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Front focus

Ron Morse

New member
I have had had the tamron 17-50 maybe three months. Every picture that I can remember taking with it have been from a fair distance. A couple of nights ago I tried taking a few shots of one of the dogs at about 2 1/2 feet with bounce flash. Every one was out of focus. I put the 28-135 IS on and every one came out nice. Today I set up some bottles and took a few shots.

I rested the camera on a drawer and took this at about 2 1/2 feet with bounce flash. The focus was on Marcum on the garlic salt. Looks to me like front focus. What would others say?

 

Ron Morse

New member
Looks like it focused on the Nutmeg to me...

Thanks for looking Kathy.

It looks like it focused on the nutmeg to me also. It seems that the bottles in front should be just as out of focus as the ones behind.

I didn't get the 17-55 IS because I read review after review about it getting dust inside. I think that I will get it anyway. I'll send this in and get it adjusted then sell it.
 

Ray West

New member
Hi Ron,

I'm not sure about which camera you use, or even if manual or af that you were testing, and if af, which focus point/method was chosen. However, it does look, at first sight that something is off, but 'resting on a drawer' is not that scientific ;-)

Best wishes,

Ray
 

Ron Morse

New member
Hi Ron,

I'm not sure about which camera you use, or even if manual or af that you were testing, and if af, which focus point/method was chosen. However, it does look, at first sight that something is off, but 'resting on a drawer' is not that scientific ;-)

Best wishes,

Ray

I should have mentioned I was trying the auto focus. My tripod is set up for the RRS adapters on my lenses so I pulled out a kitchen drawer and put a towel doubled up on it. Bottles on the granite counter top. I sat in a chair with the camera resting on the drawer/towel to stop any movement and with the flash took the picture. Center point focus with the 40D. other lenses are spot on.
 

Ray West

New member
Hi Ron,

Thanks for the extra detail. If you are happy with the other lenses, then it is probably as you say, but if you have shown the full image, and used centre point focus on the word 'Marcum', then you have recomposed the shot, and all bets are off, wrt getting it in focus. Even the simplest things are difficult to explain, without ambiguity creeping in.

Best wishes.

Ray
 

Ron Morse

New member
Hi Ray,

Rest the camera, focus and click. No recompose.

I tried it quite a while ago on some tropical fish and had a bad session. I put the 85 1.8 on and got some nice shots. I never gave it a thought about the focus might be off. I hadn't taken any fish shots in a while and thought it was me.
 

Kathy Rappaport

pro member
3rd party lenses

I had a Tamron 18-200 di when I had my 20d. The photos were never as crisp as my Canon lenses although Canon doesn't make a great travel lense with those focal lengths. I decided that if I couldn't find a Canon lens with those focal lengths I'd just have to carry two lenses because it wasn't worth it for me to have soft images unless I intended them to be that way. Now if I could just hand hold my camera at all shutter speeds....
 

Barry Johnston

New member
Focusing issues...

Hi Ron,
A little whie ago I also had front focusing issues with one of my lenses. I used the scale below to identify exactly how bad the problem was. Save and print out this scale, and stick to a door at around 45degs to the lens. Set your camera up on a tripod, using only the centre focus point. Direct this exactly at the centre line and take the picture. You will be able to identify whether your camera/lens is front or back focusing.

If this scale gets deleted due to its large size, you will find it here

original.jpg


Good Luck,
Barry.
 

Barry Johnston

New member
A4

Hi Ron,

this scale will fit into an A4 sheet, no need to resize it all .....or just make scale it to fit... it's easy....

Regards,
Barry.
 

Ron Morse

New member
Thanks Barry and Nicolas.

I have printed out 3 different charts to test with. Actually I used one of them a while ago but am not sure if I had the lense wide open although I think that I did.

If it is off I am going to send it in for calibration before I sell it. I wouldn't stick something not working right on someone else.

My new 17-55 IS will be here tomorrow. I would have had it yesterday but the holiday stuck a spike through that.
 

Ron Morse

New member
I shot the charts 5 times with the same results every time. I used an angle meter to set the chart at exactly 45 deg. to the camera.

It seems to front focus quite a bit at 17 mm and be right on at 50 mm. How is that possible?



 
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