F828 "characteristics" ?

[artyboy]

any F828 users here face the following?

a) shooting indoors with built-in flash gives (quite consistently) over-exposured results if you do not shoot "far enough" from the subject.

b) shooting night scenes of distant buildings, esp at long exposures, gives the buildings a "smudgey, thinly-veiled, soft" look? i've noticed that this is apparent more for nite shots compared to the same building taken in the day.
this happens even for shots taken at f/8, tripod-mounted and shutter triggered by timer. surprisingly, buildings nearer to the camera fares better.

c) subjects taken outdoors in cloudy (sun hidden by clouds) weather looks soft and lacks 'pop'. when its sunny its much better. seems to me the F828 is a 'sunny weather' digicam!

 

[King Tiger]

a) I face the same condition too, try using the Sony F32X with flash facing 45 degree to the ceiling.

b) Same condition too when I try to take photo of CBD building at Sheares Bridge. I saw some other F828 users set to F4.5 ~ F5.6 with shorter exposure timing to avoild this problem.

c) Haven't try before yet.

 

[holeinone]

a) I don't seem to find this problem. I have shot a picture of my wife from abt 3 feet away with the built-in and I thought the exposure was pretty good.

b) I have yet to try this though I wish to over the weekend.

c) my old 717 gives the pop, I am certainly hoping the 828 won't fare any worse. :think:

 

[rexus]

The distant building become soft... is it due to slight overexposure? I did heard from my fren who is a photographer to use a poloriser and it can cut the amount of bright light entering the lenses, thus making lights from the windows or building logo sharper. Not too sure if it works.

 

[artyboy]

yes you are quite right, the 'smudginess' from the lighted windows i wld think is normal - highlights burning out. but its the overall sharpness of the buildings which is the problem, particularly if you look at the horizontal/vertical lines. it smudges which even PS can't really help. its perculiar in the sense that this only happens in nite shots and as u rightly pointed out is most likely due to the long exposure. i've tried shooting at f/5 besides f/8 too, there isnt much improvement. since the day shots are ok i guess it wld boil down to being the long exposure being the culprit, but interestingly the nearby buildings do not suffer from this problem compared to the ones in the distance. i really hope Sony puts out a version 3 firmware to address these issues as i suspect that it could be a software issue since dayshots do not have such problems.

on another separate issue, any of you guys have problem with foilage - trees/bushes etc - showing 'jaggies' when taking day shots? its subtle but noticeable, dont know how u describe it but it looks like "digitisation effects", you know, one look at you can tell that the pic was taken with a digicam? i dont deny im edging towards the dark side if the 'problems' persists... cough..D70..cough..! but i wld want to keep the F828 even if an upgrade is "feasible" (if got $ windfall haha)... its just a joy to use and performs admirably in "normal" shooting situations.

 

[bernards]

There was technical explanation about diffraction blur when set to F8 and focus to infinity. Apparently the problem is quite common and can be found in some SLR lens too. I can't remember the details. Need to hunt down the thread.

The discussion was here http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1009&message=8496593

 

[bernards]

The built-in flash is only useful for fills. You should use the F32X for everything else. You can try setting -EVs and see if the highlights still blow.

 

[artyboy]

thats the limitation of the built-in flash : -/+ EV adjustments are limited to less or more when commonsense dictates that they shld be given in 1/3 step adjustments either way. but then again Sony wants you to buy the dedicated flash unit don't they...? seems like my previous Canon G3 despite its "less-pro" exterior offers much better flash adjustment options! the only solution for me was to manually adjust the exposure when using flash - closing down the aperture thru trial & error. guess thats the only way to go other than coughing up the cash to get the dedicated flash unit.