? regarding "people" shots and my 50mm canon lens

wheresdavid

i am not sure if this is the right place to post this question :dunno . With my canon 50mm 1.8 lens i can get a "sharp" photo when i am up close taking a portrait of a person but when i try to capture the "entire body" or a group of people i cant seem to get a sharp picture to save my life. is it me or the lens? any and all feedback will be appreciated.

i am pasting a link to a gallery i created where you can view the original size of the photos, all photos are straight out of my rebel xti and were taken this weekend (so i hope they are good examples of my "problem")I think i was trying to focus on the "eyes" in all the photos. I also think i have better luck when i am shooting portrait rather than landscape. also, i believe all photos were shot in AV mode. Thanks Dave

sorry about the lnk problem. here is the link
http://fotosbydavid.smugmug.com/gallery/2719885#144255201

thebigsky

wheresdavid wrote:

i am not sure if this is the right place to post this question . With my canon 50mm 1.8 lens i can get a "sharp" photo when i am up close taking a portrait of a person but when i try to capture the "entire body" or a group of people i cant seem to get a sharp picture to save my life. is it me or the lens? any and all feedback will be appreciated.

i am pasting a link to a gallery i created where you can view the original size of the photos, all photos are straight out of my rebel xti and were taken this weekend (so i hope they are good examples of my "problem")I think i was trying to focus on the "eyes" in all the photos. I also think i have better luck when i am shooting portrait rather than landscape. also, i believe all photos were shot in AV mode. Thanks Dave

I'm not seeing the link to your gallery, but I'm guessing from the description of your problem that you're using large apertures which are minimising your depth of field, if you're using f1.8 - f4.0 try some smaller apertures such as f9-f11, the smaller the aperture the greater the depth of field, ie the range of focus.

Could this be the problem?

Charlie

wheresdavid

thanks, i have put the link in
D

thebigsky wrote:

I'm not seeing the link to your gallery, but I'm guessing from the description of your problem that you're using large apertures which are minimising your depth of field, if you're using f1.8 - f4.0 try some smaller apertures such as f9-f11, the smaller the aperture the greater the depth of field, ie the range of focus.

Could this be the problem?

Charlie

wheresdavid

1

wheresdavid wrote:

thanks, i have put the link in. also a f8 or f11 i have the "problem".
D

LiquidAir

In a couple of the shots I see some motion blur. One was shot at 1/60s which was clearly too slow for the situation. Another was at 1/125 which is often but not always fast enough. Keep an eye on your shutter speed and if the speed. If the speed is under 1/250 when taking ambient light people pictures, you should take more than one shot to be sure of a sharp one.

Other than that I thing a few of the shots may be suffering from lens flare; my guess is that the sun was shining directly on the lens. Lens flare actually causes a loss of contrast rather than an out-of-focus like blurring, but it can make images look less sharp. The easy answer for this is get a hood for the lens. Beyond that, be aware of the issue whenever you are shooing even slightly into the light. This is one situation where higher quality lenses will behave better and you might find you get better results with a 50/1.4.

cmason

I have also learned that if I am going to be critical about sharpness, then it pays to ensure that the focus is on the specific point that I am going to judge for sharpness.

This means for a portrait, I ensure the focus pt is alway on the eye, dead center. I do this by either focus and recompose, or using one of the focal pts in camera. Either seem to work. For subjects at odd angles, its best to use the focal pts,since you can get weird results with some shots using focus and recompose.

You can check your focus spot in Canon DPP or ZoomBrowser, as they can show the focus area and focus pt for each shot. This is often very educational on these details.

Depending on apeture, focus can be dramatic. for portraits, be sure to use a high f stop, to ensure the depth from nose to hair maintains focus throughout. If not, you risk haveing eye in focus, but the tip of the nose blurry.

For full shots, it isnt that critical, but again, pay very close attention to focus spot.

Oh, and fill flash is your friend...try even the popup flash, with FEC set at -1 to -1 2/3. This will do a nice fill, but not look obviously flashed. It will also help with the camera shake blur LiquidAir mentions above.

wheresdavid

Thanks for the feedback. i usually click off about 3 or4 photos. i dont have a lens hood which was on backorder when i ordered the lens. i am in peru and i cant find a hood anywhere to save my life. i gues i have to find a friend with a big hat. thanks again

LiquidAir wrote:

In a couple of the shots I see some motion blur. One was shot at 1/60s which was clearly too slow for the situation. Another was at 1/125 which is often but not always fast enough. Keep an eye on your shutter speed and if the speed. If the speed is under 1/250 when taking ambient light people pictures, you should take more than one shot to be sure of a sharp one.

Other than that I thing a few of the shots may be suffering from lens flare; my guess is that the sun was shining directly on the lens. Lens flare actually causes a loss of contrast rather than an out-of-focus like blurring, but it can make images look less sharp. The easy answer for this is get a hood for the lens. Beyond that, be aware of the issue whenever you are shooing even slightly into the light. This is one situation where higher quality lenses will behave better and you might find you get better results with a 50/1.4.

wheresdavid

thanks,
i always try to have the af sensor on the person eye. i cant check the focus point with the canon software since my laptop was stolen and i am in peru without a laptop or photoshop!!!

thanks for reminding about fillflash. i know that will help and will definately take some photos using it.

cmason wrote:

I have also learned that if I am going to be critical about sharpness, then it pays to ensure that the focus is on the specific point that I am going to judge for sharpness.

This means for a portrait, I ensure the focus pt is alway on the eye, dead center. I do this by either focus and recompose, or using one of the focal pts in camera. Either seem to work. For subjects at odd angles, its best to use the focal pts,since you can get weird results with some shots using focus and recompose.

You can check your focus spot in Canon DPP or ZoomBrowser, as they can show the focus area and focus pt for each shot. This is often very educational on these details.

Depending on apeture, focus can be dramatic. for portraits, be sure to use a high f stop, to ensure the depth from nose to hair maintains focus throughout. If not, you risk haveing eye in focus, but the tip of the nose blurry.

For full shots, it isnt that critical, but again, pay very close attention to focus spot.

Oh, and fill flash is your friend...try even the popup flash, with FEC set at -1 to -1 2/3. This will do a nice fill, but not look obviously flashed. It will also help with the camera shake blur LiquidAir mentions above.

pathfinder

wheresdavid wrote:

Thanks for the feedback. i usually click off about 3 or4 photos. i dont have a lens hood which was on backorder when i ordered the lens. i am in peru and i cant find a hood anywhere to save my life. i gues i have to find a friend with a big hat. thanks again

Good idea!!

Lots of photogs wear a hat with a big brim precisely to use as an auxiallary lens shade. I've done that from time to time, especially with wide angle lenses.

Mike02

wheresdavid wrote:

i am not sure if this is the right place to post this question . With my canon 50mm 1.8 lens i can get a "sharp" photo when i am up close taking a portrait of a person but when i try to capture the "entire body" or a group of people i cant seem to get a sharp picture to save my life. is it me or the lens? any and all feedback will be appreciated.

i am pasting a link to a gallery i created where you can view the original size of the photos, all photos are straight out of my rebel xti and were taken this weekend (so i hope they are good examples of my "problem")I think i was trying to focus on the "eyes" in all the photos. I also think i have better luck when i am shooting portrait rather than landscape. also, i believe all photos were shot in AV mode. Thanks Dave

sorry about the lnk problem. here is the link
http://fotosbydavid.smugmug.com/gallery/2719885#144255201

It looks like the pictures are sharp, but you're not focused on the people.

gluwater

Remeber that your DOF gets smaller the closer you are to your subject. The first shot, of the man in the hat, was at f/5.6 but you were pretty close to him so his right eye is sharp but his left eye was slightly further back because of the angle of his face so it is not entirely sharp. Plus I think the focus was more on his cheek or maybe nose, rather than his eyes in that shot. The next shot was at f/3.2, which is has a small DOF, especially for a shot of two people. Unless they are both exactly the same distance from you, one of them will be beyond the DOF. The girl on the left is slightly further back so she is not as in focus as the woman. The woman looks pretty sharp, especially for f/3.2, but I think your focus was slightly in front of her eyes. The middle photo on the bottom row looks to have slight camera shake. It was taken at 1/60th, which could be a little slow, but not terrible for a 50mm lens. Were any of these sharpened? You say your laptop was stolen so you don't have photoshop. All shots need to be sharpened in post, so that could have something to do with it. These are great images though, I've enjoyed looking at them.

wheresdavid

Greetings from an x chi-burb guy. No none of them were sharpened and yes i need to keep an eye on the f-stop. I usually get in a hurry when i am tryng to take peoples portraits and i take my eye of the "display". currently i am in peru and I am using internet cafes to upload my photos. i am a power user and i dont think there are any tools to sharpen photos in smugmug. i shoot in raw and JPG and i figure i will have a few years worth of photoshop work when i get back to the states.

gluwater wrote:

Remeber that your DOF gets smaller the closer you are to your subject. The first shot, of the man in the hat, was at f/5.6 but you were pretty close to him so his right eye is sharp but his left eye was slightly further back because of the angle of his face so it is not entirely sharp. Plus I think the focus was more on his cheek or maybe nose, rather than his eyes in that shot. The next shot was at f/3.2, which is has a small DOF, especially for a shot of two people. Unless they are both exactly the same distance from you, one of them will be beyond the DOF. The girl on the left is slightly further back so she is not as in focus as the woman. The woman looks pretty sharp, especially for f/3.2, but I think your focus was slightly in front of her eyes. The middle photo on the bottom row looks to have slight camera shake. It was taken at 1/60th, which could be a little slow, but not terrible for a 50mm lens. Were any of these sharpened? You say your laptop was stolen so you don't have photoshop. All shots need to be sharpened in post, so that could have something to do with it. These are great images though, I've enjoyed looking at them.