HELP. I can't seem to get anything in focus. - Ricoh GR

[scadjacket]

A little Background:
First off I'm a graphic designer by trade, have been fror 16 years now professionally. Although I studied photography a lot in school, everything was film in my time and digital was just coming on the scene. I never really made the switch once digital took over. It felt very unnatural to me and I just never invested the time in making the transition. Eventually film seemed to die away in the late 90's early 2000's and I just put the camera on the shelf.

Recently with the resurgence in film photography I've dusted off the old cameras and taken it back up. In the process I've seen the need to learn digital photography as well (outside of my cell phone)

My wife and I just got a new puppy and are planning a trip to NYC in Dec, so it seemed like a good time to really dive into digital. I've had a K5 sitting on the shelf for awhile and have rarely used it. When I did I just set it to auto so I could get fast shots of the pups and family. As much as I love film it does have some down falls; cost, convince, speed and it's difficult to shot at night. The digital gave me the option to shoot at night easier and most of the time when I'm out with friends or family it's at night. But I very quickly noticed I'd leave the K5 at home and just use my iPhone just due to it's size and portability. So when I saw the GR it seemed like a prefect fit.

Small camera with big sensor + Pocketable + New Puppy + Trip to NY + better night shooting + Opportunity to finally learn digital = Purchase of GR


Now with all that said… I'm really struggling with the GR. I need some advice. I've read through several boards, tested, read, retested, searched YouTube, combed the net and the manual but I'm still missing too many shots. There are somethings about the camera that I don't understand and I can't seem to get anything in focus.

At first I was excited about Snap Focus, but I never can seem to hit the field correctly (from reading I think a lot of people have the same issue or they expected Snap to me more than it is) I decided to drop snap for awhile and just focus on learning the rest of the camera with using the autofocus.

Here is a list of things I've noticed or questions I have. If anyone can shed any light on these I would really, really appreciate it.


1. DNGs appear sharper than JPEGS. But DNGs seem to show more grain. Why?

2. DNGs appear truer to color, JPEGS take on a honey golden tone, especially on indoor photos. Any ideas?

3. TAV mode always seem to blow out the ISO when inside or low light conditions The results are very grainy. Is this common or am I at fault?

4. Snap Focus seems to miss focus more than I'd like. I know this is a result of my skill level in understanding zone focusing. Things like hyperfocial or infinity I just don't get.

5. In Av or P mode I seem to get a lot of missed focus shots due to s slower shutter speed. I can't imagine the light is always that low. ?

6. ND filter… what is it? Should I use it? Why is it in two places in the camera settings?

7. P mode never seems to drop below f4?

8. Full Press Snap, sometimes still seems to try and focus with both FPS and Snap focus on. I can feel/hear the lens adjust. I get the feeling that's why it misses focus a lot. I thought the point of FPS was to remove the autofocus half press since the focus point is already set.

9. AF seems to hunt in lower light. It helps if the AF light is turned on as it speeds up a little, but then I'm less incognito. Is this common for digital AF cameras? I'm used to old film manual focus. In low light or indoors it can hunt for focus for 3-5 seconds before grabbing a focus.


Here is a situation I ran into last night:

M Mode
ss 1/500
fstop 5.6
iso 3200

F1 button is set to AF/Snap
Snap is set at 2m
AF is set to Point
Button is set to Full Press Snap

I point the camera, using F1 I set it to AF, I press the AFL button to set the focus, and meter the exposure.

Obviously I'm way under exposed, so I tap the ExpComp + button.
The exposure corrects, I'm close maybe a tab bit over, but the SS drops all the way down to 1/20

Obviously I'll never get a image in focus with 1/20 due to shake, but why didn't the camera leave SS where I set it?

In the past it's done the same thing in other modes when I hit the ExpCom+ button but it would adjust the ISO or the Fstop

I've posted some images on my Flickr account if you want to take a look. You'll see how many are taken in daylight, at a high SS and with AF grabbing the areas I expect should be in focus, but they'l not.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/7709416@N05/sets/72157637249106765/

Please help.
Thanks!

 

[newmikey]

Looong list, but let me try to answer some as I'll not pretend I can answer all.

1. DNGs appear sharper than JPEGS. But DNGs seem to show more grain. Why?
DNG's do not "show" anything, they are merely archival files containing all of the info off your sensor. By using a raw converter, you can make the image represented by the DNG file visible. Use the settings in your raw converter to reduce the apparent noise. The jpeg file was "cooked" by the camera, applying raw conversion, color curves, noise reduction and sharpening.

However, JPEG is also (amongst other things) a file with lossy compression. Very small details visible in the DNG file might be simply unvisible in the jpeg. That would affect noise, but also surface details, fabric threads, hairs etc.

It is very easy to get the impression the DNG file, or any raw file for thet matter, is noisier than the raw file of the camera (any camera) that generated both. The simple truth is that the DNG file is pure and undiluted, unprocessed image data. If you want it to have less noise after conversion, that is up to you. The jpeg is the image data processed to bits and beyond by the camera jpeg engine. If you feel you get better results with jpeg, there's no shame with shooting jpeg whatsoever.

2. DNGs appear truer to color, JPEGS take on a honey golden tone, especially on indoor photos. Any ideas?
See above, with a twist. Although the final converted DNG will merely show whatever your raw converter was set to make out of it, the DNG also contains a small preview jpeg which you would see on any desktop as representing the file icon in the file manager. That preview jpeg was processed by the camera exactly as it would an in-camera jpeg.

3. TAV mode always seem to blow out the ISO when inside or low light conditions The results are very grainy. Is this common or am I at fault?
This is not common and maybe you are expecting TAv to do something else than what it was designed for. I've used it for years on all of my Pentax DSLRs and found it to be a lifesaver at times, "not so nice" on other occassions.

It merely does what it says it'll do: match the iso automatically to shutterspeed and aperture set by the user, on the basis of the metering mode set by the user, assuming the user is ready to shoot at whatever combination that will result in. If you have set metering to spot, you will almost certainly blow-out some highlights somewhere or have other exposure issues.

You can control the grainyness you are experiencing by setting shutterspeed and aperture to their most sensible combination for the light available and then allow TAv to control variations. If you just set shutterspeed to 1/500 and aperture to f7.1 the resulting ISO set by TAv will indeed shoot noise through the roof - that is user error, not a camera issue.

4. Snap Focus seems to miss focus more than I'd like. I know this is a result of my skill level in understanding zone focusing. Things like hyperfocial or infinity I just don't get.
Snap focus on the GR has one big difference with the previous Ricoh compacts: the GR has a gigantic sensor, compared to the GRD models and with that a greatly reduced DOF at any f-stop. We want that of course but it work against snap focus as that is based on setting focus zones which we want to be as large as possible. Set a higher aperture on the GR and you will see snap focus results improve. Get a DOF calculator online to figure out the best combo of f-stop and snap-focus setting and to see where your "zone" is.

5. In Av or P mode I seem to get a lot of missed focus shots due to s slower shutter speed. I can't imagine the light is always that low. ?
In Av, you are in full control. If you set the aperture to f2.8 and the ISO high enough, the meter will decide on a competent shutterspeed. In P mode I understand there may have been an issue with the aperture not hitting f2.8 under any circumstances. The newer firmware (2.03) has solved that.

6. ND filter… what is it? Should I use it? Why is it in two places in the camera settings?
Neutral Density or ND filters are used to reduce the amount of light hitting the sensor, allowing for a larger aperture to be used and reducing DOF or alternatively under extreme circumstances temper the light to avoid overexposure. On a DSLR you would use a screw-in ND filter on the lens, with the GR you can quite simply move it into the lightpath with a menu setting.

7. P mode never seems to drop below f4?
See my earlier answer: upgrade your firmware.

8. Full Press Snap, sometimes still seems to try and focus with both FPS and Snap focus on. I can feel/hear the lens adjust. I get the feeling that's why it misses focus a lot. I thought the point of FPS was to remove the autofocus half press since the focus point is already set.
Then you are not pressing all the way through in one fluid motion. I get the same as the half-press is so built-in to my brain over the years, that's what my finger does even if I do not want it. Snap-focus takes a lot of unlearning at least for me.

9. AF seems to hunt in lower light. It helps if the AF light is turned on as it speeds up a little, but then I'm less incognito. Is this common for digital AF cameras? I'm used to old film manual focus. In low light or indoors it can hunt for focus for 3-5 seconds before grabbing a focus.
If you get really, really low light with the GR it is indeed my experience that autofocus slows down a lot more than let's say my K-5 with the 35mm/f2.4 lens.

 

[Blow-in]

Some good answers above I think.

Regarding JPEGs & indoor colour I suggest you have a play with the white balance settings....I tend to cycle through them until what I see on the monitor comes close to what my eyes are seeing (on my GXR)

For the puppy pictures, try going to manual mode, setting a reasonably fast speed (125 +) and say F5.6 aperture and then set auto ISO. The camera will try to hold the speed & aperture by varying the ISO so you retain a bit more control. You could then auto focus or set the manual focus to a pre-set distance (or indeed use snap preset) and let the depth of field take care of the rest of it (in good light you could close down the aperture to help improve the depth of field).

I also find full press snap hard to use as it seems counter-intuitive to press fully without pausing so I prefer manual or snap for quick shots.

Richard

 

[odklizec]

H scadjacket and welcome here! Since newmikey already answered most of your questions (thanks Mikey for such great explanation!), I would like to add only few more details.

Here is a situation I ran into last night:

M Mode
ss 1/500
fstop 5.6
iso 3200

F1 button is set to AF/Snap
Snap is set at 2m
AF is set to Point
Button is set to Full Press Snap

I point the camera, using F1 I set it to AF, I press the AFL button to set the focus, and meter the exposure.

Obviously I'm way under exposed, so I tap the ExpComp + button.
The exposure corrects, I'm close maybe a tab bit over, but the SS drops all the way down to 1/20

Obviously I'll never get a image in focus with 1/20 due to shake, but why didn't the camera leave SS where I set it?

If you press ExpComp button in M mode, it sets best shutter/aperture combination for given lightning conditions. The way how it does it can be controlled in "One Press M Mode" menu option. In this menu, you can select that the ExpComp button should act as if the Mode dial is set to Program [P], Aperture [Av] or Shutter priority [Tv] mode. In your case, the "One Press M Mode" option is most probably set to Aperture mode, because the camera changed shutter speed and fixed aperture.

This is why the camera shutter speed has been changed. If you prefer to keep the shutter speed intact, use the Tv mode instead. In this mode, you can fix the shutter speed and camera will be pick best combination of ISO (if set to Auto or AutoHi) and Aperture. But of course, this means high probability that the camera will pick much higher ISO value that you like or much lower aperture. Simply the combination of 1/500, f5.6 and ISO3200 is unrealistic for anything than only slightly dim/overcast lightning. From the lightning situation I saw in your photos, you will either have to pick much higher ISO and/or drop the aperture number.

9. AF seems to hunt in lower light. It helps if the AF light is turned on as it speeds up a little, but then I'm less incognito. Is this common for digital AF cameras? I'm used to old film manual focus. In low light or indoors it can hunt for focus for 3-5 seconds before grabbing a focus.

Yes, this is a common behavior for all mirror-less digital cameras, i.e. cameras with large sensor and no mirror and internal phase-detection AF sensor.

Phase detection AF sensors were (and still are) built into the DSLRs, where the mirror allows redirection of light to AF sensor. After the arrival of cameras without mirror, fast phase detection AF is absent. Only in recent days, some manufacturers put the phase detection sensors directly onto the image sensors so the AF is noticeably faster (but still not on par with DSLR cameras).