Canon 7D softness?

Bob: No, I have not compared contrast AF in liveview to phase AF with the camera on a tripod. Is this supposed to reveal something?

In any case, the bird shot is my best attempt at sharpening. Maybe exposure was bad to strat with, and that introduced noise and artefacts.

As I'm printing on my new Pixma 9000 MkII, I notice that prints RAWs from my old 350D are stunning while prints from RAWs from the 7D are, well, OK, as long as they are not cropped.

I'll try the phase vs contrast focus, see if there's a difference. Thanks Bob.

Bob's suggestion is spot on. Contrast detect uses the image from the sensor to fine tune focus... one reason why it's so dog slow. However, it's also extremely accurate. Many folks here (myself included) use it as a reference for doing MFA. A quick way to see if the lens (or camera/lens combination) is the culprit would be to do exactly what Bob suggested. Take two shots from a tripod... one using Live View CD focus and the other using standard phase detect. Ensure the settings are otherwise identical. I'd start with the LV CD shot, then carefully watch the lens focus ring and take a shot using standard PD focus. If you see it move at all, your lens is not focusing correctly and you should definitely consider either sending the camera in to Canon for a looksee, or try to use MFA to address the issue. That exact process helped me find an issue with my 100-400 calibration and with MFA am now able to get razor sharp images across its range. Doing the same process with other lenses can also help you determine whether you have a camera calibration issue or something that's more unique to that lens (I'd guess the latter... but take that with a grain of salt).

No reason this should continue to drive you nuts. There are enough great examples here to show that the 7D is more than capable of delivering razor sharp images. Yours should be able to do the exact same thing.

Michel Savage said:

Bob: No, I have not compared contrast AF in liveview to phase AF with the camera on a tripod. Is this supposed to reveal something?

In any case, the bird shot is my best attempt at sharpening. Maybe exposure was bad to strat with, and that introduced noise and artefacts.

As I'm printing on my new Pixma 9000 MkII, I notice that prints RAWs from my old 350D are stunning while prints from RAWs from the 7D are, well, OK, as long as they are not cropped.

I'll try the phase vs contrast focus, see if there's a difference. Thanks Bob.

Click to expand...

It's a great camera but I notice that when shooting in ambient light, the pictures do look kinda mushy.

Once I put on the flash (not to increase shutter speed, but rather get some catchlight) the pictures tend to come to life. Most of the 'sharp' portraits you will see people post were taken with flash.

Ask them to post sharp pictures taken in ambient light to see what I'm talking about. This isn't a matter of shutter speed of hand holding technique, hard flash just inherently increases contrast.

Michel Savage said:

Bob: No, I have not compared contrast AF in liveview to phase AF with the camera on a tripod. Is this supposed to reveal something?

In any case, the bird shot is my best attempt at sharpening. Maybe exposure was bad to strat with, and that introduced noise and artefacts.

As I'm printing on my new Pixma 9000 MkII, I notice that prints RAWs from my old 350D are stunning while prints from RAWs from the 7D are, well, OK, as long as they are not cropped.

I'll try the phase vs contrast focus, see if there's a difference. Thanks Bob.

Click to expand...

akin_t said:

It's a great camera but I notice that when shooting in ambient light, the pictures do look kinda mushy.

Once I put on the flash (not to increase shutter speed, but rather get some catchlight) the pictures tend to come to life. Most of the 'sharp' portraits you will see people post were taken with flash.

Ask them to post sharp pictures taken in ambient light to see what I'm talking about. This isn't a matter of shutter speed of hand holding technique, hard flash just inherently increases contrast.

Click to expand...

I'd agree that the sharpest pictures have what I think of as "sharp" light - either via sun or some kind of flash. To me this makes sense - of the cameras I have used (40D, 5D, 7D) ambient light picks out less detail, which I'm sure could be explained by the physics of light (just not by me). Just like trying to read with a proper desk lamp vs. soft living room light - the words on the page are "sharper" to the eye.
--
Don't assume. It makes an a** out of you and me. ;-)
http://www.molimophoto.com

BellaBull8 said:

akin_t said:

It's a great camera but I notice that when shooting in ambient light, the pictures do look kinda mushy.

Once I put on the flash (not to increase shutter speed, but rather get some catchlight) the pictures tend to come to life. Most of the 'sharp' portraits you will see people post were taken with flash.

Ask them to post sharp pictures taken in ambient light to see what I'm talking about. This isn't a matter of shutter speed of hand holding technique, hard flash just inherently increases contrast.

Click to expand...

I'd agree that the sharpest pictures have what I think of as "sharp" light - either via sun or some kind of flash. To me this makes sense - of the cameras I have used (40D, 5D, 7D) ambient light picks out less detail, which I'm sure could be explained by the physics of light (just not by me). Just like trying to read with a proper desk lamp vs. soft living room light - the words on the page are "sharper" to the eye.
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Click to expand...

Do you really see a difference in the comparison below?

Tungsten light and WB, RAW files, DPP 3.7, same Canon 50mmf1.4 at f5.6, 4 seconds, ISO 100, Standard picture styles with all sharpening and NR sliders to zero. Contrast AF for 7D and 50D, manual focus in liveview for 40D.

7D top left, 40D top right, 50D bottom all at 100%



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http://www.pbase.com/rwbaron

Bob: I have just tried what you were suggesting: comparing contrast detect to phase detect. Tripod, cable release, spot with expansion, ISO 100 and cable. The results are: contrast detecty pics ARE sharper than phase detect, viewed at 100% with no sharpening at all, in RAW format.

What does this mean?

It means your camera and lens are not in proper AF calibration and most likley the lens is out. This is where AF micro-adjust can make a big difference. If you need help doing the micro-adjust I can help but I'm on my way out the door as I write this and it won't be until later this evening.

Bob

Michel Savage said:

Bob: I have just tried what you were suggesting: comparing contrast detect to phase detect. Tripod, cable release, spot with expansion, ISO 100 and cable. The results are: contrast detecty pics ARE sharper than phase detect, viewed at 100% with no sharpening at all, in RAW format.

What does this mean?

Click to expand...

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http://www.pbase.com/rwbaron

Thanks Bob. I have all the info (more than I need) on MA. Thanks for the info though. The difference between live view and quick view is quite obvious. I'll get into MA, but some otrher day. I have procrastinated enough today.

When you import into Lightroom, you can choose a preset to apply. It will default to the one your choose last time, so you only have to set it one time. There are a couple sharpening ones, but you can also create your own.
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Todd Haehn

Michel Savage said:

Thanks Bob. I have all the info (more than I need) on MA. Thanks for the info though. The difference between live view and quick view is quite obvious. I'll get into MA, but some otrher day. I have procrastinated enough today.

Click to expand...

Here's a link to a raw file from my 7D:

http://www.manzi.org/7draw.zip

7D files need a little tweaking, but not that much, really. I get very good results from mine. Let me know what you see and what you think.

--
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'Hit Refresh if pix do not appear. Flaky ISP at work.'

Wow, wow, and re-wow. I just saw your raw file showing an engine. It's a lot sharper than what I get. Impressive even at 100%. At 200%, pixels start showing but that's natural.

However.

I have noticed that pics taken within say 20 feet/7 meters appear to be much sharper than pics taken at infinity.

I have posted many pics so far, in the hope of confirming or infirming problems with my 7D unit. Alas, I'm still left with uncertainty - is it me, is it my lens, is it my camera, I am imagining things. It's my wife !

shankardarren said:

But i think my 7D has no focus issues as stated by someone above. Nah, i think due to the Camera's large sensor with high density 18megapix, a better glass would solve the sharpness issue. maybe some good L glass ? Opinions?

Click to expand...

Getting no response to my post made me think you hadn't read it & I'm interested to know if you think the small amount of sharpening I did made the shots look good enough for you. If they do then all this talk about looking at the 100% raw files will just send you around in circles until you disappear up your own Fstop. You have stated you only want to shoot Jpeg & do no post processing so looking at 100% raw files seems redundant in your case. If you want to pick the sharpest Jpeg then just look at the 50% view & pick the best from that.

Yes better lenses do give some better results, better contrast & colours etc & the good EFS lenses like the 17-55 F2.8 IS accomplish this as well as the L lenses.
Regards Rod

shankardarren said:

But i think my 7D has no focus issues as stated by someone above. Nah, i think due to the Camera's large sensor with high density 18megapix, a better glass would solve the sharpness issue. maybe some good L glass ? Opinions?

Click to expand...

Just to confirm there is no focus issue with your 7D, you should borrow or rent 1 good lens like the 100mm 2.8L Macro and check it out. The 100mm 2.8L Macro is one the sharpest lenses from Canon.

Thanks Rod , the unsharp mask did make a difference but it can be clearly seen that its post processing. As i was mentioning in another post debating this same issue that it was me all along expecting something ridicules.
Lemme just copy..

No i did read your post, and realized that there wasnt any problem at all. It was all me from the start. Clearly this goes for any camera out there. there is no sharper, or sharpest camera. Its only how we perceive things, and manipulate light with the chosen shutter speed, aperture, iso and exposure. I clearly shot pictures in low light expecting great sharpness, but clearly no camera (rather prosumer) at this point can satisfy such high demands. Maybe full frame, but thats another story.

So bottom line is, no probs people. Prob just get a sharper lens..or use bounce flash to deal with the so called prob.

To play with the in camera picture style menus where you can increase the sharpening colours etc for good looking straight from the camera Jpegs, set & forget then you may like what comes out of the camera without having to post process at all.
Regards Rod

It looks more like 100% of a small compressed Jpeg file. It's full of Jpeg artifacts. You need to look into your own workflow & knowledge of digital cameras before you start blaming everything on a bad copy of the 7D.
Regards Rod

Same lenses on the 7D as my 550D, the 550D delivers sharper results, I remember a few months ago when there were threads on this subject, it was claimed then that the softness was due to the high MP count, well the clearly isn't true.

maybe it was just a bad first batch of 7D's that were affected

Robemo said:

... this subject, you will find many posts about this issue.

It is my experience that cameras with a high pixel count (15 mpixel +) and high density sensors (like APS-C sensors) are very demanding for lenses. For example, only after I started using cameras with more than 15 mpixel I found out that one of my lenses I had been using for years (a 35 mm f 2) had a slight decentering defect. With sub 10 mpixel cameras this defect was not visible.

In general when lenses are used wide open it will be very visible that they produce more errors (like softness) on high pixel/high density sensors. So better glass will pay off on these sensors. What glass are you using?

Ron

Click to expand...

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The 7D isn't soft the users are. Nikon has a very smart strategy not to give the average user a fine pitch sensor which allows good shots with average skills. If you pick up a 7D with 50% more pixels it demands the very best in optics and users skills to allow you to look 50% closer not see problems in optics or skills.









I wish I could say these are 7D shots. I thought the 7D softness myth was dead or I would have soft a few with it. What you are looking at are images from an EF 70-200 F2.8 IS MKII. I have also a EF 70-200 F2.8 and calling the difference night and day doesn't go near far enough.

I have another pair of images shot hand held at about 30 from the subject to get a full body in profile where I did a crop to her head and I can see through her cornea. Crystal clarity on stuff you'd never expect to be able to see.

The 50D was suposed to be soft also but I found if I shot high speed burst there'd more often than not be a perfect image buried in there. I concluded I was not steady enough for the 50D.

--
Phil Agur

7D - 5DMKII - Dual Body Bag - Go 'L' and don't look back!

Got 7D? See http://www.usa.canon.com/dlc/controller?act=GetArticleAct&articleID=3167

325xia said:

Always shoot in Raw. Then use DPP. You will get the best results that way. You
can make the adjustments in DPP.

Click to expand...

If you are using Lightroom then forget this advice. Lightroom is capable of doing anything that Digital Photo Professional can do, and more. The only advantage of using DPP over Lightroom is when you are only looking at a couple of images and importing them into Lightroom can be more trouble than it is worth.

As others have said, your shutter speed is quite low, allowing for a small amount of camera movement (shake) to soften the images. Using any lens at, or near, its maximum or minimum lens opening (aperture) will result in soft images. A plot of lens resolution (sharpness) vs. aperture pretty well look like a rounded hill with the peak around f/8 or f/11 for most lenses.

I was going to suggest you increase your ISO setting so you could use a faster shutter speed and a smaller aperture but I see that your photos are already at ISO values between 500 and 1600. You must have been taking the photos in near darkness. I would be happy to get any images under those conditions, and expect them to be a bit soft.

Hang in there, you will get better with practice.

shankardarren said:

Currently using kit 18-55 and 50mm 1.8. Yes i agree better glass is the key but where do i start? im currently a med student who just blew all his cash on a 7D! haha..
Any suggestions

Click to expand...

Now blow your bank account and get a 70-200L
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So much to see.....so l'il time to capture!!