Nashy Posted May 22, 2006 Share Posted May 22, 2006 Hey All. I'm an aircraft spotter and obviously travel around with a camera. I don't know much about the settings, but apprently I should be shooting with ISO100 and f8, however, I usually just set it at Auto, and let it choose for me. More often than not, I get really bad quality pics. I have a few nice ones from aircraft on the runway, but today it was quite bad. Could someone look at the quality of this image (100% zoom in Fax Viewer), and tell me if its normal? I certainly don't think it is. This photo was taken in good like at about 10AM today at approx 3/4 zoom on the lens. Equipment: Canon 300D (Rebel 6MP for people in the states I believe) Canon USM 90-300mm Lens Help would be greatly appreciated everyone. :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
V0b0 Posted May 22, 2006 Share Posted May 22, 2006 pic? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nashy Posted May 22, 2006 Author Share Posted May 22, 2006 My Bad: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
V0b0 Posted May 22, 2006 Share Posted May 22, 2006 that doesn't seem to be bad quality? maybe a little undersharp but photoshop can fix that quick. no offense but the real problem with the pic is composition. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nashy Posted May 22, 2006 Author Share Posted May 22, 2006 So the settings its picking are alright? I'm not used to SLR's, so I really wouldn' know if its bad, or if its good, I mean as soon as I zoom out a bit they look good. and planes are cool :-p Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Island Roots Posted May 22, 2006 Share Posted May 22, 2006 Are you using a tripod? If not, does your lens have IS (I'm not familiar with the 90-300mm)? Granted, you are shooting at a fairly fast shutter speed, the more stabilization you have the better. To go along with that, you may want to consider opening up the aperture more (lower f-stop number) to allow in more light, which will in turn allow for a quicker shutter speed. What I'm getting at is I think the speed of the plane has a lot to do with the sharpness level. You said that pictures of planes at the airport turned out good...chances are those ones weren't taking off. But when you have a plane taking off or landing, the faster you can get the shutter speed the sharper the picture. In the Rebel XT (300D's successor), there are parameter settings within the camera - I believe one of them is sharpness. You might want to consider turning this up (as a last resort and/or to reduce post-processing) a tad. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nashy Posted May 22, 2006 Author Share Posted May 22, 2006 It doesn't have IM. I coudln't afford it. Thanks for the tips Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Timmah Veteran Posted May 22, 2006 Veteran Share Posted May 22, 2006 I actually quite like that picture - the oasis-style effect on the runway's pretty good. Get a tripod, a few nice filters (UV and polariser) and keep practicing! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
V0b0 Posted May 22, 2006 Share Posted May 22, 2006 at 10 am, using much higher of a shutter speed with an aperture of F8 than 500 as noted is probably going to be underexposed. above advice is good but i'd say the "problem" if you could call it that is it simply needs to be sharpened in an editing program as do most digital photos. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Monkeh Posted May 22, 2006 Share Posted May 22, 2006 1. Poor exposure. Are you using 3D/Matrix metering (or the Canon equivalent)? 2. Use a larger aperture and increase the ISO. 3. Make sure you're using the continuous autofocus system (AI Servo? I'm not a Canon user). 4. Experiment with the manual settings. Using auto with a mediocre entry-level lens (from Canon even...) and shooting at the telephoto end won't get you the results you are looking after most of the time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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