Airways1 From United Kingdom, joined Jul 1999, 554 posts, RR: 0 Posted (9 years 7 months 3 weeks 4 days 5 hours ago) and read 1895 times:
About a month ago I bought a Canon 300D. The pictures I get from it look very good, but perhaps not quite as sharp as they could be. In each case I am shooting with a zoom lens, Canon EF 75-300mm, EF 28-80mm or EFS 18-55mm.
I was just wondering whether fixed focal length lenses would give me sharper images...?
Having said that, I'm not complaining about the photos I am getting.
LGW From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 1, posted (9 years 7 months 3 weeks 4 days 4 hours ago) and read 1874 times:
David,
Fixed focal length lenses (eg 300mm f4) will give you sharper images that the lenses discussed above and better image quality.
Although this does come at a price, comparitivly fixed focal length lenses are more expensive than their zoom counter parts.
Probably one of the best people to give you a responce to this thread would be Colin K Work as he uses fixed focal length lenses as wel as zoom.
You talk of your images being soft, on a side note Canon DSLR images are meant to eb soft in order to give the user greatler control over the editing of the images, unsharp mask in Photo shop is probably the best method of making images sharper while maintaining quality.
Glennstewart From Australia, joined Jun 2003, 1124 posts, RR: 56 Reply 2, posted (9 years 7 months 3 weeks 4 days 4 hours ago) and read 1869 times:
Hi David,
I can confirm that primes are certainly sharper than zooms. It's a given that the sacrifices that are made to a lens to allow it to zoom, reduce the ability for it to perform at its best. Primes are designed specifically for their given zoom.
I think however that you may be experiencing one of a number of possible problems
Aperture
With the 75-300mm at least, try to stay away from f4.0 or more wide open. The consumer zooms are terrible performers at these apertures. I suggest f7.1 or f8.0 at least - otherwise softness will be encountered.
Movement & ISO
In some situations, using f7.1, f8.0 will force you to use lower shutter speeds unless you wish to alter the ISO setting. At the lower shutter speeds (e.g. 1/60), panning with a subject to take a single shot, you'll produce hit and miss results. Try taking a few shots by holding down the shutter release, and pan with the subject. This will reduce the movement associated with hitting the shutter release and produce a couple of good results in a batch of bad.
If you have IS, resort to this for the static shots, otherwise bump up the ISO. At around 800 ISO you'll be getting as noisy as our point and shoot counterparts do on a daily basis at 100. If the noise is still unacceptable, try www.neatimage.com
Design
Unlike the point & shoot, rangefinger digitals, the Canon DSLR range are designed from the ground up to produce slightly soft images. In this un-retouched form they are more suit to publishing. The 300D is a little sharper that the 10D because the parameters are shifted up a notch (sharpness 0 on 300D is like +1 on 10D). Canon's covering those amateur photographers who will insist on making prints straight from the image found on the CF without visiting Photoshop first.
If you don't edit your shots, and resort to USM - you're missing out.
Skymonster From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 3, posted (9 years 7 months 3 weeks 4 days 4 hours ago) and read 1853 times:
Sweeping generalisations... Whilst primes are generally sharper than zooms, I bet I can find a zoom that is sharper than a prime - it all depends on who makes them, which lenses, etc.
I am unaware of the capabilities of the EF-S lens but the other lenses you mention are quite capable of producing nice sharp results. More particularly they should produce nice results because you're using a 300D, which with its small sensor which puts the emphasis on a lens' central definition rather than the edges which is where most softness is likely to exist. Certainly, there's shouldn't be any major softness problems produced by those lenses unless you're intent on using them wide open at longest focal lengths all the time, and I know from direct past experience that the 75-300 and 28-80 are quite capable (although obviously not as good as L glass) even used wide open, unless you're into producing really big enlargements.
I certainly wouldn't spend money on primes to achieve greater sharpness - what you've got now is good enough and the problems are more likely to be that you need to unsharp the images, as does everyone who uses a DSLR.
EGBB From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 4, posted (9 years 7 months 3 weeks 4 days 3 hours ago) and read 1829 times:
Whilst primes are generally sharper than zooms, I bet I can find a zoom that is sharper than a prime - it all depends on who makes them, which lenses, etc.
Derek challenges Andy to name a zoom superior than a Canon prime
Skymonster From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 5, posted (9 years 7 months 3 weeks 4 days 2 hours ago) and read 1819 times:
Derek, I didn't say a Canon prime... I bet I can find some grot-bag prime made by some back-of-beyond company that isn't as good as, say, one of Canon's 70-200L lenses.
Ckw From UK - England, joined Aug 2010, 545 posts, RR: 17 Reply 6, posted (9 years 7 months 3 weeks 4 days ago) and read 1779 times:
Well I would say my 70-200f2.8 L is as sharp as if not sharper than my Canon 50mm 1.8 - but then it bloody well should be considering the price difference!
But the general rule would be that for a given price point, the prime will always outperform the zoom.
If you are comparing the center of the image shot at f8 across a range of lenses, you'll probably see little difference in sharpness across a range of lens types and prices. But when you start looking at the edges shot with the lens wide open, the difference becomes very obvious. Yes, a good Canon L zoom will outperform many budget and even midprice primes in this respect.
Another consideration is that primes will invariably perform much better with extenders than zooms.
Ckw From UK - England, joined Aug 2010, 545 posts, RR: 17 Reply 8, posted (9 years 7 months 3 weeks 3 days 19 hours ago) and read 1730 times:
Its not that "soft shots" are used for publishing as such, it's that the amount of sharpening required on an image depends on how it is to be used. For critical work a publisher will often prefer a shot straight out the camera (soft) and apply their own sharpening technique - they can't do this to a sharpened image as this will result in artifacts being emphasised.
Clickhappy From United States of America, joined Sep 2001, 9463 posts, RR: 72 Reply 9, posted (9 years 7 months 3 weeks 3 days 18 hours ago) and read 1710 times:
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