Is my lens or my camera failing?
Oct 6, 2014 07:47:39 #
MR BILL wrote:
I am an avid non-pro Nikon D4 high school sports s... (show quote)
Spot focus is your problem. Your camera is re-focusing very quickly on a very small "spot". Hence what you wish to be in focus has moved out of the "spot" It is reacting more quickly than you are. You would do better to change from spot to area focus. IMHO as an amateur. :-)
Oct 6, 2014 07:51:41 #
MR BILL wrote:
another pair
If you provide shots please set them to store original so what we may download them so that we can see the metadata and focus point. This will help greatly in analyzing the images. Thanks
Oct 6, 2014 08:16:18 #
CHOLLY wrote:
Parts of your images REMAIN in sharp focus... the referee, the trees... one or the other background players.
I say camera and operator are probably the likely reason for soft photos.
I say camera and operator are probably the likely reason for soft photos.
I tend to agree. If the camera's AF module is set for shutter priority AF some shots will not be in focus, especially if the focus bracket is not on the subject.
Consider also that a low shutter speed or not high enough ISO will not guarantee sharp pictures. In your case it would be preferable to increase ISO and make sure your shutter speed is beyond 1/400sec. minimum or higher if possible. Aperture priority at times due to lighting conditions will select a slow shutter speed and in that respect for this type of photography shutter priority is a better shooting mode since the operator is selecting a shutter speed known to render the pictures sharper. Useless to repeat that the shutter speed should be HIGHER than the equivalent focal length of the lens in use. In my case, I also disable VR.
Hope this gives you some thoughts.
Oct 6, 2014 08:26:41 #
djb663
Loc: Massachusetts
Hopefully, this is an easy fix. Check your setting for continuous high shooting in the menu. If you have it set to 11, it retains the focus and exposure settings from the first shot. If you want it to adjust focus and exposure continuously, you have to reduce your continuous high speed setting to 10 frames per second. I'll keep my fingers crossed that that is your issue, it was mine!
Oct 6, 2014 08:34:30 #
djb663 wrote:
Hopefully, this is an easy fix. Check your setting for continuous high shooting in the menu. If you have it set to 11, it retains the focus and exposure settings from the first shot. If you want it to adjust focus and exposure continuously, you have to reduce your continuous high speed setting to 10 frames per second. I'll keep my fingers crossed that that is your issue, it was mine!
Also verify that the camera is in AFc versus AFs. and Multi focus points is better in this as the camera will try to use greater depth of field to bring everything into focus. Single point focus is going to be tough on fast moving images.
Oct 6, 2014 08:48:39 #
ole sarg
Loc: south florida
what is your f stop at? looks to me like you are shooting too open and need more dof. In shot three focus is on the ref.
Oct 6, 2014 09:29:59 #
MR BILL wrote:
I am an avid non-pro Nikon D4 high school sports s... (show quote)
Someone else likely has said this, but when shooting in burst mode, the camera will re-focus after every shot. It's likely it is focusing on something other than the subject between shots.
Oct 6, 2014 09:33:48 #
JDFatCat
Loc: Libertytown, Md
After seeing your shots, I suspect you have auto focus on spot, which means the lens focuses on that spot where ever you are aiming it, the trees, the ref, or the gal kicking. Try changing the pattern to take in more space, like an averaging, that might improve the overall focus.
Oct 6, 2014 09:36:51 #
I'm going to offer a different possibility for you to consider. I shoot a D700 so I think the controls are similar. I also notice the two shots seem to have different dof's as well as degree of lighting. Is it possible that as you are tracking you are accidentally moving the daisy wheel and resetting the f stop settings. It would be easy to do. Check the settings on the pictures and see if the f stops are changing. Hope this helps, it would be a easy fix and less costly.
Oct 6, 2014 09:42:35 #
Oct 6, 2014 09:48:20 #
I'll take a SWAG! (Scientific wild --s guess!). Your focus was set on AFS! How do I know, because I've done that before, and got the same result! Can't speak about the D4, because I skipped that for the D4s, but I do not like the new arrangement for setting focus (probably mostly because I've used the same method from the F5 until now).
Oct 6, 2014 09:54:40 #
Have you looked into back button focus? Completely changed the game for me..
Oct 6, 2014 09:59:07 #
Stef C wrote:
Have you looked into back button focus? Completely changed the game for me..
I recently switch to BBF myself and will echo the same - great tip & technique.
Oct 6, 2014 10:13:57 #
peterg
Loc: Santa Rosa, CA
Dngallagher wrote:
... or Nikon Capture NX2It is.... if you use Lightroom, you should look at a plugin that will show the focus points used by the camera.you can find it here: http://www.lightroomfocuspointsplugin.com/
Or you could use View NX2 to load and display the same information per image.... It would also help if you can state what focus modes you are using....
Or you could use View NX2 to load and display the same information per image.... It would also help if you can state what focus modes you are using....
Oct 6, 2014 10:41:05 #
Since you are shooting in bursts and the exposure seems to be changing between frames, I wonder if you're shooting with auto-bracketing enabled. I've forgotten to turn bracketing off a couple of times when shooting single images and it almost drove me nuts trying to figure out why the EV, etc was changing frame-to-frame. Anyway, it's a thought...
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