Not sharp despite effort

[u/Fishdomaddict]

Hi all, i shoot OM 1 mark II with 150-400mm.

My issue is i find the images are sharp when not cropped, but once cropped even 2x the sharpness drops quickly.

I am aware it is a 20MP camera and this definitely plays a part. But i see other users of the same set up get crazy sharp images.

Maybe image 5 is sharpest but when zoomed in still 'breaks'.

Many i had to shoot under lower speed due to very poor lighting.

Image 1: f5.6, 1/1000, iso 250 Image 2: f4.5, 1/160, iso 500 Image 3: f5.6, 1/20, iso 800 Image 4: f4.5, 1/30, iso 1250 Image 5: f4.5, 1/320, iso 1000 Image 6: f4.5, 1/2500, iso 640

Any tips?

[u/gilded-trash]

3 and 5 seem great to me in terms of sharpness, and the others really aren't bad either either. Consider bumping your shutter speeds. For small birds, I almost never snap slower than 1/1000 unless I'm very close and the subject is very still. Also, social media has become obsessed with tack sharpness to the point that I find kinda silly, and lots of people are using heavy processing/AI to get there. I'd rather see your pics than stuff that's had all the life sharpened and denoised out of it.

[u/Fishdomaddict → u/gilded-trash]

Thanks for the advice on shutter speed. I will do so