Question on Sharpness
 

I have just taken delivery of a AFS300 f4 and am a little dissapointed in the sharpness of the initial shots.
Here is photo of a Blackbird taken with a TC1.7E11 attatched. The camera was on a ridged tripod - ISO 200 - f6 1/40 at 500mm. it is cropped at 1467x1160 from the full frame with no sharpening or adjustments.
Would you say its down to operator error or the Lens TC combo.

I'd say it's down to shutter speed, Prostie. 1/40th of a second is around 20 times slower than I'd want to be using with an effective 500mm focal length. Or ten times faster than that, at the very least. A tripod helps, of course, but in the end, shutter speed is king. As soon as the light starts getting ordinary, take off your converter, open your lens up wide, and push your ISO up as far as you dare (I mostly use 400 in good light, 200 in very, very bright light, 800 in fair light, and 1600 in poor light, though your effective max ISO before the noise gets too bad varies with different camera models, so you will have to make your own judgement there).

Always better to crop a good quality image with a small bird in it than wind up with a big bird in a poor quality picture.

Thanks Tannin
Too used to the 70-200 f2.8 - will have to think again now whilst useing the 300.
Thanks for the tips - will start useing a higher ISO to get the speed and light flowing properly.

Brian

1/1000 shutter speed should give much sharper results at 510mm. I can't imagine anything sharper than 70-200VR f2.8. TC17E II has 1.5 stop light loss so effective f8 has master lens at f4.8-ish.

Have you considered TC14E II - a great TC I use with 200-400VR to give 560mm f5.6.

What camera are you using?

Hi Brian

I don't know your kit but I am surprised it looks so bad if your using a good tripod. What the other have said is good advice but even so considering this is scaled down as well.

Attached is from a bare 300mm 1/80 sec f7.1 ISO 400 Tripod Manfrotto 55 + 128 RC. 1000 x 1200 crop and just resized.

Hi Stephen and Rob

I have a D70 and use a AFSVR70-200 f2.8, AF105Macro, AF35mmf2,AF50mm f1.8, AFS18-70kit lens, TC1.7E11, various MF short Primes for use on my macro PB% Bellows outfit and todays addition the AFS300mm.

I have read about lens vibration on the 300, due to the poorly designed tripod foot and think with better light and useing faster shutter speeds this will in the short term not be much of a problem. Kirk make a tripod collar and foot for this lens which seems to overcome the mirror slap vibration and this will be a must for me I think.

The shot attatched shows it up, taken this evening ISO200, 1/13, f4, look at the lettering on the bottle - this was with the camera mounted on the Manfrotto all steel heavey duty tripod.

Cheers

Brian

Brian,
Might be worth another go with a bit of mass draped over the lens to damp vibration. Pic certainly displays up and down movement. Otherwise a staight flash shot would do the trick as irrespective of shutter speed the flash will fire well lest than 1/1000 sec.

Don

Brian

Kor thats like an earth quake !!!!

I knew I had a slower one.

1/30 sec f8 same kit 1500 x 1800 crop

Definitely motion blur.

Top Advise from Don, I used manual exposure in my latest teleconverter test with flash. Using flash allowed 1/400th f11 (effective) and produced dynamite sharpness from 70-200VR f2.8.

Could you post a sharpness comparison with 70-200VR?

Stephen
Whilst you were posting I took this hand held with the on board flash and I think it shows the bounce is due to the tripod collar on the 300.
Have been called out so will post a shot with the 70-200 tomorrow. syl.

Cheers

Brian

I assume on board flash fixes shutter at 1/60th. My problem on initial TC test was shutter speed at high focal lengths. TC test using 70-200 employed higher shutter speeds due to external flash and shorter focal lengths.

I'll look forward to the shoot out between 70-200 and 300, try to use a subject with lots of detail and move 200 closer to frame the same as 300.

I won't argue with what has already been said, but you could always try and damp the vibrations by using mirror lock up if you have it, and a cable release if not, and placing a bean bag over the lens. I'm sure a brick wall would provide a good test target for experimentation.

Leif

Stephen,

If the shutter speed is set to sync speed, then flash will predominate. Although the shutter speed is low the burst of light from the flash will, depending on subject distance and of course the power of the flash, be in the region of 1/1000 sec + throught to around 1/20,000 sec if powerfull flash is used close up.

The great thing with the subject taken is it has sharply defined horizontal lines that will show any mirror bounce effect quite obviously.

Agree a comparison would be nice as the 300mm may join the wish list of the future.

Don

Well it's been too wet and cold to get out to find a wall - but here are two shots to compare.
Taken from the bedroom doorway approx 15' to a bedside table - lit only from a leaded window to the right of the pic. Light temp 4250, ISO 400, the 200 settings were 1/15 at f6.3 and the 300 was 1/20 atf8.
No adjustments to either
Spot focus point - the red nail varnish bottle (not Mine)

Robski,

Re your shots of the robins. What was the distance?

Thank you.

Grant.

Hi Grant Welcome to WPF.

I was pretty close. The first shot was around 12 feet and the second was about 8-9 feet. Robins are fairly tame and will allow you to get close.

Hi Grant,

Just noticed this is your first post. Welcome to WPF.

I think if I'd taken that shot of the Blackbird with a Nikkor 300 f4, I'd have binned it, said nothing to anybody and brushed up on my technique. The Nikkor 300 f4 is a superb lens, I used one myself, it's as sharp as a pin even wide open at f4, however vibration will knock the edge off the best of lenses, in order to use the slow shutter speeds with success you have to be prepared for many failures. I use film in my cameras, I use slow speeds regularly, I expect to maybe get one good shot out of a roll of 36 if I'm lucky, sometimes I don't get any! It's just the same with digital, you have to be prepared to fire off as many shots as you can when you get the chance. Birds don't hang around for long, using shutter speeds of 1/15 second or less will get you very few shots if you just press the shutter once? Persevere with the lens, it's more than capable, hell it's a Nikkor!!

nirofo.

Hi Nirofo

Yes agree with you Nikon gear is great.

The Blacbird shot is a disgrace, but maybe I did not explain the circumstances well enough. The lens and camera were locked down solid on a very heavy all steel Manfrotto and the bird was posing for me (not a Snap shot) light was fair Cloudy.
I have deleted the Raw file, but from memory it was about 1/40 at f5.6 App Priority with Auto WB+2 ISO200 and a ML-L3 used to operate the shutter.

Saturday, I did a series of exposures, tripod mounted and electronic triggered, in the garden, bright sunlight and a stationary subject at 20ft.
I used shutter speeds from 1/500 - 1/2000 at f4 - f8 and all were no better than the Blackbird shot. Changed to the 70-200 with the TC1.7 went through the same proceedure,and all were razor sharp.

Even the best gear fails some times - I am taking the lens up to Nikon at Richmond next week for a check up.

Make you wonder if something has worked loose ?

As long as its in the lens and not my head Robski, It'l be OK:) :) :)

Yelvertoft, thank you for the welcome; likewise Robski, and thank you for the info.

I use 6x7 film (what do you mean, “what’s that?”) and considering a decent telephoto. However, I need to translate your info into my format. Hence the interest.

As a minimum I will need to get a 400mm plus a 1.4 converter to give 560mm. In 6x7 terms, this will equate to about 280mm. Maybe that’s not enough. Looks like I will need to reconsider.

2x converter? Depends on the quality.

Grant.

Grant

I used a 300mm plus the sensor 1.6 crop factor equates to 480mm in 35mm terms.

If I recall your standard lens is something like 150mm ?

LOL - Now there's a thought :)

Sounds to me as though there is something wrong with the lens, however, that shouldn't cause motion blur unless the electronics are sending the wrong signal to the camera, making the camera think you a need slower shutter speed than you should be getting! Even then, with the camera and lens locked down hard on a subtantial tripod you should be able to obtain sharp images of stationery subjects. That is providing of course you're using some sort of electronic shutter release and not manual.

nirofo.

Rob, there is a correction to my post, ie “In 6x7 terms” should be “In 35mm terms”. No matter.

I don’t have a standard lens but it’s 90mm.

If you’re using an effective focal length of 480mm, for comparable results I would need to go 2x this or nearly 1000mm (to convert 35mm equivalents just double the focal length).

My ignorance of digital cameras is almost total but does the film sensor area produce a raw image about 1.5x that of 35mm? If this is correct, then your figure of 480mm could be divided by 1.5 to give just over 300mm (320mm) in 35mm terms? It’s simpler for me to think in terms of 35mmm/6x7.

You may wonder why I’m so keen to pin this down. Simple, if I going to fork out around £1,300 for a second-hand lens (£7000 new) plus £250 for a used 1.4x (or 2x) converter, I need to know it will deliver the images. If not, I’ll save the money and enjoy the excellent shots on WPF.

I’ve just had a quick glance at your portfolio. Magnificent stuff, especially the jersey. Re the squirrel, the focal length is given as 300.0mm (35mm equivalent: 2245mm). Note 2245mm. Is this correct?

Thanks in advance.

Grant.

I can answer that one for you, the number is incorrect, highly!

That's a bug with the gallery software, it multiplied 300 by 7.48333... instead of the correct 1.6... It does that to a lot of the photos taken with the 20D.

Grant the Crop factor is due to the fact that many DSLR sensors are not full frame. 1.3 and 1.6 are common for Canon and 1.5 for Nikon. The bigger the sensor the harder it is to produce in reliable quantities and hence very expensive. If your into bird photography may you should thing about getting a DSLR it may be cheaper. Digital has pretty well caught up with film these days.

May be worth a look at this thread and the link on post 5. http://www.worldphotographyforum.com...read.php?t=689

Don

Thanks Nirofo

Your last post regarding Electronics spured me to take a look at the elecronic bayonet pins on the lens. They were furred and a gentle wash and bush up has made all the difference. - here's the first shot at 50 feet 500 at
f4, much improved dont you think.

Robski,

A DSLR would also entail lenses, new computer, software, scanner and printer.

I'll see how things go; give it a year, possibly (and improve my technique in the meantime). Then I'll buy the 'current' top of the range DSLR model for a song. All the used stock dumped by those who upgrade at every opportunity provides a good market.

Grant.