how to take clear pictures
January 23, 2019 4:10 PM Subscribe
I recently took some photos using my Fuji x100f at my nephew's wedding. I was shooting mostly on aperture priority. For the most part, the shots came out well.
A few shots came out unfocused and I am wondering why.
These were shot indoors at night at the reception. I kept the aperture at about f4 or wider. I was thinking the camera would pick the appropriate ISO and shutter. However my shots of people walking into the room, taken from about 5 feet away, were blurry. Specifically the people were blurred. I would have thought with an aperture that wide the shutter would have been faster?
What could I , should I, have done differently? I did realize after the fact that I kept the camera on single focus, rather than continual, as might have been more appropriate.
These were shot indoors at night at the reception. I kept the aperture at about f4 or wider. I was thinking the camera would pick the appropriate ISO and shutter. However my shots of people walking into the room, taken from about 5 feet away, were blurry. Specifically the people were blurred. I would have thought with an aperture that wide the shutter would have been faster?
What could I , should I, have done differently? I did realize after the fact that I kept the camera on single focus, rather than continual, as might have been more appropriate.
See if the metadata in the blurry photos records shutter speed. My guess like caek is the camera used a slow speed and that's it's motion blur.
posted by sammyo at 5:20 PM on January 23, 2019
posted by sammyo at 5:20 PM on January 23, 2019
I don't know the details of your camera, but all the SLRs I've used will not adjust the ISO on aperture-priority, just shutter speed.
Several things to consider: a) f/4 or wider wouldn't have great depth of field, b) if you don't focus every shot, you can get blurred subjects, c) if people are moving you can get blurred subjects, d) even if you were auto-focusing, low light sometimes leads to poor focusing behavior (depending on the camera).
As for the shutter speed, you can check what was chosen with either the camera (if the photos are still on there) or an EXIF-viewing utility or most photo-organizing programs. The human eye is extremely versatile and forgiving and it can be surprising how large a variation in brightness we don't notice.
posted by Gilgamesh's Chauffeur at 5:27 PM on January 23, 2019
Several things to consider: a) f/4 or wider wouldn't have great depth of field, b) if you don't focus every shot, you can get blurred subjects, c) if people are moving you can get blurred subjects, d) even if you were auto-focusing, low light sometimes leads to poor focusing behavior (depending on the camera).
As for the shutter speed, you can check what was chosen with either the camera (if the photos are still on there) or an EXIF-viewing utility or most photo-organizing programs. The human eye is extremely versatile and forgiving and it can be surprising how large a variation in brightness we don't notice.
posted by Gilgamesh's Chauffeur at 5:27 PM on January 23, 2019
f/4 is not really wide enough for indoor night shooting, and the X100F (which is a lovely camera, I held one once and was nearly overcome with camera lust) is unstabilized to boot. Crank that sucker all the way open to f/2 in low-light situations, that's what f/2 is for. f/4 is a good walking-around default aperture for when light isn't really an issue, but for low light you need to go faster.
Also, there is almost certainly a maximum ISO setting. That is, you can tell the camera how high it is allowed to raise the ISO automatically before it starts lengthening the shutter speed instead. This is because the very highest ISO settings will give very grainy images. Play around and figure out how high you're willing to let the camera go.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 5:34 PM on January 23, 2019
Also, there is almost certainly a maximum ISO setting. That is, you can tell the camera how high it is allowed to raise the ISO automatically before it starts lengthening the shutter speed instead. This is because the very highest ISO settings will give very grainy images. Play around and figure out how high you're willing to let the camera go.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 5:34 PM on January 23, 2019
By the way, one thing you can do if you're willing to do a bit of post-processing is to underexpose by a stop or maybe even two (somewhere online you can find out how low the X100F's sensor will actually let you go, but I bet you can get away with two stops) and then brighten the photos later in post. You will get better results from this technique if you shoot in RAW though, whereas the X100F is really built around the concept of JPEG shooting with little if any post-processing.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 5:36 PM on January 23, 2019
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 5:36 PM on January 23, 2019
To elaborate a little on my first answer, most modern high-end cameras will operate like so on aperture-priority mode, at least by default:
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 5:46 PM on January 23, 2019 [2 favorites]
- Aperture is locked by user.
- Camera starts out at base ISO, ISO 200 for your camera.
- Camera seeks a shutter speed that will yield proper exposure at set aperture and ISO 200.
- If proper shutter speed would be too long for hand-holding (1/30s for the X100F's 35mm-equivalent lens, probably) camera raises ISO until shutter speed is fast enough to avoid hand shake.
- If camera hits max allowable ISO, it gives up and allows the shutter speed to lengthen, hand shake be damned.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 5:46 PM on January 23, 2019 [2 favorites]
I have the forerunner to your camera (x100s).
As mentioned already, it may be camera shake, not lack of focus. However, also check that you weren’t accidentally on macro mode. I’ve done that a time or two!
posted by The Deej at 5:58 PM on January 23, 2019
As mentioned already, it may be camera shake, not lack of focus. However, also check that you weren’t accidentally on macro mode. I’ve done that a time or two!
posted by The Deej at 5:58 PM on January 23, 2019
I realize that I did not actually explain why you would underexpose. The reason to do this is to achieve a faster shutter speed and/or lower ISO. For every stop you underexpose, you can cut either your shutter speed or your ISO in half. In many cases, there is very little image quality penalty for raising the exposure by a stop or two in software, e.g. in Lightroom, especially if you start from a RAW rather than a JPEG.
Opening the aperture also gives you more stops but the scale is weird. You'd think f/2 would be one stop faster than f/4 (2 being half of 4) but it's actually two stops faster. One stop faster than f/2 is f2.8. f/2 harvests four times as much light as f/4, which is obviously advantageous in dim environments.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 6:11 PM on January 23, 2019 [1 favorite]
Opening the aperture also gives you more stops but the scale is weird. You'd think f/2 would be one stop faster than f/4 (2 being half of 4) but it's actually two stops faster. One stop faster than f/2 is f2.8. f/2 harvests four times as much light as f/4, which is obviously advantageous in dim environments.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 6:11 PM on January 23, 2019 [1 favorite]
Oh plus possibly (sorry for the serial commenting, last one I promise) at f/4 in dim light, the X100F just can't effectively autofocus. One of the weaker points of what, I should be clear, is overall a very strong camera is the X100F's autofocus system. It's noticeably improved relative to its predecessor but still well short of the state of the art. So don't expect too much of it in low light, especially if you're stopped down. Also note that apparently zone focus and single-point focus are more reliable on this camera than wide-focus, and that a high miss rate should be expected for AF-C mode in general.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 6:19 PM on January 23, 2019
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 6:19 PM on January 23, 2019
Yes, the Fuji cameras will adjust ISO as described by anticipation and you can set a maximum ISO, if you would prefer motion blur and shake to noisy images.
We do need to know the shutter speed of the blurry images to offer suggestions as to what's happened.
posted by deadwax at 2:54 AM on January 24, 2019
We do need to know the shutter speed of the blurry images to offer suggestions as to what's happened.
posted by deadwax at 2:54 AM on January 24, 2019
f4 isn't all that wide open. Higher end zoom lenses are f2.8. Nice primes are at 1.4.
2.8 is twice as much light as f4, and f2 is four times as much light at f4.
In general, 3 things cause blurry pictures, and you can parse the details of a particular photo to understand what is making them blurry. (It could be a combination of the below.)
1. Moving Camera: Especially at slow shutter speeds you often get indoors like 1/30, 1/60, 1/100, etc, you need to have the camera very still. Set your feet, keep your elbows at your side, focus on being still. Avoid panning to follow a moving object. A moving camera will mean there is no part of the image that is perfectly in focus. At any contrasty edge, you'll see a bit of ghosting, like the edge has been smeared in one direction. Looking over the whole image, you'll likely this smearing will be in a consistent direction.
2. Moving subject Especially at slow shutter speeds you often get indoors like 1/30, 1/60, 1/100, etc, your subject may move through the frame as you are taking the photo. Even if the camera is perfectly still, the moving things in the photo will be blurred. In the photo you'll notice this smearing in the direction of the moving thing. People walking in opposite directions will be smeared in opposite directions. Things moving faster, like the hands of dancing people will be smeared more than slower moving things. This happens even outside. At 1/1000, a soccer player might be sharp, but their toe or the ball might not be. I've gotten moving subject blur from hummingbird wingtips at 1/2000. Your solution here is to choose a faster shutter speed. That might require wider aperture (lower number) or higher ISO, or adding your own light with flash. If you're photographing people walking down an aisle at a wedding, sometimes you can pick out the bright spots where the sun is shining through a window, or where two artificial lights overlap, and take your shot when people are there.
3. Focus. In low light indoors, sometimes your focus system just can't focus fast enough. Or it has locked focus on an object that isn't the most important thing in the frame. Occasionally it will hunt, going through the entire focus range of your lens looking for the right focus. You'll see this in your photo where some things sharp in the foreground or background, but not your subject. Occasionally the camera will stick on near focus when you take the shot and the photo will be entirely fuzzy. The fix here is to learn your focus system for your particular camera and practice with the type of subjects you'll be around. Generally, the camera has an easier time focusing on subjects that are well lit and contrasty, and near the middle of the frame.
One additional case here is high ISO noise. It's a lack of sharpness and detail across the image.. Every camera has a range of ISO it will work at. If you are in low light, the camera might have to shoot at its highest ISO. Depending on the camera, you'll see one of two things: The photo will either look really grainy, and if you zoom in on a computer screen, you'll see speckled noise all across the frame. It'll look like someone sifted sand all over the photo. Sometimes, the camera software will try to remove the noise, with the result being a sort of blockiness or watercolour effect. Phones are notorious for this.
posted by thenormshow at 7:44 AM on January 24, 2019
2.8 is twice as much light as f4, and f2 is four times as much light at f4.
In general, 3 things cause blurry pictures, and you can parse the details of a particular photo to understand what is making them blurry. (It could be a combination of the below.)
1. Moving Camera: Especially at slow shutter speeds you often get indoors like 1/30, 1/60, 1/100, etc, you need to have the camera very still. Set your feet, keep your elbows at your side, focus on being still. Avoid panning to follow a moving object. A moving camera will mean there is no part of the image that is perfectly in focus. At any contrasty edge, you'll see a bit of ghosting, like the edge has been smeared in one direction. Looking over the whole image, you'll likely this smearing will be in a consistent direction.
2. Moving subject Especially at slow shutter speeds you often get indoors like 1/30, 1/60, 1/100, etc, your subject may move through the frame as you are taking the photo. Even if the camera is perfectly still, the moving things in the photo will be blurred. In the photo you'll notice this smearing in the direction of the moving thing. People walking in opposite directions will be smeared in opposite directions. Things moving faster, like the hands of dancing people will be smeared more than slower moving things. This happens even outside. At 1/1000, a soccer player might be sharp, but their toe or the ball might not be. I've gotten moving subject blur from hummingbird wingtips at 1/2000. Your solution here is to choose a faster shutter speed. That might require wider aperture (lower number) or higher ISO, or adding your own light with flash. If you're photographing people walking down an aisle at a wedding, sometimes you can pick out the bright spots where the sun is shining through a window, or where two artificial lights overlap, and take your shot when people are there.
3. Focus. In low light indoors, sometimes your focus system just can't focus fast enough. Or it has locked focus on an object that isn't the most important thing in the frame. Occasionally it will hunt, going through the entire focus range of your lens looking for the right focus. You'll see this in your photo where some things sharp in the foreground or background, but not your subject. Occasionally the camera will stick on near focus when you take the shot and the photo will be entirely fuzzy. The fix here is to learn your focus system for your particular camera and practice with the type of subjects you'll be around. Generally, the camera has an easier time focusing on subjects that are well lit and contrasty, and near the middle of the frame.
One additional case here is high ISO noise. It's a lack of sharpness and detail across the image.. Every camera has a range of ISO it will work at. If you are in low light, the camera might have to shoot at its highest ISO. Depending on the camera, you'll see one of two things: The photo will either look really grainy, and if you zoom in on a computer screen, you'll see speckled noise all across the frame. It'll look like someone sifted sand all over the photo. Sometimes, the camera software will try to remove the noise, with the result being a sort of blockiness or watercolour effect. Phones are notorious for this.
posted by thenormshow at 7:44 AM on January 24, 2019
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posted by caek at 4:50 PM on January 23, 2019 [1 favorite]