Nikon D3s not AF fine tuning with Focal Pro

wezza13

wezza13

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Tried to fine tune my newly acquired D3s with my 300mm PF, as it wasn't very sharp after shooting some football, but I just couldn't get my D3s to work properly with my Focal Pro software. I'd just updated the software before use and couldn't get it past a point where it said something along the lines of "taken 8 test shots and each is different blah, blah".

Tried it a few times and couldn't get it to work.

Switched to my D500 and it worked fine first time.

Also, using the hard target that I bought from Focal Pro website.

Anyone else had a similar issue?

Thanks in advance.
 
From what I remember, focal won`t auto fine tune Nikons. I had an issue with my old D700, and gave up in the end, Maybe because the D500 has the auto tune thing, it works, but with the D3s, I`m pretty sure it tells you what to adjust, and you have to then do it manually.
 
Paulie-W said:
From what I remember, focal won`t auto fine tune Nikons. I had an issue with my old D700, and gave up in the end, Maybe because the D500 has the auto tune thing, it works, but with the D3s, I`m pretty sure it tells you what to adjust, and you have to then do it manually.
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Yes, with the D500 and my previous D810 I have to do the Semi-Auto method, where I have to manually adjust the AF fine tune front and back distance manually and then press enter on the keyboard. But in the manual it says that it can Auto tune the Nikon D3s specifically but even when I select the semi-auto method it doesn't go further than the test shot part that I mentioned earlier :(
 
wezza13 said:
Yes, with the D500 and my previous D810 I have to do the Semi-Auto method, where I have to manually adjust the AF fine tune front and back distance manually and then press enter on the keyboard. But in the manual it says that it can Auto tune the Nikon D3s specifically but even when I select the semi-auto method it doesn't go further than the test shot part that I mentioned earlier :(
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That`s a wierd one then. The only thing I can think of, is firmware ...
 
Good luck mate :thumbs:
 
wezza13 said:
Tried to fine tune my newly acquired D3s with my 300mm PF, as it wasn't very sharp after shooting some football, but I just couldn't get my D3s to work properly with my Focal Pro software. I'd just updated the software before use and couldn't get it past a point where it said something along the lines of "taken 8 test shots and each is different blah, blah".
.
Click to expand...
Considering these 2 comments...
Was it previously sharp, then suddenly became unsharp? If so, perhaps something has worn to the point where getting accurate focus consistently isn't possible (without a service?).
Focal takes a number of shots and then does maths on the results to determine the best microadjustment. If the shots are sufficiently different, it's not going to give you a good answer, and in this case it seems to have given up.

What happens if you set up a forward/backward test target, and then take a number of shots (setting the lens out of focus between each one) as if you were doing microfocus adjustement manually? Is the focus all over the place? If not, then use the manual technicque to set your mfa :)
 
When I had my 2 x D3S's with the older Focal version, neither would complete the test and I got a refund for the software, however I haven't had any problem with the new software and later cameras. I assume you followed all the initial checks, VR off, single-point, viewfinder covered?
 
gramps said:
When I had my 2 x D3S's with the older Focal version, neither would complete the test and I got a refund for the software, however I haven't had any problem with the new software and later cameras. I assume you followed all the initial checks, VR off, single-point, viewfinder covered?
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Yup, went through the initial set-up multiple times with all the pre-checks taken care of :(
 
LC2 said:
Considering these 2 comments...
Was it previously sharp, then suddenly became unsharp? If so, perhaps something has worn to the point where getting accurate focus consistently isn't possible (without a service?).
Focal takes a number of shots and then does maths on the results to determine the best microadjustment. If the shots are sufficiently different, it's not going to give you a good answer, and in this case it seems to have given up.

What happens if you set up a forward/backward test target, and then take a number of shots (setting the lens out of focus between each one) as if you were doing microfocus adjustement manually? Is the focus all over the place? If not, then use the manual technicque to set your mfa :)
Click to expand...

Thank you for your response.

I bought it second-hand and, where I shoot non-league footy each weekend, took it along to the game with my 300mm PF attached. All of them seemed to be off focus-wise, where all my D500 shots, paired with my Tammy 70-200 2.8 that I've fine-tuned, came out nice and sharp.

Yesterday, at the footy, I got some shots of the players warming up and kept manually changing the af fine tune and I believe it looked better (on the LCD anyway) at around +5. Will go through the photo's this evening and check (y)
 
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