got the time to pre-configure your camera for the event. Otherwise, I stick to the Creative zone. I like to stay in control of things 😉 The only really usefull one is the A-DEP (once you know how it works..!)
The best example is the sport mode… which sets the ISO to a maximum of 400. I’ve done the demo here, a few weeks ago, that shooting at ISO 800 is quite acceptable, I don’t know why Canon stopped the Sport mode to ISO 400… ? Same is true for Portrait. It only uses a smaller aperture number (greater aperture value). Go in P mode, and use program shift. Same result, more fun!
Well, it does all I do. But I do more than it does 😉
I don’t know about other SLRs, but when shooting in Green Zode (Portrait, Macro, Night, Landscape, Sport, etc), there’s nothing customizable by the photographer with the 10D. I can’t even adjust the focus points (it chooses amongst the 7 available), nor can I shift the program to a higher or lower speed, greater or smaller aperture. The camera makes all the decisions. Worst, it doesn’t let you save as RAW, only JPG can be used. Under difficult situations (snow, highly contrasting subject, etc.), results are not always good.
That’s why I learned to use the Manual mode or the Program mode. Program is like Green zone, but with the ability to customize everything (over / under expose, focus points choice, ISO rating, etc.). Only recently have I started to study the light meter in my camera. So now, I’m slowly starting to shoot in Manual mode. More fun!
My previous one, a Canon Powershot A20 had a Macro mode. It retailed for 600 C$ (I’d say 400 U$ at that time). My current film SLR has the same Macro setting as my current digital (they are 99% identical btw).
I’m sorry to have confused you, that wasn’t my intention 🙁
Your 3 pictures on PBase have 3 different aperture settings. You obviously made those settings. Can you choose other aperture settings also?
Of course, that’s what makes an SLR so attractive. I could have chosen different exposures (exposure = aperture & shutter speed combination). But, to show up the effect of aperture on DOF, I couldn’t have chosen differently with this lense. Otherwise, say a greater aperture (a smaller aperture number) would have made more of the picture in focus.
And I think in your last post you said you can’t adjust shutter speed while in macro setting (in other words shutter priority), right?
Macro mode, for my 10D, isn’t shutter priority. It’s rather Aperture priority. The bigger the aperture, the less time the picture needs to exposed (greater shutter speed), and the more blurry the background will be. In Macro mode, the camera tries to get the greater aperture it can acheive, in a given set of parameter (to avoid camera shake, for example).
I don’t want to give a full photo lesson here (people usually find this stuff boring to death), but to summarize things, a good picture is obtained by first, evaluating the light, then choosing an aperture and shutter speed based on the speed of the film (the ISO rating). So, if the meter in the camera says that, at ISO 100, f/5.6 1/250 is a good exposure, then it will be exactly the same as f/4.5 1/500 (more light, less exposure time) or f/6.7 1/125 (less light, more time). All of these settings will acheive the same exposure (a nicely exposed picture). What will change is the Depth Of Field. The smaller the aperture, the more time the picture will have to be exposed, the more of the subject will be in focus.
Pete, my Canon G2 has Program, Aperture Priority and Shutter Priority modes in both normal and Macro modes. It’s been superseded (twice), and its closest relative in the Canon line (the G3) is about $500. It’s not an SLR, but it’s a very nice size and performs well.
I can only blame myself, since the A70 is a point-and-shoot sort of camera. But one of the reasons I bought it was I figured–who needs an SLR when an LCD performs the same function? The LCD shows what the digital "film" will see, so an SLR is superfluous. Or, well, that was my fuzzy logic (pun intended).
What has become painfully clear (oh, another bad pun!) to me in the past few weeks is that the LCD is so tiny and has such a low resolution, that it is essentially worthless for use as a focusing aid. It’s simply a cropping aid, and nothing more.
Let me give you a quick blow-by-blow of the pictures on my web site:
IMG_0708: This was a lucky coincidence. I was trying to make the red leaf in the foreground out of focus, with the primary interest being the wooden seat. It probably looks just as good the other way around, though.
IMG_0724: This was my biggest disappointment. You can tell especially in the "after" picture that the subject (the colored leaves on the ground in the background) are totally out of focus and the black branches in the foreground are in sharp focus. Again, the exact opposite of what I intended.
IMG_0748: Here again I was trying for the background in focus, but it works just as well in reverse (lucky me!).
IMG_0848: The ladybugs were swarming like flies this day, and I can’t tell you how many pictures I took until I got one in focus. And it’s still kinda iffy (its face isn’t really in focus, but it’s the best picture I had).
IMG_0853: The farm scene should’ve been in focus, not the branches in the foreground. Not at all what I wanted.
And this is after I’ve been playing with it for a few months. You should see all the out of focus spring flowers I have. And I wasn’t even going for the soft wedding look. 🙂
Another related problem with focus on these point-and-shoot digital cameras is that because the LCD is so low resolution, it’s impossible to take good pictures at a large aperture (to isolate the subject for example) because it’s impossible to tell what is and is not out of focus. I think this is basically the problem you are running into (or at least one of them).
In a nutshell, I miss my Pentax SLR. It wasn’t fancy or expensive, but it was definitely WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get). For these very reasons I was thinking about asking Santa for a digital SLR for Christmas, but after seeing the prices, I’m thinking maybe next year. 🙁
Thanks for the new terminology. I’m adding it to my tech terminology repitour. 😉
Wish I had something useful to add but as I’m probably the worlds worst photographer, well that just about sums it up. This has been a very interesting and informative thread, though. I’m looking to upgrade to a new camera and you all have given me some new/good info to chew on.
Sorry Barb, but can I take this discussion slightly OT?
If a camera lists " f/2.8 – 8.0 (wide); f3.7 – 8.0 (tele) " for it’s aperture specification, what is this telling me? Might Barb have been able to do what she wanted had she been able to manually set the aperture somewhere within this range?
Sorry if this question is too basic and goes beyond the scope of this thread, but I figured with all the knowledgeable and skilled photographers that hang out here, someone might be able to translate for me.
Joe, the maximum effective aperture (i.e., lowest f-stop) of a zoom lens is almost always a range, with a larger maximum aperture at the widest setting of the zoom. You’ll find that to be the case with lenses for SLR’s, too. I have a zoom lens for my SLR that’s f 4.0-f5.6 over a range of 75-300 mm. Generally, the lower those numbers the better – the lower the f-stop, the more light will be admitted at a give shutter speed. But, as this thread has explored, the lower the f-stop, the shorter the depth of field….
Barbara, I have been studying the market since I want to buy a new camera. Also the above, extended discussion has been instructive. I have concluded, based on my "research," that a camera with a good quality glass lens is critical, and that the plastic lenses on some cameras are much less desirable. Next, the matter of optical and digital magnification has to to considered. The latter is a digital process which is multiplicative, but inferior to the input provided by a quality optical system. The next critical issue is avoidance of camera shake, by tripod, built-in lens stabilization, bracing or what have you. Still haven’t bought the camera, but hope to find one that is compact enough to carry along on trips and satisfy most of these demands. Ken
The body and lower wing are fine, but the back part of the butterfly is
wretchedly soft. It’s not camera shake, wrong aperture (I don’t think), so what am I doing wrong?
Thanks for any advice.
Barbara
When I look at the picture, the leaf that the legs are on looks very sharp. You also see this, and say that the front wing is sharp. The back wing is less in-focus, similar to the leave just behind the antennae.
If you stack these "objects" up in 3D, and measure the distances, then all of the information fits into depth-of-field.
I don’t have an s400, but I can put my finepix 3800 into "manual" mode, and then into "macro," and have access to other apertures.
The body and lower wing are fine, but the back part of the butterfly is
wretchedly soft. It’s not camera shake, wrong aperture (I don’t think), so what am I doing wrong?
Thanks for any advice.
Barbara
I just read something that tells me that you have no access to aperture priority. If this is so, than you could try lowering exposure compensation, and this will give you a smaller f-stop.
Ed, I do keep it down usually, since I’m in Fl and things get blown out a lot if I leave the exposure compensation where the camera wants it to be.
I guess my question for everyone now is how you know what you are dealing with when you go to buy a camera. I researched this pretty much, and everyone gave this little beast very high marks.
Ed, I do keep it down usually, since I’m in Fl and things get blown out a
lot if I leave the exposure compensation where the camera wants it to be.
I guess my question for everyone now is how you know what you are dealing
with when you go to buy a camera. I researched this pretty much, and everyone gave this little beast very high marks.
I read things about my camera too, but did not understand what they really meant. Only by purchasing the camera did I find out what I was NOT getting.
With the money I have to spend on this hobby, I won’t get everything I want. Late last year I set my budget (under $500), and found I would not get manual focus, and so on, for less than $750. So I spent $400. Now I have found that the camera does many things I want it to do, but the shortcomings hold me back in several situations. Guess what? The manufacturer has a better model, with some more things I want, for $350! If I purchase this, I’ll be in for $750!!! But I still will not have everything.
The only way out, that I can think of, is that we all move to the same neighborhood, and swap cameras each weekend, or as the need changes.
Second best solution is to read or search rec.photo.digital, and also make sure you check dpreview.com and similar sites.
Leen, I agree with you. I am seeking out a quality product – a lens which will conform to precision standards. I have an older digital camera with a plastic lens and have problems with focusing such as Barbara alludes to. On the next go-around I shall be more circumspect. Thanks. Ken
Generally, the lower those numbers the better – the lower the f-stop, the more light will be admitted at a give shutter speed. But, as this thread has explored, the lower the f-stop, the shorter the depth of field….
So 2.8, which is what Barb’s camera was set at, isn’t low enough for what she wanted to achieve with the image?
Joe – to get a bigger depth of field you need a higher number aperture (smaller hole letting the light in). Even if Barbara could have set a higher aperture manually, then her shutter speed would have slowed down and the movement of the butterfly wings/windshake/camera shake then becomes a problem. The G3 has a couple of useful features that help with macro picture taking – one is the ability to manual focus – for extreme close up it is (marginally) easier to set the camera onto its minimum focal distance manually and then move the camera back and forwards until the right point is sharp (particularly true if using a close up lens). It also has focus bracketing, where it will take three consecutive shots of the same image with the focus slightly behind and in front of the set distance – the amount being variable. I am not having too many problems with out of focus images, other than macro, altho’ I am pretty careful to get focus lock before I finally take the picture – I tend to set focus and exposure on the main subject, recompose and then shoot. . Susan S
(Your #40) You just about summed up the frustrations of wannabe photographers whose neglected closetful camera gears bear testimony to their eternal search for the perfect do-it-all-in-one camera. Sadly or happily, I was one of those. <grin>
Susan, focus bracketing is a feature not available on my old G2 – seems like that would be a valuable tool for depth-of-field-sensitive pictures. I haven’t had much luck with manual focus on the G2; very hard for me to tell whether it’s in focus or not. And the G2 layout had the manual focus button in a most inopportune place – have taken a few pictures where I had accidentally triggered manual focus and the resulting images were way out of focus….
You and me both, Chuck. I can’t seem to make use of the manual focus on my G2 as well. I thought it’s because of my poor eyesight. One time I had the camera on a tripot with a magnifying glass, none of the five shots I took on f8 (minimum) even got close to the stamen of a flower. Since then I back off from the closest focus just to get some kind of sharpness. Guess the only way is to invest in a DSLR like you have and use a macro lens.
Shan, it seems there are always trade-offs. My DSLR with macro lens is so heavy that I just cannot use it without a tripod, so some of the ‘grab’ shots I’ve gotten with the G2 in macro mode simply aren’t possible with the DSLR….
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