I was out shooting the other day. Over 200 shots and the focus was off-subject on all of them. It seems autofocus was focused on something other than what I was shooting. What gives with this?
Nikon lets you choose a different focus point, I'm sure Canon does that, too. I sometimes set mine to other than the middle without immediately noticing. Have you checked your settings?
I was out shooting the other day. Over 200 shots and the focus was off-subject on all of them. It seems autofocus was focused on something other than what I was shooting. What gives with this?
I was out shooting the other day. Over 200 shots and the focus was off-subject on all of them. It seems autofocus was focused on something other than what I was shooting. What gives with this?
I have the same problem with my camera, though it's not an SLR. It was better before, but nowadays seems like it totally forgot focusing. I always wait until it stops noising, and I only shoot after. Manual focus is terrible on this cam as it's just a cheap compact camera with quite a bad screen...
I was out shooting the other day. Over 200 shots and the focus was off-subject on all of them. It seems autofocus was focused on something other than what I was shooting. What gives with this?
Sometimes it pays to "chimp"! ;^)
It was set on AI Servo and Evaluative. As far as chimping goes, what's the point? You can't tell anything from those stupid little LCD displays anyhow. Lotsa times I've looked at the display and thought they looked fine only to download later and find out the shots are crap.
Doesn't your camera let you zoom in on the LCD? I took a bunch of shots once and realized (halfway back to the car) that my dioptric adjuster was set wrong. Zoomed in and saw they were OOF. Glad I did, or I would have missed the chance to reshoot.
I have focus issues with mine too. I'm thinking it's my cheap lense, though, and have just taken to using MF most of the time.
I was out shooting the other day. Over 200 shots and the focus was off-subject on all of them. It seems autofocus was focused on something other than what I was shooting. What gives with this?
Sometimes it pays to "chimp"! ;^)
It was set on AI Servo and Evaluative. As far as chimping goes, what's the point? You can't tell anything from those stupid little LCD displays anyhow. Lotsa times I've looked at the display and thought they looked fine only to download later and find out the shots are crap.
AI Servo might be a way of explaining your problems. If the focus point was slightly off the intended subject (particularly if everything is moving about rapidly), the camera might refocus onto the background and, with no focus confirmation 'beep' you might not know. Just a thought.
What lens were you using? There were a million and one threads on DPReview regarding back-focus issues with the 70-200 f4, particularly with the 300D. I've not experienced the problem myself, but I did have to make a refund to an Ebay purchaser who bought my 70-200 to use with a D60 and couldn't get a single shot out of it in focus.
I was using my 70-200 F/2.8. I find focusing issues mostly when I tend to have dark subjects in darkened areas. Like birds in trees. Auto focus will focus on a twig in the tree and not on the bird. I have some nice clear shots of twigs and branches with fuzzy birds.
I was using AI Servo because I was shooting flying eagles.
I wouldn't use evaluative. Put it on one of the spots so you can chose what to focus on (i.e. the bird and not the twig).
With evaluative the camera picks what to focus on for you, and it won't always be right (i.e. the twig). This sounds like what happened to you.
If you are shooting a high aperture this won't be a big problem, but if you are shooting low aperture (shallow DOF) it will.
As far as chimping goes, what's the point? You can't tell anything from those stupid little LCD displays anyhow. Lotsa times I've looked at the display and thought they looked fine only to download later and find out the shots are crap.
My bad. I'll keep the helpful sarcasm to myself. The zoom feature on my LCD works pretty well...been helpful a few times when uncertain.
"Chimping" just means looking at your or someone else's pictures in the viewfinder and going, "ooh ooh!" You're sorry you asked now, aren't you? ;-)
I found that any time I let the camera choose what to focus on, it virtually assured poor focusing. I set focusing to center point only and just focus on my intended subject and then recompose the shot.
And you can zoom in to check focus on the LCD, which I've done several times when it loooked like the photo might be a bit soft. If you have any doubt about your focus, take another shot.
... I set focusing to center point only and just focus on my intended subject and then recompose the shot. ...
I'll focus and recompose also, but one thing I've found to be careful of (especially with a narrow DOF) is that when moving to recompose that you don't take the intended subject slightly out of range. I'm finding myself using the focus area selection mode more frequently. Then I can choose one of nine focal points and usually not have to recompose.
If you have trouble focussing on dark subjects against light backgrounds, it may be that the subject is so dark that it lacks enough contrast for the AF system to find something to lock on to. The focus points, I believe, actually extend beyond the markers on the AF screen, so may well lock onto the branches, as there is enough contrast there (dark branch against bright sky). If the subject is, indeed, quite dark, perhaps try aiming at the edge of the subject where there is, clearly, contrast between it and the background. Obviously, this may well be a little to difficult for anyone to achieve if the subject is a fast-moving bird.
As I think has been hinted at here, evaluative is, in these cases, gonna screw you up royally. Those twigs have really high contrast edges that the AF system loves to find You have to direct the attention of the system where YOU want it, by choosing a specific focus point.
Normally it's best to choose the center focus point. I don't know for sure about the XT, but on most Canons the center point is a cross-type sensor, which gives better focus accuracy. It also gives the most options for later cropping, which will nearly always be necessary with such shots anyway.
If you're having trouble judging whether the focus is on the correct "subject" in the viewfinder, make sure the diopter adjustment is set correctly. You should be able to tell when there's significant misfocus.
You're doing the right thing using AI Servo for in-flight shots. Aim the selected focus point at the edge of the subject, not the center, in backlit situations, to take advantage of the high-contrast edge.
