How To Get Super Sharp Photos Every Time With Any Camera

so in my photography i use a very wide range of cameras i use really really expensive full-frame cameras with the best lenses and glass that money can buy i use mid-range cameras with kit lenses that you might get in the box and i also use compact cameras that fit in the size of your palm and literally just go straight into your pocket and no matter what range or what price bracket of camera i end up using at any given time i make sure that i follow specific rules specific principles a specific foundation to make sure that every single shot that i take regardless of the camera that i use is going to be sharp and crispy so that's what i wanted to share with you guys in this video today i wanted to share how to get super sharp images with any camera every single time all right we'll just jump straight into it so whenever i think about shooting doesn't matter what device it's on i'm always thinking about four different things the first two of them are settings so i'm always thinking about shutter speed and focus and the other two things are more like scenario based things so i'm thinking about is the subject moving or is the subject still and it's these four things that when put together when you consider them and all the rules that go with them which i'm about to cover in this video then every single shot that you make regardless of the camera will be sharp now at the end of the video i'll also add in some supplementary things that can either help or hinder your overall sharpness as well but these four things are the foundation to make sure that every single shot you take will end up being sharp all right so thinking about the scenarios is your subject moving or is your subject still so let's tackle still subjects first so if you're shooting things like architecture or landscape or still life or anything like that where the subjects they don't move then in terms of shutter speed and focus settings what you'll need on the shutter speed side is something that is one to three times your focal length and what i mean by that is say for example you're shooting a landscape image and you are shooting with a 16 millimeter lens at the 35 millimeter equivalent then you want to be shooting at 1 over 16 of a second or usually 1 over 15 of a second in most cameras equally so when you're shooting at say 200 millimeters and you're shooting you know the landscapes at that vocal distance then you want to be making sure that the multiplier is higher so in this case you might want to go up to a three times your focal length multiplier so if you're shooting at 200 millimeters you might want to start at one over 600 of a second in terms of your shutter speed what you want in this kind of shutter speed setting is to make sure that you're combating the camera shake that you're eventually going to end up making obviously if you're on a tripod then these rules don't really apply to you but if you're shooting handheld then one to three times your focal length is a great place to start and when it comes to focus things are really simple so i use autofocus single or a single point autofocus mode or i use manual so this is great because your subject or the distance away from your subject isn't going to move and so you can lock in that focus and that's fine happy days it's very very simple now when it comes to moving subjects on the other hand so when you're doing things like shooting portraits or you're shooting people or you're shooting street photography or you're shooting sport in terms of shutter speed what you'll be looking out for is what is the shutter speed that will allow you to freeze the action and a great place to start for that is one over four hundredth of a second there are other things that are modifiers in terms of this number if the subject for example in your frame is quite large it takes up a large portion of your composition or if the subject is moving quite fast then generally you want an even faster shutter speed than that as well something like 1 over 1000 and above is ideal as for an example in sports you want to be shooting well over one over one thousandth of a second because people are going to be moving fast and the subjects the humans in those frames are going to be quite large they're going to take up quite a large portion of the overall frame and so there's a lot of movement on the camera there's a lot of movement on the person and so you need a high enough shutter speed to be able to combat that so when it comes to focus what you want to be using is a continuous autofocus mode and this allows the camera to select a point and then constantly pull the distance between the lens and that point to make sure that that's constantly in focus so rather than like a single point auto focus in landscapes for example where you're just setting this focus point and then if the if the subject or you moves then suddenly it's out of focus the continuous autofocus modes constantly pull so for example the camera that i'm shooting on right now has a eye tracking continuous autofocus mode right now so if you pay attention to my eye and i move forward and i move back the camera automatically tracks that and make sure that i'm in focus the entire motion regardless of the distance that i am to the camera and this is really important especially for things like portraits where getting the eye in focus is absolutely critical and that's kind of it it really is that simple there's just four things to worry about it is is the subject moving or is the subject not moving and then what are the shutter speed and the focus mode settings that correspond to those things this is the secret of sharp shots it's literally if you get either of those two settings wrong for the given scenarios then there is no way to sharpen back a blurry shot in post processing for example if one of those two things doesn't go well then you're not going to have an image that is as sharp as it could be but of course in addition there are supplementary things that can either help or hinder you in whether or not your final image will be as sharp as it could be or you know might be a little bit softer than actually desired and the first thing is gear so lenses are usually where you'll find the most games to be had when it comes to having sharp images much more so than bodies so the the disparity between a really cheap lens and a top of the line lens is not only you know quite large in price but also it is quite large in sharpness as well but that kind of difference isn't the same when talking about bodies for example the difference between say the rx100 mark 7 compact camera that i always use versus the a7r mark iv main camera that i always use the difference in sharpness there is not as severe as say the difference in sharpness of a kit lens versus the top of the line g master that that difference in the the lens marker is definitely a lot more than in the body version so the general advice when you're considering sharpness is to pick a mount that you can stick with so for example the sony e-mount that you can stick with for many many many years and so that you can start to invest more of your money into lenses rather than bodies so another thing i want to talk about is aperture and depth of field so you might have heard of lenses with apertures like f 1.2 or f 1.4 or f 1.8 really shallow depth of field lenses we call them fast lenses and these fast lenses are fantastic for generating out of focus areas and really focusing you on the important parts of the frame but the problem here is that sometimes the older bodies can have a harder time focusing with lenses that have a very shallow depth of field you'll see often that sometimes you know in portraiture for example the shot might be focused on the eyebrow rather than on the eye and because the depth of field is that shallow it is that thin it really is distracting and that is something to call out and to look out for and in the newer bodies is not so much of a big deal anymore but generally with focusing with aperture the higher numbers so f4 or f8 will give you a much larger depth of field which gives you a lot more leniency to make sure that the things that you're trying to shoot are in focus now the last thing i want to talk about is iso and with iso what you're looking for in terms of the exposure triangle so when you're learning photography basics there's shutter speed there's aperture and there's iso what you're looking for is to adjust your shutter speed and your aperture to the correct settings depending on your context depending on your goals depending on how you want to shoot that particular image and then use your iso as the gain so is the exposure high enough or doesn't need to come down right you use iso last typically and with iso people are i guess afraid of the noise that comes with that there is this like this culture of avoiding noise at all costs but with that don't be scared of noise don't be scared of cranking up your iso if it means that the shutter speed that you use is absolutely spot-on because noise can be kind of removed in post-processing especially in post-processing software in today's world one thing to consider and one thing to just be on the lookout for is that higher isos do generally give off a little bit of a softer look to them which can be kind of fixed in post-processing but that is also something to be wary of but that in and of itself is never going to be as bad as not getting the correct shutter speed up front as a little bit of a bonus if you're using instagram to share your work there are specific settings that will allow you the best export settings in adobe lightroom to export to instagram and i have a video all about that right here or check out the link in the description all right that's it these are the things that i follow every single time with any camera that i'm using to make sure that every single image i take is absolutely tack sharp and crispy every single time all right i hope you enjoyed this video hit that like button and subscribe and all that good stuff if you're looking for extra photography content i do a image analysis on my patreon where i break down one of my portfolio pieces every single month and i tell you guys the the story the way that i decided to shoot it in the settings how i decided to approach the edit little bits and pieces of tips and tricks and all that kind of stuff all of that good stuff and it's also a great way to support me and the community so i hope to see you there alright i'll check you guys in the next video but until then get out there and make something that matters peace you

Channel: Pat Kay

Views: 562,685

Keywords: patkay, pat kay, photographer, photography, travel photography, travel photographer, photography tips, sharp photos, how to get sharp photos, how to make sharp photos, sharp photos with any camera, photography tutorials, how to get sharp images, sharp images, how to get sharp photos every time, how to get super sharp photos every time, how to get sharp photos with any camera

Id: Se1WzQLyldk

Length: 11min 46sec (706 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 08 2021