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A few shots with new V3 + 70-300... Images a little soft/noisy?

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Obviously something is wrong with you camera, or lens, or both.

The images are really soft and noisy. Particularly the monkey, which is unacceptable. Nothing to say on the #3, which is too small.

I suppose you don't have only the 70-300? If you have another lens, try it on your body, and see what happens. If everything is OK, then it should be the 70-300 which is faulty.

Auto iso on the 1 cameras is poorly implemented. That's a shame, when you know how well it works on Nikon DSLRs and on the Coopix P7800.

I disagree with the suggestion of using aperture priority: even wide open, if light is poor, the camera will choose a slow SS, and you'll end up with blurry images, unrecoverable.

IMO, you did the right choices: S mode, auto iso (which you should limit to 3200), spot metering.

That's why I think something is wrong with your gear.
 
Your images look like heavy crops, they also appear to be focused off the main subjects - the monkey leaves are in focus for example. I suspect you just need to practice - fire off plenty of shots and I'm sure you will get the results you are looking for.

When shooting nature outdoors I always shoot Aperture priority - CX lenses work best wide open.

Centre focus point

At least 5fps burst

Centre weighted metering

Never auto ISO - I always select an ISO to give me an appropriate speed.

I almost always have VR switched on.

My 70-300CX is consistently sharp and well exposed - of course it is possible you have faulty equipment?

My 70-300cx album
 
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Sonyshine said:
Your images look like heavy crops, they also appear to be focused off the main subjects - the monkey leaves are in focus for example. I suspect you just need to practice - fire off plenty of shots and I'm sure you will get the results you are looking for.

When shooting nature outdoors I always shoot Aperture priority - CX lenses work best wide open.

Centre focus point

At least 5fps burst

Centre weighted metering

Never auto ISO - I always select an ISO to give me an appropriate speed.

I almost always have VR switched on.

My 70-300CX is consistently sharp and well exposed - of course it is possible you have faulty equipment?

My 70-300cx album
Click to expand...
I'd say follow Ian's advice above and you'll get sharp images, no doubt about it!


Although this is a slight crop, I have seldom seen any sharper of a starling! Not my shot, my wife's!


Same starling male, even better shot! Downsized a bit. Also the wife's.

The Tamron 70-300 VC isn't bad either, and with the sun behind you they are hard to tell apart:











--
Tord_2 (at) photographer (dot) net
Mostly Nikon V1, V2, & D600, user
 
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Sonyshine said:
Your images look like heavy crops, they also appear to be focused off the main subjects - the monkey leaves are in focus for example. I suspect you just need to practice - fire off plenty of shots and I'm sure you will get the results you are looking for.

When shooting nature outdoors I always shoot Aperture priority - CX lenses work best wide open.

Centre focus point

At least 5fps burst

Centre weighted metering

Never auto ISO - I always select an ISO to give me an appropriate speed.

I almost always have VR switched on.

My 70-300CX is consistently sharp and well exposed - of course it is possible you have faulty equipment?

My 70-300cx album
Click to expand...
First, as can be seen by your album the 70-300 is a sharp lens, without question.

Second, love the shots :)....

Third - at the request of Tom Stirr I have been trying Manual with Auto ISO for BIF shots. I too was (still am) largely a Aperture priority guy, but when I was trying to get the Hummingbird I wanted the 1/3200 and f5.6 controlled and let the ISO go crazy. The shy little bird is NOT cooperating but I am liking the results thus far with a few other BIF shots.

I too and center focus point and center weight meter & AF-C. Don't think my VR has ever been off on the 70-300 it is brilliant.

Mike
 
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pda4you said:
Sonyshine said:
Your images look like heavy crops, they also appear to be focused off the main subjects - the monkey leaves are in focus for example. I suspect you just need to practice - fire off plenty of shots and I'm sure you will get the results you are looking for.

When shooting nature outdoors I always shoot Aperture priority - CX lenses work best wide open.

Centre focus point

At least 5fps burst

Centre weighted metering

Never auto ISO - I always select an ISO to give me an appropriate speed.

I almost always have VR switched on.

My 70-300CX is consistently sharp and well exposed - of course it is possible you have faulty equipment?

My 70-300cx album
Click to expand...
First, as can be seen by your album the 70-300 is a sharp lens, without question.

Second, love the shots :)....

Third - at the request of Tom Stirr I have been trying Manual with Auto ISO for BIF shots. I too was (still am) largely a Aperture priority guy, but when I was trying to get the Hummingbird I wanted the 1/3200 and f5.6 controlled and let the ISO go crazy. The shy little bird is NOT cooperating but I am liking the results thus far with a few other BIF shots.

I too and center focus point and center weight meter & AF-C. Don't think my VR has ever been off on the 70-300 it is brilliant.
Click to expand...
I might try that with BIF, Mike! Tom Stirr's advice is something I wouldn't ignore!
 
Yup, I sometimes use manual focus - when I need to - but usually I shoot in AF-C mode.
 
D300SandV1shooter said:
pda4you said:
Don't think my VR has ever been off on the 70-300 it is brilliant.
Click to expand...
Good discussion of Nikon's VR and best use thereof by Thom Hogan here:-

All about VR
Click to expand...
5 years old so a bit dated. Not sure that we can't say VR has advanced in that time.

Your welcome to turn yours off.

I am very happy with the super slow shutter speeds it allows, so I leave it on mostly so I don't lose a shot due to it being off.

Works for me.

Mike
 
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pda4you said:
D300SandV1shooter said:
pda4you said:
Don't think my VR has ever been off on the 70-300 it is brilliant.
Click to expand...
Good discussion of Nikon's VR and best use thereof by Thom Hogan here:-

All about VR
Click to expand...
5 years old so a bit dated. Not sure that we can't say VR has advanced in that time.
Click to expand...
VR technology has definitely marched forward quite a distance since then!
pda4you said:
Your welcome to turn yours off.

I am very happy with the super slow shutter speeds it allows, so I leave it on mostly so I don't lose a shot due to it being off.

Works for me.
Click to expand...
That's the same strategy I use, and it works most of the time very well!
 
pda4you said:
I am very happy with the super slow shutter speeds it allows
Click to expand...
No question about VR helping there, but probably not for the 1/3200 and 1/2000 speeds used by the OP.

As well as the Thom article I mentioned, Ming Thein has written "What they don’t tell you is that there’s an upper limit to stabilizer effectiveness, too. Above a certain shutter speed, the stabilizer mechanism can’t respond fast enough – so you’re actually going to get a bit of smearing or double imaging. In general, I’d turn it off above 1/500s or so."
 
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D300SandV1shooter said:
pda4you said:
I am very happy with the super slow shutter speeds it allows
Click to expand...
No question about VR helping there, but probably not for the 1/3200 and 1/2000 speeds used by the OP.

As well as the Thom article I mentioned, Ming Thein has written "What they don’t tell you is that there’s an upper limit to stabilizer effectiveness, too. Above a certain shutter speed, the stabilizer mechanism can’t respond fast enough – so you’re actually going to get a bit of smearing or double imaging. In general, I’d turn it off above 1/500s or so."
Click to expand...
I use it at all speeds for super sharp images. I will watch though.

I find that when I shoot in aperture priority and I don't always have time to look at the shutter selected. So I leave it on.

I fully believe that Thom and Ming might be right - but again dated material and I don't see any smearing or double imaging at all with this lens. Shots at very high shutter are still ROCK solid and tack sharp.

I guess at the end of the day - since lenses and camera's now communicate the camera should manage that setting "if" VR is going to cause issues. Then it could manage the setting on or off based on shutter. In fact the cx lens does not have the VR switch it must be managed in a menu.

What I also know is that I ALWAYS turned off VR on Fuji gear when it was not essential. I saw a clear difference and had issues in cases with VR on vs off. So I totally get what Ming and Thom say.

But Nikon's VR is freaky good, IMHO.

Mike
 
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So after reading the many useful responses to my original post asking why the images from my new V3+70-300 gear seemed soft and noisy, I decided to try some new shots. I used much slower shutter speeds and set the max ISO to 800 and shot, as before, in S priority with VR on.

The new pictures seem sharper, but are they still too soft/noisy considering what this Nikon 1 gear is supposed to be capable of?

I shot whatever I could find on a cycle ride late morning and a hike early evening. The birds are all from the morning cycle ride when light was good. The monkeys were shot in poor light and under/within dense forest with difficulty focusing past twigs and branches, so conditions were not as good as I had hoped...weather does what it likes, I just shoot what I find in a mountainous forest area, not a zoo or park, so sometimes I am lucky, sometimes not. The birds were about 20 feet away, the monkeys about 80 feet away. All images cropped.

So, are these new images whose up to V3+70-300 standards, or is something still very wrong, either with my technique, or the gear? Opinions most appreciated.

5c21f76cda824481a5164ee661655f76.jpg

31ad237c8ba84359848d0e68b8f8504a.jpg

72a8dfd3377d4671b59c873ffb8ad9ca.jpg

54a977d937b34af1871959b1145ddec6.jpg

adfb227791844e38a7804f505ab3d63f.jpg
 
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@simon2001: are these jpg's straight from the camera or are they processes in any way? I noticed some are quite smaller than the sensor resolution. Did you crop them? And with what software (and compression settings)?

They sure look soft or out-of-focus to me, but maybe the shutter speed is a little too slow (1/125s at 300mm could be used with vr, but that depends on how much the animals were moving while taking the shot).

Or you could indeed have a defective 70-300mm CX-lens. Maybe you could share some raw-samples of the photos?

With regards,

Pieter.
 
Viewing at original size, it seems to me that except for the third bird, you are slightly missing critical focus on your subject. Regardless of the effect or otherwise of VR on the final image, in-lens VR affects the VF image and lens element re-centering can slightly nudge your focus point (can depend on use of half-press or AF-On, and AF settings). The focus box is only indicative of the actual location of the AF sensors - see this screenshot showing the physical location of the sensors (this is for a V1):-

aa7ad836a241477092a4264e2fea471d.jpg
 
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xarafan said:
@simon2001: are these jpg's straight from the camera or are they processes in any way? I noticed some are quite smaller than the sensor resolution. Did you crop them? And with what software (and compression settings)?

They sure look soft or out-of-focus to me, but maybe the shutter speed is a little too slow (1/125s at 300mm could be used with vr, but that depends on how much the animals were moving while taking the shot).

Or you could indeed have a defective 70-300mm CX-lens. Maybe you could share some raw-samples of the photos?

With regards,

Pieter.
Click to expand...
Trying to...getting file type error messages
 
simon2001 said:
So after reading the many useful responses to my original post asking why the images from my new V3+70-300 gear seemed soft and noisy, I decided to try some new shots. I used much slower shutter speeds and set the max ISO to 800 and shot, as before, in S priority with VR on.

The new pictures seem sharper, but are they still too soft/noisy considering what this Nikon 1 gear is supposed to be capable of?

I shot whatever I could find on a cycle ride late morning and a hike early evening. The birds are all from the morning cycle ride when light was good. The monkeys were shot in poor light and under/within dense forest with difficulty focusing past twigs and branches, so conditions were not as good as I had hoped...weather does what it likes, I just shoot what I find in a mountainous forest area, not a zoo or park, so sometimes I am lucky, sometimes not. The birds were about 20 feet away, the monkeys about 80 feet away. All images cropped.

So, are these new images whose up to V3+70-300 standards, or is something still very wrong, either with my technique, or the gear? Opinions most appreciated.

54a977d937b34af1871959b1145ddec6.jpg
Click to expand...
OK I am 98% sure you have a bad copy.

May we try one more test? It will take the guesswork out of things. The best thing we can do check the lens in a well lit controlled environment.

Make sure the object is VERY well lit! This will keep ISO down.

The goal is to get the entire object across one focal plane. I.E. you are completely taking the focus of items in front of the subject and rear of the subject out. You can use ANY focus mode as there is only one "plane" to focus on - a flat object. Then we make sure the camera focal plane is exactly parallel to the object. The lens will need to be perpendicular to the chart for the test to work.

Click on this and look at the "flat field testing"

http://www.lensrentals.com/blog/2010/11/how-to-test-a-lens

He even has the charts you can download for the test.

If you don't have the tripod connection for the lens that is OK just setup something on a table with bean bags or other so the lens ISN'T moving. Lineup is super critical so take some time. Then you can include the pics when you send it off for warranty work! :)

Take a pic with VR on and VR off. Normally for tripod or fixed testing we want VR off. (VR MAY be casing the issue afterall).

Then shoot with another, known good lens. This narrows it to the lens not the camera body/sensor or focus. It can be the body too!

Make sense?

Mike
 
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5623b1bffbf94c62aae4f829e36dfdc4.jpg

i tried saving RAW, but had some error message and was not able to. the above is saved straight RAW, to JPG in DXO optics using export to disk, using resolution 300ppi....not sure if it will be of any use but its the least processed i can save right now, for some reason.



In this image i tried focusing on the left most area of flower petals in the pot, at 300mm, 1/100 secs.



all other images previoulsyb attached were cropped and processed, either in DXO or Corel, as im trialing both.



Regards,



Simon
simon2001 said:
xarafan said:
@simon2001: are these jpg's straight from the camera or are they processes in any way? I noticed some are quite smaller than the sensor resolution. Did you crop them? And with what software (and compression settings)?

They sure look soft or out-of-focus to me, but maybe the shutter speed is a little too slow (1/125s at 300mm could be used with vr, but that depends on how much the animals were moving while taking the shot).

Or you could indeed have a defective 70-300mm CX-lens. Maybe you could share some raw-samples of the photos?

With regards,

Pieter.
Click to expand...
Trying to...getting file type error messages
Click to expand...
 
You can't upload RAW files here. You can just shoot OOC JPG and that will work fine, or as you did just no processing and save as JPG.

Again - we need a "flat" object photographed as I requested above. :) Since it is flat it takes all the guesswork out. :)

Shoot both a known good and this lens too - it might be the body.

Mike
 
Here's a SOOC JPG which the OP could compare his results with (warning - large file).

6cc61d91e3844fc5adf3bf61c321c81b.jpg
 
Last edited:
pda4you said:
simon2001 said:
So after reading the many useful responses to my original post asking why the images from my new V3+70-300 gear seemed soft and noisy, I decided to try some new shots. I used much slower shutter speeds and set the max ISO to 800 and shot, as before, in S priority with VR on.

The new pictures seem sharper, but are they still too soft/noisy considering what this Nikon 1 gear is supposed to be capable of?

I shot whatever I could find on a cycle ride late morning and a hike early evening. The birds are all from the morning cycle ride when light was good. The monkeys were shot in poor light and under/within dense forest with difficulty focusing past twigs and branches, so conditions were not as good as I had hoped...weather does what it likes, I just shoot what I find in a mountainous forest area, not a zoo or park, so sometimes I am lucky, sometimes not. The birds were about 20 feet away, the monkeys about 80 feet away. All images cropped.

So, are these new images whose up to V3+70-300 standards, or is something still very wrong, either with my technique, or the gear? Opinions most appreciated.

54a977d937b34af1871959b1145ddec6.jpg
Click to expand...
OK I am 98% sure you have a bad copy.

May we try one more test? It will take the guesswork out of things. The best thing we can do check the lens in a well lit controlled environment.

Make sure the object is VERY well lit! This will keep ISO down.

The goal is to get the entire object across one focal plane. I.E. you are completely taking the focus of items in front of the subject and rear of the subject out. You can use ANY focus mode as there is only one "plane" to focus on - a flat object. Then we make sure the camera focal plane is exactly parallel to the object. The lens will need to be perpendicular to the chart for the test to work.

Click on this and look at the "flat field testing"

http://www.lensrentals.com/blog/2010/11/how-to-test-a-lens

He even has the charts you can download for the test.

If you don't have the tripod connection for the lens that is OK just setup something on a table with bean bags or other so the lens ISN'T moving. Lineup is super critical so take some time. Then you can include the pics when you send it off for warranty work! :)

Take a pic with VR on and VR off. Normally for tripod or fixed testing we want VR off. (VR MAY be casing the issue afterall).

Then shoot with another, known good lens. This narrows it to the lens not the camera body/sensor or focus. It can be the body too!

Make sense?

Mike
Click to expand...
Many years ago, when I wanted to do a quick lens test, I would get a broadsheet newspaper (like the Daily Telegraph in the UK or USA Today), take one of the sheets from it, and stick to to a wall. Then photograph it from a distance so that the paper completely filled the screen. If you couldn't read the text there was something wrong with the lens.

Minor problem with that are that on a V3 with the 70-300mm lens, one would need to be a long way back to fit the whole paper into the frame when set to 300mm - definitely not an indoor activity unless one has an extremely large house!

--
DaveR
 
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