curious: What is "acceptable" sharpness

[PhotoProZero]

I'm curious to find out: what is/will be the acceptable sharpness when viewing a photo on your LCD screen, zoomed in at 100%? I know it will be the details of the subject, however, does that mean if zoomed in at 100% on LCD Screen, details seemed soft or alittle blur, its consider sharp??

 

[Octarine]

Read up: http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/sharpness.shtml
But first, ensure that your images don't suffer from handshake, object movements or other. At 100% images will look sharp at the screen (real monitor, not LCD of camera) if well taken.

 

[spheredome]

I will use my expectation of perfect sharpness to a digital image on LCD screen. "As sharp as your text, frames and icons on your browser". Basically well defined outlines within and along every subject feature.

Visual sharpness is degraded by low resolution LCD and improved by image downsize, which in latter, our eyes cannot resolve minute pixel from a normal viewing distance. It must be free from shakes, out of focus, softness to begin with and no haze obstruction for landscape. You mentioned about detail which is not my definition of sharpness but rather how much you can see (not how well). E.g if during image blow up and you can see the person in the building is not sharpness but rather information captured.

I am talking only about seeing a picture from the whole. If you crop, the final picture must be sharp. Cropping 100% is unlikely to be sharp because nothing can be made out of that section on a notebook LCD for instance. However zooming viewing can help detect blur on picture.

People's ability to determine sharpness to a picture (IMO), is dependent on having past experience of seeing a sharp and not so sharp image. E.g if you have been using dot-matrix printer for instance, you never know what is sharp till you see laser printer printouts.

 

[Diavonex]

Paste and shoot a newspaper on the wall. If you can read the newspaper on the monitor, that is sharp.

 

[PhotoProZero]

well, ive tried shooting (using a tripod) to take newspaper prints to check on:
1.Focusing
2. Sharpness

Sadly, when zoomed in at 100% crop using the provided software, fonts' lines are not "crisp sharp" and looks soft and blur.

Lens and Camera has been recently sent for calibration. There was an issue of back-focusing.

So, right now, Im a little confuse as to what could be a problem.....:dunno:

 

[Diavonex]

Make sure you set the resolution of your monitor correctly. Have you tested with another lens?

 

[night86mare]

show us pictures of the 100% crop.

some people just demand too much from dslrs, or misunderstand what sharpness is. contrast is not sharpness. the amount of detail is, if focus is correctly obtained.

 

[2evans]

well, ive tried shooting (using a tripod) to take newspaper prints to check on:
1.Focusing
2. Sharpness

Sadly, when zoomed in at 100% crop using the provided software, fonts' lines are not "crisp sharp" and looks soft and blur.

Lens and Camera has been recently sent for calibration. There was an issue of back-focusing.

So, right now, Im a little confuse as to what could be a problem.....:dunno:

Make sure you are looking at where the focus point is. Lens and aperture used, can also be factors, as each lens does have a natural sweet spot, where it's sharpest.

 

[PhotoProZero]

show us pictures of the 100% crop.

some people just demand too much from dslrs, or misunderstand what sharpness is. contrast is not sharpness. the amount of detail is, if focus is correctly obtained.

Well, I'm not talking abt contrast. But I do agree on the focusing point. I will post some photos later tonight to help this discussion better....

Tks

 

[spheredome]

The LCD thing is a technology of itself regards of what you present on the screen. LCD pixel are form of squares (or perhaps hexagon), so you cannot draw a flat line diagonally because there will be jagged like stairs. The more closer you look, the more obivous it gets. That is LCD and nothing to do with camera. Take your painter software or Visio, magnify to 300% and draw a line. Macs add a layer of LCD screen filter to smoothen up the surface so that it is less obvious but the jagged still present.

Assuming every setting is optimal, the blur may be due to optic quality. If one is pondering why some people can take very clear close up insect macro like PTroy, that is bec he photographed the insect in distances of inches not feet.

The higher the zoom used to take the picture, the lesser you can crop.

well, ive tried shooting (using a tripod) to take newspaper prints to check on:
1.Focusing
2. Sharpness

Sadly, when zoomed in at 100% crop using the provided software, fonts' lines are not "crisp sharp" and looks soft and blur.

Lens and Camera has been recently sent for calibration. There was an issue of back-focusing.

So, right now, Im a little confuse as to what could be a problem.....:dunno:

 

[Octarine]

The higher the zoom used to take the picture, the lesser you can crop.

That would mean that when using a 50-500 (Sigma) that any image taken at 500mm cannot be cropped further. I suspect the owners of such a lens will have a different opinion.

 

[PhotoProZero]

The LCD thing is a technology of itself regards of what you present on the screen. LCD pixel are form of squares (or perhaps hexagon), so you cannot draw a flat line diagonally because there will be jagged like stairs. The more closer you look, the more obivous it gets. That is LCD and nothing to do with camera. Take your painter software or Visio, magnify to 300% and draw a line. Macs add a layer of LCD screen filter to smoothen up the surface so that it is less obvious but the jagged still present.

Assuming every setting is optimal, the blur may be due to optic quality. If one is pondering why some people can take very clear close up insect macro like PTroy, that is bec he photographed the insect in distances of inches not feet.

The higher the zoom used to take the picture, the lesser you can crop.

Kekeke, well, I dont quite understand the first part...But I'll do some reasearch...

As to macros, well, i do hope to get troy's macro sharpness. But of course nowhere there! And i do know that it is caused by my handshake therefore not able to get sharp quality photos....:sweat:

 

[Diavonex]

......The higher the zoom used to take the picture, the lesser you can crop.

I think this only apply to digital zoom; with optical zoom you should still be able to crop as per normal.

 

[chalib]

Very subjective

So post the pics for forumers here to value the sharpness

 

[spheredome]

I mean lesser % of crop that is within visual acceptance. The raw image size will always be the same regardless at 50 or 500mm. Just that at zoom end, picture flaws becomes prominent and thus higher cropping reveals more. At least that is what I see from my Sigma 150-500mm lens.

This has nothing to do with sharpness though.

That would mean that when using a 50-500 (Sigma) that any image taken at 500mm cannot be cropped further. I suspect the owners of such a lens will have a different opinion.

 

[PhotoProZero]

Photo for discussion?

 

[night86mare]

so which part is soft?

i see a sharp zone.

do you knwo what depth of field and wide open aperture are?

 

[PhotoProZero]

so which part is soft?

i see a sharp zone.

do you knwo what depth of field and wide open aperture are?

Hi night86mare, where is the sharp zone you see? Yes, I do understand DOP and Wide Open Aperture, what they are.

Im pretty curious to knw if this is the photo taken persay, and zoomed in at 100% on your LCD screen, what is the "acceptable sharpness"? Mine usually happens that on the LCD screen, it becomes blurry and soft.

Thanks.

 

[night86mare]

is that 100% crop?

don't think so right.. what are the settings used for that picture, you have dumped the exif.