I prefocus quite often when the action location is predictable. The problem comes when you are using long lenses and want very shallow DOF and the action location is not predictable. Then AF can help. I recently finished the local league here of 26 teams (little league baseball) and posted 9,446 images to my ordering site. Of those, probably about 1/2 were AF. I am glad that I have AF available to me when I need it. There was a stretch during the season when I had to have my main lens (Sigma 100-300/4 EX) repaired. During that time, I could only use manual focus. My keeper rate went down some on the shots where I couldn't predict the action location.
-- Best regards, Bruce Friday, July 15, 2005, 1:22:06 PM, you wrote: G> Most of us old-timers would use zone focus in those kinds of G> cases. We would know what area the subject would be in focus in G> with the camera setup that way and only shoot when the subject was G> in the focus zone. Mindlessly simple when you know how, and you G> will I wager get far more in focus shots than with most AF cameras. G> It even works with the 4x5 graphic for goodness sake. G> graywolf G> http://www.graywolfphoto.com G> "Idiot Proof" <==> "Expert Proof" G> ----------------------------------- G> Markus Maurer wrote: >> Hi Graywolf and Shel >> most of the PAW/PESOS I saw from Shel so far where unmoved objects where >> manual focusing is easy. >> But, taking photographs of a soccer game or for example a young dog moving >> into your direction manually >> is really hard, at least for me and my eyes. >> >> That are some of the occasions where I would use auto focus. Otherwise I >> always shoot manually but like >> the in focus indicator on AF bodies a lot. >> >> greetings >> Markus >> >> >> >>>>Shel, I assume you know the technique of focusing an SLR without >>>>fiddling; if so you can focus manually faster than almost all >>>>auto-focus cameras in most situations especially difficult ones. >>>>So you are correct an auto-focus camera provides you with almost >>>>nothing worthwhile. >>>> >>>>graywolf >>>> >> >> >>
