New D90 Taking Surprisingly Average Pics

[funkymonkey]

Dan - just open up image in lightroom or photoshop. Resize to 1024 max width or height.. then apply slight sharpen and save as srgb jpeg.

Edit: how is flickr altering your image? As in what happens?? Millions of people use flickr so doubt it is.

no point discussing the clarity of an image when you're resizing to 1024 and applying software antialiasing etc is there?

leave it as it is, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

[siddr20]

uh?

So you want us to view full high res file? I dont think it will even fit on any screen.

All your doing is resizing an image, and applying a bit of sharpen since your resizing from such a big file resolution.

[FST513]

Sidd i think the point here is to view it SOOC.

Resizing and sharpening will make the image appear sharper and more in focus than it actually is.

Oh and more people have problems with photobucket than any other image hosting site because it fcuks with your photo if you don't know how to resize/go over file limits etc...

Flickr - Works perfectly IMO, i've never had a problem with it. Although unless i want to quickly share photos, i'll host off my website. It will resize humungous images automatically.

Anyway - Haven't looked at the photos but judging by peoples comments you were expecting a lot more lol.

You have to remember on a P&S camera the sensor is so small and your normally shooting extremely wide angled so photos will always appear to look good. Until you start zooming in. You can definitely take some amazing shots with your kit lens, i think this is just user error (to do with settings).

Auto mode is referred to as "Green box of death" for a reason. To get all artsy and fancy as you describe it, shooting in AV/TV/M is a better way of doing it. Remember to get that blur you can get the same blur at f/16 as long as your close enough to the subject. If you get right up in the books face and back off until it locks focus and take a snap, it will have nice bokeh (blur).

I'll check the photos when i get home and comment then. Will take too long to download at work. I don't think your expecting too much, i just think the settings are wrong for what your expecting.

Matt - Every photo i saw of yours on the calendar shoot night was so friggin cold and blue it wasn't funny hahaha, get some warmth in ya! Lol, doesnt matter cause your shooting RAW anyway.

[No Crust Racing]

OK Same setup as before.

D90

1 Reset done, timer

2 As above

3 Highes F number in P mode

4 Lowest F number in P mode

Canon Ixus 80

5 Reset done, fully auto, timer

6 As above

The D90 doesn't appear to have gotten any better after reset (no UV filter on any of these pics) Tmie of day is similar and the subject and distance is pretty similar too.

The comparison makes the D90 look very overpriced in this basic comparison.

Surely the D90 can't be only as good as a basic Canon point and shoot.

What am I doing wrong =\

Edited November 9, 2010 by ActionDan

[MaTBoY]

Dude, there is NOTHING wrong with your camera. What you're doing wrong is you haven't spent a bit more time practicing and learning about the possibilities. If you just want to point and shoot it, use a point and shoot.

If you give your granma your lambo to hit the shops she's not really going to appreciate it if she just drives it exactly like she'd drive her fiesta.

Did you expect to just point it at something and have everything turn out awesome? The A for auto mode, not Awesome mode! (Don't use auto. it's crap) Learn how to shoot manual, or 'S' or 'A' priority.

This was taken with my D90, with my kit lens, which is the same as yours. Minimal photoshop too. Only adjusted levels and contrast i think. nothing fancy though.

[No Crust Racing]

"Did you expect to just point it at something and have everything turn out awesome?"

Well I was hoping so

Note at the bottom of my last post I said What am "I" doing wrong. I'm not blaming the camera, I wanted to confirm that there was nothing wrong with it, and I have so that's good but I'd still like to have a better idea on how to get some decent shots out of it and feel like the money was worth it and I appreciaet the feedback I'm getting here

Using your anology, even in fully auto mode the lambo is a pretty trick bit of gear, without touching any of the e-gear or traction settings etc it will rock out, the D90 however seems to treat auto mode like running the lambo on 4 cylinders, or about as good as a snazzy looking fiesta.

Yes I realised going fully manual would yeild better results, as I'm sure it would in the lambo if you went crazy fine tuning everything, but I did expect that in it's basic auto mode it would still be noticable better in a side by side comparison.

Edited November 9, 2010 by ActionDan

[MaTBoY]

just spend a bit more time on it dude. All it can do better than your P+S in auto mode is give you a bigger picture and a sharper picture (Depending on a few things)

I know your not blaming the camera, I'm just saying you need to spend more time on it. It's not the hardware that makes awesome photo's. A camera is just the paint in your hand.

Good luck mate!

[FST513]

That first shot of the book, looks fine. Reason why it is soft at the top where the writing is, is i'm guessing because you used auto focus points as well? I assume that it grabbed the bottom of the book (It will search for contrast closest to the focus point).

Pick a subject that is a constant (I.E. Always there). Take a photo, post it up and tell us what you dont like about it. We will tell you what we would of done, composition wise, focus wise and distance to subject etc.. So many variables as you can see.

I can guarantee now that after looking at the photos you have posted, is that you need to choose CENTER POINT focus (also the strongest and most accurate focus point) and focus correctly.

Take some more pics!

[funkymonkey]

The IXUS 80 is shooting at f2.8 ISO 80

The D90 is shooting at f4.0 ISO 200

This means that there is a LOT more light going into the IXUS than there is for the D90 with the kit lens. Which explains why the IXUS is more vibrant.

[FST513]

The IXUS 80 is shooting at f2.8 ISO 80

The D90 is shooting at f4.0 ISO 200

This means that there is a LOT more light going into the IXUS than there is for the D90 with the kit lens. Which explains why the IXUS is more vibrant.

QFT.

[No Crust Racing]

I'll take a few more test pics and point out what I'm talking about as far as what I think should/could look better.

As for the difference in fstop and iso number, why would the Canon be choosing such a different set of figures and producing a result that so much richer in colour? TBH the Nikon did look more representative of the real colours, the table protector is not that orange.

[r32impul]

who say Nikon's colour is not rich or sharp? what you need to do is set "picture control" to "Vivid" under shooting menu and use "S, A or M".

Never use the "Auto". Maybe you should get some good lens too

ISO6400 hand-held 1/60s F2.8

[r32impul]

Please click link below, it teach you how get great colour out of D90

how to get great colour from D90

[FST513]

That horse photo is ISO 6400, f/2.8 and 1/60th and still way too dark?! Wow, must be extremely dark. Looks a bit too saturated as well.

Colour is best set in post instead of in-camera. Unless you shoot JPEG 24/7. Of which you could still get better colour in post anyway than set in-camera as it would be more accurate.

My picture style is set on standard, no adjustments, it doesn't matter anyway, cause i shoot RAW.

[funkymonkey]

yeah I prefer to do saturation adjustments etc post processing on RAWs. Nowhere near pro enough to get it right on the fly.

[r32impul]

That horse photo is ISO 6400, f/2.8 and 1/60th and still way too dark?! Wow, must be extremely dark. Looks a bit too saturated as well.

Colour is best set in post instead of in-camera. Unless you shoot JPEG 24/7. Of which you could still get better colour in post anyway than set in-camera as it would be more accurate.

My picture style is set on standard, no adjustments, it doesn't matter anyway, cause i shoot RAW.

Well, that's a black horse at night around 11:00pm in the Melbourne CBD, it is quite dark

Yes, it is taken by Nikon D3 with 14-24mm F2.8 and JPG, this shoot I was testing the high ISO wide open

[r32impul]

This is Post edit shoot

ISO1600 1/800s F6.3 (D3 + Sigma 150-500mm)

[No Crust Racing]

Hey guys, back again.

Been playing a bit and have worked out a few handy controls which has helped. I've been focusing on using the S mode for now and have also had a bit of a play changing the intensity of the flash when taking pics in low light which has also helped in some circumstances. I like the idea of being able to wind up shutter speed to avoid needing flash though.

One thing that I'm still really struggling with is getting the clarity.

If you look at the attached images, tell me what settings would give me clarity here.

I tried auto with flash shutter mode with different speeds and I've played with focus modes too.

I'm guessing that given the varying lighting and wide range of depth here it makes it a hard shot to get.

I was using the knife block under the phone as a reference point while not actually focusing on them specifically.

I resized them to get them under the 2mb individual size limit.

Excuse the dishes, I just finished washing up

[MaTBoY]

dude your shooting hand held in a really badly lit enviroment. I think if you want a clearer shot inside at night you need one of the following

a) day time

b) tripod

c) $10k camera

your camera looks fine man. when u see a nice shot of an interior at night or with all the lights on you can bet your arse it's not straight from camera.

To improve the shots you've posted up i would do the following.

Turn on every light that might add light to the photo

get a tripod

exposure to suit F6ish No flash.

correct the white balance to kill that yellow, or add a blue-ish filter to it in post processing.

you could even try a hdr.

[FST513]

Get a proper flash and bounce it. Use a tripod, bounce the flash straight up, off the left wall, off the right wall and behind you. Add them all together in post making a composite. It does look really poorly lit.

Go out in day time, shoot something in A (Aperture mode) at like F5.6 -F8 and then post it up. Then we can rule out camera errors/front/back focusing etc... and put it down to the user.

Shooting in really badly lit environments does your head in especially when your just starting out. Don't expect great things out of the built in flash either. They are rubbo!