The White Paper - Contrast, Sharpness and Quality

Chapter 7 - Contrast, Sharpness and Quality

The H-Series cameras let the user control a number of settings that impact the final image produced by the camera. While none of these is as critical as autofocus or exposure, they can add the touch that turns a good picture into a better picture.

Contrast

Contrast is the difference between the brightest brights and darkest darks in an image. Increase the contrast and the shadows become darker and the highlights brighter. Decrease the contrast and your highlights grow dim, your dark areas lighten up.

too little contrast

Contrast also affects color. More contrast usually results in more saturation of colors. Too much contrast and your pictures will look like day-glo posters. I see this often in sunset and floral shots. No sunset is more powerful, no flower more beautiful than the colors you see in nature. There's no need to enhance them - unless you've blown the exposure!.

too much contrast

Some people feel that the default contrast setting of the H1 is a little too high, so they lower it (on the menu) to -1. They're probably right. But since I like just a touch of extra contrast (I feel it makes pictures look a little more 3-dimensional), I leave mine at 0. The H2 and H5 seem to have a little more contrast at default settings and you may not have to adjust contrast. The H9 contrast seems to be spot-on and I don't imagine that you'd need to change it from the default setting of "0". Experiment!

Tip: Increasing contrast can be dangerous. It decreases dynamic range, which means you can blow highlights (turn them stark white) which will destroy all detail in the bright sections of your images. In .jpg format, the lost detail is not recoverable. Most of us spend a lot of effort tryin to maximize dynamic range, not decrease it.

The H7 and H9 have a unique new contrast setting, D-R, which used a special tone-curve to dim down the highlights a bit and bring up the dark shadows. D-R is an attempt to solve the high-contrast problem - preserving highlights and shadows in a scene that challenges the camera. For example, shoot a sunset just over a nearby hill. If you expose for the sky, the hill becomes a dark silhouette. If you expose for the hill, the sky blows out and ruins your sunset. D-R helps to preserve both the hill and the sky. It won't cure drastically high contrast, but it will help salvage those marginal shots. It works well. Like any compromise, D-R also has a downside. Photos taken with D-R turned out may be a bit less "punchy" due to the lowered contrast. On the other hand, how "punchy" is a sunset shot with the sky washed out?

correct contrast

The contrast setting should be set to reflect your personal taste.

Color

The default color setting (saturation) in the H-Series is near perfect. All the "H" cameras produce remarkably life-like, beautifully saturated colors. If you're not getting good colors, either your white balance is wrong, or your exposure is wrong. There is no need to alter the "Saturation" setting on the Menu.

Sharpness

This is another area of debate. Some people find that the H1 does too much in-camera sharpening resulting in sharpening artifacts - halos in some cases, ghost lines in others. Again, they're probably right. However, once again, the H2, H5, H7 and H9 do not suffer from oversharpening at default settings. In fact, the in-camera sharpening is close to ideal.

Tip: Generally it's not a good idea to let the camera do too much sharpening. It's hard to tell if you've oversharpened. The LCD and EVF just don't show enough detail. Since sharpening cannot be "undone", a little less sharpening is better than a little too much.

good sharpness (camera default: sharpness = 0)

too much sharpening

Although I personally use the normal (0) setting for sharpening, you might want to lower yours a bit if shooting with the H1. But don't be surprised if your pictures come out a touch too soft. You may have to add sharpening to many of your pictures in post-processing. Or raise the sharpening to +1. I don't recommend fiddling with the sharpening setting in the H2, H5, H7 and H9 unless you're diametrically opposed to post-processing and your pictures are coming out a bit soft.

Note: Don't mistake sharpening for detail. Detail is the presence of lots of information about your scene, including lines, areas of color and areas of texture. Sharpness is the contrast on the edges. Sharpening just increases the bright and dark lines on edges. It doesn't add any detail that isn't there. It just makes what's there more visible.

But there are distinct limits to what sharpening can do. If your photo is seriously out-of-focus to begin with, sharpening will not help. It can help a slightly out-of-focus image look a bit crisper, but anything more than that will result in a fake, over-processed look - an obvious "save" and an ugly photograph.

White Balance

Each film has a built-in color bias. Some are better at blues, some are warmer, some are better indoors. The White Balance setting of the digital camera lets you change the color characteristics of your digital images - with wild abandon. You need to be careful. You can get some really awful photos using the wrong White Balance.

Bad White Balance can also cause visible noise. The White Balance works by increasing the signal in the blue and/or red channels. It's like turning the ISO up, but just on one or two channels. You want to get this right in the camera, not after-the-fact, where the amplification of a channel can make any existing noise painfully apparent.

AUTO White Balance

This is one of the rare cases where a fully automatic setting works really well in the H-Series cameras, with the possible exception of indoor, non-flash shots.

Custom (One Push) White Balance

If you can't get a good color match for the scene you're shooting, get out a white handkerchief or the back of a photo print (or even better, a commercially-available 18% gray card - that's the photographer's standard). Aim the camera at it. Change your White Balance on the WB menu to "One Push Set" . The display will go dark, or flash for a bit while the camera calculates. Once it figures out the correct color balance, the menu will automatically jump to the "One Push" setting. No buttons to press, nothing to set manually. Just go to "One Push Set" and let the camera do the work.

To go back to that setting, change WB to "One Push", (the same icon without the word "SET").

Note: The H2 thourgh H9 seem to have somewhat more advanced firmware for setting a custom white balance than the H1 and earlier Sony digicams. I have shot directly at the sky, or at a line of cars, or even a building and gotten excellent custom WB. I believe these new cameras look for the brightest element they can find in a scene and, assuming that color is white, set the white balance by that point. Past cameras required a really uniform target that filled the screen to achieve good custom white balance. Not the H2 and H5. It's quite a surprising improvemen -, and a very, very good one!

Fixing White Balance

Sometimes you'll shoot a shot with the wrong white balance and the whole picture comes out blue, green, red or yellow. No problem, the information is still there. You can use the eyedroppers in Photoshop's Levels tool to restore the original colors.

Click here for an easy-to-follow article on fixing White Balance by Peter iNova published on DPReview.com.

Quality

This is an area of disagreement among photographers, but one I feel very strongly about. Always use the highest (Fine) settings and the largest possible file size. Why? Because your images are built of digital information. Any reduction in size or quality is simply throwing away information - information that you may not need now, but you never know if you might! I have some beautiful pictures I shot 5 years ago that I can't show because the resolution and quality won't let me blow them up to the necessary size.

.JPG Compression

Some claim that not much quality is lost in .JPG compression, but I disagree. I've seen my vibrant photos go lackluster, striking sharp detail go soft when compression was increased (iwhen quality was set to "Standard"). Many claim they can't see the difference in prints, but please check out the borrowed example below. The samples were taken by PhotographyBlog.com for a review of a Nikon DSLR, but the results pertain equally to the H-Series cameras. And this is the best example I've seen so far. Note the difference in contrast and detail between the two railings and louvers:

Note: Unfortunately, the H7 and H9 don't offer any settings for .JPG compression. Instead, they use a fancy algorithm to selectively compress certain areas of your image and not others. When this works right, it's excellent - the best of all possible worlds. When it doesn't work, it can take a toll on your pictures. Click here for a discussion on .JPG compression in the H7 and H9.

Next: Chapter 8 - Esthetics: Zoom, POV, Depth of Field and Bokeh
Return to White Paper Introduction and Contents



	Chapter 7 - Contrast, Sharpness and Quality

	The H-Series cameras let the user control a number of settings that impact the final image produced by the camera. While none of these is as critical as autofocus or exposure, they can add the touch that turns a good picture into a better picture. Contrast Contrast is the difference between the brightest brights and darkest darks in an image. Increase the contrast and the shadows become darker and the highlights brighter. Decrease the contrast and your highlights grow dim, your dark areas lighten up. too little contrast Contrast also affects color. More contrast usually results in more saturation of colors. Too much contrast and your pictures will look like day-glo posters. I see this often in sunset and floral shots. No sunset is more powerful, no flower more beautiful than the colors you see in nature. There's no need to enhance them - unless you've blown the exposure!. too much contrast Some people feel that the default contrast setting of the H1 is a little too high, so they lower it (on the menu) to -1. They're probably right. But since I like just a touch of extra contrast (I feel it makes pictures look a little more 3-dimensional), I leave mine at 0. The H2 and H5 seem to have a little more contrast at default settings and you may not have to adjust contrast. The H9 contrast seems to be spot-on and I don't imagine that you'd need to change it from the default setting of "0". Experiment! Tip: Increasing contrast can be dangerous. It decreases dynamic range, which means you can blow highlights (turn them stark white) which will destroy all detail in the bright sections of your images. In .jpg format, the lost detail is not recoverable. Most of us spend a lot of effort tryin to maximize dynamic range, not decrease it. The H7 and H9 have a unique new contrast setting, D-R, which used a special tone-curve to dim down the highlights a bit and bring up the dark shadows. D-R is an attempt to solve the high-contrast problem - preserving highlights and shadows in a scene that challenges the camera. For example, shoot a sunset just over a nearby hill. If you expose for the sky, the hill becomes a dark silhouette. If you expose for the hill, the sky blows out and ruins your sunset. D-R helps to preserve both the hill and the sky. It won't cure drastically high contrast, but it will help salvage those marginal shots. It works well. Like any compromise, D-R also has a downside. Photos taken with D-R turned out may be a bit less "punchy" due to the lowered contrast. On the other hand, how "punchy" is a sunset shot with the sky washed out? correct contrast The contrast setting should be set to reflect your personal taste. Color The default color setting (saturation) in the H-Series is near perfect. All the "H" cameras produce remarkably life-like, beautifully saturated colors. If you're not getting good colors, either your white balance is wrong, or your exposure is wrong. There is no need to alter the "Saturation" setting on the Menu. Sharpness This is another area of debate. Some people find that the H1 does too much in-camera sharpening resulting in sharpening artifacts - halos in some cases, ghost lines in others. Again, they're probably right. However, once again, the H2, H5, H7 and H9 do not suffer from oversharpening at default settings. In fact, the in-camera sharpening is close to ideal. Tip: Generally it's not a good idea to let the camera do too much sharpening. It's hard to tell if you've oversharpened. The LCD and EVF just don't show enough detail. Since sharpening cannot be "undone", a little less sharpening is better than a little too much. good sharpness (camera default: sharpness = 0) too much sharpening Although I personally use the normal (0) setting for sharpening, you might want to lower yours a bit if shooting with the H1. But don't be surprised if your pictures come out a touch too soft. You may have to add sharpening to many of your pictures in post-processing. Or raise the sharpening to +1. I don't recommend fiddling with the sharpening setting in the H2, H5, H7 and H9 unless you're diametrically opposed to post-processing and your pictures are coming out a bit soft. Note: Don't mistake sharpening for detail. Detail is the presence of lots of information about your scene, including lines, areas of color and areas of texture. Sharpness is the contrast on the edges. Sharpening just increases the bright and dark lines on edges. It doesn't add any detail that isn't there. It just makes what's there more visible. But there are distinct limits to what sharpening can do. If your photo is seriously out-of-focus to begin with, sharpening will not help. It can help a slightly out-of-focus image look a bit crisper, but anything more than that will result in a fake, over-processed look - an obvious "save" and an ugly photograph. White Balance Each film has a built-in color bias. Some are better at blues, some are warmer, some are better indoors. The White Balance setting of the digital camera lets you change the color characteristics of your digital images - with wild abandon. You need to be careful. You can get some really awful photos using the wrong White Balance. Bad White Balance can also cause visible noise. The White Balance works by increasing the signal in the blue and/or red channels. It's like turning the ISO up, but just on one or two channels. You want to get this right in the camera, not after-the-fact, where the amplification of a channel can make any existing noise painfully apparent. AUTO White Balance This is one of the rare cases where a fully automatic setting works really well in the H-Series cameras, with the possible exception of indoor, non-flash shots. Custom (One Push) White Balance If you can't get a good color match for the scene you're shooting, get out a white handkerchief or the back of a photo print (or even better, a commercially-available 18% gray card - that's the photographer's standard). Aim the camera at it. Change your White Balance on the WB menu to "One Push Set" . The display will go dark, or flash for a bit while the camera calculates. Once it figures out the correct color balance, the menu will automatically jump to the "One Push" setting. No buttons to press, nothing to set manually. Just go to "One Push Set" and let the camera do the work. To go back to that setting, change WB to "One Push", (the same icon without the word "SET"). Note: The H2 thourgh H9 seem to have somewhat more advanced firmware for setting a custom white balance than the H1 and earlier Sony digicams. I have shot directly at the sky, or at a line of cars, or even a building and gotten excellent custom WB. I believe these new cameras look for the brightest element they can find in a scene and, assuming that color is white, set the white balance by that point. Past cameras required a really uniform target that filled the screen to achieve good custom white balance. Not the H2 and H5. It's quite a surprising improvemen -, and a very, very good one! Fixing White Balance Sometimes you'll shoot a shot with the wrong white balance and the whole picture comes out blue, green, red or yellow. No problem, the information is still there. You can use the eyedroppers in Photoshop's Levels tool to restore the original colors. Click here for an easy-to-follow article on fixing White Balance by Peter iNova published on DPReview.com. Quality This is an area of disagreement among photographers, but one I feel very strongly about. Always use the highest (Fine) settings and the largest possible file size. Why? Because your images are built of digital information. Any reduction in size or quality is simply throwing away information - information that you may not need now, but you never know if you might! I have some beautiful pictures I shot 5 years ago that I can't show because the resolution and quality won't let me blow them up to the necessary size. .JPG Compression Some claim that not much quality is lost in .JPG compression, but I disagree. I've seen my vibrant photos go lackluster, striking sharp detail go soft when compression was increased (iwhen quality was set to "Standard"). Many claim they can't see the difference in prints, but please check out the borrowed example below. The samples were taken by PhotographyBlog.com for a review of a Nikon DSLR, but the results pertain equally to the H-Series cameras. And this is the best example I've seen so far. Note the difference in contrast and detail between the two railings and louvers: *Note:* Unfortunately, the H7 and H9 don't offer any settings for .JPG compression. Instead, they use a fancy algorithm to selectively compress certain areas of your image and not others. When this works right, it's excellent - the best of all possible worlds. When it doesn't work, it can take a toll on your pictures. Click here for a discussion on .JPG compression in the H7 and H9. Next: Chapter 8 - Esthetics: Zoom, POV, Depth of Field and Bokeh Return to White Paper Introduction and Contents