Canon EOS400D Photos/focus really soft, what can I do?

valve90210

valve90210

valve90210

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At work we have a Canon Eos 400D with two canon lenses, the kit 18mm - 55mm and a zoom lens which I can't remember at the moment.

It's not a bad camera and can take some pretty good shots but I do find that pretty much any shot I end up wanting to use in a publication needs sharpening as the shots are all quite soft, in focus but soft.

I imagine I'd be able to get sharper shots shooting in RAW and processing myself but as it's not just me that uses the camera and uploads the pics to the network etc I'm wondering if there is anything I can do on the camera that will help sharpen up the pics?

I don't use the camera myself all that much and haven't ever really had a good look at the options in camera as it only ever occurrs to me once I have taken pics and they have come out soft and then I don't touch it for a while again and forget all about it! :)

Any help very much appreciated.

Valve
 
providing shutter speed is high enough etc. more likely to be the lenses causing softness to be honest.

got any example shots with EXIF data?
 
one of the first things i did with my 400D when i had it was replace the kit lens! never looked back since!
 
Bought mine Body only, as I had a 28-105 Kit lens from my EOS 33v (wich ain't a bad lens for a Kit!), but I then got a Nifty and that spends most of the time on it!! :)
 
Any number of reasons for softness: Too narrow a depth of focus, diffraction limitation, motion blur, front or back focusing, high ISO with high noise reduction, mis-aligned lens element, poor quality lens, poor hand-held technique, poor quality tripod, mirror slap, poor quality filter, atmospheric haze, heat distortion, subject motion.

You have 2 lenses so this should allow to see if one of the lenses is defective.
Best to test a lens using a high quality tripod otherwise really make sure the shutter speed is high enough, at 55mm you should really shoot at 1/100th second exposure on a crop camera, faster the better.
 
33L said:
one of the first things i did with my 400D when i had it was replace the kit lens! never looked back since!
Click to expand...

Simian said:
Bought mine Body only, as I had a 28-105 Kit lens from my EOS 33v (wich ain't a bad lens for a Kit!), but I then got a Nifty and that spends most of the time on it!! :)
Click to expand...

Sadly it's a works camera so no option of buying a different lens!

D.P. said:
Any number of reasons for softness: Too narrow a depth of focus, diffraction limitation, motion blur, front or back focusing, high ISO with high noise reduction, mis-aligned lens element, poor quality lens, poor hand-held technique, poor quality tripod, mirror slap, poor quality filter, atmospheric haze, heat distortion, subject motion.

You have 2 lenses so this should allow to see if one of the lenses is defective.
Best to test a lens using a high quality tripod otherwise really make sure the shutter speed is high enough, at 55mm you should really shoot at 1/100th second exposure on a crop camera, faster the better.
Click to expand...

It's not so much that's it's a defective lens or anything like that, nor is it a problem of camera shake and the like, those I know and understand and it's just that the images are a little on the soft side, more like that jpeg processing is a little too soft or something like that, or the auto focus just missing, are the 400D known for this kind of thing at all?
 
just looked at the example and it could be a little bit of shake. shutter speed is 1/100 and the focal length is 250mm and as a rough rule of thumb shutter speed should (ideally, but not necessarily always) be be equal or faster to the focal length i.e. 1/250

could also be the focus missing a moving subject, are you in AI SERVO? but then nothing is in focus so wouldnt expect it to be that, more likely shake in my opinion.
 
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neil_g said:
just looked at the example and it could be a little bit of shake. shutter speed is 1/100 and the focal length is 250mm and as a rough rule of thumb shutter speed should (ideally, but not necessarily always) be be equal or faster to the focal length i.e. 1/250

could also be the focus missing a moving subject, are you in AI SERVO? but then nothing is in focus so wouldnt expect it to be that, more likely shake in my opinion.
Click to expand...

You are forgetting the crop factor.


If the example shot was at 250mm then on a Canon crop camera don't expect sharp photos below 1/400th of a second
 
Not quite surewhat settings etc that one was taken on as it was someone else taking it.

It's not the best example I'll have a look later when I get a moment and see if I can find a better example taken by me.
 
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