Confessions of an Autofocus Snob
Copyright 2011 Michael A. Schwarz
These fancy Nikon cameras that I like to use have some incredible technology built into them. Thankfully, lots of research and development must have gone into the autofocus functions of these cameras. I don’t know what I would do if I had to resort to manual focus or rely on substandard autofocus technology.
One function that controls how the autofocus works is called AF-Area Mode. In AF- Area mode, you basically tell the camera how the active focus point is selected. The three most used AF-Area modes are Single-point AF, Dynamic-area AF and Auto-area AF. In my workshops I usually explain that in Single-point AF mode, you set an active focus point and that focus point must be over your subject for the subject to be in focus. It works great for static or slow-moving subjects. Dynamic-area AF mode works great if you have a moving subject, because Dynamic will compensate for subject movement by utilizing adjacent focus points to maintain focus if the subject moves out of the selected focus point (and you can also control how far it will track outside of the selected point). This function is available when you are AF-A or AF-C autofocus modes (these are different than AF-Area mode).
Auto-area AF mode? Well, he said snidely, that’s for people who just don’t want to deal with the complexity of setting an active auto focus point (smirk). What do I use? Well, of course, being a pro, I would never use Auto-area AF mode (smirk). I almost always use Dynamic-area AF mode, being careful to precisely set my selected focus point in an area of the frame where the subject will be. In Auto-area mode the camera takes over control of determining what should be in focus. Not for me. I like control.
And then last month I met my match in the form of a tiny frog, staring, no, mocking me from just above the waterline in a tiny pond at the Atlanta Botanical Gardens. Now here’s the problem: the pond is surrounded by a wall, perhaps 2 or 3 feet above the waterline and I wanted to shoot the frog pretty tight and at eye level (his eye level), which meant I wasn’t going to be able to look through the viewfinder while shooting because I was going to have to lean over the wall and hold the camera down to water level, shoot with the fantastic 105mm Micro Nikkor and point it in the general direction of the frog. Kind of hard to match up the selected autofocus point with your subject when you can’t look through the viewfinder. Live View didn’t help because I couldn’t see the back of the camera. Perhaps if my camera had one of them new-fangled articulatin’ LCD screens like the Nikon 5100 has, I could have made it work. But I was shooting with my new best friend, the Nikon D7000 and dammit, I didn’t want to have to get in the pond.
So I shot a few frames using Dynamic-area AF like I usually do and naturally the focus was off because I couldn’t line up the subject with the selected autofocus point. I tried a few shots, manually focusing, but that didn’t help. And then it dawned on me, well actually it was more like a little voice screaming at me, “AUTO-AREA AF MODE, YA BIG DUMMY”. Wow, this was the perfect spot for that. Shooting blindly, trying to get the camera lined up and aimed at the frog, with the camera determining (how do it know?) that the frog was the subject of the photograph and should be in focus. Bingo. Sharp frog, dry pants and a renewed respect for Auto-area AF mode.
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