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How to make a blurry photo clearer? Clear photos - how to take them.

Probably many have come across a situation when on the small screen of the camera during the shooting process you see excellent clear images, and after downloading to a computer they turn out to be muddy, blurry, and sometimes all of them, and sometimes only partially. Where did the sharpness go? Why photos are out of focus? This article will show some possible causes.

Reason #0. You quickly get used to a good lens

This is a somewhat unexpected approach to the problem of lack of sharpness, but it should be taken into account. Suddenly this is your case. Let's say you recently bought a new good expensive lens for your DSLR. Before that, you shot with whales, but saved up some money and now you cannot get enough of the quality of your photos.

Over time, you may forget how ordinary digital cameras are shot or what photos were taken with a whale lens. Then suddenly it happens that for some reason you are shooting with your good old soap dish instead of good camera with a quality lens. When you view the received photos, you may notice that the picture from the soap dish is "not sharp at all". After painful thoughts about possible reasons, you guess to look at the old photos that were taken with the same camera before buying a DSLR.

The result can be amazing. You can see that your soapbox ALWAYS shot so "unsharp", but before you just had nothing to compare. Of course, a DSLR, and even with a good professional lens, will give a much clearer picture. Especially if you used a lens with a fixed focal length when shooting. The principle worked here - you are used to the good, and what was previously considered good already seems mediocre, gray, "C grade".

Even if you have perfectly mastered the rules for choosing exposure parameters and the law of thirds, in some cases, you will not be able to get beautiful photo. Let's take a look at some common mistakes beginner photographers make together.

What is a hairdresser

As a rule, a blurry frame is obtained when, during the shooting of the next frame, you, or the automation of your camera, set a slow shutter speed.

When shooting long exposures, it is very important that at all times
when the camera shutter is open, the camera and subject were still

This can be achieved if you constantly, especially at the beginning of your passion for digital photography, follow that.

However, with a large zoom ratio (large focal length of the lens), blurry frames - the so-called shaker- are obtained even with a relatively short shutter speed.

The longer the focal length of the lens, the more difficult it is to get an unblurred frame. For example, for a lens with a focal length of 250mm, movement can already occur at shutter speeds longer than 1/250 sec. So, sometimes a rigid support is simply necessary.

The longer the focal length of the lens,
the easier it is to spoil the photo with grease!

The reason lies in Let's assume that your camera accidentally moved only two degrees or two millimeters during shooting - there is not much difference in units of measurement - the main thing is the presence of an accidental movement of the camera. In the diagram, the movement of the camera lens is indicated X1, and the movement of the image on the matrix is \u200b\u200bmarked X2. With a longer focal length of the lens, the image on the camera's matrix will shift much more than with a wide-angle (short) lens! Accordingly, the blurring of the photograph with the same random movement of the camera will be noticeably greater!


X1 - random movement of the camera; X2 - moving the image on the camera matrix It is easy to see that with a larger focal length of the lens it is very easy to get a stir - click on the pictures to enlarge

General rule for those who do not have a tripod, but want to avoid wiggling

If you are photographing movement,
the general formula for holding the beginning of a stir does not work!

But, if you are shooting with a slow shutter speed and your camera is still, blurring the frame is still possible if there is movement in the frame!

A stationary object in the frame is clear, a moving one turned out to be blurry, although the shooting was done with a stationary camera mounted on a tripod.

In this case, the SHUTTER start formula (above) does not work! In this case, the shutter speed of the beginning of the stir is selected empirically: the faster the object moves, the shorter the shutter speed should be.

Motion photography errors

To "freeze" the fast movement in the frame, you must set a fast shutter speed. So if you don't want to mess around with exposure settings, instead of AUTO set the scene mode to SCN and select the scene. And if your camera allows you to select the mode, then it is better to set this mode. Choose a shutter speed depending on the focal length of the lens.

Sometimes, when shooting fast-moving objects, a blurry frame is obtained even with a fairly fast shutter speed. It's all about the relativity of motion.

Lubrication is guaranteed to you if you shoot a speeding car, perpendicular to its trajectory - the car enters the frame from one side and leaves from the opposite side. You need to change the shooting angle so that the perpendicular component of the velocity decreases to required value. For example, to shoot a moving car not from the side, but at a certain angle, for example, ¾ of 90 °. A beautiful motion effect can be obtained by making the blurring of the picture work for us. To do this, you need to use the so-called photography with wiring. Those who have already read know what it is about ...

Emphasize the dynamics of movement with photography with wiring

Composition when shooting moving subjects

I want to draw your attention to one more feature of shooting moving objects. Look carefully at the photo of the moving car above.

By shooting with a leash, we emphasized the speed of the car, the exposure and white balance also seem to be normal. BUT, something is wrong with this picture...

And you noticed that the car has nowhere to go! Before him, the frame ends - there is more free space in the back than in front! This should also be taken into account when shooting moving objects - in front, along the trajectory of the subject, leave more free space than behind.

When photographing moving subjects, leave more free space there
where the object being filmed is moving, you still photograph the car,
cyclist, athlete or running child!

Despite the fact that modern digital cameras are extremely easy to use, since the vast majority have an automatic adjustment mode, amateur photographs do not always turn out spectacular. One of the common problems for amateur photographers is the lack of clarity and turbidity of photos in general, or unsuccessful focus setting, as a result of which not the subject is in focus, but some insignificant background object, so the subject being shot looks blurry. Most often to receive blurry photos results in incorrect depth of field, incorrectly selected focal length (when the camera is too close to the object), camera shake during shooting (which is typical for handheld shooting), and a number of other factors. You can improve such pictures by sharpening - the entire image as a whole or only in the focus area. At the same time, it is worth noting that even pictures taken on professional cameras usually need some sharpening, which allows them to be presented more advantageously. This is due to the fact that digital camera sensors and lenses always blur the image to some extent, so even professional digital photo sharpening required.

As for the wrong focus, a well-tuned focus gives the picture a b O more expressiveness, and the wrong setting of focus automatically leads to pictures that do not make the right impression, since the subject being shot merges with elements of the background. Unfortunately, it is impossible to radically correct photos with completely blurry focus, but it is quite possible to correct slightly blurry focus. Moreover, even in pictures with perfect focus in some cases (more often when shooting portraits, macro photography, when photographing close-ups), it makes sense to apply sharpening in the focus area - this will draw attention to individual fragments of the photo, focusing on any important detail(for example, in front of the eyes).

About sharpening techniques and tools

Sharpening (full or selective - taking into account objects in focus) is an integral part of the processing of any digital image, however, such an operation should be carried out with extreme caution, since excessive sharpening leads to increased noise and the appearance of color artifacts at the boundaries of contrast transitions.

The sharpening procedure should be resorted to only after performing the entire complex of traditional actions to improve the image - that is, eliminating noise, performing color correction, adjusting contrast, etc. Otherwise, these actions will be much more difficult to perform. In particular, sharpening prior to denoising typically results in a noticeable increase in noise that is difficult, and often impossible, to eliminate. It is also worth noting that when sharpening, it is necessary to view the image at 100% size (in extreme cases, at 50%), and not at a smaller scale - otherwise it will be problematic to correctly assess the changes during the selection of parameters.

There are different ways to sharpen photos - you can use the built-in Adobe Photoshop sharpening filters (combined in Filter → Sharpen), however, obtaining high-quality results with their help usually involves working on several layers with sequential adjustment of the sharpness level on each of the layers and their subsequent mixing at carefully selected levels of transparency. Other ways to sharpen in Photoshop have been developed - using channels and filters that have a completely different main purpose (for example, Emboss), etc. It is obvious that all these methods are very laborious, and it is difficult to call them intuitively understandable. In addition, if you need to adjust different options for the level of sharpness for different fragments of the image, it is necessary to painstakingly select the corresponding areas, and this requires additional time. As for focus, no software solution is able to sharpen an image with a completely blurred focus - in best case you can tweak the slightly blurry focus a little, but no more. How? In general, everything is quite simple - you need to increase the sharpness of the object in focus while blurring the background elements. Thanks to this, the subject will be highlighted against the general background, and the image itself will look clearer and more expressive. Of course, all these operations can be performed in Adobe Photoshop.

An alternative is to use third-party specialized plug-ins and even independent applications (such applications solve the same tasks as plug-ins, but do not require Photoshop to be installed on the computer). With their help, you can achieve high-quality results faster and with much less effort (often without the need for selection and masking).

Which option is better - each user decides for himself. If we talk about plug-ins and independent applications, then everything is obvious: professionals will work with plug-ins (this provides the possibility of complex selective sharpening using selected areas and masks, etc.), amateurs will prefer applications (they often do not need complex and expensive Photoshop ). In turn, the choice between Adobe Photoshop sharpening filters and tools from third-party manufacturers is by no means obvious. Much here depends on the usual technology of work, personal preferences and your own visual assessment of the results of processing in a particular solution.

Therefore, we will not single out more or less preferred software tools, but will confine ourselves to considering concrete examples sharpening and focus manipulation in such well-known professional software solutions, as Nik Sharpening Pro and FocalBlade, as well as in not so popular, but also interesting programs for amateur photographers - AKVIS Refocus and Focus Magic.

Sharpening

Perhaps the easiest tool to use for sharpening images is the program. AKVIS Refocus. Let's use it to sharpen the entire image as a whole, choosing a slightly blurry image for experiments (Fig. 1). Let's launch AKVIS Refocus (in this case, a separate application), open the source image - the image will be automatically processed with the default settings (AKVIS Default preset), and the result will be shown in the tab Before in the preview area (see Figure 1). Further actions are reduced to selecting the most appropriate parameter values for a particular image, which can be achieved either by choosing one of the built-in presets or by manually adjusting the settings (Fig. 2).

Rice. 1. Applying the AKVIS Default preset in AKVIS Refocus to a photo

Rice. 2. Sharpening a Photo in AKVIS Refocus

Sharpen your pictures with FocalBlade also does not require special efforts from the user, if limited to the use of automatic and semi-automatic tools in the mode Easy mode designed for beginners. For example, let's open the original photo in FocalBlade (mode Easy Mode), click on the button reset to set the default values, change the view to top view(with checkbox enabled multiple) and then indicate that the image is supposed to be displayed on the display (option display for parameter Output). The result of applying the default settings is shown in fig. 3. To ensure that the photo is sharpened in the central part of the image without the appearance of visible noise and with a limited degree of impact on textured surfaces, change the basic settings on the Auto tab: set the parameter to sharpness(adjusts the amount of photo sharpening) option high, and for parameters surface(determines the nature of texture processing) and Details(adjusts the level of detail) options light And Very Rough respectively. As a result, the flower in the photo will become more expressive - fig. 4.

Rice. 3. Automatic image processing for display in FocalBlade

Rice. 4. Sharpening the center of the photo with FocalBlade

Perhaps even more fast way Improving images in FocalBlade will use built-in presets, which, according to the developers, are more than 80. Let's consider this option. Open the original image and make the initial settings (mode - Easy Mode; display type - right view with checkbox enabled multiple; display image - option display for parameter Output) - rice. 5. To better distinguish small details, increase the display scale to 300% and see that the sky area turned out to be noisy (Fig. 6). Apply a preset to a photo Noise Reduced Sharpen, which provides sharpening while reducing noise - as a result, the mountains will look sharper, and the noise in the sky will be almost invisible (Fig. 7).

Rice. 5. The result of auto-processing the image in FocalBlade

Rice. 6. Zoomed view (FocalBlade)

Rice. 7. Sharpening with Noise Reduction in FocalBlade

IN Sharpener Pro, in principle, there are also opportunities for rapid sharpening. In the very simple case To do this, simply open the original image in Adobe Photoshop, activate the module output sharpener(Fig. 8) and correct as desired in the section creative sharpening sharpening parameter values: Output Sharpening Strength(adjusts the strength of global sharpness), structure(provides display control small parts) And local contrast(adjusts the degree of local contrast). For example, in this example, we changed the value of the parameter structure to negative (so that too small inclusions in the sand are not visible) and choose the appropriate value from the point of view of this image local contrast. As a result of these simple manipulations, the blurry image became much less blurry, and the selective one (in this case, by adjusting structure) sharpening made it possible to draw attention to marine life thrown onto the sand (Fig. 9).

Rice. 8. Original photo opened in Sharpener Pro

Rice. 9. Adjusting processing options in Sharpener Pro

Bringing the image into focus

To begin with, consider the option of bringing a certain object into focus in AKVIS Refocus. Let's open the original image (Fig. 10), but we will not make any changes in terms of setting the sharpening parameters (we will trust the default settings). Now you need to tell the program the focus area (the fragments where you want to sharpen - in this case, this is an insect) and the background. To do this, we outline the approximate outer contours of the focus area with a blue pencil, and the inner contours of the background objects with red. All paths must be closed - otherwise the effect will extend beyond the drawn borders. Very careful selection of fragments, as a rule, is not necessary, although when forming contours it is still better to draw lines close enough to the border separating the focusable object and the external background, since in this case the probability of a program error will be minimal.

Rice. 10. Opening the original image in AKVIS Refocus

For masking, select a tool Focus area and draw a blue outline around the insect. Then activate the tool Second plan and draw a red outline to limit the objects of the second plan (Fig. 11). Please note that the unsuccessful fragments of the blue and red outlines can be easily removed with an eraser, and then again drawn more carefully. After that, start the processing by clicking on the button Start. The converted image will be displayed on the tab. After(Fig. 12).

Rice. 11. Masking an Object in AKVIS Refocus

Rice. 12. Result of Focusing in AKVIS Refocus

A little more difficult (mostly due to the need to determine the degree of blur “by eye”) is to “focus” on Focus Magic. Let's try using this solution to improve a photo that is noticeably blurry due to the movement of the object. Let's open the original image in Adobe Photoshop and select the desired area of focus by tracing the corresponding "lasso" fragment (Fig. 13). Let's carefully consider the image at an enlarged scale and roughly estimate the extent of the blur (in pixels). Activate the Focus Magic plugin ( Filter → Focus Magic) and choose the module Fix motion blur. Since the default value of the parameter image source(determines the source from which the image was obtained) was set correctly, then we restrict ourselves to setting the parameters Blur direction And blur distance- the first sets the direction of the blur (it is easier to set it using the built-in compass), and the second indicates the extent of the blur (Fig. 14). In order to additionally highlight the object in focus, blur the background - invert the selection and apply a Gaussian blur ( Filter → Blur → Gaussian Blur) with blur radius ( Radius parameter) in 5-6 pixels. After the manipulations, we will see that the subject began to look much clearer, and the picture itself now makes a better impression, although we were not able to completely eliminate the blur (Fig. 15).

Rice. 13. Selecting an Object in Adobe Photoshop

Rice. 14. Adjust sharpening options in Focus Magic

Rice. 15. View of the photo after final processing by means
Adobe Photoshop and Focus Magic

For comparison, consider an example of obtaining the soft focus effect of portrait optics, which is possible using FocalBlade. Let's open the original photo (Fig. 16). Apply a preset to it portrait sharpen(Fig. 17). Activate the tab effects and apply a soft focus effect to the photo soft focus from the group Blur. As a result, the portrait photo will look softer (Fig. 18).

Rice. 16. Original photo opened in FocalBlade

Rice. 17. The result of applying the Portrait Sharpen preset in FocalBlade

Rice. 18. Soft focus effect with FocalBlade

IN Sharpener Pro the selective sharpening process based on focus is implemented differently, since the area of focus (as well as other areas) is usually set through control points. Open the original image in Photoshop and activate the module output sharpener- image view with preview disabled (checkbox preview) is shown in Fig. 19. Turn on the preview mode. In chapter output sharpening select output to inkjet printer ( Inkjet) and determine the type of paper used ( paper type) and printer resolution ( Printer Resolution). In chapter creative sharpening select the appropriate values for the selected photo sharpening parameters: Output Sharpening Strength, structure And local contrast. In chapter Selective sharpening activate the formation of a focusable area by control points ( control points), add control points to the original image (button Add Control Point) and adjust the radius of application of the effect and the strength of its impact - fig. 20. Additionally blur the area to the left of the bud, because it looks too clear. To do this, in the lower left corner of the image, create a new control point of the desired radius and with negative focus. After that, we will make several duplicates of this control point and place them sequentially on the left side of the image around the bud (Fig. 21). Before printing, we will evaluate the appearance of the processed image by activating the mode Sharpening Soft Proof- this mode provides the ability to preview the final result (in this case, printouts on an inkjet printer) on the monitor. As can be seen from fig. 22, there is a qualitative sharpening taking into account the focus area in the absence of noise and other artifacts.

Rice. 19. Original photo opened in Sharpener Pro

Rice. 20. Determine the area of focus (Sharpener Pro)

Rice. 21. Set Control Points for Blur Areas (Sharpener Pro)

Rice. 22. Preview of the image enhanced with Sharpener Pro

A Brief Overview of Sharpening Programs

Sharpener Pro 3.0

Developer: Nik Software, Inc.

Distribution size: Windows version - 72 MB; Mac version - 159 MB

Work under control: Windows XP(SP3)/Vista/7; Mac OS 10.5.8-10.7; Adobe Photoshop CS3/CS4/CS5

Distribution method: shareware (15 day demo - https://www.niksoftware.com/site/)

Price:$199.95

Sharpener Pro is one of the most popular solutions for sharpening digital images for a variety of devices and media, including monitors and printers. The program is presented as a plug-in for Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Photoshop Elements, Adobe Photoshop Lightroom, etc. and is aimed mainly at professional photographers.

The main differences between Sharpener Pro and other solutions under consideration are support for output to a wide range of devices with the ability to manual setting specific parameters (for example, when outputting to a printer, you can determine the type of paper and resolution of the printer) and the use of a two-stage sharpening system. To implement such a processing system, the product includes two modules: RAW Presharpener and Output Sharpener. The RAW Presharpener module is designed for preliminary sharpening in RAW files. It is used to compensate for the action of the camera's low-pass filter and allows you to slightly sharpen the image even at the stage of the RAW file without increasing the noise level and other artifacts that inevitably appear to one degree or another during the final sharpening. In turn, the Output Sharpener module is used for the final sharpening (of the entire image or selectively) taking into account the features of the image output technology. With its help, the basic sharpness parameters, data relating to the features of the output of a particular image (on a monitor screen, printer, etc.) are adjusted, and sharpness is fine-tuned in specific areas. Selective sharpening, which allows you to fine-tune the level of sharpness in those areas of the image to which you want to draw attention, is carried out by setting control points (determine the radius of the effect), forming selected areas with a special brush, or specifying specific colors for which individual sharpening is required. Selected settings can be saved to presets for later use. The Sharpener Pro plugin can work with 8-bit and 16-bit images and supports TIFF, JPEG and RAW image formats.

FocalBlade 2.02b

Developer: Harald Heim

Distribution size: Windows version - 2.73 MB; Mac version - 1.7 MB

Work under control: Windows 98/NT/Me/2000/XP/Vista/7; MacOS X; Windows 32-bit - Adobe Photoshop version 3 and above; Windows 64-bit - Adobe Photoshop CS4 and above; Mac OS X - Adobe Photoshop version 7 and higher

Distribution method: shareware (demo that watermarks images - http://thepluginsite.com/download/)

Price: $69.95

FocalBlade is a renowned solution for sharpening images (for both screen and print viewing) with minimal artifacts. The product is presented as a standalone application and a Photoshop plugin (only a plugin is offered for Mac OS X) and is interesting for both beginners and professionals. For the former, a simplified automatic correction mode (Easy Mode) is designed, while the latter can take advantage of the fine-tuning of numerous parameters in the Classic Mode and Advanced Mode, which allows you to achieve high-quality results on various types of images.

FocalBlade includes many preset presets, so you can achieve a variety of processing effects with minimal effort. The solution supports one-, two- and three-pass sharpening algorithms and provides full control over this process, in particular, it allows different ways control sharpness on surfaces and contours, ignore certain fragments and specific colors during processing, sharpen the central part of the photo without affecting its background, etc. Any transformations can be performed on a group of images at the same time. Additionally, the plug-in can be used for noise reduction and a number of effects, such as glow, soft focus, etc. FocalBlade supports sharpening in any color model (RGB, Grayscale, Lab and CMYK) with a color depth of 8/16 bits per channel and works with major graphic formats including JPEG, TIFF, PNG, PSD, RAW and DNG.

AKVIS Refocus 1.5

Developer: AKVIS LLC

Distribution size: Windows version - 23.8 MB; Mac version - 27.3 MB

Work under control: Windows XP/Vista/7; Mac OS X 10.4-10.7; Adobe Photoshop 6-CS5

Distribution method: shareware (10 day demo - http://akvis.com/en/refocus/download-sharpen-photo.php)

Price: depends on the type of license: Home - $39; Home Deluxe - $49; Business - $72

AKVIS Refocus is a tool for sharpening fuzzy, blurry, out-of-focus pictures. The program is presented as a separate application and a Photoshop plug-in and is focused on both wide circle users as well as professionals.

This solution allows you to enhance the sharpness of the images as a whole or only on certain fragments of the image; if desired, certain fragments ignored during sharpening can be blurred, which, in combination with sharpening in the focus area, visually provides the effect of “bringing into focus”. It is possible to save favorite settings (presets) for their further use, as well as batch processing files. AKVIS Refocus works with 8-, 16-, and 32-bit images in RGB, Grayscale, CMYK, and Lab color modes and understands major graphic formats, including RAW.

Focus Magic 3.02a

Developer: Acclaim Software Ltd

Distribution size: Windows version - 1.5 MB; Mac version - 2.5 MB

Work under control: Windows 95-7; MacOS X; Photoshop (almost all versions, including CS2/CS3/CS4CS5)

Distribution method: shareware (demo version that allows you to process up to 10 photos - http://www.focusmagic.com/download.htm)

Price:$45

Focus Magic is a simple solution for sharpening blurry (due to lens movement during shooting or subject movement) and out of focus photos. The program has a minimum of settings, works quickly and is presented as a Photoshop plugin, as well as a separate application, so it may be of interest to a wide range of users.

The solution includes two sharpening modules - Out-of-Focus Blur and Motion Blur, which work according to different algorithms. The Out-of-Focus Blur module is designed to improve out-of-focus shots, while Motion Blur is used to sharpen blurry photos. Additionally, the program can be used for noise reduction and to deal with dust and scratches on the scanned image. Focus Magic can restore sharpness in RGB, Grayscale and CMYK color models (color depth 8/16 bits per channel); the standalone application only understands JPG files, the plugin works with all formats supported by Adobe Photoshop.

Conclusion

We looked at several well-known solutions for sharpening blurry and out-of-focus images, including both quite expensive professional products and more affordable programs aimed at the widest audience. It is very difficult to single out the best among the presented solutions, since a lot depends on the type of source images, tasks and preferences, although in general Sharpener Pro and FocalBlade products provide better results. The Sharpener Pro solution stands out for its tools for preparing images for printing (taking into account the printer's resolution, paper type, etc.), as well as the functionality for quickly selectively changing the sharpness in different fragments of the image. In turn, FocalBlade is interesting with a lot of preset presets, with which you can effortlessly and in a matter of minutes achieve high-quality results when solving a variety of sharpening tasks. At the same time, both tools allow you to fine-tune a variety of sharpening parameters, which is important for professional photographers. As for the programs AKVIS Refocus and Focus Magic, they are attractive due to their simplicity and comparative availability (in terms of price and in terms of development) - even a novice amateur photographer can improve pictures with their help.

Unfortunately, even choosing a professional tool for work, you should not deceive yourself, since blurring and defocusing can only be corrected to a certain extent, and not in any picture. If the main details of the objects being photographed are clearly visible in the resulting image, then the chances of its successful improvement are high, but, of course, you should not hope to save completely blurry photos.

Sharpness is one of the most important criteria for image quality. However, we often encounter its disadvantage. The reasons may be different, but the main one is the mistake of the photographer. In this chapter, I will rather not talk about sharpness, as such, but about the reasons for its absence and how to deal with it.

Blurring due to motion (shake)

The most main reason blur - this is a stir, that is, blurring of the picture due to the fact that at the time of shooting the photographer's hand trembled. The result of the shake looks something like this:

A pitiful sight, you will agree. The main factors causing the appearance of shaking are listed below:

Shooting in low light without a tripod and without flash
Shooting with a long focal length (with a strong "zoom")
Shooting while in motion, such as from a car window
Shooting fast moving subjects

If only one of the factors, the factor, is present in the shooting conditions, then it can almost always be dealt with. But if there are several of them at once, we are almost guaranteed to get a defective photograph.

For the first two factors (handheld shooting in low light, long focal length shooting), the "safety exposure" rule works.

A safe shutter speed will most likely ensure the absence of movement. It depends on the focal length. Many sources give a simple formula by which you can calculate the "safe" shutter speed - you need to divide the unit by the focal length. That is, at a focal length of 50 mm, the safe shutter speed will be 1/50 of a second. All this is wonderful and simple, but this rule does not take into account that the camera may have a crop factor, which narrows the angle of view and, as it were, increases the focal length of the lens. A 50mm lens on a 1.6 crop has an 80mm equivalent focal length. How to calculate a safe shutter speed, say, for a focal length of 24 mm not a crop? You can't do without a calculator! I offer a simple but effective way.

We look at the scale of focal lengths of the lens:

At a focal length of 24 mm, the next notch corresponds to 35 mm. We consider safe shutter speed according to it, having previously rounded the value up. Thus, a safe shutter speed for 24mm on a 1.6 crop would be 1/40 of a second. We check in the calculator - 24 mm * 1.6 = 38.4. That is, absolutely the same thing - a safe shutter speed of 1/40 second!

As the focal length increases, the safe shutter speed decreases proportionally. That is, for EGF 50 mm, the safe shutter speed is 1/50 second, for 300 mm - 1/300 second. This explains why a telephoto lens without a stabilizer can only be used without a tripod on a sunny day.

Image Stabilizer (IS, VR, Antishake) makes life a lot easier by extending the safe shutter speed by 2-3 times. That is, a 300mm telephoto lens with stabilizer on allows you to get predominantly sharp photos already at a shutter speed of 1/100 second.

Of course, much still depends on the physical abilities of the photographer. Someone manages to get clear pictures at shutter speeds of 1/5 second without a tripod, someone does not have enough for this and 1/500!

Shooting from a car window- very poor conditions to be avoided at all costs. In addition to the fact that often shooting is carried out through glass (which does not add sharpness), the composition in such pictures is almost always absent. Purely documentary footage, but I haven't seen a single artistic shot taken from the window of a moving car.

Shooting a moving subject can be solved in two ways - either with a very short shutter speed, or with a long shutter speed with wiring.

We know that there are two ways to reduce shutter speed - by opening the aperture and increasing the ISO sensitivity. Shooting fast-moving subjects (such as passing cars) almost always requires doing both. The picture at the same time looks static - the car seems to be standing still. To convey the movement, a technique is used - shooting with wiring.

Photo by Sergey Silence

Pay attention to how wonderfully the movement is conveyed in the photo due to the characteristic blurring of the background. How to do it? For shooting moving object with wiring you need to perform some steps to set up the camera:

Set the burst mode
We set the shutter priority mode (TV, S) and fix the shutter speed in the region of 1/30-1/60 seconds. The slower the shutter speed, the more dynamic the blurring of the background will be, but at the same time the risk of shaking increases by foreground. More speed - shorter shutter speed.
Autofocus is switched to tracking mode.

When an object approaches us, we take it in the "crosshair" and start continuous shooting, trying to keep this object in the center of the frame. Imagine that you have in your hands not a camera, but a machine gun, and an object - a low-flying enemy aircraft that you need to "shoot down" :) The higher the burst shooting speed, the larger the series of photos from which you can choose the most successful ones.

Blurring due to optics

1. "Chronic" autofocus miss

The phenomenon when autofocus constantly tries to aim a little closer or a little further than necessary is called front focus And back focus(respectively).

Most of all, front / back focus spoils the life of those who like to shoot portraits, macro, as well as photographers involved in subject photography. When shooting at close range, even a small autofocus miss significantly increases the reject rate. For example, we know that when shooting a portrait, the focus is on the eyes. Even if the focus confirmation point blinked where it should be, due to back focus, sharpness will really be focused on the ears, with front focus - on the tip of the nose (more serious misses are possible).

How to detect front/back focus? There are many options. First, use a special target to test autofocus. It looks like this:

However, such a target is only available in photo shops and you can use it, basically, only when you buy a new lens (or camera). The beauty of the target is that it is very easy to determine not only the presence of an error, but also its exact value.

Second, you can download front/back focus test plate take advantage of her. This can be done on the website www.fotosav.ru.

Well, and thirdly - the easiest option! Just take a photo of a piece of printed text, focusing on a particular line or heading first. At the same time, you need to open the aperture to the maximum possible value and set the ISO sensitivity so that the shutter speed is not shorter than 1/100 (to eliminate shake). Take pictures from this angle:

The arrow on the sheet of paper shows the line on which autofocus was aimed. As you can see, in this case it worked correctly. To be sure, it is better to repeat the experiment 5 times.

However, sometimes it happens that all these five times the device focuses in the wrong place.

This is what it looks like front focus

And it looks like this back focus

What to do if front/back focus is detected?

If front / back focus is detected when buying a lens, it is better to refuse such an instance and ask for another one - and so on until the result of the check suits you. But what if the defect is discovered after the purchase?

Now some DSLRs have an autofocus micro-adjustment function, with which front / back focus can be corrected without leaving home. However, most devices do not have this function, so you will have to take the camera with the entire fleet of optics to a service center for adjustment. Yes Yes! All your equipment! If the master "tunes" your device for a particular lens, it is not a fact that your other lenses will work as correctly as before.

2. Curvature of the image field

With most lenses, it is noticeable that the sharpness of the image in the corners of the photo differs from the sharpness in the center, and for the worse. This difference is especially pronounced at an open aperture. Let's look at the reason for this phenomenon.

When in earlier chapters we talked about the depth of field (DOF), we meant the space outside the lens, that is, somewhere in environment. But, do not forget that there is a depth of field zone on the other side of the lens, where the shutter and the matrix are.

Ideally, the matrix completely falls into the depth of field zone (internal), but the whole trouble is that the image field (marked in the figure by a dotted line) is not flat, but slightly curved:

It is because of this that the image clarity in the corners of the image will be lower than in the center. The saddest thing is that it is a congenital defect of the lens that cannot be corrected by any settings. It is known that a similar drop in sharpness in the corners of the picture is present in the first version of the Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM lens. In the second version of the lens, this drawback was eliminated, but this caused a significant increase in the cost of the lens.

3. Spherical aberration

Spherical aberration in photography it appears as a softening of the image due to the fact that the rays incident on the edge of the lens are not focused on the matrix itself, but a little closer than necessary. Because of this, the image of the point turns into a blurry spot. This is especially pronounced on the open aperture. At medium apertures, spherical aberration disappears for most lenses.

In portrait photography, it gives an interesting effect in the blur zone - the blurred background has a characteristic "twisted" pattern (bokeh). The picture itself, even in the sharpness zone, looks very soft.

Please note that the spots from light objects in the blur zone are not round, but slightly elongated, resembling cat eyes in shape. This effect is sometimes referred to as "cat's eyes".

For decreasing spherical aberrations aspherical elements are inserted into the lenses.

4. Diffractive blur

From the previous paragraph it follows that in order to obtain the best sharpness, the aperture should be covered. Another question is to what extent and is there any reasonable limit?

Consider an example. I just took three shots of text on a monitor screen, Canon 50mm f/1.8 lens, shooting distance about 50 cm. Shooting was done with different apertures. Here is a 100% crop located near the center of the frame:

1. Aperture 1.8 ( a starting point). Sharpness is not so hot, spherical aberrations are strong at an open aperture, they soften the picture:

2. Aperture 5.6 (intermediate position)

It can be seen that the detail has become much better than with the maximum aperture! The reason for this is the reduction of the effect of spherical aberration. Well, it's already good. Can we assume that the more the aperture is closed, the better the detail? Let's try to stop the aperture to the maximum!

3. Aperture 22 (aperture clamped to the maximum)

What's happened? Why is the detail so low? It turns out that the conclusion we made is premature. We completely forgot about such a phenomenon as diffraction.

Diffraction- this is the property of a wave to slightly change its direction when it passes an obstacle. Light is nothing but an electromagnetic wave, and the obstacle is the boundaries of the diaphragm opening (aperture). When the diaphragm is open, diffraction is practically not manifested in any way. But with a closed diaphragm, the waves propagate in something like this:

It is clear that the image of a "perfectly sharp" point in this plan will turn into a slightly blurry speck. Exactly diffraction and is the reason for the decrease in the sharpness of the picture when the aperture is closed too much.

For most APS-C DSLR lenses, the detail-to-f-number ratio graph looks something like this:

In the vertical axis - points as in school: 2 - bad, 5 - excellent.

It follows from the graph that maximum detail (in the sharpness zone) is achieved at apertures from 5.6 to 11. At a smaller aperture number, the picture is spoiled by spherical aberrations, at a larger aperture - by diffraction. However, this does not mean at all that you need to shoot everything at aperture 8. Often, the difference in detail is not so significant, but interesting artistic effects can appear with open and closed apertures. With an open aperture, this is a pleasant softness in the portrait, good blurring of the background. When closed - characteristic stars around bright light sources.

Blurring due to mirror clapping

As you know, the reflex shutter, when triggered, causes a slight shake of the camera body, which, under certain conditions, can cause a slight loss of sharpness.

To avoid this, most DSLRs have a " mirror lock" or " mirror pre-lift". Its essence lies in the fact that for shooting you need to press the "shutter" button not once, but twice. The first time you press c, the mirror rises (the optical viewfinder turns black), the second time you shoot.

A very illustrative example is given in a short article on the site www.fotosav.ru, which compares two photographs taken without mirror blocking and with blocking.

The left fragment is taken from a picture taken in normal mode, the right one - with mirror lockup.

A rather old Canon EOS 5D camera participated in the test, its shutter is really, very noisy and when it fires, the hands clearly feel the vibration. The shutters of modern DSLRs are more advanced in terms of vibration loading, so the risk of such blurring of the picture is much less. Some devices have a "quiet" mode, in which the shutter is a little slower, but there is much less vibration, the picture is clearer.

Unsharpness due to improper use of the stabilizer

Stabilizer- a device that allows you to reduce the shake when shooting handheld. However, sometimes it can be harmful.

There is almost always a warning in the instructions for a lens with a stabilizer - turn off the stabilizer when shooting from a tripod. Often this rule is neglected, but in vain. Have you ever brought a microphone to a speaker? After that, the amplifier self-excites and the speakers begin to whistle. It sounds exactly like the saying "much ado about nothing". The same with the stabilizer. It is designed to counteract vibration caused by shake, but it does not occur on a tripod. However, the rotating gyroscopic elements of the stabilizer cause a slight vibration, which is perceived as a stir and the stabilizer tries to extinguish it, "swaying" more and more. As a result, the picture is fuzzy.

It is believed that the stabilizer can reduce the sharpness of the picture during daytime handheld shooting. Maybe this is so, but I don’t remember in my experience a single case when the included stabilizer noticeably spoiled the sharpness when shooting with a short shutter speed. Although, on the Internet they regularly write about the detrimental effect of the stabilizer, for example, in macro photography. The arguments are as follows:

Reverse shake - the stabilizer reacts too strongly to slight camera shake and causes the picture to shift in the opposite direction.
A noticeable push when turning on the stabilizer causes the image to be blurry. The stabilizer turns on when we half-press the shutter button (to focus) and works until the frame is taken. If you immediately press the shutter button to failure, then, indeed, the stabilizer can cause blurring of the picture. If you give the stabilizer a second to "calm down", then the risk of getting a blurry picture is reduced. A lot also depends on the lens. For example, on the Canon 75-300 IS USM, the stabilizer turns on with a distinct knock and causes noticeable vibration, while on the Canon 24-105L it is almost silent.
Microvibration from gyroscopes reduces the clarity of the picture. Again, a lot depends on the lens - in cheap optics (Canon 75-300), indeed, vibration is noticeable. The Canon 24-105L has virtually no vibration.

Personally, I prefer to turn off the stabilizer in cases where it is not needed, but mainly to reduce power consumption. The stabilizer really helps in those cases when, when shooting handheld, the shutter speed becomes longer than safe and at the same time you do not want to increase the ISO sensitivity. In other cases, it is useless.

The stabilizer is also useless when shooting moving objects. It only compensates for the vibrations transmitted to the camera from your hands, but it cannot slow down the movement of a running person who is in the frame. The stabilizer helps only when shooting static scenes. No matter how many exposure steps the stabilizer compensates for, at slow shutter speeds, moving objects will inevitably turn out to be blurry.

Incorrect image settings

In obtaining visually blurred images, not only the lens can be to blame, but also the camera itself, or rather, its settings. In the image settings of the camera, there is an item sharpness or sharpness, which determines the degree of contrast of the edges of objects in the photo.

This setting is relevant only when shooting in JPEG. If you prefer the RAW format, then the desired level of software sharpening (sharping) can be set in the program used to convert from RAW to JPEG.

With an increase in software sharpness, an unpleasant surprise may lie in wait for us - an increase in the noise level. Look at two fragments of the same photo, shown at 100% scale.

The first picture is with standard sharpness settings, for the second, in-camera sharpening is turned to the maximum. The second picture is visually perceived as clearer, however, it is also noisier.

Control tasks

1. Learn to calculate safe shutter speeds.

2. Try taking a photo with a long exposure tripod with stabilizer on and off, compare the results and draw your own conclusions.

3. Find the function in your camera manual mirror lock and learn how to use it.

4. Try shooting the same scene with different apertures (using a tripod). Find out at what apertures your lens produces the sharpest image.

5. Try shooting in daylight with the stabilizer on and off (wide angle). Make a conclusion regarding the feasibility of using a stabilizer in good light and a small focal length.

Many people, at the first purchase reflex camera, the question immediately arises - how to do clear pictures? And there is a certain impression that all the pictures taken with the newly bought new SLR camera do not bring any joy, because. photos are not sharp, not clear, blurry.

How to avoid it? How to take a photo sharp and clear? That is what we will talk about today. After reading this article, you will always get crystal clear, mesmerizing pictures.

The main reasons for not clear photos:

Wrong focus- the most common problem of the majority. Focus error camera may result in a blurry picture. This happens often when you are too close to the subject, or you set the wrong exposure, or you just shoot too fast, because of which the camera does not have time to automatically focus.

The subject being photographed is in motion is another common mistake photographers make. When shooting an object that is in move, very often, inexperienced photographers get blurry pictures.

« Shevelenka"- this term is often used to refer to camera shake in hands. For example, a professional SLR camera with a professional lens is not light in weight, and in order to learn how to hold it evenly, firmly, without jitters in your hands, you should resort to some tricks, which we will discuss below.

« Noise” is another reason for not sharp photos. With lifting ISO- you raise the level of digital noise in the photo, thereby losing the sharpness and clarity of the photo.

with major problems not sharp photos we figured it out. Now, let's look at how to avoid it, and finally learn how to do it clear pictures:

Hold your camera correctly

This is perhaps the main rule for beginner photographers. A huge number of low-quality pictures, which show a clear frame blur is the result camera shake, which occurs due to improper fixation of the camera in the hands of the photographer. How to hold the camera correctly:

Use both hands: Grab the camera grip with your right hand and support the lens with your left hand.
Hold the camera as far as you can closer to your body: lean it as close as possible to your face, try to press your hands to your body to ensure good stability.
Find a foothold, let's say some wall, chair, table, tree, pillar, etc. If there is nothing nearby, if you are photographing while sitting, rest your elbow on your knee to ensure a stable position of the camera in your hand.
Try hold breath during important shots when you are shooting at long exposures handheld to minimize camera shake.

Use a tripod

Tripods are designed to reduce, and even completely eliminate, camera shake. Sometimes, of course, they are not practical enough, but with them you will succeed in 90% of cases only sharp and clear photos.

Why only in 90% , not in 100% ? Sometimes, even with a tripod, a blurry frame can result, for example, due to a too massive camera, which shakes the tripod when opening / closing the shutter, thereby causing shake. There are also cases where the tripod is set up incorrectly, when it does not rest too firmly on the ground. Simply put, when shooting with a tripod, you also need to gain experience in order to bring the number of successful shots to 100% result.

Also, tripods are essential when shooting with ultra-telephoto lenses due to their long focal length.

Shutter speed

This is perhaps the first thing to think about if you want to achieve sharp photos. Obviously, the shorter excerpt, the clearer your subjects will be in the frame.

As a result short exposure you kill two birds with one stone: you freeze a moving object in the frame (the most common case is when the owners bought a kitten and try to photograph it, but it turns out to be blurry in the frame) and exclude the possibility of camera shake (even if the camera shakes a little, a very fast shutter speed will be compensate).

Depending on which lens and what focal length you are using, always remember how to set the shutter speed:

50mm 1/60s.
If you are shooting at focal length 100mm, do not use shutter speed, longer 1/125s.
If you are shooting at focal length 200mm, do not use shutter speed, longer 1/250s.

Also, do not forget about the main ones - the shorter your excerpt, the more you should open diaphragm.

Diaphragm

Aperture affects the depth of field of an image. Open aperture provides a small degree of sharpness (in other words - blurred background), A closed aperture(For example f/20) increases the depth of field by making sharp and clear all objects in the frame.

It follows from this that if you want to get clear photos - don't shoot wide open. For example, if your lens allows you to take pictures at an aperture equal to 1.4 , try to close it to the values 1.8 , 2.2 and you will see that the pictures are much clearer.

Each lens has a so-called " perfect point of focus", which means that for certain values focal length And diaphragm, the pictures are as sharp and clear as possible. How to find such a point? Just experiment with the settings, shoot, gain experience and, over time, you will find it yourself.

Light sensitivity (ISO)

The third element in exposure is ISO, which has a direct effect on the digital noise of a photo. One thing you need to remember is that the higher the ISO value, the more digital noise in the photo, which means that the photo will turn out less sharp and clear, because. noise "kills" the sharpness of the image.

As practice shows, depending on the SLR camera, the most acceptable ISO values \u200b\u200bare from 100 to 800. If higher, then there is more digital noise in the photo, and subsequently you have to process images in .

The whole shooting technique, roughly speaking, consists of how well you can operate with three values: endurance, diaphragm And photosensitivity. If you can find the optimal values of these three indicators in a given situation, you will always succeed clear pictures.

CONCLUSION

All that was said above is the basic rules that you must master in order to get sharp photos. But don't forget about lighting too - the more light around you, the clearer your photos will be. For example, outdoor photos, even in cloudy weather, will turn out much better than if there is not enough lighting there.

Of course, there are many more details that you should pay attention to, for example: image stabilization (be sure to turn it on if your lens has such a function, or in the SLR camera itself), always keep an eye on correct focus camera, do not rush, clearly focus on the subject being shot so that it is always in sharpness, even if you use auto focus.