a68 Soft Focus Problem

[wineguy20]

I just purchased an a68 and am having some soft focus issues.

I have tried just about everything to correct this but with no success.

When focusing through the view finder everything looks very sharp. After taking the picture and the camera processes the picture, the preview image displayed is slightly soft. You can see it happen. As soon as the shutter cycles the image looks great and a split second later it goes soft. Macro looks great, portrait photos look good but anything taken at a distance of 30' or further, or taken at longer focal lengths I lose the sharpness.

I have tried all my different lenses, tried apertures from f2.0 to f40, shutter speeds up to 1/4000s ISO's from 100, manual focus, auto focus and tried different file sizes up to 24mp. Also extra fine jepg and RAW. AF Micro Adjust seems to do nothing and I have also done a factory reset to no avail.

I would assume that if the image looks sharp before you release the shutter that the picture would also be sharp. Even after download to the computer the images are still soft.

I have contacted Sony and am setup for a return to have it looked at. But before sending it I was hoping someone has either heard of this before or maybe have some other things to try.

Thanks  for any help.

[Dollanganger]

This sounds very strange what subjects are you shooting?

 

Can you upload some samples so we can see the problem?

[wineguy20]

Mostly landscape.I have lost of landscape opportunities right from the back yard and I'm missing out with this problem.

Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here…

Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members!

[Username]

What you are seeing is a moment of the viewing/focusing

image just before it's replaced by the recorded image. The 

v/f image is hyper sharpened and contrast boosted to best 

perform its intended purpose. If you could actually keep it 

from disappearing you'd get a better look at it and find that 

it's too harsh and noisy for most viewer's tastes. 

   

Fine tune your picture styles [that "std-neut-port-etc" stuff] 

to induce moderate increases of sharpness, contrast, and 

saturation. This will give you jpegs that look more like the

v/f image seems to look, in that brief glance before it goes 

away. Toadally unedited picture styles tend to look a little 

dull and soft. None of this applies to raw. Raw is always 

in need of editing. Thaz what raw is for :-) 

[doctoralx]

On 1/16/2017 at 12:51 AM, wineguy20 said:

I just purchased an a68 and am having some soft focus issues.

I have tried just about everything to correct this but with no success.

When focusing through the view finder everything looks very sharp. After taking the picture and the camera processes the picture, the preview image displayed is slightly soft. You can see it happen. As soon as the shutter cycles the image looks great and a split second later it goes soft. Macro looks great, portrait photos look good but anything taken at a distance of 30' or further, or taken at longer focal lengths I lose the sharpness.

I have tried all my different lenses, tried apertures from f2.0 to f40, shutter speeds up to 1/4000s ISO's from 100, manual focus, auto focus and tried different file sizes up to 24mp. Also extra fine jepg and RAW. AF Micro Adjust seems to do nothing and I have also done a factory reset to no avail.

I would assume that if the image looks sharp before you release the shutter that the picture would also be sharp. Even after download to the computer the images are still soft.

I have contacted Sony and am setup for a return to have it looked at. But before sending it I was hoping someone has either heard of this before or maybe have some other things to try.

Thanks  for any help.

@wineguy20Hi there. I bought a sony A68 with ony 1000 clicks as a replacement of a much older A33 SLT. I experience the same issues with the A68 as you did. Problem exists even when using premium lenses (e.g. Sony 16-50mm). Did you ever manage to identify or fix the problem? Image quality with the A33 was much better even with the crappy 18-55 kit lens.

[Cameratose]

4 hours ago, doctoralx said:

@wineguy20Hi there. I bought a sony A68 with ony 1000 clicks as a replacement of a much older A33 SLT. I experience the same issues with the A68 as you did. Problem exists even when using premium lenses (e.g. Sony 16-50mm). Did you ever manage to identify or fix the problem? Image quality with the A33 was much better even with the crappy 18-55 kit lens.

He hasn't been here since January of 2017, I don't know if he'll ever see your message. 

[Wolvy]

I got one tuned up pretty well last year. I don’t remember exactly after doing a 77ii not too far apart that was different. The a68 was faster and more accurate but color profile was more work to tune btw.

profile/style set to clear and highest sharpness allowed + micro focus adjustments per lens if I remember right. And any of these fall apart fast in low light or slow lenses. 

[wineguy21]

Still here! and still having the soft focusing issue. Playing around with lower ISO settings and using the sweet spot f stops on the Tamron 28-105 lens.

Going to step out and take another picture of the mountain with these settings and compare to the older pictures. 

[Wolvy]

I’ll have access to a a68 in a couple weeks and post some shots to compare with the body settings. Part of it could be the lens aging too unless you’re having the same problem with multiple lenses. A lot of those 28-90/28-105s get softer with use and the worst are super glowy at the long end.

[wineguy21]

Nice, I'll look forward to seeing those pictures. 

This issue I have is with all my lenses and since they were new. 

I'm going to download a fucus chart and play around with micro focus adjustments next. I hope I find something there. 

Thanks!

[Cameratose]

21 hours ago, wineguy21 said:

Nice, I'll look forward to seeing those pictures. 

This issue I have is with all my lenses and since they were new. 

I'm going to download a fucus chart and play around with micro focus adjustments next. I hope I find something there. 

Thanks!

That's the answer right there. One advantage of mirrorless is no microfocus required. Now that you mention it, I had an SLT-A65v a while back that suffered from the same issues. I had to adjust microfocus for several lenses. Pain in the butt. The same thing can occur when using an LA-EA4 on a mirrorless due to the translucent mirror in the adapter. That mirror setup was one of the worst systems ever developed, AFAIC. You lose about a half stop of light due to the mirror. It put a lot of people of Sony.  

[wineguy21]

I have been considering going to a mirrorless camera. The reason I went with the a68 is I had all Minolta lenses from my old SLR I had. I don't know of any other camera that would accept these so I may have to bite the bullet and start with all new gear.

Any suggestions?

[Cameratose]

I still shoot several A-Mount lenses including the 500/8 AF Reflex (a real hoot! A 500 Reflex in AF?!!), the 28-135, the 85/1.4, the 35-105, and the lowly 100-200 (or whatever it was). I use them with the LA-EA5 on my A1 and A7 IV. 

Up until a year ago I also had the 70-210 'Beercan', 100-400 APO, 80-200/2.8 APO HS G (yes, the 'G' designation came from Minolta) and probably a couple others I'm forgetting. 

Just use caution if you go this route. Not all of Sony's cameras work the same with all of their adapters, and the adapters are different. Anything older than the A1 and A7 IV need the LA-EA4, which defeats the purpose of going mirrorless.

Heck, I still have a Minolta Maxxum 7000 and a Minolta Maxxum 5D, their last digital camera. Might've been their last camera.  

Edited 21 hours ago by Cameratose

[Wolvy]

6 hours ago, wineguy21 said:

I have been considering going to a mirrorless camera. The reason I went with the a68 is I had all Minolta lenses from my old SLR I had. I don't know of any other camera that would accept these so I may have to bite the bullet and start with all new gear.

Any suggestions?

The a7iv with the laea 5 is pretty hard to beat. It’ll run all your legacy glass as well as the SLTs with more resolution and better light handling. The more expensive stacked sensor bodies work well with some and not so much with others. Continuous autofocus works but isn’t nearly as dramatic. Unless the a7v comes out with even more advanced stuffs and a non stacked sensor for not a lot more money. And of course you can always add e mount glass as you go, but in my opinion it’s rarely worth the price unless you need the tech specifically. Sigma has some nice options and the 200-600 is nice for sports and wildlife. And the small mortgage 400 & 600. 600 Mino is basically manual focus. It will auto but so slow with the heavy glass it’s not worth the strain on the battery and adapter. 
The a68 will keep up with the newer crop sensor bodies well enough that I wouldn’t consider those. 7/8ths autofocus speed, just as bad in low light and similar IQ. Same with the a7iii and older full frame. You’ll game a little but not much for the cost.

Should we get the rumored 7r vi that can hang with a Hasselblad or Fuji and retain all the bells and whistles though… 

[Wolvy]

6 hours ago, Cameratose said:

I still shoot several A-Mount lenses including the 500/8 AF Reflex (a real hoot! A 500 Reflex in AF?!!), the 28-135, the 85/1.4, the 35-105, and the lowly 100-200 (or whatever it was). I use them with the LA-EA5 on my A1 and A7 IV. 

Up until a year ago I also had the 70-210 'Beercan', 100-400 APO, 80-200/2.8 APO HS G (yes, the 'G' designation came from Minolta) and probably a couple others I'm forgetting. 

Just use caution if you go this route. Not all of Sony's cameras work the same with all of their adapters, and the adapters are different. Anything older than the A1 and A7 IV need the LA-EA4, which defeats the purpose of going mirrorless.

Heck, I still have a Minolta Maxxum 7000 and a Minolta Maxxum 5D, their last digital camera. Might've been their last camera.  

This is the way. I take better care of my Mino and Koni gear than the Sony stuff because the really nice ones are harder to find all the time.

[Wolvy]

32 minutes ago, Wolvy said:

The a7iv with the laea 5 is pretty hard to beat. It’ll run all your legacy glass as well as the SLTs with more resolution and better light handling. The more expensive stacked sensor bodies work well with some and not so much with others. Continuous autofocus works but isn’t nearly as dramatic. Unless the a7v comes out with even more advanced stuffs and a non stacked sensor for not a lot more money. And of course you can always add e mount glass as you go, but in my opinion it’s rarely worth the price unless you need the tech specifically. Sigma has some nice options and the 200-600 is nice for sports and wildlife. And the small mortgage 400 & 600. 600 Mino is basically manual focus. It will auto but so slow with the heavy glass it’s not worth the strain on the battery and adapter. 
The a68 will keep up with the newer crop sensor bodies well enough that I wouldn’t consider those. 7/8ths autofocus speed, just as bad in low light and similar IQ. Same with the a7iii and older full frame. You’ll game a little but not much for the cost.

Should we get the rumored 7r vi that can hang with a Hasselblad or Fuji and retain all the bells and whistles though… 

The raw files are too big to post but that’s the zeiss a mount 135 with a mega crop and some 85/1.4 bokeh as a couple examples, if not as good as they actually look.

Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here…

Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members!

[Cameratose]

Pretty sure the forum downscales images.