OM-1 + M.Zuiko 100-400mm F5.0-6.3 ---- Is My Lens Copy Soft?

The OP bird has it's beak open which usually indicates a More Motion sensitive issue as opposed to yours where the all the BEAKS are closed plus all the birds  appear to be in what I called their Pause Mode. Also, your subjects are more clearly in view for the camera and lens to focus on. The OP, more branches, beak opening, more motion. So I don't believe this is a suitable comparison.

I think the lens is sharp.
I have the 300/4pro and when shot with the MC14 at 420mm I wouldn't expect to see more detail on a bird just 500px high top to bottom. The bare 300/4 might show slightly more sharpness/detail, but not by much.
So when you say pixel peeping it disapoints ... I'll have to ask ... compared to what?

I'd be very surprised if you found a different copy of that lens which is noticeably sharper!

JasonTheBirder wrote:

That bird is way too far away to get a sharp-looking shot. Even my 500PF at that distance doesn't look that great....no lens really would.

By far the biggest issue with small birds is having them stay still long enough to dial in the shot. That one appears big enough in the frame to achieve that given enough time.

Mait wrote:

Today i took few more samples with this lens. Subject distance about 5 - 7 meters.

SOOC JPG

RAW + PS with Topaz Low Light preset

SOOC JPG

RAW + PS with Topaz Low Light preset

SOOC JPG

DXO PureRaw, no lens sharpening, PS color editing.

SOOC JPG

DXO PureRaw, no lens sharpening, PS color editing.

and final result with crop

SOOC JPG

DXO PureRaw, no lens sharpening, PS color editing + crop - final result.

edit:

And one more example where the bird is 50 meters away, processed with DXO pureraw:

Colin,

I’m sorry I was slow to respond.

I believe that I exported raw files to jpg using Dxo photolab. It does apply a base level of sharpening unless you turn off the base adjustments that it makes.

The first picture I do believe that I lifted the exposure a bit. I included it because it had something in its beak and it appeared to be interesting.

Yes I think the bird detect picked the bird on the left in the third picture. However, I don’t think there is that much of a difference in sharpness between them.

The new firmware came out literally hours before. I installed it and ran right out to test it as I have been questioning the sharpness of the lens. I took a hundred or so shots, many of them in small bursts. I didn’t really intend to do anything with them, so I didn’t do any processing on them other than what DXO did on export that is.

Interestingly enough, I’ve been using that folder of images to test my initial installation of Photo Mechanic Plus for culling and cataloging images. PMP renders images from raw files using the imbedded jpg image and does no processing. Almost all of those images are sharp. I can share some as exports straight out of PMP if you’d like. I don’t see any difference between them and the exports from DXO.

Similarly, I had taken some shots back in the summer of squirrels in the yard. The yard has decent shade coverage and the little buggers were about 60 feet away. The images are like the one you had in your OP. Days later there was one in the front yard in a bush eating berries. I was closer and It was in direct sunlight. You can count his whiskers. Could share those too if you’d like also from PMP exports.

In the same time period, I shot some high school baseball in bright sunlight and was quite pleased with the results.

The take aways for me are, keep the firmware up to date, pay attention to settings, pay attention to set up and technique, get as close as you can, expect your best results in good light.

Good Luck!

Dan

Look at the switches that are turned on automatically by DXO.

You can go into preferences and set it up to do nothing when the image opens.  Then flip those switches one by one to see the effect.

Yes, exporting to JPEG with Deep Prime turned on takes 20-25 seconds on my mac book pro.  XD is crazy long with no great benefit from what I can see.

Have fun.

Dan

lokatz wrote:

Perched birds rarely make movements that cannot be frozen at 1/800s.

As long as the bird does not move that much, I try to get as low speed as possible.

When on tripod, I often used iso640 (for everything) with my manual lens. I found that 1/80 and up was no problem (perched). With 1/60 and 40, then not many keepers at all.

(oops. ALL three taken with same lens - 600mm f7,5 manual lens. (NOT 40-150mm as it says on the first one. Don't have one.)

Here's just one sample. I've been real pleased with the superb sharpness of the Olympus 100-400 f5-f6.3. Even at the 400mm end which is rare.

Co172 wrote:

Hello all. OP here. I managed to get my hands on another copy of this lens to test for a comparison to the one I purchased. I also printed a 300DPI 20"x30" test chart and performed the testing indoors on a tripod under controlled conditions. I have a couple of hundred test photos across different focal lengths, apertures and AF modes, but they are all quite comparable. So, I post here a comparison at 400mm, ISO200, stopped down to F9. They just don't seem very different. Any comments on this would be welcomed!

Original lens 400.0mm_ISO200_S-AF_F9.0

Comparison lens 400.0mm_ISO200_S-AF_F9.0

F9 - you could be getting diffraction.

Shutter speed is too slow.

Shoot in brighter light at 400mm wide open 1/400th - 1/800th and let the ISO float.

Co172 wrote:

Thanks for the response!

Wide open at 400mm is F6.3 for this lens so I'd be surprised to see diffraction at only 1 stop down. The F6.3 and F13 shots look nearly the same so I don't think I'm near that point.

For a sharpness comparison, you really want the lowest ISO possible. Noise will definitely soften edges and I'm not doing any PP for this comparison. Understood about lower shutter speed, although since I'm on a tripod and indoors, I wasn't too worried about a 1/15 or 1/20 shutter speed. Sadly, these are the grayest days of the year in the NW and there is little hope for any sun. I tried taking controlled shots outdoors last month and even slight breezes were enough to add variability at 400mm (800mm EFL), so I opted for the "bright" confines of a hallway in my work building with adjacent windows and a big skylight.

For reference, my procedure was built similar to this: https://www.bhphotovideo.com/explora/photography/tips-and-solutions/how-test-your-lens

Did you use E shutter or mechanical shutter? If mechanical try E-shutter.

Co172 wrote:

@tammons

I forgot to ask... so based on your comments, you agree that the sharpness is not great? Did you see any noticeable difference between the 2 photos or they were both the same to your eyes?

They are very close. I think the 2nd copy is slightly softer.