Help needed with 7D IQ

I'm looking for some help and/or advice before I go crazy. I recently bought a 7D and, to be honest, I am less than enamoured with it. In fact, I preferred the 40D of which I have just disposed. I see all the wonderful examples of this camera's results on the Post 7D pictures thread in this forum but I unable to get anywhere near the same results. I've been using a 40D since it was introduced and, before that the 10D, 20D and 30D - all with great results - but the 7D is a let down.

I know that people say that there is a learning curve with this camera and, for instance, the AF system needs getting used to, but there are other aspects of the camera's IQ that I am less than happy with. For instance, I feel that noise is excessive, even at ISO200 and, because conventional wisdom says that 7D files need more sharpening than usual, such sharpening only exaggerates the noise.

First of all, I want to know what I may expect from the camera and if I am being unrealistic and, to do that, I need other people (experts?) to look at a couple of the shots that I think are eg too noisy. If post them onto this forum, they have to be jpegs (I shoot in RAW) and the one or two I have posted on the 7D thread have suffered awfully from the conversion to jpeg.

Is there any way that I can show you gurus the RAW files, without any degradation in order for you to give me your opinions? Or is there any other way to post the pics for you to comment on the IQ in a meaningful way. Any suggestions would be very welcome.

Post a couple of jpegs @1024p that show what you usually receive from the camera. Search on POTN about noise reduction and sharpening techniques.

All the shots in my Flickr (see signature) are shot with a 7D. See if my shots are as noisy as your shots (I rarely use NR).

Sharpening doesn't have to exaggerate noise if you sharpen smartly with masks in LR.

Staszek - your pictures do not look as noisy as mine. What ISO are they?

Sdiver - I use LR. What is the technique for sharpening without accentuating noise?

Post up some samples.

I was on a 40D before the 7D and on a pixel-peeping level, I would say there isn't a whole lot of difference (other than my 40D started showing "banding patterns" at 1600 and higher). But when I look at the entire image, the 7D photo looks a helluva lot cleaner. I use to not want to go above iso800 on my 40D, now I can comfortably shoot at 3200 (again working with the entire image, not in terms of pixel-peeping).

If you are pixel peeping you may be seeing that you need increased shutter speed as compared to your previous bodies to account for the increased resolution. I've found this to be true on my 1DIV. At the resolution level of the 7D you may be seeing motion blur where you aren't used to seeing it.

Roy
It may be you and your inexperience with the new camera. There are too many people now using the 7D and not having the same issue as you.

What are the lighting conditions?

Are you under exposing the images when shooting?

Have you figured out the necessary settings with the lens and lighting at the time of shooting your subject.

It may help to send a couple of jpegs and the exif with them.

Don't worry, this issue will be settled, later than sooner....ah, I meant sooner than later.

Roy Mathers wrote in post #12297530
Staszek - your pictures do not look as noisy as mine. What ISO are they?

Sdiver - I use LR. What is the technique for sharpening without accentuating noise?

I believe on a PC it is "alt" you hold down when you are moving the sliders for sharpening. You can see what areas of the image you are controlling better by doing this and can set the detail and masking slider appropriately to sharpen true detail, not noise. You can do better in PS but I haven't ventured that far yet as LR is usually sufficient for my needs.

Thank you all so much for you help - there are some very sensible comments here it seems.

These are a couple of the shots I've taken in the past few days - the exif should be intact.

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The one on the right is under exposed, most any camera will exhibit poor noise characteristics when under exposed. The one on the left looks fine to me. (Except for the silly hat of course!)

What lens are you using, the 7D is hard on lesser quality glass, it also needs to be more rock steady in the camera shake department as 18MP is more unforgiving than lower megapixels. Your shots will get better.

EXIF data didn't survive and it helps to look at full resolution images. If you have no place to host look at www.mediafire.com or similar websites.

HKGuns wrote in post #12297656
The one on the right is under exposed, most any camera will exhibit poor noise characteristics when under exposed. The one on the left looks fine to me. (Except for the silly hat of course!)

Right and left? Mine are shown one above the other! But, judging by the comment about the policeman's helmet, I know which one you mean). According to the histogram in LR, the one in the woods was correctly exposed. With the shot of the policeman, the noise shows very clearly at 100%. Perhaps I should stop looking at them at 100%

Roy Mathers wrote in post #12297761
Perhaps I should stop looking at them at 100%

Sorry about that...I have a pretty wide screen.

The above would be a great start......Print them and see how they look to you, that is the acid test of IQ. I realize that is hard to do as I do it as well, to see how well I nailed it.....But realize that when it isn't 100% it will be fine in print & web. I have to keep reminding myself that 100% isn't that important. Especially with the resolutions we're dealing with today.

I can't see the exif and I can't see your histogram. It just looks underexposed and in the shadows on my calibrated screen.

artyman wrote in post #12297689
What lens are you using, the 7D is hard on lesser quality glass, it also needs to be more rock steady in the camera shake department as 18MP is more unforgiving than lower megapixels. Your shots will get better.

The lens was the 24-105 f/4L, an excellent lens and one that served me well on the 40D

Sdiver2489 wrote in post #12297694
EXIF data didn't survive and it helps to look at full resolution images. If you have no place to host look at www.mediafire.com or similar websites.

I have got a web site that I can use - do I just use straight jpegs with no reduction in size?