> Warren Sunkel wrote: > Continuous focus means > that the camera will continuously refocus on the selected spot in the > viewfinder (the F5 has five: top, bottom, left, right, center). My personal opinion from using mine for a year is that these five spots are too close together; all in the middle. Ironically, I use AF in the studio when I use this camera at all in there, and MF(?... that doesn't sound right) manual focus on moving trains.
> The > shutter will then operate at the motor-driven speed and assume that the > camera is always in focus. This mode works fine until you 1) hit a > headlight, 2) hit the sky, or 3) hit a large area of Platinum Mist on > the side of a Genesis unit. Or 4), compose a normal shot where the train isn't in the middle under the AF sensors. I was excited about the F5 autofocus literature when I got my camera, but now I use AF very little. Too many variables to control for me when I am primarily interested in sharp focus and my composition. This never seems to take place where those little sensors are. Maybe it's just me? I enjoy focusing on the train myself much more than experiencing the tense suspense as I watch the train in the viewfinder and hope that it doesn't lose contact from an AF sensor, and to what degree. And in Dynamic AF mode, which of the five sensors that is in use is not indicated once the focus point shifts! > Dave Cohen can be much more specific on the above points. Maybe he > will chime in here. Well, OK. The camera is OK. I just never had much luck with AF and trains. I still try once in a while though. I'm still waiting for a camera that knows where I want it to focus. Unfortunately, that would be impossible. I used to rely heavily on split image focusing screens, but now I am favoring the plain mat type (with lines) more because I can compose my shot the way I like it and keep it that way while I focus without any other distractions on my finder. The cross lines on the focusing screen help me keep handheld shots level too when I cannot use a tripod, or when I pan with the ballhead loose. I also have better than 20/20 corrected vision, and I know this is a big issue and it helps me focus more than any of the camera variables. Despite all of this, I do think that AF definitely has its applications. I also think that predictive autofocus modes are still in their infancy and things will get much better in the future. There needs to be more AF sensors and they need to be tied to the distance of the moving subject in correlation with a much more reliable computer program. Similar to the D Nikon flash technology, but for moving subjects. There is no such thing as a 'simple' autofocus system that works reliably. Surely a more complex program can plot the course of a moving object and track it better by plotting a projected path than what we have available today. If a 35mm camera had as many AF sensors as the F5 has RBG color meter sensors, this would be close to accurately possible. Wishful thinking I suppose. I actually like to manually focus. > My greatest satisfaction with the F5 has been the 3-D color matrix > metering. It is not bad for a reflected meter. I still like my hand held incident meters. And I still use my best judgment even then. I have no idea why this method seems to work for me, but it does. My greatest satisfaction with the F5 so far has been with the third stop aperture and shutter speed adjustments. Of course normal infinite aperture adjustment is also possible when you move the aperture ring (from its smallest aperture setting) instead of the secondary command dial on the front, but you lose the aperture digital display in the viewfinder and top displays when you do this. Luckily you still have the Aperture Direct Readout (ADR) showing right off of the lens' actual aperture ring still showing in the viewfinder, but once you get used to looking in one spot for it instinctively, you get irritated when your data is in different places and displayed in different forms when you use a different aperture control ring. This is one of the F5's biggest control problems. If it didn't cause me problems in use, I wouldn't have thought it worth mentioning here. Regards, Dave Cohen Photographer [EMAIL PROTECTED] --> SPORRS: Serious Photographers of Railroad Related Subjects
