Is this 'operator error" or what ????

wgosma · Oct 27, 2015

Folks,

This photo is not as 'sharp' as I know it could be using this camera/lens combo; when I go 1:1 with the raw file in LR5 I can see it's 'off', just a tad bit.

Can you point me to the problem? (I have my idea but let me hear your unbiased input).

K3 II w/Tamron 17-50 lens

1/2 second exposure @ F/8

'handheld' with camera support on tree trunk or rock (I forget which)

I don't recall where I focused the camera

Shake reduction ON

Thanks/Bill

--
Bill / Oceanside, CA
www.billgosmaphotography.com

Smitty1 · Oct 27, 2015

Impressive you handheld (even if supported) at 1/2 of a second.

It looks like high noise reduction (NR) or some kind of softening image compression is occurring at 1:1

Then again at 1:1 the images generally don't look nearly as impressive as they are at 1:2 or so.

wgosma · Oct 27, 2015

Smitty1 said:
Impressive you handheld (even if supported) at 1/2 of a second.

It looks like high noise reduction (NR) or some kind of softening image compression is occurring at 1:1

Then again at 1:1 the images generally don't look nearly as impressive as they are at 1:2 or so.

Interesting comment; camera is very new to me, tho I had K-5 experience. I did have the in-camera High ISO noise reduction set to 'auto'....hmmm, maybe that was the cause!

I did have a VERY steady support for the shot as I recall. Next time I pull out the tripod and turn off the shake reduction.....and the noise filters too

Thanks/Bill

miles500 · Oct 27, 2015

It looks fairly sharp for a long exposure and hand held image and I would not expect to get better than this unless I used a tripod.

MightyMike · Oct 27, 2015

So thats 22mm at 1/2 a second... You're relying on just over 4 stops of IS for this shot

Now you might think that by supporting yourself you can get a more stable image, however without using a 2 second timer (which shuts off SR) the act of pushing the shutter button full down might be enough to cause motion blur in the image. Also assuming you have a very stable hold/support on the camera the SR itself may cause blur as its supposed to be turned off when on a tripod just for that reason.

You could have opened the aperture to F5.6 or even F4.0 and still got away with this shot, you could have increased the ISO to 800 and maybe could have pushed 1600 and still got a similar result, I'd prefer opening the aperture over the ISO due to DR or for that matter do a combination of the 2.

Given you didn't have a tripod just remember shots like these were not even possible handheld in the not to distant past.

One last thing, either your shadow lifting technique or your WB was off as the green on the lens don't look realistic to me

wgosma said:
Folks,

This photo is not as 'sharp' as I know it could be using this camera/lens combo; when I go 1:1 with the raw file in LR5 I can see it's 'off', just a tad bit.

Can you point me to the problem? (I have my idea but let me hear your unbiased input).

K3 II w/Tamron 17-50 lens

1/2 second exposure @ F/8

'handheld' with camera support on tree trunk or rock (I forget which)

I don't recall where I focused the camera

Shake reduction ON

Thanks/Bill

--
Bill / Oceanside, CA
www.billgosmaphotography.com

--
Mike from Canada
"I am not a great photographer! God is a great creator! All I do is capture His creation with the tools He has provided me."
'I like to think so far outside the box that it would require a telephoto lens just to see the box!' ~ 'My Quote

'

http://www.michaelfastphotography.com/galleries/VP-BDI_3a.jpg

Aviation Photo Search | Airliners.net

www.airliners.net

Daedbird · Oct 27, 2015

I concur that it is likely a combination of Auto NR and long exposure.

In the K3 line, Ricoh bumped up the NR levels then what we saw in the K5 and earlier lines (one of the things I loved was lower NR default than Nikon back in my K10).

That was the issue when the K3 came out, and many pentaxians questioned its shooting ability initially. The more sensitive NR, along with some other settings needed to be adjusted more out of the box than with the K5 line (there are threads online where people tell their perfect settings for the K3). I, for example, have NR turned off for anything 1600 or below.

Also, there are two different NR adjustments. There is high ISO NR, which actually probably did not affect your photo as much as long exposure NR, which I assume was the more likely culprit.

-NOTE- Adjustments to NR sensitivity are not utilized in Green mode, they stick with the camera defaults.

Honestly, the image looks very sharp considering how you shot it.

This image seems to be the perfect opportunity to utilize the pixel shift tech in the K3II (you lucky devil). With landscapes like this, if you do not know, the camera shifts its sensor to capture more detail. In stills like this, with no moving items, it should really improve your image quality.

Honestly, the results I saw from tests made me want to dump my K3 for it (I could care less about GPS, and I have plenty of flashes).

wgosma · Oct 27, 2015

MightyMike said:
So thats 22mm at 1/2 a second... You're relying on just over 4 stops of IS for this shot

Now you might think that by supporting yourself you can get a more stable image, however without using a 2 second timer (which shuts off SR) the act of pushing the shutter button full down might be enough to cause motion blur in the image. Also assuming you have a very stable hold/support on the camera the SR itself may cause blur as its supposed to be turned off when on a tripod just for that reason.

You could have opened the aperture to F5.6 or even F4.0 and still got away with this shot, you could have increased the ISO to 800 and maybe could have pushed 1600 and still got a similar result, I'd prefer opening the aperture over the ISO due to DR or for that matter do a combination of the 2.

Given you didn't have a tripod just remember shots like these were not even possible handheld in the not to distant past.

One last thing, either your shadow lifting technique or your WB was off as the green on the lens don't look realistic to me

wgosma said:

Folks,

This photo is not as 'sharp' as I know it could be using this camera/lens combo; when I go 1:1 with the raw file in LR5 I can see it's 'off', just a tad bit.

Can you point me to the problem? (I have my idea but let me hear your unbiased input).

K3 II w/Tamron 17-50 lens

1/2 second exposure @ F/8

'handheld' with camera support on tree trunk or rock (I forget which)

I don't recall where I focused the camera

Shake reduction ON

Thanks/Bill

--
Bill / Oceanside, CA
www.billgosmaphotography.com

Click to expand...

--
Mike from Canada
"I am not a great photographer! God is a great creator! All I do is capture His creation with the tools He has provided me."
'I like to think so far outside the box that it would require a telephoto lens just to see the box!' ~ 'My Quote '
http://www.michaelfastphotography.com/galleries/VP-BDI_3a.jpg
http://www.airliners.net/search/[email protected]&thumbnails=

Hi Mike,

Ok good info, thanks - good points. I did/do have a tripod....it was in the backseat of my car- shooting 'hand-held' here is called being old and lazy at the end of a long day

Had I been a little more on the ball I would have shot w/larger aperture as I did note the long 1/2 second time, I think at the time I felt I'd lose sharpness for lack of depth of field if I opened up the lens, but as you say....with this short focal length I could have pulled it off- my error on that point.

I'm wondering about the other poster's comment about the high ISO NR filter?.....I don't consider ISO 400 to be 'high' but that is besides the point. I did have the camera set up with 'auto' for the high ISO NR function and maybe it played into this?

The green has been tweaked in LR; the camera captured w/WB set to 'daylight' (4900 / +5 tint if I'm correct); I wanted less blue/ more 'green' so I adjusted it to 4600 w/-16 tint. Plus green 'luminance' has been pushed to +20.....that could be what you've spotted?

Bill

--
Bill / Oceanside, CA
www.billgosmaphotography.com

wgosma · Oct 27, 2015

Daedbird said:
I concur that it is likely a combination of Auto NR and long exposure.

In the K3 line, Ricoh bumped up the NR levels then what we saw in the K5 and earlier lines (one of the things I loved was lower NR default than Nikon back in my K10).

That was the issue when the K3 came out, and many pentaxians questioned its shooting ability initially. The more sensitive NR, along with some other settings needed to be adjusted more out of the box than with the K5 line (there are threads online where people tell their perfect settings for the K3). I, for example, have NR turned off for anything 1600 or below.

Also, there are two different NR adjustments. There is high ISO NR, which actually probably did not affect your photo as much as long exposure NR, which I assume was the more likely culprit.

-NOTE- Adjustments to NR sensitivity are not utilized in Green mode, they stick with the camera defaults.

Honestly, the image looks very sharp considering how you shot it.

This image seems to be the perfect opportunity to utilize the pixel shift tech in the K3II (you lucky devil). With landscapes like this, if you do not know, the camera shifts its sensor to capture more detail. In stills like this, with no moving items, it should really improve your image quality.

Honestly, the results I saw from tests made me want to dump my K3 for it (I could care less about GPS, and I have plenty of flashes).

Thanks much...more good info here. I came to this camera from a K5 very recently, it's a bit more 'touchy'. I did have the high ISO NR set to 'auto' AND the Long Exposure NR turned ON....so now I'll leave them off and move forward, see what I get.

I had a tripod in the car but was just lazy as I'd been driving most of the day and was tired, ugh - getting old! The tripod and pixel shift mode did cross my mind but my fatigue won out. There will be a next time, stay tuned.

MightyMike · Oct 27, 2015

wgosma said:
Hi Mike,

Ok good info, thanks - good points. I did/do have a tripod....it was in the backseat of my car- shooting 'hand-held' here is called being old and lazy at the end of a long day Had I been a little more on the ball I would have shot w/larger aperture as I did note the long 1/2 second time, I think at the time I felt I'd lose sharpness for lack of depth of field if I opened up the lens, but as you say....with this short focal length I could have pulled it off- my error on that point.

I'm wondering about the other poster's comment about the high ISO NR filter?.....I don't consider ISO 400 to be 'high' but that is besides the point. I did have the camera set up with 'auto' for the high ISO NR function and maybe it played into this?

No telling what Ricoh chose to do with the NR, best find a scene and shoot a bunch of shots at different levels and see what you like and what you don't like

wgosma said:
The green has been tweaked in LR; the camera captured w/WB set to 'daylight' (4900 / +5 tint if I'm correct); I wanted less blue/ more 'green' so I adjusted it to 4600 w/-16 tint. Plus green 'luminance' has been pushed to +20.....that could be what you've spotted?

As far as i know daylight is 5500... at least thats what it is in ACR and if you check places like wikipedia. adjusting the kelvin to even lower will add blue rather than subtract it but the tint would seriously add more green.

However consider this is not daylight but in the sunset realm, you might consider a much warmer 7500-12500 kelvin depending on the amount of reds, yellows and oranges in the sunset. if you're willing go back to the original image, leave the tint as it was originally and shift the kelvin to a lot warmer keeping an eye on the green until the green looks right. Keep in mind foliage more often then not is yellow and not green (yes we see it as green but its the yellow channel that has the most affect on it)

What i have described is a method i use on sunsets to achieve what i call green balance instead of WB as there isn't always an untainted white object in the photo to WB off of. an example of the technique can be seen at the end of this gallery

Loading…

www.michaelfastphotography.com

I also increased the exposure so i could see the green better while adjusting the WB then set the exposure back to ideal. Also the last 2 sunrise photos in this gallery

Loading…

www.michaelfastphotography.com

wgosma said:
Bill

wgosma · Oct 27, 2015

MightyMike said:
wgosma said:

Hi Mike,

Ok good info, thanks - good points. I did/do have a tripod....it was in the backseat of my car- shooting 'hand-held' here is called being old and lazy at the end of a long day Had I been a little more on the ball I would have shot w/larger aperture as I did note the long 1/2 second time, I think at the time I felt I'd lose sharpness for lack of depth of field if I opened up the lens, but as you say....with this short focal length I could have pulled it off- my error on that point.

I'm wondering about the other poster's comment about the high ISO NR filter?.....I don't consider ISO 400 to be 'high' but that is besides the point. I did have the camera set up with 'auto' for the high ISO NR function and maybe it played into this?

Click to expand...

No telling what Ricoh chose to do with the NR, best find a scene and shoot a bunch of shots at different levels and see what you like and what you don't like

MightyMike said:

The green has been tweaked in LR; the camera captured w/WB set to 'daylight' (4900 / +5 tint if I'm correct); I wanted less blue/ more 'green' so I adjusted it to 4600 w/-16 tint. Plus green 'luminance' has been pushed to +20.....that could be what you've spotted?

Click to expand...

As far as i know daylight is 5500... at least thats what it is in ACR and if you check places like wikipedia. adjusting the kelvin to even lower will add blue rather than subtract it but the tint would seriously add more green.

However consider this is not daylight but in the sunset realm, you might consider a much warmer 7500-12500 kelvin depending on the amount of reds, yellows and oranges in the sunset. if you're willing go back to the original image, leave the tint as it was originally and shift the kelvin to a lot warmer keeping an eye on the green until the green looks right. Keep in mind foliage more often then not is yellow and not green (yes we see it as green but its the yellow channel that has the most affect on it)

What i have described is a method i use on sunsets to achieve what i call green balance instead of WB as there isn't always an untainted white object in the photo to WB off of. an example of the technique can be seen at the end of this gallery

http://www.michaelfastphotography.com/galleries/k-3/vacation/tahoe/day10byosemite/

I also increased the exposure so i could see the green better while adjusting the WB then set the exposure back to ideal. Also the last 2 sunrise photos in this gallery

http://www.michaelfastphotography.com/galleries/k-3/vacation/tahoe/day12burntforestdeerhit/

MightyMike said:

Bill

--
Bill / Oceanside, CA
www.billgosmaphotography.com

Click to expand...

--
Mike from Canada
"I am not a great photographer! God is a great creator! All I do is capture His creation with the tools He has provided me."
'I like to think so far outside the box that it would require a telephoto lens just to see the box!' ~ 'My Quote '
http://www.michaelfastphotography.com/galleries/VP-BDI_3a.jpg
http://www.airliners.net/search/[email protected]&thumbnails=

Thanks again Mike....I'll look over your info. I warmed that image to 6350K (below), I like the look! In re-looking at a several different images in this shoot I may have had the camera set to AUTO WB; not how I normally shoot but the figures seem to point that direction - i.e. slight WB variances from image to image, hmmm.

Bill / Oceanside, CA
www.billgosmaphotography.com

Holger Bargen · Oct 27, 2015

wgosma said:
Smitty1 said:

Impressive you handheld (even if supported) at 1/2 of a second.

It looks like high noise reduction (NR) or some kind of softening image compression is occurring at 1:1

Then again at 1:1 the images generally don't look nearly as impressive as they are at 1:2 or so.

Click to expand...

Interesting comment; camera is very new to me, tho I had K-5 experience. I did have the in-camera High ISO noise reduction set to 'auto'....hmmm, maybe that was the cause!

I believe that it is the noise reduction. I remember that many people were not satisfied with the sharpness of the K3 - and a little later they recognized that the automatic nose reduction of the camera was very strong and could destroy details in the photos.

Did you shoot also RAW? - If so you could try to solve the problems in post processing as the noise reduction has only influence on the processing of the JPG within the camera.

1/2 of a second is y long exposure time for a camera with a pixel density of the K3. I remember that I had to learn that the exposure times I used to work with in analogue days with my cameras were not short enough for my K5 - even though SR helps a lot.

Another question: Did you use shake reduction correctly? It works only if you press the release button half - wait till the symbol is shown in the display - and then it works for exactly one photo - thus, for series of photos it does not help anything.

wgosma said:
I did have a VERY steady support for the shot as I recall. Next time I pull out the tripod and turn off the shake reduction.....and the noise filters too

Thanks/Bill

--
Bill / Oceanside, CA
www.billgosmaphotography.com

wgosma · Oct 27, 2015

Holger Bargen said:
wgosma said:

Smitty1 said:

Impressive you handheld (even if supported) at 1/2 of a second.

It looks like high noise reduction (NR) or some kind of softening image compression is occurring at 1:1

Then again at 1:1 the images generally don't look nearly as impressive as they are at 1:2 or so.

Click to expand...

Interesting comment; camera is very new to me, tho I had K-5 experience. I did have the in-camera High ISO noise reduction set to 'auto'....hmmm, maybe that was the cause!

Click to expand...

I believe that it is the noise reduction. I remember that many people were not satisfied with the sharpness of the K3 - and a little later they recognized that the automatic nose reduction of the camera was very strong and could destroy details in the photos.

Did you shoot also RAW? - If so you could try to solve the problems in post processing as the noise reduction has only influence on the processing of the JPG within the camera.

Yes, it was RAW capture w/camera set to 'auto' High ISO noise reduction (and noise reduction mode for long exposure); so if what you state about in-camera noise reduction affecting ONLY JPEG capture, this in-camera setting was not the issue causing problems here, correct? Or do I mis-understand your statement?

Holger Bargen said:
1/2 of a second is y long exposure time for a camera with a pixel density of the K3. I remember that I had to learn that the exposure times I used to work with in analogue days with my cameras were not short enough for my K5 - even though SR helps a lot.

Another question: Did you use shake reduction correctly? It works only if you press the release button half - wait till the symbol is shown in the display - and then it works for exactly one photo - thus, for series of photos it does not help anything.

Not certain on the operation of the SR feature. Being that this shot took me a few moments to compose/steady the camera on a tree stump and fact that I believe I used auto-focus then I think likely the camera had sufficient 'time' to click-into (so to speak) SR mode, but can't confirm as I did not note status in the viewfinder.

Holger Bargen said:
Holger Bargen said:

I did have a VERY steady support for the shot as I recall. Next time I pull out the tripod and turn off the shake reduction.....and the noise filters too

Thanks/Bill

Click to expand...

Daedbird · Oct 27, 2015

Now some people have attempted pixel shift while hand-holding their cameras - this length of time would probably be a mistake, but maybe bump the ISO higher to cut the shutter time.

1600 ISO with pie shift may reduce the shutter's time enough that you wouldn't notice any wobble. Worst case scenario, you just have couple more blurry photos.....

-TIP- There are three ways to get RAW images with a Pentax camera.

1. Change the settings in the menu for RAW capture (I prefer having the setting at DNG vs PEF)

2. Pressing the RAW button (button can be set to change all settings, or for the next shot)

3. Review last picture - Pentax has given all cameras the ability to retroactively make the last picture RAW by simply pressing on the AE-L button when viewing image. This works as long as the camera was not turned off......

ozdean · Oct 27, 2015

Use a tripod

set to f13 - f16

iso 100

SR off

2 sec timer

cover viewfinder

Landscape mode if shooting Jpeg to make it pop.

Your shot has noise, movement and lack of dof.

wgosma · Oct 27, 2015

Daedbird said:
Now some people have attempted pixel shift while hand-holding their cameras - this length of time would probably be a mistake, but maybe bump the ISO higher to cut the shutter time.

1600 ISO with pie shift may reduce the shutter's time enough that you wouldn't notice any wobble. Worst case scenario, you just have couple more blurry photos.....

-TIP- There are three ways to get RAW images with a Pentax camera.

1. Change the settings in the menu for RAW capture (I prefer having the setting at DNG vs PEF)

2. Pressing the RAW button (button can be set to change all settings, or for the next shot)

3. Review last picture - Pentax has given all cameras the ability to retroactively make the last picture RAW by simply pressing on the AE-L button when viewing image. This works as long as the camera was not turned off......

Ok I get this, thanks! I think the better solution is to go back to the car and pull out the tripod that was laying on the rear seat....it's was all of a 25' walk away

Freddy Quimby · Oct 27, 2015

Half second is a long time. That's impressive, but I think you are just past what the SR was able to give you.

miles green · Oct 27, 2015

wgosma said:
Daedbird said:

I concur that it is likely a combination of Auto NR and long exposure.

In the K3 line, Ricoh bumped up the NR levels then what we saw in the K5 and earlier lines (one of the things I loved was lower NR default than Nikon back in my K10).

That was the issue when the K3 came out, and many pentaxians questioned its shooting ability initially. The more sensitive NR, along with some other settings needed to be adjusted more out of the box than with the K5 line (there are threads online where people tell their perfect settings for the K3). I, for example, have NR turned off for anything 1600 or below.

Also, there are two different NR adjustments. There is high ISO NR, which actually probably did not affect your photo as much as long exposure NR, which I assume was the more likely culprit.

-NOTE- Adjustments to NR sensitivity are not utilized in Green mode, they stick with the camera defaults.

Honestly, the image looks very sharp considering how you shot it.

This image seems to be the perfect opportunity to utilize the pixel shift tech in the K3II (you lucky devil). With landscapes like this, if you do not know, the camera shifts its sensor to capture more detail. In stills like this, with no moving items, it should really improve your image quality.

Honestly, the results I saw from tests made me want to dump my K3 for it (I could care less about GPS, and I have plenty of flashes).

Click to expand...

Thanks much...more good info here. I came to this camera from a K5 very recently, it's a bit more 'touchy'. I did have the high ISO NR set to 'auto' AND the Long Exposure NR turned ON....so now I'll leave them off and move forward, see what I get.

I might be wrong about this, but i believe long exposure NR is for looong exposures (about 15 seconds and more) where the camera will take a second dark frame exposure mainly to cancel out noise generated by the sensor heating up. I don't think it has anything to do with this picture (which i like a lot btw!).

I think the HDR processing had a lot to do with the loss of detail, you could check the original file?

wgosma said:
I had a tripod in the car but was just lazy as I'd been driving most of the day and was tired, ugh - getting old! The tripod and pixel shift mode did cross my mind but my fatigue won out. There will be a next time, stay tuned.

wgosma · Oct 27, 2015

miles green said:
wgosma said:

Daedbird said:

I concur that it is likely a combination of Auto NR and long exposure.

In the K3 line, Ricoh bumped up the NR levels then what we saw in the K5 and earlier lines (one of the things I loved was lower NR default than Nikon back in my K10).

That was the issue when the K3 came out, and many pentaxians questioned its shooting ability initially. The more sensitive NR, along with some other settings needed to be adjusted more out of the box than with the K5 line (there are threads online where people tell their perfect settings for the K3). I, for example, have NR turned off for anything 1600 or below.

Also, there are two different NR adjustments. There is high ISO NR, which actually probably did not affect your photo as much as long exposure NR, which I assume was the more likely culprit.

-NOTE- Adjustments to NR sensitivity are not utilized in Green mode, they stick with the camera defaults.

Honestly, the image looks very sharp considering how you shot it.

This image seems to be the perfect opportunity to utilize the pixel shift tech in the K3II (you lucky devil). With landscapes like this, if you do not know, the camera shifts its sensor to capture more detail. In stills like this, with no moving items, it should really improve your image quality.

Honestly, the results I saw from tests made me want to dump my K3 for it (I could care less about GPS, and I have plenty of flashes).

Click to expand...

Thanks much...more good info here. I came to this camera from a K5 very recently, it's a bit more 'touchy'. I did have the high ISO NR set to 'auto' AND the Long Exposure NR turned ON....so now I'll leave them off and move forward, see what I get.

Click to expand...

I might be wrong about this, but i believe long exposure NR is for looong exposures (about 15 seconds and more) where the camera will take a second dark frame exposure mainly to cancel out noise generated by the sensor heating up. I don't think it has anything to do with this picture (which i like a lot btw!).

I think the HDR processing had a lot to do with the loss of detail, you could check the original file?

Single RAW file was only processed in LR5; not HDR, etc. on this one.

miles green said:
miles green said:

I had a tripod in the car but was just lazy as I'd been driving most of the day and was tired, ugh - getting old! The tripod and pixel shift mode did cross my mind but my fatigue won out. There will be a next time, stay tuned.

Click to expand...

MightyMike · Oct 27, 2015

wgosma said:
Thanks again Mike....I'll look over your info. I warmed that image to 6350K (below), I like the look! In re-looking at a several different images in this shoot I may have had the camera set to AUTO WB; not how I normally shoot but the figures seem to point that direction - i.e. slight WB variances from image to image, hmmm.

I always shoot AWB but then I always adjust the WB in RAW... WB and Exposure are the first things i adjust in an image

wgosma said:
Bill / Oceanside, CA
www.billgosmaphotography.com

--
Mike from Canada
"I am not a great photographer! God is a great creator! All I do is capture His creation with the tools He has provided me."
'I like to think so far outside the box that it would require a telephoto lens just to see the box!' ~ 'My Quote

'

http://www.michaelfastphotography.com/galleries/VP-BDI_3a.jpg

Aviation Photo Search | Airliners.net

www.airliners.net

miles green · Oct 28, 2015

By HDR processing, i mean the lifting of shadows and saving the highlights. Sometimes, it destroys contrast in the mid-range and makes pictures look unsharp.

If you had the camera on a rock/trunk etc, and used the 2-second delay, without touching the camera at all, you shouldn't be getting any shake, especially with wide lens, or with very long exposures as with an ND400 filter

Is this 'operator error" or what ????

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