Canon G7x - Why am I so frustrated with it? Help please!

[Snoobles]

Wow thanks for all the amazing advice! Yeah full manual was a bit of a pain so going to Bonaire in August so will try shutter or aperture priority before I give up on it (want to get this going well before Lembeh and Raja in October)... Here are a few pix I took that I thought were grainer than expected..

Pixwithissues-2

• Snoobles
• Jun 8, 2016

Pixwithissues1

• Snoobles
• Jun 8, 2016

Pixwithissues

• Snoobles
• Jun 8, 2016

(had to save in jpg to get it to upload here but they were shot in RAW aka. CR2) and not so sharp even though on the old camera they would have been.

So anyone using this camera - what do you set your camera and strobe to setting wise? I know this camera shoots TTY, so do i set the strobe to TTY? If so what does the camera need to be in?

Thanks again@

 

[rob1967]

For example your second shot, settings are f/11, 1/160 sec, ISO 640, so your camera is metering for ambient light (background is exposed correctly) and your strobe is overexposing the subject in the foreground. Your first shot has similar settings but the foreground is not so glaringly over-exposed.

You third shot is metering for the sun, so it is mostly backlit with little to no strobe apparent.

For the first two shots, which are macro shots, if you had been in manual mode, you could shoot say f/11 or a bit more open, ISO 100, but a faster shutter speed, say 1/200 or faster. The lower ISO would give a sharper image and the faster shutter would eliminate most of the ambient light (as well as any motion blur) so that it is mostly the strobe lighting the foreground. You could play around with your shutter speed to adjust your background exposure, faster means darker background. It is important to understand that shutter speed does not affect the strobe power, it only affects ambient light. The strobe power controls foreground exposure (assuming you have a fast enough shutter speed to eliminate most ambient light).

For the wide angle shot, it's a bit trickier, because your strobe power falls off quickly with increasing distance to your subject. For wide-angle, try bumping up you ISO to 400, opening up your aperture, then adjust strobe to correctly expose foreground and shutter speed to control background exposure. If you maintain near-constant distance to subject, you won't have to adjust your settings that much.

I have never tried TTL, manual seems easier to me. By the way, you can practice this by shooting a small toy at your dining room table. Practice getting a black background and lighting your subject only with strobe, even in a well lit room.

 

[tarponchik]

I'd say, there is no need to use f/11 underwater except, maybe, extreme close-ups. There are 3 factors to consider here:
1. Underwater, the sharpness of distant objects is limited by water transparency rather than aperture settings.
2. Camera's with small sensors have their "effective" aperture, meaning, on my s95 f/4.0 corresponds roughly to f/8.0 on DSLR, etc. So you need to quit this kind of thinking in similarities between the two.
3. Lens sharpness typically peaks around (effective) f/4.5-6.3, then decreases gradually.

 

[rob1967]

I'd say, there is no need to use f/11 underwater except, maybe, extreme close-ups. There are 3 factors to consider here:
1. Underwater, the sharpness of distant objects is limited by water transparency rather than aperture settings.
2. Camera's with small sensors have their "effective" aperture, meaning, on my s95 f/4.0 corresponds roughly to f/8.0 on DSLR, etc. So you need to quit this kind of thinking in similarities between the two.
3. Lens sharpness typically peaks around (effective) f/4.5-6.3, then decreases gradually.

Yes, I guess I should have been more clear, the aperture range of the g7X is f/1.8 wide, f/2.8 telephoto to a minimum aperture of 11. So I would recommend starting out with an aperture in the middle of that range, say around f/4 to f/8. That should provide enough depth of field for most shots, but for macro or super macro, one may need to go higher. I tend to favour a relatively closed aperture to get more depth of field, especially for macro, but it is fun to play around with different apertures. By starting in the middle of the range, one has room to either open up or stop down.

 

[Snoobles]

Thanks for the advice - running an experiment with the G7x compared to my S100 with all the same settings in manual - thus far can't seem to get the G7x to be as sharp as the S100 (will upload pictures tomorrow, photo shoot got cut short by a thunderstorm)... Could I have gotten a dud? Stay tuned for photos tomorrow...

 

[Snoobles]

Ok successful recreation of my "fake" reef. Here is where I need help. I set the Canon S100 and G7x to all the same settings (for the Canon S100 I did have it in custom since that is what I shot in, then set the G7x to the same settings the camera selected for aperture and shutter). I set ISO at 200. Two photos per camera - the first focuses on the lego man in the back - if you compare his face the S100 is crisper than the G7x. The second focuses on the red mushroom coral in the front. With the S100 more of the coral is in focus and seems crisper (like you can see the dust better on it), and the G7x blurs more of the coral.

Being an engineer this is as scientific as I could get Please help.
Mushroom coral:
S100:

16_06_Jun_12_CanonS100_Focus_MushroomCoral_3591

• Snoobles
• Jun 12, 2016

Canon S100 - Focus is Mushroom Coral in front

G7x:

16_06_Jun_13_CanonG7x_Focus_MushroomCoral_3591

• Snoobles
• Jun 12, 2016

Canon G7x - Focus is Mushroom Coral in front

Lego Man:
S100:

16_06_Jun_12_CanonS100_Focus_LegoMan_3591

• Snoobles
• Jun 12, 2016

Canon S100 - Focus is Lego Man in Back

G7x:

16_06_Jun_13_CanonG7x_Focus_LegoMan_3591

• Snoobles
• Jun 12, 2016

Canon G7x - Focus is Lego Man in Back

 

[mattia_v]

The metering on those shots is quite different, with the GX7 looking a little overexposed. That you have less depth of field (less of the shot acceptably sharp) for the larger sensor camera is normal. The only real way for me to check what you're seeing would be with the RAW files, which often look a little 'soft' before appropriate processing and sharpening - JPGs are pre-processed and can look sharper / more colorful (the S100 images are both a touch darker and quite a bit more saturated).

 

[Snoobles]

The metering on those shots is quite different, with the GX7 looking a little overexposed. That you have less depth of field (less of the shot acceptably sharp) for the larger sensor camera is normal. The only real way for me to check what you're seeing would be with the RAW files, which often look a little 'soft' before appropriate processing and sharpening - JPGs are pre-processed and can look sharper / more colorful (the S100 images are both a touch darker and quite a bit more saturated).

If you can tell me how to upload the RAW I will - they were taken in RAW. But so if the larger sensor camera has less depth of field what is the advantage to that? Wouldn't you want more depth of field with the larger sensor one?

Any other ideas why the actual item that is supposed to be sharp is less sharp with the bigger sensor camera? That has been one of my key frustrations. Could the camera have something wrong with it (it is new...)?

Thanks.

 

[mattia_v]

You could upload using Dropbox or one of many file sharing systems.

The advantage to larger sensors is better noise performance and better dynamic range and color depth; the disadvantage for some types of shooting is shallower depth of field, but it's also an advantage if you want to increase subject isolation. 1" sensors don't have massive depth of field, and stopping down to about F5.6 to f7.0 should be plenty.