Question about focusing? Am I doing something wrong?

[Sarah23]

I think I might be doing something wrong. Why are so many of my photos coming out so blurry, even tho I have it focused on what I want to shoot...the shutter speed up pretty darn high (as long as there is suitable light), and am braced against something to help with camera shake????

Am I doing something wrong with Auto focus? I will sometimes have it with all 9 points searching, but most of the time I tell just one specific point to focus on so I can make sure that the subject is what is in focus.

Should I not be doing that??

Am I just THAT shaky??? Im only 23...I shouldn't be SHAKY yet! :P

Im frustrated

[koigirl]

Which mode are you shooting in? Manual? Shutter priority? Do you have the same problem when shooting on Auto?

[Sarah23]

Well today I was shooting in Aperture Priority. I usually shoot in that or TV. Sometimes manual but not often. Ive never shot in Auto...lol...so I dont know.

But even like today, I had my aperture set a few stops down from wide open, and the shutter speed was nice and fast (like 1/2000 - 1/3200) and i still got blur

[ann]

it woule be helpful to see an example.
there is a good chance your moving at the moment your firing the shutter.

[Sarah23]

ok...uploading one...

[Sarah23]

ok...well this one didnt have as fast of a shutter speed as I thought...it was 1/400...but shouldnt that be fast enough still??

Not a great picture at all...but just an example. Maybe between it being my 2 year old who never stays still, and me moving when I press the shutter, its bluring? Its really hard to take crisp shots of a child who doesnt want their picture taken...lol!

[JIP]

Where it is in focus it looks pretty sharp to me. You might have a depth-of-field issue if you are concerned with everything being in focus try using a better aperture.

[mrodgers]

Are you squeezing the shutter button? I have told my wife and mother time and time again to gently squeeze or gently press down the shutter, yet they both still mash down on it. That gives the photos they take problems with looking sharp.

I don't know about all cameras, but mine focuses with a half shutter press. It focuses and meters the light with that half press. Then it's the simple matter of pressing a bit more for the photo. I believe that dSLRs are the same at least with the autofocus, that it focuses when you half press the shutter. Make sure you are doing that first as there could be a slight jarring of shake if you are not initially pressing the shutter halfway down.

Take that with a grain of salt as I'm only a few months into this, and not using a dSLR, but not a basic point and shoot either. Just my thoughts here.

[The_Traveler]

the picture is really too small to see well.
Crop a copy of the original like this, rotate it 90 degrees so it is lying on its side and repost it at 800 x 600.

That way we can see the largest possible image of what you think should be in focus.

[Sarah23]

ok....here...



Maybe its because im using too large of an aperture. I need to get off this "small aperture is good all the time" thing I have stuck in my head. It was very bright out, so I should have stopped it down more.

[Village Idiot]

Could be a number of things? Are you shooting RAW or JPG? RAW images need to be sharpened as no processing what so ever is applied to them. If you're shooting JPG, try to increase the in camera sharpening by one or two points.

Also, it could be the lenses. Sorry, but the kit lens and the 75-300 are not known for their sharpness. Some times it takes a little extra tweaking in the post processing steps to get an image where you want it.

Edit: Plus it looks like your focus it off. Do you use the focusing points or just do you let it focus based off of all points? I rarely ever use anything except for specific focus point so I can get exactly what I want in focus.

Plus stopping down the lens will usually take a sharper picture. Using a wide open aperture uses the full area of the glass and the edges are usually not considered sharp. Using a smaller aperture will use the middle of the glass which is usually considered sharped and can get you a better image. f/8-f/9 would most likely be better than f/3.5-f/4 on a kit lens.

[B192734]

I would think that it's a DOF issue personally. You said that the shutter speed was 1/400. That really should be enough to take care of most motion, and taking that type of photo, there really isn't normally that much fast movement to capture anyway. I would think that lessening the size of aperture would help out. IMO anyway. I'm not the official expert.

[The_Traveler]

IMO, it is an f stop issue. If you look at your image after sharpening, you can see individual hairs, etc but no past of the image is in good sharpness. Your DOF should be a good foot there (f4, 50 mm , 8 feet) and yet nothing looks terrific.

I would try reshooting with a couple of stops more closed (f 8), in the len' sweet spot.

[MX962]

http://focustestchart.com/focus21.pdf You may try this test so you can get an idea of how your lens is focusing and also it is a good test for comparing detail from one lens to the next just remember to use very bright light . Your image apears to me to be just out of focus depth of field should be enough at f-4 with a 50mm for this shot i could be wrong but it looks this way to me with depth of field issues you should see some point in focus this image has none that i can see just soft ,therefore my reason to think it is "oof" check your lens and try a new lens if you can ,then compare your results

[tjphotography]

Does your camera have a continuous focus mode? Sometimes I have accidently flipped to that and it continually refocuses on what is I am centering the camera on....and since a lot of my subjects are not dead center in my images, my subject is blurry but the background is sharp. I know right away when this occurs, but if you don't know where to look, you can get frustrated.

Travis
www.tjphotography.com