Canon EOS 450D

Hi all,

Well I've been taking photos, on and off for years, never that seriously though.
Last year (or maybe a bit further back) I bought a Fuji 9600, great camera, I've taken thousands of photos with it and enjoyed using it very much.

This year I thought it was time to upgrade to my first DSLR, so I bought a EOS450D. Lens-wise I got the 18-55mm kit lens, a Tamrom 70-300mm and a 50mm prime.

I must say I am a little dissapointed with the results. Perhaps I am expecting too much, or maybe it's just because it's winter in Britain (i.e. lack of light), but I'm having real difficulty getting decently focussed images reliably from it.

I suspect I'm just expecting too much from the laws of physics given the current average light levels and that I'm nearly always shooting handheld - I guess I'll have to wait for the summer to see if I feel happier about it.

Also while I'm having a moan, even when I do use a tripod, flash, 10 second timer and mirror-lockup the picture still needs sharpening on the PC!! To rub salt into the wound I was reading a Photo-mag article the other day describing the EOS 50D and the author passed a generic comment that Cannons, as a rule, need to have their images sharpened. Doh!!

Maybe I should have bought a Nikon!?!?!

What do you think?

Cheers,
Shaun

P.S.
On the plus side, the Fuji suffered with terrible chroma-noise which the Canon improves upon greatly, so it's not all bad.

Hi Shaun,
sorry to have to tell you this but I have been so disappointed witht eh results from my Canon 30D. Canons do tend to be a bit soft but I take everything in raw now and apply sharpening myself in photoshop. I also found that my biggst problem was the kit lens....
I purchased an 'L' series 24~105mm from that auction website for £400 second hand.
and have been so pleased with the beautiful crisp images.
Kit lens? pah! So much heartache, I'm glad I ditched it.
What I did was go into Jessops and ask for a lens comparison with kit lens versus nice Canon ones and others. Took the same photo with each. Then viewed them all zoomed in to a part of a pic. Most were fairly similar until the 'L' series. Wow is all I can say! I didn't know it was an 'L' series until I said 'wow that's great, which lens was that?' the assistant said 'well it is an 'L' series.
I wasn't happy to put my hand in my pocket for £800 so went hunting and found the one on Ebay. Am well pleased.
I have contemplated a Nikon because of this for a long timne. Now am only contemplating a move because of the fantastic low light photography quality.
But then maybe I need to research the new 5D to save changing systems now I have a lens I adore.

In summary, Canon kit lenses are cr**p

Hi Shaun

I had a Canon 300d and was very happy with the results but I switched to a 40d last year and like you have been disappointed with the results. The lenses I have are Canon EFs 17-85 IS USM and Canon EF 70-300 IS USM.

A couple of points I would make are:

1) Don't judge focus using the display on the camera, everything looks soft on that.
2) Sharpening in photoshop does help a lot.
3) I think I need to look at my technique, especially use of a tripod.

Sorry I can't help much, but at least you know you are not alone!

Colin

Thanks Julia and Colin.
It's reassuring to know it's not just me.

When I was choosing a camera, I'd narrowed it down to a Canon 450D, and Sony Alpha 350 or a Nikon D80.

Nikon Went and brought out the D90, and all of a sudden the D80 looked much less appealing. I could have got the D90 but I wouldn't have had any lenses at all! For a bit less money I ended up buying the 450D with the 18-55mm kit lens, a Tamron 70-300mm and a 50mm Canon prime; a flash gun; an 8GB memory card and a couple of filters.

The Sony A350 always appealed because of it's "proper" live and in-camera IS. The Canon won over the Sony because of the thing that annoyed me the most on my old camera (Fuji S9600) - chroma-noise, the Canon is very good at keeping the chroma-noise down to a minimum, the Sony is not so good.

Hey ho, I'm stuck with it now.

Cheers,
Shaun

I too have read that Canon bodies/lenses results are not always as sharp as expected. I tested, on a 40D, two Canon 17-85mm IS USM lenses which were not up to the standard I expected. I then tested two 24-105mm L USM IS lenses which were superb at 105mm and not what I wanted at 24mm f8. Again, returned for credit. A friend tried three of the last mentioned lenses before he found a good one and even then he had to get Canon to tweak it before he was satisfied.

I'm still using my old 28-135mm IS USM lens at f11 and get stunning results although the front of the lens is very loose! Hence my need to replace it with a 24-105! My 100-400mm IS USM lens is a stunner.

Canon Camera appear to minimise noise my mushing up the image so a good dose of Unsharp Mask (200% at 0.8 radius and Threshold 2, 279 pixels per inch printing) applied immediately before printing helps. I shoot everything in RAW and convert in CS3 with 10 or 30 detail setting and some denoise also.
I hear that the Canon 50D is sharper ... but what is the noise like? Anyone out there got any experience of the 50D yet?

So these threads seem to be confusing a number of issues with regard to sharpness.

Shooting with any digital camera in a RAW format if going to produce a soft image due to the antialiasing filter that lies over the sensor. This softening is readily reversed using sharpening either using software in the conversion of the RAW file or in camera, using default settings that the manufacturer feels the user will enjoy. Current Nikon default settings use more sharpening and more noise reduction than Canon, but these setting are under your control if you wish to change them. And you can sharpen a soft image more if you need to.

Focussing is then the next issue. Professional series camera bodies and lenses are produced to higher standards than consumer ranges with tighter control on calibration. You may well therefore find poor examples of lenses and cameras, which amplify the callibration differences between them. Professional quality lens such as Canon's L series are also generally able to resolve more detail, show reduced colour aberration and more even light distribution from the edges to the middle, although in the real world this difference can sometimes be hard to see - a lot depends on whether you print and how big.

Camera shake is an additional confounding factor. To properly assess your sharpness you need to use a sturdy tripod, a cable release (or the self timer) and focus on something stationary. Newsprint taped to a wall with the camera carefully aligned is the time-honoured process.

While I'm sure that bad copies of lenses and cameras do exist I obviously have been very fortunate in that all of my last 4 dSLRs and 9 lenses have been good.

Canons are generally softer as DA says and need a little software work after. The 18-55 kit lens as I recall got tested in AP some time ago against a Nikon, Pentax and Sigma and it came in last by some distance! The L series lenses are generally very good but at a price. However, some of the older Canon lenses are also not too bad so check out the following link for user reviews as you may get away with something a little less expensive for the type of photography you are doing

http://www.fredmiranda.com/reviews/

Few things.
Why not post a link to a full-res. image so that we can comment on the real quailty? I have the same camera, and would be interested to see your results. Perhaps you're comparing it to some competition pictures taken with £1000+ 300mm pro IS USM lenses? At first, I was slightly disappointed for this reason.

I'd guess that the Tamron 70-300mm is non image-stabalised? At this length, you really need a tripod, and even then, the quality won't compare to 18-55mm lenses.