possible focus problem - test shots - now what?

Last Saturday I grabbed my T3i and my 70-200 2.8 IS and headed to a park here in Cleveland where there is a "castle" i set up on a tripod about 100' back turned off IS, and started shooting with the self timer. Started at 2.8 and 200mm and worked up to about f11 at 200 before going to 135mm, going through the aperatures again back to 2.8, then switched to 70mm. I didn't move the tripod during the testing, but did hit the back button focus each time just to make sure nothing changed. In viewing all images at 100% every photo taken at below f6 or so looked soft to me on my computer. even some above f6 looked soft based on the focal length. (the photos were of a rock wall on the front side of the castle, with a corner just to the right of the focal point so that I could get some impression of depth in the pics)

I only have DPP on my computer. How do I do a 100% crop so that I can post them here? I'm hoping that you guys can verify a potential focus problem, or just tell me I am nuts. I do know that I've seen photos posted here that look absolutely stunning and when I take similar photos they look fuzzy and not at all sharp in many cases.

Posting photos would help. Grab screen captures of 100% zooms on your computer and host them -- leave the focus points from DPP. Just host them online through flickr, imageshack, photobucket, etc., then right-click to get the URL of the .jpg, click the little landscape icon above your message window on this site, and paste the URL. You can also host a presentable resolution and post that, then post a URL to the full-size version.

Can you also please post your EXIF with the shot (screen capture won't have it)?

Are you selecting focus point manually? Are you using the center point?

Check this previous thread out. Step by step procedure although a few things might be different since the DDP version is likely much newer.

https://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthre​ad.php?t=497533

It also looks like this sticky thread could help:
-=What to do if you suspect a focus problem with your DSLR=-

waterrockets wrote in post #15100367
It also looks like this sticky thread could help:
-=What to do if you suspect a focus problem with your DSLR=-

When I posted my focus problem question last week I was pointed to that thread. I've since taken a pile of pics on a tripod but now need an objective opinion. Didn't have time yesterday to crop the pics and figure out how to include EXIF info (or write it all down) I'm assuming the shutter speed, aperature, ISO, and focal length is what is needed?

That's the basic info.

Also, make sure to tell us if you were using manual focus point selection or not, and if so, which point.

A sample EXIF from a 60D is attached. Theer is a lot more info that might be useful as you can readily see. Things like focusing method, metering method, etc.

Can I grab just that window for copy and paste? Whenever I have done a screen shot in the past it always saves my entire desktop view.

That's fine.

This might be a good time to embrace Internet image hosting though. Many of us have EXIF viewers and can pull it out of an image w/out the photographer doing anything (assuming you don't strip it in export/development).

waterrockets wrote in post #15103456
That's fine.

This might be a good time to embrace Internet image hosting though. Many of us have EXIF viewers and can pull it out of an image w/out the photographer doing anything (assuming you don't strip it in export/development).

LOL, I have been uploading stuff to Flickr. Are you able to grab the data from there? If so I won't worry about creating extra files with the screen captures. I'll just note the few items with each photo.

mikeinctown wrote in post #15103517
LOL, I have been uploading stuff to Flickr. Are you able to grab the data from there? If so I won't worry about creating extra files with the screen captures. I'll just note the few items with each photo.

Absolutely! I don't use Flickr, but probably 1/3 - 1/2 of the posters on POTN do. There seems to be a standard format that gives you the image link, credit, caption, and a couple links back to the photo on Flickr. I'm sure you could figure it out by doing the first part of a reply to a flickr post, quoting so you can see what they have in their post.

At any rate, if you link us to a photo, we can get to the Exif there (under "Actions" on Flickr, to the left and above your image)

Just an FYI, in Windows the PrintScrn key grab the entire screen as you have observed - the Alt-Print Scrn hotkey combination only grabs the active window. So if you have the EXIF up for a particular image, then Alt-Print Scrn will only grab the EXIF window.

mikeinctown wrote in post #15099415
Last Saturday I grabbed my T3i and my 70-200 2.8 IS and headed to a park here in Cleveland where there is a "castle" i set up on a tripod about 100' back turned off IS, and started shooting with the self timer. Started at 2.8 and 200mm and worked up to about f11 at 200 before going to 135mm, going through the aperatures again back to 2.8, then switched to 70mm. I didn't move the tripod during the testing, but did hit the back button focus each time just to make sure nothing changed. In viewing all images at 100% every photo taken at below f6 or so looked soft to me on my computer. even some above f6 looked soft based on the focal length. (the photos were of a rock wall on the front side of the castle, with a corner just to the right of the focal point so that I could get some impression of depth in the pics)

I only have DPP on my computer. How do I do a 100% crop so that I can post them here? I'm hoping that you guys can verify a potential focus problem, or just tell me I am nuts. I do know that I've seen photos posted here that look absolutely stunning and when I take similar photos they look fuzzy and not at all sharp in many cases.

DPP will allow you to crop the image, and then export to a .jpg for posting, and the exif data will be carried along when you do so.

archer1960 wrote in post #15104111
DPP will allow you to crop the image, and then export to a .jpg for posting, and the exif data will be carried along when you do so.

How are you exporting the .jpg? I don't know of a way to do it with DPP. If you take the screen capture and save it to a .jpg in Paint, the EXIF is lost. So, how do you do it?

Just crop it to a postable resolution in DPP, and develop it normally. You can undo or reset the crop if needed for later.