How are they off? just a little soft in general or are they not sharp where you want them - sounds like the first one??
A couple of thoughts - test your lens on land at this magnification doing everything to ensure the shot is sharp and see how it compares .
Maybe post some UW samples - full image and a close crop on details for us to have a look at?
Also is it possible you have some ambient light blur from shutter speed ? could happen if light was very bright in shallow water.
Assume you have IBIS engaged? ....... Just some random thoughts.
1. Yes, just a little soft in general
2. Yes on land it appears to be sharp
3. I'll post them ASAP
4. Never heard of this, but it seems I get it soft regardless of the ambient light.
5. I had it engaged, but now I have turned it off since at fast shutter speeds it should be irrelevant.
35 minutes ago, lbedogni said:
1. Yes, just a little soft in general
2. Yes on land it appears to be sharp
3. I'll post them ASAP
4. Never heard of this, but it seems I get it soft regardless of the ambient light.
5. I had it engaged, but now I have turned it off since at fast shutter speeds it should be irrelevant.
How is your focus mode adjusted?
An average of a larger field or just a very small area (I suspect the reason for your focus problem may be that you use some general focus mode instead of a well defined small area)?
I use an area, just as small as is possible, in the center. Then I aim the camera at the region I want to be in focus (usually something like the eye of an animal) and using C-AF I change position until I have achieved the framing I want. The small area (=eye) remains in focus (when I am lucky) or not, but seldom it is slightly out of focus (presumably when I happen to focus the small area not at the correct position at the beginning (e.g. slightly away from the eye)...
Wolfgang
17 hours ago, mark kirkland said:
I notice you use the Olympus 60mm Macro. I shoot with this on an OMD EM5 MKii. I struggled with the sharpness so did some experiments on land earlier this year to see how the image quality degrades as you close down the aperture.
I find it easy to get pin sharp when shooting a really shallow depth of field, however I've concluded that images will never be that sharp past f10 - the quality loss is just too much. I'd recommend doing some experimentation and seeing if that's the problem you are encountering.
I use Zuiko 60mm and EM5II/EM1II. I know about the diffraction issue, but for my taste the larger DOF is much better in most cases than the (almost) unnoticable loss of sharpness at apertures higher than f/8. So for macro I often use f/10 to f/12, just because of the better DOF...
Wolfgang
30 minutes ago, Architeuthis said:
How is your focus mode adjusted?
An average of a larger field or just a very small area (I suspect the reason for your focus problem may be that you use some general focus mode instead of a well defined small area)?
I use an area, just as small as is possible, in the center. Then I aim the camera at the region I want to be in focus (usually something like the eye of an animal) and using C-AF I change position until I have achieved the framing I want. The small area (=eye) remains in focus (when I am lucky) or not, but seldom it is slightly out of focus (presumably when I happen to focus the small area not at the correct position at the beginning (e.g. slightly away from the eye)...
Wolfgang
It happens both with AF-C and AF-S (slight less with this tbh). I always use one point and place it exactly where I want it.
9 hours ago, lbedogni said:
It happens both with AF-C and AF-S (slight less with this tbh). I always use one point and place it exactly where I want it.
So you use small focus points option? One thing to note with AF systems is they will grab the highest contrast thing under the AF sensor point and if what you are shooting is 3 dimensional it may go for the edge rather than the surface if you get my meaning. Think of the object as a cylinder and you want the closest surface of that in focus - if the AF grabs the edge rather than the surface - the surface might be a little soft.
you could try focus bracketing - set it up in a saved custom profile you can switch to and try a 3 image bracket with a small differential- if you are using manual flash (1/64) as trigger and something like 1/4 power the strobe should keep up for a short burst. That at least might show if a slight shift in focus point will solve the issue. I've used it on land it it works quite well.
I would also suggest IBIS - not for camera shake, but more for keeping aim on the subject, you would probably want that for the focus bracket if you tried that.
11 hours ago, ChrisRoss said:
So you use small focus points option? One thing to note with AF systems is they will grab the highest contrast thing under the AF sensor point and if what you are shooting is 3 dimensional it may go for the edge rather than the surface if you get my meaning. Think of the object as a cylinder and you want the closest surface of that in focus - if the AF grabs the edge rather than the surface - the surface might be a little soft.
you could try focus bracketing - set it up in a saved custom profile you can switch to and try a 3 image bracket with a small differential- if you are using manual flash (1/64) as trigger and something like 1/4 power the strobe should keep up for a short burst. That at least might show if a slight shift in focus point will solve the issue. I've used it on land it it works quite well.
I would also suggest IBIS - not for camera shake, but more for keeping aim on the subject, you would probably want that for the focus bracket if you tried that.
I am using the smallest point, but not the squared one, i am using the rectangle instead. I got your point, and I'll try that. On land I too use focus bracketing, but for underwater shots I fear that the strobes would not keep up.
depending on what model I would think that 3 shots might be achievable as long as you don't have the power up too high, which should be possible if you are in close. you could always try it on land first.
