Is there something defective with my lense?

[ev1lmagic]

Okay so this past weekend i purchased a nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 lense. And as i was using it to take some homecoming photos for some highschoolers i noticed that even at various f-stops/ auto focus, even the supposed focused areas were kinda hazy and not as sharp as I had expected from this lense. I know most people will jump to the conclusion that it's most likely the user (me) and not the lense that is doing something wrong.

However the background behind purchasing this lense new from samy's camera was that it was the second one I had received from them in the same day. promptly after arriving home from my first purchase, as i was mounting the lense i noticed a slight reflection (thanks to my O.C.D.) in the glass, inspected it and noticed that there was something EXTREMELY EXTREMELY small (either dust, debris, or a scratch) on the inside of the glass. brought it back to them and they finally noticed it as well. They agreed it was a defect for sure and exchanged it for me. My point is as well as the quality control by nikon may be, mishaps do occur and it has already happened to me once regarding the purchase of this lense and now i'm hesitant as to if this "hazyness" is also another defect.

Here is a photo that i took with it that may serve as an example. I have used a 50mm f/1.8 on many occasions and I know how deadly the difference between focused and non-focused areas with low f-stops but imo if i can get great distinctions in focus with a 1.8 manually/automatically i do not understand why theres problems with f/2.8 unless there is yet another defect.

Here's the link to the photos: OC Photography's Photos - '09 Temple City High School Homecoming | Facebook

note: (1) I know the background/scenery is bad so please don't judge on that, the caption to the album will explain why if you're curious (2) sorry that i had to use a link to facebook, but i haven't had time to post onto other hosting sites nor do i have enough post counts to attach it here yet =\ (3) IT IS DEFINITELY NOT because facebook lowers the quality of the images, my proofs on my computer as identical to those in therms of "hazyness"

 

[ev1lmagic]

Any opinions and feedback will be greatly appreciated and i'm very sorry if this is posted in the wrong section, i read through the description of the sections and this seemed most appropriate to me.


Regards,
~Owen

 

[Stosh]

That pic may look a tiny bit soft, but it's very difficult to tell at that resolution. It's only 413x604. That's impossible to tell how sharp the native resolution picture was. It would also help if you posted all other related shot info. If you wouldn't have said it, I wouldn't have seen any kind of haziness. His spiked hair looks nice and sharp, but again, this pic is resized so small how can we know? One other note - f/2.8 is still a pretty fast lens. Yes, it's not 1.8, but there's not that much difference. We also don't know the focal length.

One other note - with a pic like this you would never be able to tell if a lens had a speck in it, even side by side. That being said, I probably would have asked for an exchange too.

 

[ev1lmagic]

mmkays thanks for the quick reply, i'll get them on flickr asap when i get onto my own computer later tonight and repost. Is there any specific photo you would like the focal length and all other info to? or all of them? all photos in that album were taken with that lense.


Regards,
~Owen

 

[Derrel]

A small fleck or speck inside a lens will not cause any significant imaging flaws. I have a 27-year old Nikon 105mm f/2.5 AiS that I used to carry inside of a wheat combine,and a 50 f/2 Nikkor also carried inside of a combine--one of the dustiest places you can imagine. Both are filled with literally hundreds upon hundreds of dust flecks,and yet both shoot beautiful images. I also have a new, 2000's vintage 105/2.5 AiS that is almost pristine. I've compared its images with those of the 27 year-old,dust-filled lens,and no difference is visible.

The sample photo looks like it might be operator error. Did you manage to put a thumbprint on the rear element when mounting it to your camera?

 

[ev1lmagic]

nope both ends are completely clean. now with that said do you agree with me that is seems a bit too softer than supposed to be? Stosh pointed out that the hair is slightly in focus and now that i look at it i agree but his face was what the auto focus was on. there could have been some slight judgement error in that particular picture but if you flip through the album, there are some where it appears wear the entire picture is at the same softness extent with no particular sharp focused spot.

 

[musicaleCA]

It looks soft, yeah, but for one, it's Facebook. Facebook's compression softens every bloody image up there. My absolute sharpest images (and I really mean tack sharp, holy crap, that's scary sharp) look soft on Facebook. Second, it's puny. Post the full size image and we can provide worthwhile feedback. At this resolution and quality of compression, anything said here is speculation.

 

[Derrel]

Yes, the photo looks a bit soft to me. Looking very closely at the guy's hair, it seems soft at the front of his hair--right at the forehead/hairline--that part of his hair looks slightly out of focus. His face also appears slightly out of focus as well. I opened the photo in Photoshop,and looked at the histogram, and verified what I thought--the photo has been given a very generous exposure. What does a generous exposure have to do with anything? My guess,and it;s just a guess, is that you're quite inexperienced with photography,and you shot this in a programmed automatic exposure mode, and the camera selected a wide aperture, and a slow shutter speed.

The girl's hair looks sharp, but the guy's face is soft. Why? His face is too close. You are standing up,and shooting down--therefore your actual depth of field is being applied at an angle,relative to the boy's head. You will note that his HAND on his knee is in acceptable focus, but yet his face is soft...that is due to the camera-to-subject angle you shot the photo at. Had the lens been stopped down to a smaller aperture, there would have been sufficient depth of field to overcome the exact, but slightly improper, placement of the depth of field band.

I tell you this with about 35 years' worth of experience--this is user error and a lack of understanding of the fundamentals. I didn't want to really go into it exhaustively the first time, but blaming your equipment,and thinking that a small speck or two inside of a professional,incredible lens was the culprit is just enough to make me want to let you know that, even without EXIF information, your photo has several clues an experienced shooter can see: camera angle, overexposure, DOF band improperly placed for ONE subject but adequate for another subject, worries that the camera gear is faulty, etc. I was only half-joking when I asked if you'd managed to put a thumbprint onto the rear element when mounting the lens, because you're clearly unsure of how to make a photograph in this type of situation. You "took" a snapshot, but didn't actually "make" a photograph in the old-fashioned sense of the craft of people photography.

EDIT: I went to your gallery and looked at the samples: they all exhibit shallow depth of field to one degree or another. There is absolutely nothing wrong with the lens,and there is no "hazyness" as you call it; you do have some shots that have shallow depth of field, but I think the worries over a tiny,tiny fleck inside, which you finally managed to get the people at Samy's to acknowledge in order to do a refund/exchange on the first 24-70 f/.8 Nikkor lens is a telling point. The fact that you only noticed this small imperfection as you put it, because of your OCD, is another good clue that the 'problem' you are experiencing likes not in the camera equipment itself, but in your use of it.

Try f/6.3 next time.

 

[benhasajeep]

Go back and check your exif data and see what aperture your using or the camera selected. Even if you were shooting higher than f/2.8. Aperature range is a sliding scale based on distance. The further you are away from the subject the larger the sharp focus range will be (any F stop!!). And of course the closer you are the smaller the sharp focus range will be, agian at any F stop. Lenses in days gone by actually had scales on them. Apparently that scared away normal consumers so they dont have them any more.

If your truely concerned about the focusing of the lens. Do a search for lens focusing test. Several of them will have a link to a test target you can print and take test shots of.

To me it seems like your using too shallow a DOF to get enough light. If your in auto mode the camera will not necessiarly pick the right aperture if its tyring to keep shutter speed up due to low light. Just a hunch on my part.

 

[ev1lmagic]

Yes, the photo looks a bit soft to me. Looking very closely at the guy's hair, it seems soft at the front of his hair--right at the forehead/hairline--that part of his hair looks slightly out of focus. His face also appears slightly out of focus as well. I opened the photo in Photoshop,and looked at the histogram, and verified what I thought--the photo has been given a very generous exposure. What does a generous exposure have to do with anything? My guess,and it;s just a guess, is that you're quite inexperienced with photography,and you shot this in a programmed automatic exposure mode, and the camera selected a wide aperture, and a slow shutter speed.

The girl's hair looks sharp, but the guy's face is soft. Why? His face is too close. You are standing up,and shooting down--therefore your actual depth of field is being applied at an angle,relative to the boy's head. You will note that his HAND on his knee is in acceptable focus, but yet his face is soft...that is due to the camera-to-subject angle you shot the photo at. Had the lens been stopped down to a smaller aperture, there would have been sufficient depth of field to overcome the exact, but slightly improper, placement of the depth of field band.

I tell you this with about 35 years' worth of experience--this is user error and a lack of understanding of the fundamentals. I didn't want to really go into it exhaustively the first time, but blaming your equipment,and thinking that a small speck or two inside of a professional,incredible lens was the culprit is just enough to make me want to let you know that, even without EXIF information, your photo has several clues an experienced shooter can see: camera angle, overexposure, DOF band improperly placed for ONE subject but adequate for another subject, worries that the camera gear is faulty, etc. I was only half-joking when I asked if you'd managed to put a thumbprint onto the rear element when mounting the lens, because you're clearly unsure of how to make a photograph in this type of situation. You "took" a snapshot, but didn't actually "make" a photograph in the old-fashioned sense of the craft of people photography.

EDIT: I went to your gallery and looked at the samples: they all exhibit shallow depth of field to one degree or another. There is absolutely nothing wrong with the lens,and there is no "hazyness" as you call it; you do have some shots that have shallow depth of field, but I think the worries over a tiny,tiny fleck inside, which you finally managed to get the people at Samy's to acknowledge in order to do a refund/exchange on the first 24-70 f/.8 Nikkor lens is a telling point. The fact that you only noticed this small imperfection as you put it, because of your OCD, is another good clue that the 'problem' you are experiencing likes not in the camera equipment itself, but in your use of it.

Try f/6.3 next time.

to start, yes i'm inexperienced i don't deny that.

but on another note, i think your 35 years have not gained you any bit of reading comprehension -_-. the OP says that there was a spec in the glass, i'm NOT saying the scratch or debris on the glass is what is causing this. i'm saying that if quality control can allow this to happen, what is to say that there isn't another defect with the one they swapped out for me? If there wasnt a defect in the first lense then i wouldn't even have doubts about this lense and blame it on myself COMPLETELY, but that was not the case. nonetheless the scratch was still an imperfection, so you're telling me you'd pay $1900 dollars for an imperfection? i for one have higher standards...

and no it was not shot in program. it was manual.

 

[ev1lmagic]

Go back and check your exif data and see what aperture your using or the camera selected. Even if you were shooting higher than f/2.8. Aperature range is a sliding scale based on distance. The further you are away from the subject the larger the sharp focus range will be (any F stop!!). And of course the closer you are the smaller the sharp focus range will be, agian at any F stop. Lenses in days gone by actually had scales on them. Apparently that scared away normal consumers so they dont have them any more.

If your truely concerned about the focusing of the lens. Do a search for lens focusing test. Several of them will have a link to a test target you can print and take test shots of.

To me it seems like your using too shallow a DOF to get enough light. If your in auto mode the camera will not necessiarly pick the right aperture if its tyring to keep shutter speed up due to low light. Just a hunch on my part.

thanks ben i'll check out the focusing test.

the pictures were shot in manual mode with autofocus on a D90 body. the reason for the autofocus is because my eyes have their good days and bad, this wasn't something that i wanted to risk having unfocused photos from.

(more so directed at other members and not you but since i'm typing here might as well put it out there): these were freshmen barely 10th grade guys with even more immature girls in revealing dresses (some). Yes i know the angle isn't the best, but any lower and she would complain that it'll see up her skirt. i tell her to sit a different way, even showed her how to sit, she was just either too shy, too jittery, or just too uncoordinated still to manage the pose. The picture where they're on the hardwood floor, you have no idea HOW far apart they were before i photoshopped it. and they're each other's dates too! you'd think the shyness wouldn't be there so much in that sense.

i must admit one fault of mine is that i shot these at iso500, i was in a darker part of the house earlier and had forgot to lower it afterwards.

 

[Derrel]

As you wrote, you have Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, and you took a lens back to Samy's,and eventually, they agreed it was a defect,and they returned the lens for you.

"(thanks to my O.C.D.) in the glass, inspected it and noticed that there was something EXTREMELY EXTREMELY small (either dust, debris, or a scratch) on the inside of the glass. brought it back to them and they finally noticed it as well. They agreed it was a defect for sure and exchanged it for me. My point is as well as the quality control by nikon may be, mishaps do occur and it has already happened to me once regarding the purchase of this lense and now i'm hesitant as to if this "hazyness" is also another defect."

What happened is,in order to get you to go away, they gave you another lens. As you wrote, "they finally noticed it as well." Yeah, I have handled returned equipment before--and they finally noticed what you saw, but which you are not sure about--was it dust? or a scratch? or was it debris?. If you're such an experienced shooter, surely you could determine if it was dust,debris,or a scratch,right??? Thankfully, your OCD helped you spot this alleged defect. And maybe the out of focus shot you got is also a defect? Oh boy,here we go again--maybe your "lense" has a defect!

Looking at your OOF photograph, I can spot the newbie mistake you made; looking at multiple other photos shot with the SAME lens at the SAME event, I can see that your equipment works fine, but the operator is inexperienced. I used to sell camera gear; customers who buy pro gear but don't know how to use it,and who are concerned with minute bits of dust are every sales guy's nightmare customer.

You are obviously, a novice shooter,and quick to blame your equipment instead of your own inexperience. The lens worked quite splendidly in OTHER photos shot minutes apart. If you're so experienced, WTF are you doing on a forum trying to help diagnose a simple case of bad focusing? Sorry, but the something "hazy" here is your understanding of camera handling and lenswork. Your picture has some OOF areas. You messed up.

 

[ev1lmagic]

A on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

A: focal length: 40 f-number: 2.8 exposure time: 1/80
B: focal length: 55 f-number: 3.2 exposure time: 1/200
C: focal length: 48 f-number: 3.2 exposure time: 1/200
D: focal length: 48 f-number: 3.2 exposure time: 1/200
E: focal length: 42 f-number: 3.2 exposure time: 1/200
F: focal length: 52 f-number: 3.2 exposure time: 1/200

again i know they're more of snapshots than anything else =\ i wanted to do it at an actual location but the kids didn't want to and yet still wanted photos. two of the guys go to the same church as me so when they asked i couldn't really say no. the crappy composition isn't my concern, it's that after having read so much about this lense, i would expect it to be much sharper than my product. imo, my kit lense produced sharper image than this....(this is saying what i'm seeing, not what is suppose to be. just putting it out there because i know someone is bound to see that i said i feel like my kit lense is sharper and immediately start bashing without even the slightest intent to concentrate on the problem presented in this thread -_- )

 

[ev1lmagic]

As you wrote, you have Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, and you took a lens back to Samy's,and eventually, they agreed it was a defect,and they returned the lens for you.

"(thanks to my O.C.D.) in the glass, inspected it and noticed that there was something EXTREMELY EXTREMELY small (either dust, debris, or a scratch) on the inside of the glass. brought it back to them and they finally noticed it as well. They agreed it was a defect for sure and exchanged it for me. My point is as well as the quality control by nikon may be, mishaps do occur and it has already happened to me once regarding the purchase of this lense and now i'm hesitant as to if this "hazyness" is also another defect."

What happened is,in order to get you to go away, they gave you another lens. As you wrote, "they finally noticed it as well." Yeah, I have handled returned equipment before--and they finally noticed what you saw, but which you are not sure about--was it dust? or a scratch? or was it debris?. If you're such an experienced shooter, surely you could determine if it was dust,debris,or a scratch,right??? Thankfully, your OCD helped you spot this alleged defect. And maybe the out of focus shot you got is also a defect? Oh boy,here we go again--maybe your "lense" has a defect!

Looking at your OOF photograph, I can spot the newbie mistake you made; looking at multiple other photos shot with the SAME lens at the SAME event, I can see that your equipment works fine, but the operator is inexperienced. I used to sell camera gear; customers who buy pro gear but don't know how to use it,and who are concerned with minute bits of dust are every sales guy's nightmare customer.

You are obviously, a novice shooter,and quick to blame your equipment instead of your own inexperience. The lens worked quite splendidly in OTHER photos shot minutes apart. If you're so experienced, WTF are you doing on a forum trying to help diagnose a simple case of bad focusing? Sorry, but the something "hazy" here is your understanding of camera handling and lenswork. Your picture has some OOF areas. You messed up.

i know i'm inexperienced you don't have to constantly say that -_-. and instead immediately pointing to one solution how about trying to think of several possible reasons? there is never one single solution or cause of anything.

i know the guy that works there. he's not just some random sales that is helping me and trying to get rid of me -_-. it's just afterall he still works there and i can't just ask for an exchange for no reason, he has to see it too and it just took him awhile to see it (due to much dimmer lights in the store possibly? iono) like i said i stated i only mentioned that story to point out that factory defects are possible so don't rule out the possibility of that happening. if i knew a member was going to be so anal and caught up on that single point, i would not have mentioned it.

now if you're going to just bash and bash and drive the stake towards your one and single viewpoint, please stop wasting my time by posting in here. I stated the scratch in the lense to open idea that there is a possibility of a defect and not just me, THAT WAS THe SOLE PURPOSE OF STATING THAT BACKGROUND STORY.


i dont want to keep this lense because your narrow minded @$$ tells me it's my fault, then i find out later on that there is possible chance i was right. then be out on $1900 dollars -_-

like i said, if you're not going to be open minded and be CONSTRUCTIVE, please don't post in here again. and if you want to know what's constructive look at the other member's post. they mentioned info as did you, but they provide HELP

 

[benhasajeep]

A on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

A: focal length: 40 f-number: 2.8 exposure time: 1/80
B: focal length: 55 f-number: 3.2 exposure time: 1/200
C: focal length: 48 f-number: 3.2 exposure time: 1/200
D: focal length: 48 f-number: 3.2 exposure time: 1/200
E: focal length: 42 f-number: 3.2 exposure time: 1/200
F: focal length: 52 f-number: 3.2 exposure time: 1/200

again i know they're more of snapshots than anything else =\ i wanted to do it at an actual location but the kids didn't want to and yet still wanted photos. two of the guys go to the same church as me so when they asked i couldn't really say no. the crappy composition isn't my concern, it's that after having read so much about this lense, i would expect it to be much sharper than my product. imo, my kit lense produced sharper image than this....(this is saying what i'm seeing, not what is suppose to be. just putting it out there because i know someone is bound to see that i said i feel like my kit lense is sharper and immediately start bashing without even the slightest intent to concentrate on the problem presented in this thread -_- )

Your aperature was wide open to nearly wide open on all the shots. This will give you a small depth of field. As a note from your picks. Going by your exif you could have easilly gone a full stop more on the aperature. Giving you a better depth of field. The last 5 you could have gone 2 stops if your just average steady hand. Almost all the shots could have been done at f/5.6 and that would have given you quite a bit larger sharp focus area.

I think if you do a focus test you will see the lens is ok.