wen Posted October 31, 2007 Share #1 Posted October 31, 2007 Advertisement (gone after registration) have with MP for a while ( around 2 years now)...I found out, oh, well, friends/famliy told me that as well..." I focus too slow" especial at night time... but, how I am going to work fast...with MP, I need to work on exposure, work on composition, and then,I need to focus. And foucs on eyes when taking portraiture, it will take me a while...let's say, 10 seconds??? So, I miss lots shot (documetary, candid, journalistic, action...) except landscape that I could take time to get it right... I know pre focus might be a way to try...but, am I playing luck in this case, because with f stop at 2, it is hard to get the distance right on, isn't it??? I would love to hear how you shoot, and any trick, practice...need help here Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Advertisement Posted October 31, 2007 Posted October 31, 2007 Hi wen, Take a look here pre focus. I'm sure you'll find what you were looking for!
christer Posted October 31, 2007 Share #2 Posted October 31, 2007 using an m7 makes quite a difference, that is why i sold my m6. chris Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hookeye Posted October 31, 2007 Share #3 Posted October 31, 2007 Hmm. I use pre-setting for the exposure - a lot. Plan ahead. Always set the aparture and shutter in advance so as to be able to capture whatever is happening. Also if the focus is set reasonably close to the distance where the "action" is - you can get the eyes in focus in less than three seconds. Rely on the hyperfocal distance whenever you can. And practice, practice, practice. I often play with the camera without film in it, spin on my heel, spot an arbitrary object, focus and "shoot" it. Often I shoot even before focusing. It works well more often than not. Then I can make adjustments for the second shot, as a backup. Use wide angle lenses whenever you can. They are more forgiving on sloppy focusing. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
rob_x2004 Posted October 31, 2007 Share #4 Posted October 31, 2007 Um...I am new to MP, about a year, so I had to practice a lot. My thumb pad sits up the aperture ring, and I adjust this while I adjust focus with the tip of my forfinger on the focus ring or tab. Aperture obviously moves in the direction of the arrow. I guess holding the camera by the lens barrel is my left hand grip. I always focus from infinity, I return there as I wind on. Dont focus hunt, you will never improve. Bring the rangefinder patch up once, which at worst will be slightly past and which will be focused close and since you have better depth of field behind you are still in business. The big thing about this is you always know the direction of rotation to bring you into focus. I second knuckle the shutter release so that I rest that fingers tip on the shutter speed dial. I get it into my head to chase the viewfinder arrow, ie towards teh arrow. The shutter speed dial will roll easily, smae as your computer mouse wheel. Throw away any soft release you have on the camera, you cant operate properly with one. If they worked they would have them on the camera in the first place. Practice without film every day. You can even leave teh lens cap on with the camera in B/off which willl really test how still you can hold the camera. Cool stuff. You can do everything at the same time, and be depressing the shutter release while you are setting aperture, shutter speed focus. MP is a really well thought out camera. Much easier than learning a piano, but you do have to learn it. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
DTD Posted November 1, 2007 Share #5 Posted November 1, 2007 I'm still getting used to my M6. One tip I was given was to always return the focus to infinity and then you know you have to move the ring in the same direction every time. Decide on what is the important exposure element aperture or shutterspeed – set that and leave it – then you only have the other to adjust. Pre-meter, so then it's just focusing and composition. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
spydrxx Posted November 1, 2007 Share #6 Posted November 1, 2007 Preset exposure (aperture and shutter speed). Preset approximate distance to target (if known), or do as others suggested, keep focussed on infinity - so you know intuitively which way to focus. Also, if working close distances, preset focus and walk into or back up into the proper focus. Lastly practice, practice. practice...do it for 1/2 hr per day for a couple of weeks...pretty soon you'll have it down cold. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wen Posted November 2, 2007 Author Share #7 Posted November 2, 2007 Advertisement (gone after registration) thanks for th tips, and advise... I heard lots said pre-meter, pre-exposure...do you mean, you looked through first, and set the exposure...or do you use "off camera" meter to determine the exposure, and adjust the setting without looking through??? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
giordano Posted November 2, 2007 Share #8 Posted November 2, 2007 I heard lots said pre-meter, pre-exposure...do you mean, you looked through first, and set the exposure...or do you use "off camera" meter to determine the exposure, and adjust the setting without looking through??? Use the built-in meter or a separate one as you prefer. But the idea is that as you're walking around you always keep the camera set to a shutter speed and aperture (and maybe ISO) that is approximately right for the prevailing lighting. Using the built-in meter, you just point the camera at a 'scene of typical brightness', take a peek through the finder and set the exposure right for that. Then when the lighting changes (e.g. sun goes behind a cloud, you walk into a narrow street, whatever) do it again. After a while it becomes second nature. If the camera is always set to approximately the right exposure, then (a) a hurried shot will probably be usable even if you can't adjust the exposure specifically for it and ( with practice you can judge the scene, think "mmm, open up bit for this one" and adjust the aperture a click or two while you're raising the camera to your eye. Same with focusing. Look at a person or object, say to yourself "That's about 2.4 metres" (or "8 feet"), set the lens to that distance - and only then look through the viewfinder to see how far apart the rangefinder images are. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
frc Posted November 2, 2007 Share #9 Posted November 2, 2007 When doing rep. or doc. always use fast film. 400 ISO. This enables you to use narrow aperture with the desired deep depth of field thus focusing is much less critical. Using narrow DOF can be a nice way of bringing a subject to the viewers attention but large aperture requires accurate setting and one often just doesn't have the time to do this. Practicing helps, I focus in less than a second, but, and here the comparison with playing piano comes in, practice day in day out if you want to archieve real speed. My MP is in almost daily use for documentary and I've shot thousands of rolls with it. ( suppose one has to be a bit crazy to be a photographer;-) ) Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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