Out of Focus

[Olivia Price]

I have been working on getting spot on focus for portraits. As suggested by several articles I've read I have increased my shutter speed and aperture and have been doing much better when capturing those close up shots but when it comes to a full body or distant shot I cannot nail down my focus. Can someone please help me How do you nail down your focus? Any tips you can give me would be great!


Here is an example:

Camera: Canon EOS REBEL T3i
Lens Model: EF50mm f/1.8 II
Exposure: 0.005 sec (1/200)
Aperture: f/4.0
Focal Length: 50 mm
ISO Speed: 100





Edit: I guess you cannot really tell from this photo, but when I zoom in 50-100% her face is not in focus.

[OsmosisStudios]

We'd need to see it closer range: from here it just looks soft.

[Olivia Price]

Here are some closer crops:



I think the whole photo is soft

[autofocus]

Based on EXIF, it looks like you did everything right. Now, how are you setting the camera's focus mode? One shot for portraits would be best. Are you dialing in your focus point, or center focus / recompose method?

[Olivia Price]

For this I used manual focus, one shot. I usually use the center focus point, but I have tried choosing my focus point to better fit my composition and have had terrible luck with that. I may just need to have my eyes checked Although it does happen when I'm using auto focus, center, one shot. Could it just be that I'm not steady enough?

[OsmosisStudios]

In this case, i'd say it's a manual focus miss caused by an improperly set diopter.

If you're getting the same results from autofocus, one shot, single centre point, then it sounds like it's focusing wrongly: in this case i'd say it's focused on her dress in the forefront of her chest.

[autofocus]

Originally Posted by Olivia Price

For this I used manual focus, one shot. I usually use the center focus point, but I have tried choosing my focus point to better fit my composition and have had terrible luck with that. I may just need to have my eyes checked Although it does happen when I'm using auto focus, center, one shot. Could it just be that I'm not steady enough?

We see the same thing from time to time...so you are not alone. You may be able to improve things a little by shooting at a smaller f/stop, however, the trade off will be a slower shutter speed, or a higher ISO...both can add to soft looking photos. You probably can still enlarge your photo to a decent size without seeing a real problem with the softness. It's when you do a tight re-crop of that full body shot where you can run into problems with prints. We (wife is also a photographer) prefer to select the focus point as opposed to center point, recompose method. The down side of the latter method is any slight movement on your, or the subject's part after a half press on the shutter can throw your focus off

[Olivia Price]

Originally Posted by OsmosisStudios

In this case, i'd say it's a manual focus miss caused by an improperly set diopter.

If you're getting the same results from autofocus, one shot, single centre point, then it sounds like it's focusing wrongly: in this case i'd say it's focused on her dress in the forefront of her chest.

It could be the diopter, since I did adjust it recently but I am also getting bad focus on auto. What do you do if it is the camera focusing wrongly....or better yet how do you really find out if this is the case?

[Olivia Price]

Originally Posted by autofocus

We see the same thing from time to time...so you are not alone. You may be able to improve things a little by shooting at a smaller f/stop, however, the trade off will be a slower shutter speed, or a higher ISO...both can add to soft looking photos. You probably can still enlarge your photo to a decent size without seeing a real problem with the softness. It's when you do a tight re-crop of that full body shot where you can run into problems with prints. We (wife is also a photographer) prefer to select the focus point as opposed to center point, recompose method. The down side of the latter method is any slight movement on your, or the subject's part after a half press on the shutter can throw your focus off

I'm so glad to hear that I'm not alone in this! I was begininng to think I'm crazy

whith this photo I'm not planning on a tight crop so I'm ok there!

[Doug Sundseth]

To find out if your lens/camera combination is not autofocusing correctly, a standard technique it to tack a newspaper page up to a wall, place the camera on a tripod directly in front of the paper, and shoot a picture.

You should use mirror lock-up (if your camera has it), shoot with a remote or cable release, use your widest aperture, and obviously use autofocus.

If you're square to the paper, you should see any focus problem immediately. If you don't see a problem, it's a technique issue, not an equipment issue.