Sharpness settings on XF305?

S

spotmeter

New member
I shoot landscapes with lots of fine detail (leaves, grass, trees) and have found that the footage out of my 305 is a little soft. So I increased the Sharpness Level in a Custom Picture File from the default zero to +10, and also the H Detail Freqency from zero to +4.

This has improved horizontal sharpness without generating any annoying halos.

But much of the details in my shots are vertical, such as grasses, trees, etc.

I don't find a setting for vertical detail sharpness, and am wondering if someone can help me improve vertical sharpness? I see that there is an HV Detail Balance, which adjusts the ratio between horizontal and vertical detail, but no setting that specifically addresses vertical detail.

Also, I am wondering if reducing Coring will also help apply sharpness to fine details?

What about using Select--is raising this variable a better way to increase sharpness for fine detail?

Appreciate hearing from those who have had experience making these changes.

Thanks.
 
Wow! I'm really amazed you find the footage a soft fromt the 305! Generally, people are finding it a tad sharp and pulling down the sharpness 3 or 4 points. I would say if you're looking for more fine tweaking, the best option would be to try the level settings on the various detail options and see what they do. There's a few tutorials on the Canon website about tweaking the profiles, and I know the manual goes in depth as to what each setting option does exactly, so that would be the first place I would start looking
 
cowpunk52 said:
Wow! I'm really amazed you find the footage a soft fromt the 305! Generally, people are finding it a tad sharp and pulling down the sharpness 3 or 4 points. I would say if you're looking for more fine tweaking, the best option would be to try the level settings on the various detail options and see what they do. There's a few tutorials on the Canon website about tweaking the profiles, and I know the manual goes in depth as to what each setting option does exactly, so that would be the first place I would start looking
Click to expand...

Most people shoot faces with the XF305, which look better with less sharpness.

I am shooting landscapes with lots of fine detail, which is why I made the original posting. The find detail lacks sharpness.

Can you post a link to the Canon website about tweaking profiles?

I read the manual thoroughly before posting and did not find it answered my questions, otherwise I would not have asked.

Regards.
 
I find the XF300 to be the sharpest 1080p camera out there and I shoot plenty of landscapes. You sure you are focused properly?
 
I am confident that our images are in focus as I make my living shooting, printing and selling 10' long panoramic landscape prints that are in focus and have plenty of sharpness in the fine details.

We are displaying our videos on a 60" Sharp LCD screen, which is where we see that sharpness is lacking in the fine details.
 
Can you give a crop sample of the softness you're talking about? Maybe with something (shot in 1080p) that has the kind of sharpness you're looking for? This is pretty confounding as it doesn't jive with the experience of nearly all XF camera operators. I use the XF cams on a travel show shooting landscapes all the time, and I've never had a moment where the sharpness looked less than spot on, as high as possible in the HD format. Maybe it's the LCD you're viewing on?
 
In answer to your original questions, though: as per the manual, "Select" sharpens areas with higher frequence, so very fine details (leaves, grass, trees) will get more sharpness applied by raising that setting. Try it and see if it gives you what you're looking for. Coring is a kind noise reduction used to just mitigate sharpening artifacts, but the manual does state that higher values of it does reduce sharpness to fine details. Perhaps try lowering it in gradual steps into the negative values and see if that affects your picture in a way that you like. You'll likely have slightly more noise in your image, but it may be worth it if you're trying to eek out every bit of fine detail. Shooting at -6db will likely keep that noise unnoticeable anyway. Also, try turning your noise reduction off. It may be still set on automatic by default which might be reducing very fine detail.

As far as I can tell, there is no setting for vertical detail only.

If any of this works for you, please let us know. I'd love to see some before and after cropped screen grabs, too, if you have the time. Good luck!
 
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Some of the XF300/305s had a fault in keeping focus. It seems some of the units would lose focus, much like a back focus problem, when ND filters were used and at full zoom out. Check to see if your camera has this fault. Try zooming into a scene, focus, then zoom fully out and check if the image gets a little soft. Record the whole test so you can check it on a big screen. Also check to see if the problem occurs when you don't use ND filters, like an interior scene.
If this is the issue, then you need to contact Canon about this. This is something they can fix.
 
Any updates on this? As an xf305 user, I'm curious. I have not had any issues with sharpness, and feel that, with years of work in still photography, including a degree in it, I would notice something on the 'soft' side. Not sure what you are used to using in the past. Might it be the change over to using CMOS sensors? I did feel that my HMC150 had almost too much sharpness of detail, and dialed it back. The xf305 has a softer look than the 150, but overall the 'softness' I see I chalk up to the Canon 'look'. But also, the LCD might have an effect. I've noticed a huge variability in LCDs, but I'll take your word, given your business experience. There have been some parfocal issues reported with some of the cameras, could this be a parfocal problem?
 
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