We all want sharper photos. But sometimes it seems like no matter what we do we just can't seem to get them pin sharp like we want. Here are a few tips to help you get your pictures as sharp as you want.
1. Pick your focus point
Today's DSLR's and mirror-less cameras have a feature to let you manually select your focus point. The camera's come shipped with it set up that the camera picks your focus point for you. While the camera's do a good job of picking the focus point, it is still guessing. The camera usually selects the closest object or the object that is dead center in the frame to focus on. This isn't always what you want to focus on. I rarely have my camera set to auto focus. Virtually all professional photographers rarely use this focus mode.
Set your camera to spot or single point focusing. That way it lets you pick exactly what you want to focus on in the image. For anything that has eyes, you typically want to put that focus point on the eyes. We are all draw to a subjects eyes so you want this to be your primary focus most of the time.
2. Pick the right focus mode
Most camera's have two primary focus modes. Single shot or continuous focus (AI Servo for Canon, nobody knows why Canon calls it that). Single shot is great for subjects that are not moving. But it does a terrible job of focusing when your subject is moving. AI servo or continuous focus allows the camera to refocus as you subject moves in the frame. The camera anticipates where the subject will be and continually auto-focuses to keep the subject in focus for you to take the shot.
3.Shutter Speed
Shutter speed is crucial to getting great shots. When you use a camera no matter how good you are there is always some movement in the camera when you hold it. Their are many steps you can take to minimize the shake in the camera, but nobody can be perfectly still. Aside from shaky hands, breathing and even heartbeats cause a slight amount of shake in a camera lens.
This effect becomes more pronounced the longer your lens is.
The way to combat this by using a faster shutter speed. The faster your camera records the image the less the shake in your hands becomes an issue.
The rule of thumb is to make sure your shutter speed at least matches the focal length of your lens. This becomes more of an issue on telephoto lenses. If you are shooting at 200mm make sure your shutter speed is at least 1/200 of a second or more.
4. Use a tripod or mono-pod
One way to combat camera shake is using a tripod or mono-pod. This will help to keep the camera still and help to eliminate camera shake. This becomes more of an issue when the light is low. In bright sunlight you can usually achieve a high enough shutter speed that a tri-pod or mono-pod is not necessary. But when the light gets low it is pretty much a necessity.
5. Remote or self timer
When the light gets really low and you have to slow the shutter down any vibration can cause blur, even when you use a tripod. The simple press of the shutter button can introduce some shake into the image, especially with cheap tripods.
The way to combat this is to use a remote shutter release to snap the picture. If you do not have a remote, just set the camera to self timer mode. Compose you shot and wait for the camera to snap the picture.
6. Image Stabilization
Get a lens that has image stabilization commonly referred to as IS (also called vibration reduction (VC) or optical stabilization OS). These lenses automatically compensate for image shake in the camera and help you to achieve sharper pictures.
7. Lens
While I usually do not advocate buying more expensive equipment when it comes to what lens to use, spending the money definitely helps you to achieve better pictures. It does not mean you have to buy the most expensive Canon or Nikon lens. While they tend to produce the sharpest images out their, you can often find third party lenses that come close at a fraction of the price. Tamron and Sigma have come a long way and are very close to producing images as sharp as the big two manufactures at a fraction of the price.
The reason these lenses perform so much better is the have better optics. These better optics allow faster focusing, better low light performance and sharper images.
Regardless of the gear you have, with some practice and proper technique you can achieve sharp images in a variety of shooting situations.
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