I took a few more test images to test out my lens' focus/resolution. Just want to make sure that I don't have a faulty or unusually soft lens or anything, the possibility of which has been nagging me.
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They were all taken at f/8. With the image of the tree, I used center spot focus and focused on the middle branch. For the three identical landscapes, I used f/8 and focused on the foreground grass, middle of the frame, and distant buildings, respectively. These are unsharpened and unedited. I think it's safe to rule out that I have a bad lens, and just need to master my focusing and technique? I also did a basic indoor focus test with a printout of a focus chart, and I don't seem to have any front or back focusing issue.