Night shots, failure, please advise

[DavidEccleston]

Jayson, the IS kit lens is tripod sensing, AND automatic panning detecting, according to Bryan's review.

[Dr Croubie]

Just something that may not have occurred to anyone:
Make sure you take all the photos before going to Crazy Pianos, not after (because everything looks blurry after coming out of there)

[neuroanatomist]

Not sure if the 650D/T4i records focus distance. My T3i doesn't.
Edit: If it had been recorded, I believe it would be visible on Flickr, but it is not there, so I think it is not recorded at all

I don't think Flickr shows it. If you use something like Exiftool you'll see fields for Focus Distance Upper and Focus Distance Lower. I believe LR uses those to estimate a distance.

I'm sure your camera records it, assuming the lens supports it (and most Canon lenses do, including the 18-55mm and even some MF lenses like the wide TS-Es and the MP-E 65mm) - that info is used for the E-TTL II flash exposure calculation.

[ahab1372]

I remember seeing it in Flickr on photos by others. But it might have been omitted by some of the software for processing. Or I might be hallucinating I guess now I have to go look for an example or doubt my sanity

[Marco van Eck]

Wow, thanks for all input and advise folks, it's very much appreciated!


I've used a pretty heavy tripod on these pictures. Used the live view LCD display to focus but didn't know I could zoom in there... Will have to try that!

Being at work I downloaded the images from Flickr but nor Windows nor ExifTool is showing anything that reassembles the focus distance. I'll try getting that info from the RAW file and DPP when I'm back home.

My stock lens (Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS II) has AF and IS. I did turn off AF to manually focus but left IS on. I'll also try turning IS off next time I'm using the tripod.

And Dr. Croubie, I took these before having fun at the Crazy Pianos


Thanks again all, will get back on the focal distance later.

Marco

[Jayson]

Jayson, the IS kit lens is tripod sensing, AND automatic panning detecting, according to Bryan's review.

Thanks David. I know my old one wasn't so I wasn't sure if the new model had been updated with that tech. Appreciate you digging a little deeper.

[neuroanatomist]

Being at work I downloaded the images from Flickr but nor Windows nor ExifTool is showing anything that reassembles the focus distance. I'll try getting that info from the RAW file and DPP when I'm back home.

Flickr strips it out. DPP won't show it. Different cameras do display different data in a full EXIF dump from the .CR2 file, such as you get with Exiftool. For example, 7D and 5DII images have Focus Distance Upper and Lower, whereas a 1D X image has a Subject Distance field instead.

[Marco van Eck]

Flickr strips it out. DPP won't show it. Different cameras do display different data in a full EXIF dump from the .CR2 file, such as you get with Exiftool. For example, 7D and 5DII images have Focus Distance Upper and Lower, whereas a 1D X image has a Subject Distance field instead.

Thanks Neuroanatomist.

Like you said, no info from DPP. With ExifTool I found a wealth of information under section MakerNotes from the RAWs, amongst others :

First shot
FocalLength : 37120 mm
FocusDistanceUpper : inf
FocusDistanceLower : 81.91 m

Second shot
FocalLength : 35072 mm
FocusDistanceUpper : inf
FocusDistanceLower : 81.91 m

No idea why the Focus Distance values are exactly the same... There is a time difference of about 30 minutes between taking the two images.

I'm sorry to say that I don't have a real idea yet if these figures are good or bad.


Hope to be able to share some better night pictures with you all soon

Cheers,
Marco

[Sheiky]

Flickr strips it out.

I'm not sure if I understand you correctly, but in my case Flickr shows all the info off my photos including focus distance.

First shot
FocalLength : 37120 mm
FocusDistanceUpper : inf
FocusDistanceLower : 81.91 m

Second shot
FocalLength : 35072 mm
FocusDistanceUpper : inf
FocusDistanceLower : 81.91 m

No idea why the Focus Distance values are exactly the same... There is a time difference of about 30 minutes between taking the two images.

I'm sorry to say that I don't have a real idea yet if these figures are good or bad.

Marco, I'm not sure if this counts for everyone, but I noticed that the number shown in the Focus Distance in EXIF is actually "quite" accurate on some points. On my lenses the distance number shown in the small dial on your lens often mirrors what you will be seeing in EXIF. However: once you get beyond the largers number on your lens(to the point where the lens goes to infitnity) the focus distance number in your EXIF cannot be trusted anymore. In your case this might explain the weird, but constand FocusDistance value.
At least that's what I noticed in my case.

[Andy Stringer]

Jan is right about EXIF data in Flickr. If the information is embedded in the jpeg file by the raw converter, Flickr will show it (assuming the photographer has elected to share this information publicly). Most of the images in my photostream show a subject distance, apart from a few that were shot as jpeg only, or stitched panoramas.

I also agree about strange data being reported when shooting at or near to infintiy.

Marco, given that "Focus Distance Lower" is around 80m, I wonder whether you were focusing beyond infinity. The focus ring on most lenses will rotate beyond the infinity focus mark, which I think is only necessary if you are taking infra red photos with a film camera.

I hope you are able to get some better results next time, using a magnified Live View.