Larry Colen wrote:
I was photographing a friend playing in a small club in Capitola the other
night. When I reviewed my photos, I found that an awful lot of them were
focused on sharp edges in front of the musician:
The tip jar, drum kit, microphone etc.
I understand how this happens with autofocus. The camera is too stupid to know
what to focus on and focuses on the sharp edge. What I don't understand is why
this happens on manual focus. *I* should know better.
One challenge that I have in low light is actually seeing the line of the split prism to
try and line that up on the musician. Especially musicians that tend to move around a
lot. As such, I may rely a lot more on the microprism ring, and wonder if I just focus
until I see whatever is in that ring come into focus, and not notice that it's not
actually the subject that I'm trying to photograph. More a case of my brain saying
"something is sharp, press the shutter".
I'm curious if other people have this problem when manually focusing, and what
they do to fix it.
I got what I thought was an amusing compliment on my dancing that night. I had a rather
nice slow blues dance with an attractive young lady. Afterwards, she said in a rather
husky voice "I need a cigarette". Unfortunately, she was married. Even worse,
her husband doesn't share.
I did get a couple shots of the lead singer which turned out pretty well:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ellarsee/4807504309/in/set-72157624409188927/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ellarsee/4808124360/in/set-72157624409188927/
In the second one Amy Lou isn't as sharp as I'd like, but I do like the way
the composition worked out with Gary (the bass player) in the background.
--
Larry Colen l...@red4est.com sent from i4est
Never understood the fascination with split prisms. They're clunky and
self-limiting. Give me a plain matte any day for manual focus.
I suspect you're shooting yourself in the foot here, Larry, by trying to
use the split prism and recomposing at f/1.4. You don't have any wiggle
room shooting with such a narrow DOF, and I think this could go a long
way toward explaining why your focus is off too often. Stop the lens
down a couple clicks. This will help with the focus and will also make
the photos look like they were taken at night in a club, instead of
afternoon in the park.
Also: Relax. It's only photography.
--
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