Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2001/07/16

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Subject: Re: [Leica] 1st Time Handling an M6
From: Pete Su <psu_13@yahoo.com>
Date: Mon, 16 Jul 2001 18:29:41 -0700 (PDT)

- --- Ethel Red <ethel_red@hotmail.com> wrote:
> If you have to take the time to position an auto-focus sensor on the point 
> you want in focus, and then push a button, then frame the image and push a 
> different button to fire this technological Rube Goldberg contraption, you 
> might just as well use a manual focus camera.

The difference is that the AF mechanism, in many cases, can hit focus on a spot
faster than you can manually. There are other cases when the AF sensor won't
work so well. But, when things do line up right, a modern AF camera can focus
in a half a second or less just by hitting one button.

In contrast, it always takes me several seconds to focus by hand. I'm just not
that good at it. I'll probably get better, but it's not all that interesting to
me to practice just for the hell of it.

Like most automatic mechanisms, AF works best when you tell it exactly what you
want it to do (focus on THIS spot please) and you use it when you know it will
work well (relatively well defined details with enough contrast). The same
principle applies for automatic exposure.

Pete


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