Blurry or soft full body photos when using canon 50mm f1.8 stm

Thank you for taking time and addressing  each part of my question.

R2D2 wrote:

muhdhumamkhan wrote:

Hello,

I am a beginner wedding photographer, its only been couple of months since I started doing wedding as a second shooter with a friend of mine. The kit I am using includes:

Canon M50 Mark II + 15-45kit5

Canon EF 50mm f1.8 stm with viltrox ef-efm adapter

Welcome to the Forum! Weddings are manic alright!

I've owned a handful of the various "Thrifty Fifties," and two of the 15-45 kit lenses. They've all been fairly decent and quite useful.

I see.

Godox TT560 II Flash.

I have the (larger) V860 III. Nice flash.

The 560 is pretty marginal as far as power is concerned (but balances on the M50ii better than a larger flash). OK for the reception, but underpowered for large spaces.

Yes I am thinking of upgrading it.

I know this is very basic setup and I shouldn't expect top notch quality but it should b good enough right?

I would consider it serviceable at least.

Really? thank you. It actually makes me feel kinda good cuz most people around me are telling me that its a bad investment and I should have gone for canon 5D M III or  sony a6500.

Now here is my problem if I have to take a full body shot with my 50mm which on m50 becomes 80mm I need to stand away at least 10ft to more from the subject.

Yup. Typical wedding shots range from 10 - 20 feet or more.

where I live most wedding are arranged at night time inside wedding venue where light is not always ideal so i use my flash to bounce off the ceiling (which is always 30ft or more high) the settings I use are:

Ouch! That's asking a lot of any on-camera flash!

Aperture f2-f2.8

Shutter Speed 1/125

ISO 500

Flash Power 1/2

I'd suggest practicing a LOT with your flash in various situations.

Now with all of this combined when I try to take full body shots thay come out blurry or soft, why is that?

In the shot you posted, the flash contributed next to nothing. Therefore you need to treat this shot like any other (low) ambient light shot.

Thats what I thought too maybe my flash is blending with the ambient light and is unable to do what its supposed to be (freezing movement)

There is subject movement evident in your example (maybe a little camera shake too?). The focal plane is also slightly behind the subject (his face and hands look OOF). What were your autofocus settings? Did he perhaps walk through your depth of field by the time the shot was taken?

for long shot my autofocus setting is set to 1-point (the smallest point) autofocus with AI SERVO enabled.

is my flash not properly balanced with ambient light?

Right. However even a properly balanced exposure will exhibit issues if you don't take into consideration the effects of the low ambient light level. My first suggestion would be to increase your shutter speed to max sync. Bring the ambient light level up with your ISO setting.

Speaking of ISO, the blur you are getting isn't due to over-zealous noise reduction.

However, going forward you will need to be raising your ISO's above what you're currently using, and therefore will need better noise reduction than what either the camera or Adobe can provide. I highly recommend investing in DxO's Photolab 6 for processing your RAWs. DxO Deep Prime and Deep Prime XD are the best out there.

yes I have PhotoLab and I am also considering instead of bouncing flash I should use Octabox or an umbrella to direct all of flash at my subject.

is the 50mm lens not good enough?

How does it do with the same aperture in good light? Is the IQ high enough?

When I taking half body shots with Eye AF enabled and the subject is lit well either with ambient light or flash the images are tack sharp.

is 24Mp resolution not enough?

The MP isn't your problem.

am I crossing the limit of how far the camera can focus?

You haven't included any details of your AF settings or technique.

I think this was a silly question I asked. I am using Eye AF for closeups and 1-point for long shots.

and will replacing the canon 50mm with sigma 30 f1.4 dc dn for efm will make any difference.

It'll change your perspective. Do you want a wider angle lens? The Sigma is recommended. The Canon 32 is more popular.

I am struggling if I should invest in it or not cuz the sigma lens costs me around Rs.60,000 (USD to PAK Rupees) and the canon one is even more expensive even in USD, it would cost me around Rs.90,000.

If you can deal with a little longer focal length, then the Sigma 56 is excellent.

Any help is appreciated.

50mm f2 ISO500 Flash 1/2

Nice shot. You could also crop this into a square (IMHO).

Hhaha Thank you I really appreciate it.

here if you zoom on his face you wil see that is soft focused.

Yup, focus is off, and shutter speed is too low. Flash is ineffective.

Your equipment is likely fine. But your settings need a lot of work.

A different camera or a different lens will not address what's fundamentally at fault.

Holler back with questions!

R2

Thanks you for your help I'll try experimenting again and see what happens.