"Tuning" Lenses

[brahma1965]

Hi folks! Another naive question from me I'm afraid! I've read something somewhere recently about "tuning" a new lens - I've tried to find the article again but can't locate it. Did I read correctly? Or have I misunderstood? What is "tuning" a lens? I haven't "tuned" any of my lenses - is this something I should be doing? Or would the article author gave been referring to something I should be doing in post?

Many thanks, Andy

 

[baconation]

They're probably talking about auto focus fine tuning. Depending on your camera body, you may or may not have a way to adjust for front/back focusing. Some lenses will focus in front of, or behind the subject and AF fine-tune corrects the problem.

 

[Janoch]

https://nikoneurope-en.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/51633/~/how-to-use-the-af-fine-tune-function

Some tests all their lenses, while some are pretty relaxed... :-D

But if you find, your AF-shots are out of focus, this would be the first test, I would run.

Happy "tuning"!

 

[brahma1965]

Thanks for the feedback guys - that sounds right - I'll have a look at the Nikon page. I also read something about " Reikan " as being useful for tuning lenses - have you got any experience of using this?

Andy

 

[nbirkett]

Thanks for the feedback guys - that sounds right - I'll have a look at the Nikon page. I also read something about " Reikan " as being useful for tuning lenses - have you got any experience of using this?

This is likely what is meant: https://www.reikan.co.uk/focalweb/

I know nothing about them but there seems to be lots of info on their web site. You can probably get advice here to do what their software does without having to pay for it.

EDIT: Here's a dpr thread which will give some ideas: https://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/4037021

 

[Janoch]

Never understood why waste money on something, that can be done for free...

The simple ruler thing on Nikon's site works perfectly well, but if you're in the mood for other ways, do a search for "dot tune method"... like this ...

 

[tarunlohumi]

Thanks for the feedback guys - that sounds right - I'll have a look at the Nikon page. I also read something about " Reikan " as being useful for tuning lenses - have you got any experience of using this?

Andy

Before you delve deeper, you might want to check if you camera supports AF Fine Tune or not. Not all Nikon's do. You could certainly fine tune your lenses+camera combination without using Reikan s/w however having it certainly helps & it helps with other functions too like focus consistency & sweet spot of your lens+camera body combination. For some camera's it even allows completely automated fine tune without you needing to even touch the lens.

 

[brahma1965]

A couple of good options there, thanks Janoch. I'll give them all a go.