[wwwmorrell]

What is wrong with you people. "LOL"
It is the year 2007 of our Lord, should we give up on auto gears, antiskid brakes, air bags in our cars, use meat safes instead of our fridges & eskys, & not to mention our ever realiable auto air conditioners & heating systems.
By all means play with the manual settings, but when it comes to the crunch its pretty hard competing with a mini computer working for you in your own camera.
Please I mean no offence, but I'm sure ninety percent of us rely on our auto settings.
Wal'

[PDL]

What is wrong with you people. "LOL"
It is the year 2007 of our Lord, should we give up on auto gears, antiskid brakes, air bags in our cars, use meat safes instead of our fridges & eskys, & not to mention our ever realiable auto air conditioners & heating systems.
By all means play with the manual settings, but when it comes to the crunch its pretty hard competing with a mini computer working for you in your own camera.
Please I mean no offence, but I'm sure ninety percent of us rely on our auto settings.
Wal'

Just who said anything about disabling AF? Why should I choose to use a limiting factor due to default settings on a camera I purchased mainly because I gained more control? (the K10D)

Just us AF to your advantage and bank on all that you have learned over the last 40 odd years.

Automatic trasmissions on cars - have their place - my son and I have manual gearboxes. My wife has an auto - big deal. All of them have anti-lock breaks - I will not buy a car without anti-lock and All-wheel drive. Air bags are mandated by the government - AF is not. Fridges, air conditioning and heaters were out long before AF. I even grew to prefer AP (apeture prefered) cameras - what I do not like is multi hundred USD cameras that make all the decisions for me - because they make the wrong ones. I am in control - but I use AF to an obscene degree - I just do not let the camera's shutter button determine what is in focus. By the use of the OK/AF button - I am in control, not the really dumb computer in the camera.

Does the computer in the camera make good choices - about 90% of the time yes - but I prefer to try to live in the 10% where it fears to go. If the image is bad - then I am to blame, not the camera - get the picture?

If you want a camera that will do all the work for you - then by a P&S and leave the creativity to the computer. Blame the camera because it really does not have a clue.

The Elitist - formerly known as PDL

[NaClH2O]

What is wrong with you people. "LOL"
It is the year 2007 of our Lord, should we give up on auto gears, antiskid brakes, air bags in our cars, use meat safes instead of our fridges & eskys, & not to mention our ever realiable auto air conditioners & heating systems.
By all means play with the manual settings, but when it comes to the crunch its pretty hard competing with a mini computer working for you in your own camera.
Please I mean no offence, but I'm sure ninety percent of us rely on our auto settings.
Wal'

There are a LOT of times when the AF function is not precise enough. The AF sensors cover a fairly wide area, and unfortunately what they use as their focus point may not be what I want. If I'm taking a portrait I may want to focus on the eye instead of the nose. If the AF sensor covers both, it will most likely focus on the nose, not where I want the focus point to be. Don't get me wrong, I'm much more of an "early adopter" than I am a "luddite" but if I can have more precise control and do it just as quickly, (see the link I posted above in my other post for a way to get quick precise manual focus) why should I rely on something that doesn't do it as well as I can?

NaCl(like PDL said, it's all about control...precise control)H2O

[wwwmorrell]

Ooooops, sooooorry, Pentax spends millions on R&D with our cameras & lenses & most of the advice coming is to ignore it all & go manual????
Please dont get me wrong, I have spent months here lurking & learning since I bought my first DSLR almost a year back & have very much appreciate the advice posted by all the members.

And as for your suggestion "PDL" to buy a P&S, I think I'll struggle on with my DSLR as I really can't blame it, its a "Pentax" much smarter than I.
Wal'

[Mike Cash]

Ooooops, sooooorry, Pentax spends millions on R&D with our cameras & lenses & most of the advice coming is to ignore it all & go manual????

One of the many things I have always liked about Pentax Forums is that it is usually devoid of hyperbole.

[NaClH2O]

Ooooops, sooooorry, Pentax spends millions on R&D with our cameras & lenses & most of the advice coming is to ignore it all & go manual????

<SNIP>

Wal'

Use what you want to use. Most of the time I'm in Av priority, sometimes in TAV priority, rarely do I go Green or P. So you're suggesting since P is more automatic than Av or TAv than I should stick to that? It must be better because it's auto? What if I want a greater or lesser DOF than what P will give me? Just accept whatever the camera gives me because that is what the camera gives me? I bought a DSLR because it gave me more flexibility. Why should I ignore that flexibility and go all auto?

NaCl(it's still about control...precise control)H2O

[JCSullivan]

I love controversy it adds colour and more opinions to the original question.

Wal, I hope you will continue learning from this forum, it's a beautiful place to be. And, BTW, Welcome to the world of posting.

[JamesD]

What is wrong with you people. "LOL"
It is the year 2007 of our Lord, should we give up on auto gears, antiskid brakes, air bags in our cars, use meat safes instead of our fridges & eskys, & not to mention our ever realiable auto air conditioners & heating systems.
By all means play with the manual settings, but when it comes to the crunch its pretty hard competing with a mini computer working for you in your own camera.
Please I mean no offence, but I'm sure ninety percent of us rely on our auto settings.
Wal'

I see the LOL so I'm taking your comment in the good-natured spirit it was meant to be. To a large degree I concur... that is, I make use of some of the auto settings (i.e. auto-focus due to my eyes not being what they were, auto-exposure through the hyper-Program allowing me some measure of control). However, you made one statement to which I would object. You said, "I'm sure ninety percent of us rely on our auto settings." The fact is, we've no way of knowing this for certain. It's a guess, plain and simple and from what I've read in this thread and from what Herbert Keppler stated in his article, this is not completely true. I know in my own case, that I generally follow Keppler's advice and turn off a good many of the auto-settings simply because I find they complicate my picture-making outings rather than free them up.

Anyway... just my two cents worth of opinion (I know... not worth much). All the best to you.

[PDL]

Ooooops, sooooorry, Pentax spends millions on R&D with our cameras & lenses & most of the advice coming is to ignore it all & go manual????
Please dont get me wrong, I have spent months here lurking & learning since I bought my first DSLR almost a year back & have very much appreciate the advice posted by all the members.

And as for your suggestion "PDL" to buy a P&S, I think I'll struggle on with my DSLR as I really can't blame it, its a "Pentax" much smarter than I.
Wal'

Camera manufactures have spent millions in R&D but they can not replace the computer behind the lens. If you want to keep everything in default mode - great, I have no problem with that.

I do suggest that you go out and get a camera that has less flexibility than a DSLR - of any brand - if you do not want to understand how and why things work. DSLR's provide you the control you want; if you just want to assume that you have arrived as a photographer - because you have a DSLR - that is all right with me too. But I suggest that you wander away from the defaults - just to experiment a little and see if you can be a little more creative than just accepting some engineer’s concept of what you should do.

I hope you will not be in the position of having someone ask you "what do all these dials an buttons do?" where you only response is --- "ahhhh - I don't know - I just use defaults". Go ahead - change a dial - stretch yourself - learn a little - grow. These things are not fashion statements, jewelry or status symbols; they are tools and tools beg to be used in creative ways.

The Elitist - formerly known as PDL

PDL, isn't pressing the AF button to auto focus, and pressing the shutter release half way to auto focus, performing the same function?

Jeff

[PDL]

PDL, isn't pressing the AF button to auto focus, and pressing the shutter release half way to auto focus, performing the same function?

Jeff

In a general way - yes - the half press or the AF button engage the AF subsystem, but it is how and when it is used that separate the concept.

Here is my put. Ever since I have been into photography, the act of taking a picture is basically the same. I focus on the thing that I want in focus, use what ever black magic I have to screw up the exposure - then I frame the image and shoot. During this period of time the exposure meter was always linked to the shutter button - so I had to push the shutter button to activate the light meter. Focusing was done by choosing the subject and using the split screen prism and ground glass mat screen to determine what I wanted to be the focus point. The object used to set the exposure was not necessarily the same object as the focus.

Now enter the autoeverything SLR (my first and most frustrating one was a Pentax SF-1). With autofocus the object in the center of the focus screen was put into focus when I pushed the button as was the exposure. Back in those days, at least for the Tokina 28-70mm I got with the camera, to manually focus you had to turn off AF or you would chew up the AF motor - no clutch on the lens. This meant that I how had the camera making two decisions for me right out of the box and I take that to mean that the camera is making choices that are mine.

Now comes the DSLR and the autofocus default settings are still there - the camera wants to make those decisions for me again. But - I go to a week long photo workshop and the three pros who are instructors - to a person - said 'de-couple AF from the shutter - take back control'.

Here is a scenario. I decide to take an image of some flowers but I do not want the one in the center to be in focus - I want the one in the back to be in focus. I pick up the camera and pick the first flower I can see push the AF button and look at the composition - I decide that that composition is cr*p but realize that the exposure should be based on this "thing" - so I push the shutter button half way and hit AE-L. Now I want a flower in the back to be in focus, I point the center AF (I have it set to the center point) and push the AF button - but wait - a better composition jumps out - I move the AF point hit AF again and now the image has the point of interest. Now I go about composing the shot - moving the in focus image to the point in the viewfinder that makes the image work.

To do this with a coupled AF/shutter would have mean that I would have -- release the shutter to get the AF to engage, blowing the AE-L and causing the camera to hunt - again and again until I got it the way I wanted.

So Yes - half press and AF button do the same thing - in that they turn on the AF circuits and focus. But, with the AF de-coupled it is up to me (you know the photographer) to decide what is in focus. So No they are not the same - the way I have it set up - I am more comfortable and have greater control over the function of the camera. I spent many years experimenting with DOF and using the focus ring to set the upper and lower limits to use DOF to the maximum. Letting the camera choose what is in focus basically gives you some engineers best guess - take control - it is more interesting.

AF is a way to assist the photographer to get the shot they want; moving the function from the shutter button gives me more control. Your mileage will vary.

The Elitist - formerly known as PDL

PS - the image from above. Shot with my *ist Ds - OK button used for AF. Exposure off of foreground flower, focus on the right hand flower. Kit lens, 55mm, f/5.6 (shallow DOF - on purpose) 1/250, ISO 200.

I think I understand what you mean now. Didn't think about the shutter release half way also metering and not just AF. Thanks for your explanation.

Jeff

[wwwmorrell]

Thanks guys, I guess I have now been suitably chastised for questioning the views of some of our top posters. "LOL"

And "PDL" as mentioned in my previous post, I do experiment a little, hence my expression "struggling"
And as to your quote "what do all these dials an buttons do?" Pentax gave me a very informitive manual which I have read cover to cover & use at every opportunity.

I will now quietly go back to enjoying my photgraphy & all the options & features that Pentax have built into my camera with expectations of greater features coming soon [hopefully/Pentoya] with new models down the track.
Wal'

p/s maybe I should have explained in my original post, I am an opportunist photographer, capturing those moments in life that present very quickly & give little time to set up ???????

[JamesD]

Like I mentioned earlier... I understand where you're coming from and for the most part, I'm in agreement.

All the best to you and in truth, that's what we all should be doing: getting back to enjoying our cameras and making great images.

[Big Dawg]

This is the second camera I've owned with AF. The first was a Kodak DX6490 and one of the main reasons for my move away from the Kodak was to go back to the Manual Focus of my old K1000 Pentax. I found with the Kodak and AF that I often could not get the camera to focus on the area I wanted in focus. A bird in a tree became a background bird in a sharply focus group of limbs not the other way around...So now I not only use manual focus but manual exposure settings as I get it right more often than the camera did. Most often the camera would over expose causing me to adjust the exposure compensation any way, so I just went back to what I know works...Setting the camera's focus and exposure manually. I'm comfortable here and do a semi-competent job shooting this way....All my lens work great now no matter the amount of light available...No more cursing and swearing when the lens refuses to focus as the light level is too low....I reserve the Auto Focus and Auto Exposure for the times when the action is moving so swiftly that Manual Focus is just too slow...It's nice to have AF when it's needed but I don't want to live there. I'm now moving more and more towards all manual lens...I'll keep a few AF lens to be sure but the feel of an all manual lens is something that brings me pleasure and comfort.

Dawg