Is this the best sharpness I can expect with the K-1II and FA 28-105?

I have a wonder if its the shutter speed causing some sort of displacement to the SR system, it seems historically in the ballpark of 1/100th sec most shutter shock happens, find a similar scene and test a range of shutter speeds to see if this may be an issue. Yes I know SR would have been turned off but the sensor still floats (held in place by those coils) so its still susceptible. I too have encountered hard to explain issues at similar shutter speeds but not always and not often enough to say this is the problem but it could be a potential problem.

EDIT ADD: now looking closer at the image it could also be the red wavelengths aren't focused as crisply on the sensor as the other wavelengths at that focal length or there are more aberrations associated with the red wavelengths at that focal length.

--
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/user/SpeEedy/profile/photos?sortBy=photoFavoriteCount

Do you allow me to give the photo a little post-processing with Piccure+? I am sure I can make it more crisp ...

Best regards

Holger

I agree with Mike that there might be something going on with SR. I suggest that you try a variety of shutter speeds and focal lengths to see if the evident softness is universal or can be isolated to particular parameters. I don't have the "ii" but have never seen this level of softness with the K-1 and 28-105 under this sort of controlled conditions. Consider also using one or more other lenses that you likely have covering the full frame, e.g., 100 macro, to separately test the body. I'm not that far from you and would be pleased to get together to share and compare. In any case, good luck

Uloo said:

I was recently enjoying and shooting the fall colors at Mt Rainier national park. When I got home I was somewhat disappointed in the lack of crisp sharpness that I seen from others with that camera/lens combination. Is there something that I could do to increase the sharpness. Every shot is of a heavy tripod with the camera set to 2sec self timer focus was set to Spot. I would like some input before I sent this expensive set up back.

Thanks Ulrich

Click to expand...

What a beautiful scene!

Sharpness is good to my eyes .



--
pentaxian .

Thanks Holger that you are willing to do that. Yes you may work with it any way you see fit.

Ulrich

Uloo said:

Thanks Holger that you are willing to do that. Yes you may work with it any way you see fit.

Ulrich

Click to expand...

Dear Ulrich - here we go:





I did the post-processing with piccure+ at settings Lens+, best quality, optical correction step between normal and strong, rendering at 14 and denoise at 11. I think the photo is close to perfect, now.

Unfortunatelly you can't buy the software anymore. It's available for downold for a short period of testing - but there is not option to buy it. The owners of the company seem to be working at university and they seem to have not much interest in marketing the product even though I think that it is the best you can get.

Thus, if you want an image to be improved - ask Holger ;-)

When I was using DxO I liked their options to blow up performance of consumer lenses in post-processing. But I dont't work with DxO anymore and I don't know if they support your camera- lens combination.

Did you test the settings of your camera? For my taste the standard settings according sharopnee are much to soft and I have added fine-sharpness or Extra sharpness and a plus of +3 steps at the JPG generation (if I don't shoot portrait).

If you have taken the photo as RAW you will be able to do the developing step in your camera with other settings, again. Maybe this would be a good step - also to tweak your camera to your needs.

Best regards

Holger

Looks good to me but as others have said, avoid shutter speeds of 1/100 to 1/180 as they seem to cause shutter blur. I tend to use TAV mode if I need critical sharpness on my K-5.

I also suspect shutter shock, I see it occasionally with this lens at that shutter speed. Since you're shooting from a tripod, switch to live-view and use electronic shutter, your images should be much sharper. My handheld shots are typically much sharper than your posted sample.

If you are referring to DFA 28-105 and not FA 28-105 Power Zoom, there must be something wrong with your settings or a camera. My DFA 28-105 is exceptionally sharp on K-1, the sharpest lens I have ever had.

I'm curious how did you set up your camera if you don't mind telling me. I just got mine a little over a week ago.

Thanks Ulrich

Gary

Are you using the Electronic shutter in your hand held shots? I have a very hard time hand holding a camera due to some hand shakes that developed over a lifetime of holding various vibrating sanders in a cabinet shop. So I got used to a tripod in all my photography.

Ulrich

At 1/180's Regular shutter


At 1/180's Electronic shutter


At 1/90's Regular shutter


At 1/90's Electronic shutter

I think that the problem is due to the over saturation, especially of the red colour. That's why it looks like a "bleeding", rather than blurriness. But without seeing it at the pixel level, it's difficult to claim anything.

--
Regards,
Peter

Thanks for you input. I have my camera set to the "Landscape" color profile.

Thanks Holger

Yes the picture is a little better but its still lacks that crispness. I guess that's the best you could do from the file as provided. But I'm sorting this slowly out.

Ulrich

flektogon said:

I think that the problem is due to the over saturation, especially of the red colour. That's why it looks like a "bleeding", rather than blurriness. But without seeing it at the pixel level, it's difficult to claim anything.

Click to expand...

Interesting - I often use Silkypix to develop Raws from my K50, and with red (and sometimes yellow) flowers it tends to come up with 'out of gamut' - well, or something like that, but basically the red channel is blown (not sure what the problem with the yellows is..). My first thought on seeing the photo was 'I bet the red channel is blown' - the red is so vivid. I've not successfully got round that (other than giving up on red flowers or accepting the limitation) so can't recommend a fix unfortunately, even though I've tried under-exposure which I believe is the standard work-round.

Uloo said:

Thanks Holger

Yes the picture is a little better but its still lacks that crispness. I guess that's the best you could do from the file as provided. But I'm sorting this slowly out.

Ulrich

Click to expand...

Dear Ulrich,

did you look at the photo at 100% resolution? Sometimes the browser renders the photos in a little bit strange way down. To me the photo now is absolutely OK - more sharpness would cause artefacts. And by the way: it is an absolutely beauty photo and a very nice scenery!

Did you try the way of doing post-processing in the camera, again (if you have the RAW)? If your lens should be not the FA but the DFA you would even be able to turn on some automatic correcton for the processing of the JPG inside your camera - I could imagine that it is possible to get a perfect photo out of your camera even with this little blur in the signal.

Best regards

Holger

I'm surprised that you've gotten many opinions about your problem - it's hard to diagnose anything on an image that has been down-rezzed to 1600x1067, then heavily compressed.

Post a full- resolution, quality 12 compressed jpg. Just a crop would be OK, since the whole image is probably about 30 MB. The image you posted is 618 KB.

David

Ok here is a crop of my raw file I don't know if that's going to help.