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Does the Q Portend the Death of the M?


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Because the eye is closer.

 

Perhaps you ought to get yourself one of these new-fangled Sony cameras that look for eyes and focus on them; it would be so much easier  :D

 

In that shot, how much is the depth of field, and how much closer is the eye, assuming that you could focus on it with an RF (i.e., that the poor beast froze for you)

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jaapv's picture demonstrates the simple fact that AF concentrates on any part of a cluttered environment whereas MF allows you to decide on exactly the point of focus. A great picture, jaapv.

Thank you for explaining with a photo what would have taken me an age to describe in words.

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A good AF lets one choose the exact point of focus as well provided DoF is not too wide. Just half press the shutter release when you find it and recompose that's all. Now an AF lens is required of course and the Leica ones are not made for rangefinders so far.


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Perhaps you ought to get yourself one of these new-fangled Sony cameras that look for eyes and focus on them; it would be so much easier  :D

 

In that shot, how much is the depth of field, and how much closer is the eye, assuming that you could focus on it with an RF (i.e., that the poor beast froze for you)

A Visoflex is no a rangefinder. In my lexicon DOF does not exist. it is called DOM*. It would next to impossible to use a rangefinder, assuming you could get close enough to use a 135 (which not)

 

*Depth of misfocus

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jaapv's picture demonstrates the simple fact that AF concentrates on any part of a cluttered environment whereas MF allows you to decide on exactly the point of focus. A great picture, jaapv.

Actually, jaapv's post and yours only demonstrate you don't know much about AF...

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I  guess you have never actually taken this kind of photograph...

You cannot even see the animal through the branches, you need the narrow DOF of binoculars to find it and the narrow DOF of the telelens to photograph it. Both animal and branches are moving. How are you going to prevent the AF to lock onto a twig?? The moment you try  (or the camera tries through an eye detection feature) to lock focus another branch will move in front.

The problem with AF is that it is not very good at deciding the content of the photograph.

 

My take: Use a camera with AF when AF works best, one with MF when MF works best, and for the rest (which for most of us is 90% of our photography) whatever you like best. Not worth starting a tribal war over.

 

In the case of point, I will use MF for everything, because I am not going to carry a second system all over the world and my 90% preference is manual, not because I think one is "best" over the other.

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jaapv's picture demonstrates the simple fact that AF concentrates on any part of a cluttered environment whereas MF allows you to decide on exactly the point of focus. A great picture, jaapv.

Thank you for explaining with a photo what would have taken me an age to describe in words.

There is autofocus when you let the camera decide what is in focus and there is autofocus when you decide yourself.   The way to do this is to ignore the fancy 51 point modes and set the camera for a single autofocus point.   You use that to decide what is in focus and with a half press hold it and recompose if necessary.  It is very accurate that way, and maybe even in Jaap's image you could do it with this kind of autofocus technique.  Like using a rangefinder, it is slower but more accurate.  This is the way I always use autofocus, in any autofocus camera I have owned.  Maybe because I grew up with a rangefinder patch and it is more comfortable as a working style.   Autofocus is seen by many here as "stupid".  It is if you allow it to be but it doesn't have to be that way.

 

BTW I still prefer to do it myself manually on an M.   

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In other words, you can use AF in very much the same way as you use AE...

 

I often take a reading of a neutral area in the frame and then hold exposure with a half press... so why not with AF.

 

That's how I was thinking all the way through these discussions... I never really thought about a FULL autofocus camera... that would be pretty useless... but an AF with a small focus point ie. smaller than an M rangefinder patch, would be a great step up on an M with AF lenses, switchable with the standard optical (rangefinder patch) for manual focus.

 

All you need do is switch off the rangefinder patch mechanically and superimpose an electronic rangefinder in that same area... allowing the focus area to expand on focus much in the same way as the existing EVF solutions with focus peaking. It would make accurate focussing easier on manual - leaving the choice to the user whether to use fully manual RF focussing, assisted manual focussing with an electronic rangefinder and auto focus on a single point AF system.

 

That way you leave the existing rangefinder screen exactly as is, with space outside the frame just as there always has been.

 

Designed sympathetically, wouldn't even need to see any real difference in the viewfinder either.

 

I still don't see why anyone would object to the M moving in that direction... You get what you want in an M with the advantages of an evolving system...

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I wouldn't object to moving in that direction.  The superimposed patches have defined "optical rangefinder" for decades but there may be ways to retain the rangefinder advantages while reinventing the way focus is achieved.  Ideally this could work with MF lenses too.  It would just be focus confirmation done electronically.  Of course we have not seen any new system yet so there is no way to compare -- yet.   I suppose some will still prefer the optical approach no matter.

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Alan, you could possibly do, but you are making a simple thing difficult. Just like I (and quite a few others here) can demonstrate manually focused shots that would have been easier taken with AF, but, as it is one needs to have the appropriate camera to one's eye, being dogmatic about technique results in no shot at all....

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... I was thinking that you could have BOTH optical viewfinder and electronic viewfinder targetting the patch and switch between the two (the mechanical switch shutting down the optical path and the electronics taking over the patch area).

 

All this in a single body supposed to have more MPs, to do AF and to be faster and slimmer than the M240... Would this be feasible technically and how many firmware updates would we have to endure before this swiss army knife camera works as simply and efficiently as an M is supposed to? Jack of all trades...

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... I was thinking that you could have BOTH optical viewfinder and electronic viewfinder targetting the patch and switch between the two (the mechanical switch shutting down the optical path and the electronics taking over the patch area).

Bill, I think this is unrealistic because of size and complexity and cost (but I am not an engineer so maybe I am wrong).  I think it more likely they would continue to offer an optical VF/RF as long as there was enough demand, while also offering a parallel new solution that was a digital RF (even if not AF). 

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Maybe I got a bit carried away there... But there is no reason technically why this couldn't be done. It's certainly not a jack of all trades, more a 'would meet everyone's demands' type of thing... which is kind of what this thread is all about isn't it...?

 

Surely no one takes any of this too seriously? :)

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