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No sharp pictures with A6000! Need help :(


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Man, had the same problem.....

Disconnect all the Noise Reduction, High ISO NR and DR/HDR options. Switch them off.... and start from there....

Seems like this options processes too much the pictures......

 

It will work.... awsome photos!!!!!!

Im going to have to agree with mtigo's suggestion

Also as others have suggested is adjusting the noise reduction in RAW and not relying on the camera jpeg at High ISO images.

I personally rarely shoot over ISO800 and almost never shoot over f8.

It's to be noted also that shooting any aperture over f11 will negatively impact the sharpness on almost all normal and normal zoom lenses due to lens diffraction, (Telephoto lenses differ)

Also make sure your "[Creative Style]" settings such as contrast and sharpness are not set too high. Over setting those adjustments will actually hurt your image quality. Try setting your Image "creative style" settings to standard and give it a try again.

 

Here's an a6000 image at ISO100 f2.2

15743245557_84daa8de2c_o.jpg

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  • 3 weeks later...
Guest Jaf-Photo

My top tip is to get a book that explains A6000 in detail. Friedman and Busch have one each and Gary Fong even has an interactive app.

 

A few years ago, I switched my main system from Canon to Sony. I was often puzzled by the naming of different functions and the way they behaved. So this kind of third party resource helped me understand exactly what different settings do. They often interact.

 

I imagine it's the same thing going from Nikon to Sony.

 

My second tip is to disable all functions in the camera that are supposed to improve image quality. They often do the exact opposite, which is true for most camera manufacturers. Noise reduction, DRO and lens corrections would be on top of that hit list. Then shoot RAW (+JPEG) and use lightroom to get the images looking the way you like.

 

It's actually much easier to process a raw file than wrestling with various auto functions in the camera. With raw you have multiple options to fix the image post fact.

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  • 3 months later...

Hello everyone!

 

I know this topic has been quiet for a few months, but I came across it because I have been having the same "everything out of focus" problems with my Sony a6000.  I am shooting RAW (3:2), and I did notice that the pictures improved after some post-processing (I was not aware that focusing issues were fixable via software??).

 

I have 3 lenses that I use with my a6000:

1) the kit lens that came with the camera (E 3.5-5.6/PZ 16-50 OSS) is what I use for general shooting,

2) A Sony 1.8/50 which I use for indoor shooting of objects (I have an online business reselling estate sale and garage sale items).  I normally use this lens in Aperture mode at about F10 to keep the entire object in focus (depth of field).

3) A Sony 4.5-6.3/55-210 telephoto which I use for landscape and high-zoom shots.

 

Here are the focus-related settings I am using:

Focus Mode: Single-Shot AF

Focus Area: Wide

AF Illumination:  Off

AF Drive Speed:  Normal

AF Track Duration:  Normal

Lock-On AF:  On

Face Detection:  On

Steady Shot:  On

Pre AF:  Off

AF With Shutter:  On

 

I am not a professional photographer by any means, But I am learning.  The other day I went outside on a sunny day and took 6 shots with each of my lenses:

1) landscape shot in Scene mode (with the little mountains setting chosen)

2) Landscape using intelligent auto (green) mode

3) Landscape using Aperture mode at F10

4) Object closeup in Scene mode with the little flower setting chosen

5) Object closeup in the green intelligent auto mode

6) Object closeup in Aperture mode at F10

 

Six shots X three lenses = a total of 18 shots in RAW.  I imported these 18 RAW images into ACDSee Ultimate 10 (what I normally use) and then viewed each raw file.  In all cases the focus did not seem quite right to me.  When zooming in while viewing, I was unable to find any spot in the pictures that were in focus.  I then applied a Develop preset that I have set up, and exported the images as full-size JPG files.  These looked substantially better, and more in focus, than the RAW files.  This seems very confusing to me.  While researching this, I came across this web page:

 

http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/sony-a6000/sony-a6000HI_ISO_NR.HTM 

 

All the RAW files on that page also seem out of focus.  So, as I said, I am confused as to how this works.  Does anyone see any problems with my Focus settings above?  I will try the initializing step suggested above and see if that makes any difference.

 

Dave 

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At aperture of F10 you might be getting some diffraction blur.

 

The Anti-Alias Filter of the sensor (a6000 has that right) will also cause some blur.

 

Autofocus might not be focusing where you think, causing some blur.

 

The lenses might lack some micro contrast, causing some blur.

 

High ISO will cause some blur.

 

Camera shake, normally slower shutter speed, can also cause blur

 

Jpeg conversion usually includes some sharpening, which can recover from the above blur.

 

 

I would recommend to try a larger aperture (smaller number), perhaps one stop less than max, then try to manual focus on a subject, like the grill of a car, and then see what is in focus, and what is not, so you get a good idea of what is possible with the Lens camera combination. Try that again with other apertures, like F10, and see how the DOF changes, and how the sharpness is affected.

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..............................................

 

All the RAW files on that page also seem out of focus.  

So, as I said, I am confused as to how this works.  Does

anyone see any problems with my Focus settings above?  

....................

    

Well one AF setting problem is AF itself being "on". 

  

Sony AF works very well but you didn't shoot in MF 

so your test has no control. Use the 10X magnified 

MF. BTW, if you pixel peep unprocessed digital pix, 

they do not normally look 100%. Just how it is. It's 

not an actual image. It's data. It NEEDS processing. 

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  • 11 months later...

Hi Silva,

  I just joined the forum and was interested in your problems in England with your a6000. I just bought an a6500 and am experiencing the same problems with it. I agree that the lack of sharpness is more noticeable in low light. By the way, I don't split hairs over the definition of "sharpness".  Blurry, soft, out of focus, and others, though caused by different things all look the same to my poor eyesight.  I get the same results with sony 18-105 G, or Zeiss 16-70, or Sigma Art DIN 60mm. Did you ever figure out what was going on?

Frustrated too,

thansard9

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Hi Silva,

  I just joined the forum and was interested in your problems in England with your a6000. I just bought an a6500 and am experiencing the same problems with it. I agree that the lack of sharpness is more noticeable in low light. By the way, I don't split hairs over the definition of "sharpness".  Blurry, soft, out of focus, and others, though caused by different things all look the same to my poor eyesight.  I get the same results with sony 18-105 G, or Zeiss 16-70, or Sigma Art DIN 60mm. Did you ever figure out what was going on?

Frustrated too,

thansard9

Hi thansard9,

 

I'm so sorry to hear that you discover the same problems with your camera! I still remember that frustrated feeling back in England. 

By now I have no problems anymore - what I did (I don't know if that was the solution or I just learned how to use this camera properly...):

 

- Sending the camera to service and they cleaned the sensor (no technical problems found), BUT I got the feeling that the pics were sharper after the cleaning

- Using a higher value lense (50mm 1.8 from Sony) which makes awesome sharp pics

- Accepting that the quality of the 16-55mm kit lense is poor, especially in low light

- Still not learned how to use the 18-105mm properly - have to do this, cause it got some really good reviews for some reasons...

 

So my basic problem was this overall kinda blurry/painted look, like if I would use a painted-filter WHEN shooting in Automatic mode. Since I learned so much through my problems I don't use the Automatic mode anymore (instead of this depending on the stuff I shoot, I mainly use Aperture Priority). 

 

I was just not used to this bad quality with my Nikon Camera + Lense + Automatic mode before the Alpha 6000... In my opinion also pics taken in Automatic mode should look good in normal light conditions. So, I'm not sure if the answer to my problems was just cleaning the sensor and learning to shoot in other modes and how I can help you :/ Wish I could!

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  • 3 years later...

I bought A6000, 5-6 month ago, and after using it with kit lens. i didn't feel any focusing issue.

but recently I bought a sigma 56mm prime lens and Now I'm also facing some auto focus issue with this camera.

then I searched online and found one cool solution, which helps me to get sharp photos all the time.

so here is the thing, you can try back button focusing technique to get more sharp result.

if you don't know anything about it then you can read about back button focusing here.  

Basically when you press shutter-button half way to get the shot, and because of low shutter-speed and moving subject you may get blurry result ( that thing occurs  to me a lot time :D )

Just sharing my thought, hope anyone found it helpful :)

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On 6/7/2021 at 11:01 AM, pewdoc said:

if you don't know anything about it then you can read about back button focusing here.  

Basically when you press shutter-button half way to get the shot, and because of low shutter-speed and moving subject you may get blurry result ( that thing occurs  to me a lot time :D )

..

Steve Perry has a great video on how to use back button AF. I’ve started using it. I started photography long ago with all manual focus gear, so separating the focus operation from exposure seems more natural to me.

 

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