John, nice work on the software testing. Im curious, did you zero the AFMA between runs on each lens or did you just leave the previous settings from one run to another?
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John, nice work on the software testing. Im curious, did you zero the AFMA between runs on each lens or did you just leave the previous settings from one run to another?
Hi Bob,
I tried both without and with zeroing in between runs and it didn't seem to make any difference. FWIW, I did much of my repeatability testing with the 24-105mm f/4 IS, since that's the lens I use most on the 5DII. Generally, though, the f/2.8 lenses gave the most consistent results (and had the tightest point spreads with a steeper curve.
Did you check the analysis info after each run? That avoids the known bug of it reporting no change needed when, in fact, a different value is optimal.
BTW, working on short lenses on the 7D now. Preliminarily, testing distance and especially focal length for zooms seems to have a much larger impact than on the 5DII - the spreads seem bigger. I'll try to post the data tomorrow.
Nope, But I plan to run my other lenses through the test again this coming weekend and I will watch the analysis info this time.Quote:
Did you check the analysis info after each run? That avoids the known bug of it reporting no change needed when, in fact, a different value is optimal.
Here are the results from some shorter lenses on the 7D:
Lens Focal length 50x AFMA 25x AFMA Selected AFMA EF 16-35mm f/2.8L II USM 16mm 3 -4 4 24mm 8 2 35mm 6 7 EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM 17mm -5 -2 2 35mm 0 5 55mm 0 4 EF 24-105mm f/4L IS USM 24mm 1 -1 2 50mm 2 1 85mm 3 2 105mm 2 4 EF 35mm f/1.4L USM 35mm 5 -2 0
The wider zooms seem to have much more spearation between values based on focal length and distance, e.g. comparing the 16-35mm II on the 5DII with a 5-unit gap (-5 at 16mm 50x to 0 at 35mm 25x) vs. the same lens on the 7D with an 11-unit gap (-4 at 16mm 25x to +7 at 35mm 25x). Likewise, the 35mm prime shows a larger differential from testing distance (5 units on the 5DII, 7 units on the 7D). I wonder if this is due to the thinner DoF with the 7D (the distances are the same as with the 5DII, so the shot/framing is different, but under those conditions the APS-C sensor delivers shallower DoF). In general, the curves for the same lenses were steeper on the 7D than on the 5DII, analagous to the difference bewteen a slower and a faster lens.
Not sure how useful these results will be for me...most of my shooting in the shorter ranges is with the 5DII, on the 7D I do use the 17-55mm but not really the other lenses, more the 100-400mm and sometimes the 70-200mm. I think this was the second time I've mounted the 35L on the 7D, and the first time was for the LensAlign AFMA... Still, I wanted to test the same lenses to get an idea of differential performance across bodies. Also, the 7D can certainly be a backup camera to the 5DII, so if I need to grab it and shoot, I want the adjustments ready.
Might get to the 85L, 135L, and 70-200mm II on the 7D this evening.
--John
John
Taking a look at your results, it is no wonder people have trouble doing this with cereal boxes and yard sticks.
I would have a problem just picking what number to use as an average.
Looking at your results with the 5D II and the 70-200mm they are similar to the results that I was seeing with the lensalign. If you were to graph the AF performance in relation to the lens length, initially to me it seems the lens has an elongated S curve the optimum AF point follows. The designers of the lens obviously know this. I wonder what point on the lens did they use to determine what point would be the zero point for optimum AF performance. Say if they use the point where the lens is extended to 145mm it would give the best average for the lens throughout. It would be nice to have this information, maybe if someone were to ask nicely Canon would tell us the best point to establish an AF adjustment point is at XXXmm......probably not....
Rick
FWIW, here are the results from a few more lenses tested on the 7D:
Lens Focal length 50x AFMA 25x AFMA Selected AFMA EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM 70mm 5 4 2 135mm 1 3 200mm 1 2 EF 85mm f/1.2L II USM 85mm 1 -2 -1 EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM 100mm 2 3 2 ~MFD: 0 or 4 (n=2) EF 135mm f/2L USM 135mm 5 1 3
This just leaves the 100-400mm and the 70-200mm with 1.4x and 2x TCs, holding off until it's a bit warmer outside...
The sorts of data which can now be collected are making even the two-point AFMA on the 1D-X seem needlessly primitive. With the right software one can get a whole heap of AFMA data in, what, maybe an hour per lens--body combination? Distilling this down to one pair of AFMA values (or worse, a single AFMA value) is then in a needless compromise, especially given it's only a software issue. I agree with John's observation that the correction is non-linear. My preference would be to be able to provide to the camera exactly the sort of grids being posted in this thread -- the AFMA given a focal length and distance-to-subject -- and have it extrapolate between points.
(The cynic in me wonders if the AFMA feature is deliberately crippled. At the risk of opening a can of worms, third-party lenses seem to need more correction, so a comprehensive AFMA mechanism would allow any deficiences to be compensated for. Or, even with Canon lenses, if they calibrate them after the warranty period, they pocket a nice fee.)
Like many others in this thread I have been contemplaating the calibration of my 7D and 5D MKII to my 6 Canon lenses. While both LensAlign and SpyderLensCal have performed well for many people I was hoping that there might be something better on the horizon. Once again I wrote to Bryan and, once again, he had a great suggestion... FoCal... and this thread.
Have read the theory of FoCal until my eyes glazed over and have found the information on the site and in this thread very illuminating. One question I did have came to mind when I read the posting from John relative to doing a calibration with a 1.4X TC attached to his 70/200. I am going to both admit and show my ignorance by asking how, exactly, would the camera AFMA go about identifying a lens with a TC on it and how would it be listed/registered within the index of AFMA lens in the camera?
I have long thought that both my 100-400 and 70/200 have been a bit soft with the TC (and the 100-400 by itself). FoCal may just be woth its weight in gold to a "non-techie" "sort-of techie" like myself. Thanks for any help or suggestions any of you may make.
Bill
The camera knows you have the TC on, as long as it is a Canon TC.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bill_in_WA
I always thought the same when using the TC with zoom lenses that the TC was to "soft". The 70-200mm II might be close to performing acceptable with the TC on but I have never had a need for it, really I have only found the 1.4x acceptable on the super telephotos and primes. Really it all depends on what you think is "acceptable" and my opinion may not match others.
Thanks for the information... Yes, it is a Canon TC and I had a "Senior Moment" on the 70-200 issue... What I shoul have written in is the 100-400. As I gain more knowledge I am not so sure that taking the 100-400 and screwing on a TC might not be presenting a lot of variables in AF... maybe a bit too many. We'll see what happens... it should be interesting. Just ordered the FoCal Pro so I'm sure I will be back on asking more questions.Quote:
Originally Posted by HDNitehawk
Bill
Your 100-400 will not focus with the 1.4x TC attached, so I do not think FoCal will help you with that combo.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bill_in_WA
As Rick states, the camera is aware of the presence of the TC, and even records it in the EXIF data. I think the 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II does pretty well with teleconverters. Here are links to three examples:
Note that the two shots with the 7D are both at ISO 3200, which is pretty noisy, and the first shot was shot in heavy mist/drizzle (which is why I was using the 70-200+TC instead of the 100-400, since the latter is not weather sealed.
- 7D with 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II and 1.4x II
- 7D with 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II and 2x II
- 5DII with 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II and 2x II
Back to the point at hand, the EXIF for the middle shot, for example, shows the lens as "EF70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM +2.0x" and the focal length as 400mm.
So, you have to calibrate each lens and lens + TC combination separately, and each combo counts against your max of 20 stored adjustments.
FWIW, the 1D X will go a step further and actually associate adjustments with the serial numbers of the lens and/or teleconverter - useful for studios with multiple copies of lenses that require differnet adjustments, since other cameras wouldn't know my 70-200mm f/2.8 IS II from Rick's copy of the lens, and so would apply the set adjustment to any lens of that type.
While I think the 70-200 II plus TCs delivers usable images, I was less pleased with the 100-400 + TCs, it just doesn't stand up to them that well (and as Pat states, unless you nave a 1D III, 1Ds III, or 1D IV, you can't AF with the 100-400 + 1.4x anyway, fo FoCal wouldn't be of any use...
Bill
You had mentioned that you thought your copy of the 100-400mm is soft even without the TC. If your comparison is against a 70-200mm F2.8L II then I think indeed it would feel soft as the 70-200mm is a much better lens IMO. As mentioned your 7D and 5D II wouldn't focus with the teleconverter anyway. But that really shouldn't matter in your decision to get foCal because it is your camera that will not focus at F/8 no matter what type of system you use to set your AF adjustment. Another thing is shooting with a TC on the 100-400mm may not matter to you any way, because it may never produce the quality you are looking for. I suggest you test your 100-400mm to see if it is really soft, or it is another problem. Set it up on a tripod and take test shots using live view and focus on 10x. If you can't get what you believe is acceptable sharp IQ doing this, doing AF adjustments will not help.
Good Luck
Rick
I purchased this software the last time it was mentioned on this site. I've since calibrated all of my lenses with the exception of one very specific combination.
I am using a 7D with the latest firmware.
My Canon EF 400mm f/4.0 DO IS USM lens and Canon EF 2x III Extender do not calibrate properly together, giving some weird error that nobody seems to know what it means. The lens calibrates properly by itself, and the Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM calibrates properly with the extender, but I think the problem is that with that 400mm combination, the lens actually reports to the body that it's in manual focus mode (as seen in the quick menu), EXCEPT in liveview, you can still get autofocus to work in liveview. I'm assuming liveview uses a different AF method that is still working. I figured if you can AF using the shutter or liveview, Focal would still work, but I guess not. I have been in touch with Rich about the issue. He has tried to work with me over many emails, but ultimately just never responded to my last one. Benefit of the doubt, but I would have liked to hear the reason why from the people who write the software instead of me guessing... But that's neither here nor there.
The software works really well. I calibrated all of my lenses within a few nights using the purchased target and my apartment with a couple of LED video lights on the target. It takes maybe 30-50 shots to calibrate normally, and the results are visually obvious. It also allows you to see how bad a lens may be as far as accuracy with AF. I calibrated each lens three times and a couple of the cheaper/older canon lenses had issues between the three tests, with very large variety in the scores. Re-stabilizing my tripod and testing again seems to have narrowed that gap to an acceptable window, to which I just took the average.
All in all, I'd recommend the software without batting an eye. I think Rich is great but maybe just a bit overwhelmed over there. For the price, this software adds a very valuable modification to my kit. A lens that cost me $6500 was -15 off on the AF micro-adjust after three consecutive tests!! That's simply huge and extremely obvious on a 1:1 crop.
Hope this helps, and I hope that I've been fair and honest in my review, as I've definitely tried to be.
I just wish that my 7D could do stepped AF microadjust. I'd love to get settings for my 70-200 throughout the range. :)
Welcome MeHoo.
I wouldn't expect that combination to work. An f/4 lens with a 2x extender will act as an f/8 lens, which won't autofocus on your body. Microadjust only adjusts values used in phase-detection AF (non live view, or live view Quick mode), so the contrast detect AF used by the regular live view mode can't be adjusted by the software.
David is correct, and the only puzzling thing is why Rich @ FoCal didn't pick up on this immediately...Quote:
Originally Posted by MeHoo
As Canon states, "With most EOS cameras, the maximum aperture of the compatible EF lens/EF extender combination must be f/5.6 or larger to support autofocus. With EOS-1 class digital SLRs, autofocus with the center focusing point is supported for compatible EF lens/EF extender combinations with maximum apertures of f/8 or larger."
Your 7D is 'most EOS cameras' and since an f/4 lens with a 2x Extender becomes f/8, phase detect AF is disabled (and that's what AFMA adjusts, so the calibration fails). Contrast-detect AF (what Live View uses) is not affected by the aperture limitation.
I know about the f8 limitation, but I didn't know if foCal used liveview's AF or not because it does have to be in liveview in order to work for my setup. That told me that maybe it was using that combination, and thus, might still work. Now I know.
Makes me wonder if when the camera is on a tripod and I'm using liveview to focus, that it's actually a really bad idea and less accurate.
Live View (contrast-detect) AF is very accurate, it's just a lot slower than phase-detect AF. Phase detect measures the difference between the separated contrast peaks from the incoming light, and calculates the magnitude and direction of change, then tells the lens to move X amount in Y direction, and that's it. Contrast detect essentially checks contrast, moves lens, checks contrast, moves lens, etc., until maximum contrast is achieved (which isn't known until contrast peaks than starts to go back down).Quote:
Originally Posted by MeHoo
Hi all,
I have been running the software now and I have done most of my autofocus lenses, I still have the 500mm f4L to do as well as the 100-400mm at 400mm when I get some time to setup for a long distance. I used approx 50x the focal length for all the testing and this was done using the Pro version of the software. One thing that is critical to getting good calibration, or at least for me, is to have a well lit target. I ended up setting up with led video lights to illuminate the target, this helped a lot, and also it really needs a place that is out of the wind, etc. running was pretty straightforward and I am overall happy with the results. Here are some of the numbers I got, all lenses are Canon EF lenses unless noted, the quality is the quality of the curve fit.
1DMarkIV 5DMarkII
Lens AFMA quality AFMA quality
50mm f1.4 6 ex 5 ex
100mm f2.8L macro 2 ex 2 ex
180mm f3.5L macro 3 ex 1 ex
85mm f1.8 -8 acc 13 gd
100-400mmf4.5-5.6L @100mm 0 ex 0 gd
70-200mmf4L @70mm 5 ex -4 ex
70-200mm f4L @200mm 4 ex -5 ex
17-40mm f4L @17mm -4 ex -7 gd
17-40mm f4L @28mm -4 ex -7 gd
17-40mm f4L @35mm 0 gd -1 gd
17-40mm f4L @40mm -3 ex 3 gd
24-105mm f4L @24mm -7 gd 6 ex
24-105mm f4L @105mm 3 gd 5 ex
Tokina 16-28mm f2.8 @16mm 3 ex 1 ex
Tokina 16-28mm f2.8 @28mm 11 ex 7 ex
300mm f2.8 L IS 3 ex 7 ex
35mm f2 -4 pr 0 pr
50mm f1.8 II 7 gd 11 ex
At least I am getting repeatable results, I have a lensalign that I never got real repeatable results with so I never trusted it, but overall I am very happy with this software solution.
Alan
Oh well when I entered the message above the data was all in columns, when I edit it, it is all nicely formatted and readable but as soon as it posts it is all messed up, so sorry I could not get more of a table.
Alan
I purchased FoCal Plus this evening and have been unable to get it to install. I am running Windows XP SP3 on Parallels 7. When I go to install FoCal it tells me I need to install .NET Framework 4.0 and presents me the option to do that. I hit the "Yes" button and ran through the installation process for that and restarted the VM. When I went to install FoCal it gives me the same dialog box asking me to install .NET 4.0. Anyone else have this problem and find a solution? I have emailed Reikan but didn't know if there was an easy fix anyone else had encountered.
ETA: Figured it out. FoCal was directing me to a Client Profile subset of .NET 4.0. When I installed the full framework I was able to install FoCal without a problem.
IIRC, I downloaded the .NET framework directly from Microsoft. I'm also running it on a Parallels XP SP3 VM.
I also downloaded it from microsoft. It just sent me to the .NET 4.0 client profile instead of the full thing. Not really sure what the difference is but installing the full framework fixed it right up.
FYI, v1.6 is now available, which offers support for the 1D X (in MSC mode like the 5DIII), and a few other enhancements.
I wonder why it takes so much time to integrate a new camera and yet this is not the full automatic mode... Is Canon changing its API for every camera? By now, I would have guessed that they had a more or less stable interface.
The 5DIII and 1D X have a more complex AFMA than previous cameras, including serial number recognition and storing two values for zoom lenses. I suspect that is what's behind the need for a partly manual mode
You're right. I had overlooked the two AFMAs for tight and wide. I hope Reikan ends up with a proper integration and a full auto mode. I find it so nice to put a lens on the 7D and let it do its stuff alone.
Thanks, JohnQuote:
Originally Posted by neuroanatomist