A7II manual focus EVF problem

[Portrait Painter X]

Manual focus works great when there's ample light, like outdoors, but when I'm in the studio I have a hard time manual focusing, because the EVF is super grainy and laggy (focus magnifier ON, live view setting effect OFF). I have my strobe modeling lights on, but apparently that's not enough. Focus peaking makes things even worse because there's yellow dots everywhere. In every other situation. I love shooting manually with Loxia, it's super easy to hit perfect focus in good light, but in the studio with a model, it's basically a big frustrating mess because I look like a total amateur when I can't focus properly.

 

Is there a solution to this problem or should I look into auto focus lenses? I'm thinking of buying the FE 24-70mm because it's a convenient focal range and it has auto focus. Is this a wise choice?

[Portrait Painter X]

Am I the only one who has this problem?

[Wesley]

Manual focus works great when there's ample light, like outdoors, but when I'm in the studio I have a hard time manual focusing, because the EVF is super grainy and laggy (focus magnifier ON, live view setting effect OFF). I have my strobe modeling lights on, but apparently that's not enough. Focus peaking makes things even worse because there's yellow dots everywhere. In every other situation. I love shooting manually with Loxia, it's super easy to hit perfect focus in good light, but in the studio with a model, it's basically a big frustrating mess because I look like a total amateur when I can't focus properly.

 

Is there a solution to this problem or should I look into auto focus lenses? I'm thinking of buying the FE 24-70mm because it's a convenient focal range and it has auto focus. Is this a wise choice?

 

Manualing focusing a model in a dim studio is not something I would do.

 

Solution is turn on the ceiling lights (if you have them / there off) and raise strobe power or close down aperture to compensate for the higher ambient light if you wish.

Also what strobe are you using? You can often turn off tracking of the modeling light so that it can be full brightness regardless of the strobe power level.

 

I have tried the FE 24-70 and it has one of the worst distortion I've seen on a modern lens.

24mm - large barrel distortion; only good for the wide, environmental model shots

35-40mm - usable; no deal breakers

45-55mm - large pincushion distortion; don't shoot 3/4 or full body shots (fixing in post still result in distorted limbs); usable for portraits/headshot

55-70mm - most pincushion; I only use for headshots

[Portrait Painter X]

Thanks for your reply.

 

I shoot 50/50 outdoors/indoors, so I have a portable strobe system, the Elinchrom Ranger Quadra, plus various radio triggered manual hotshoe flashes.

 

The ceiling light seems to be an excellent solution. Does it matter that the ceiling light is yellowish tungsten, or will the higher effect 400 WS of the Elinchrom negate that color temperature difference?

 

I've read about the 24-70mm epic distortion. I think I would be fine with that if post processing took care of that.

[Golem]

...... in the studio I have a hard time manual focusing,

because the EVF is super grainy and laggy (focus magnifier

ON, live view setting effect OFF). I have my strobe modeling

lights on, but apparently that's not enough. Focus peaking

makes things even worse because there's yellow dots

everywhere. In every other situation. ...............

You have the effect setting OFF. That means the viewing

system adjusts gain to brighten up dark scenes and dim

down bright scenes. The gain boost needed to view at studio

strobe apertures [f8 thru 22] when working in moderate to

low ambient light is a whole lotta gain and thaz what you're

seeing ... grainy view, lag, speckles, etc.

 

I do not see any mention that you open the lens to full open

aperture [f2.8 or whatever] for focusing. You can't focus a

studio view camera, or other manual iris camera with ground

glass focusing, unless you open it up. When you put a manual

iris lens on your camera, even though it's digital, you have

mimicked the view camera situation.

 

Sooo ... are you focusing wide open, or not ? If not [which is

what I'm guessing] thaz the reason for the crappy view. It's

perficklee normal to photography, has been since Dauguerre.

 

If the manual iris procedure is too slow for your style of

working with live action, you need an auto-stop-down lens.

Twas ever thus. Well ... not EVER. Only since the auto-iris

was introduced, and thaz only about 60 years ago :-)

 

`

[Portrait Painter X]

Thank you very much for that explanation, Golem. I feel kinda silly now. It's just that I moved from Canon and used to auto focus everything, and now I'm easing into mirrorless, EVF and manual focus. Still learning! I will try opening up to f/2 for focusing and then stopping down for the actuation. I will probably need a dedicated studio lens with AF at some point as this method, I suspect, will be too cumbersome in the long run. I'll tell you this - in the studio I really miss my Canon 24-70mm! But in every other situation I prefer my A7II.

 

Skickat från min GT-I9505 via Tapatalk

[Wesley]

Thanks for your reply.

 

I shoot 50/50 outdoors/indoors, so I have a portable strobe system, the Elinchrom Ranger Quadra, plus various radio triggered manual hotshoe flashes.

 

The ceiling light seems to be an excellent solution. Does it matter that the ceiling light is yellowish tungsten, or will the higher effect 400 WS of the Elinchrom negate that color temperature difference?

 

I've read about the 24-70mm epic distortion. I think I would be fine with that if post processing took care of that.

 

400WS seems bright enough if the light is couple ft away. Can you put them to max power independent from flash power? What is your light setup?

 

I think the camera white balance would be more affected. I'd go custom WB because auto can vary a lot in this situation.

 

I'll be waiting to try the A7RII new focus system with the Sony and Nikon 24-70 2.8 (I used Nikon)

 

 

You have the effect setting OFF. That means the viewing

system adjusts gain to brighten up dark scenes and dim

down bright scenes. The gain boost needed to view at studio

strobe apertures [f8 thru 22] when working in moderate to

low ambient light is a whole lotta gain and thaz what you're

seeing ... grainy view, lag, speckles, etc.

 

I do not see any mention that you open the lens to full open

aperture [f2.8 or whatever] for focusing. You can't focus a

studio view camera, or other manual iris camera with ground

glass focusing, unless you open it up. When you put a manual

iris lens on your camera, even though it's digital, you have

mimicked the view camera situation.

 

Sooo ... are you focusing wide open, or not ? If not [which is

what I'm guessing] thaz the reason for the crappy view. It's

perficklee normal to photography, has been since Dauguerre.

 

If the manual iris procedure is too slow for your style of

working with live action, you need an auto-stop-down lens.

Twas ever thus. Well ... not EVER. Only since the auto-iris

was introduced, and thaz only about 60 years ago :-)

 

`

 

For AF lens, the aperture should be wide open when setting effect is off in dim lighting. Does the Loxia bypass this when aperture is set on the lens?

[Golem]

For AF lens, the aperture should be wide open when setting

effect is off in dim lighting. Does the Loxia bypass this

when aperture is set on the lens?

Auto focus and auto iris are two separate concepts using

two separate mechanisms for two separate purposes.

 

OTOH, common sense design would mean that an AF lens

should be equipt with auto iris to assure an advantageous

focusing situation during AF ... specifically providing a

bright image of minimal DOF for the AF sensors to evaluate.

And it holds true in the marketplace: AF lenses usually

have auto iris mechanisms. Only exception I know of is the

mirror optics with AF.

 

Reading the Loxia specs on the Zeiss site, it is clear

that these are NOT AF lenses. Zeiss does not mention an

auto iris feature. Neither do they specifically mention

that Loxias are manual iris, but Zeiss does specify that

that the aperture control can be declicked ... which is

a huuuge hint that these are manual iris only.

 

I'm not sure what you mean when you write: "For AF lens,

the aperture should be wide open when setting effect is

off in dim lighting ... ". What I do know is that Loxia

and other manual focus lenses can work with the effect

view engaged or disengaged. Effect view is mainly about

exposure. It does not preview DOF, WB, etc. On SOME of

the Sonys there is an actually image preview feature to

check DOF, WB, exposure, etc etc. My A7M2 has this, but

none of my APS-C Sonys have it. It works with any optic

including a pinhole, water drop, reading glass, etc etc.

I hope that includes some answer to your query.

 

 

`

[Golem]

......

 

Does it matter that the ceiling light is

yellowish tungsten, or will the higher effect

400 WS of the Elinchrom negate that color

temperature difference?

 

..........

400WS is next to nothing. The warm tone of the

ceiling lights will yellow the shadows in your

strobe shots. Maybe you can jack up the shutter

speed enuf to fix that ... maybe not. It usually

takes more than 400WS to overpower ambient light

especially in the shadows of the strobe beam.

1200 to 2000WS is pretty much entry level for

studio strobes.

 

Now that we can shoot 800 ISO [+/-] for studio

work, rather than the previous 100 [+/-] 400WS

may be enuf to give decent apertures to render

the whole subject in focus, but the RATIO of

ambient-to-strobe remains unchanged, thus still

problematic.

 

`

[Wesley]

Auto focus and auto iris are two separate concepts using

two separate mechanisms for two separate purposes.

 

OTOH, common sense design would mean that an AF lens

should be equipt with auto iris to assure an advantageous

focusing situation during AF ... specifically providing a

bright image of minimal DOF for the AF sensors to evaluate.

And it holds true in the marketplace: AF lenses usually

have auto iris mechanisms. Only exception I know of is the

mirror optics with AF.

 

Reading the Loxia specs on the Zeiss site, it is clear

that these are NOT AF lenses. Zeiss does not mention an

auto iris feature. Neither do they specifically mention

that Loxias are manual iris, but Zeiss does specify that

that the aperture control can be declicked ... which is

a huuuge hint that these are manual iris only.

 

I'm not sure what you mean when you write: "For AF lens,

the aperture should be wide open when setting effect is

off in dim lighting ... ". What I do know is that Loxia

and other manual focus lenses can work with the effect

view engaged or disengaged. Effect view is mainly about

exposure. It does not preview DOF, WB, etc. On SOME of

the Sonys there is an actually image preview feature to

check DOF, WB, exposure, etc etc. My A7M2 has this, but

none of my APS-C Sonys have it. It works with any optic

including a pinhole, water drop, reading glass, etc etc.

I hope that includes some answer to your query.

 

 

`

 

For example, with setting effect on in manual mode, the exposure of the LCD/viewfinder is shown depending on the SS/aperture/ISO. It won't budge unless I change one of the three settings regardless of the ambient light.

With the setting effect off, I assumed the camera was either putting aperture wide open or higher ISO to compensate for low ambient to view the scene even though I'm on manual mode.

 

I thought I've read long ago that the Loxia's aperture could also be changed by camera if I turned the lens aperture ring to one of the ends.

[thomasstrand]

My experience with the 24-70 f2.8 G lens on the A7R2 is that autofocus does not work in a studio situation. Once you turn the Live View Display to off, which you have to do in studio with strobes, the aperture stops down and stays that way. In my case to F16. In autofocus the camera indicates it has locked onto the subject but I can see in Capture One(I am shooting tethered) that it is not even close. The camera does not open up the aperture to focus when Live View Display is OFF like it does when it is on. It seems as though it is trying to focus while stopped down at F16 and it is confused. Because the aperture stays in the stopped down mode the EVF is also grainy and pixelated. Manual focus is of no use. Try manually focusing when the aperture is at F16 and pixels are jumping all over your display. I have recently updated to the 3.30 firmware and perhaps it will help. But at this point I have to hang on to my Canon gear as the Sony is worthless in studio.