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Post by zou on Dec 10, 2022 12:30:02 GMT
Pretty much all my film lenses have focus scales on them which allow for easy zone focusing. These days if there is a scale, it seems to be about 1cm from infinity to close focus and of little practical value. Has autofocus (and small sensor sizes) rendered zone focusing obsolete? The only modern camera I can think of that's designed to be shot with zone focusing is the Ricoh GR.
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Post by squeamishossifrage on Dec 11, 2022 13:18:05 GMT
I would argue yes, it is still relevant (and another reason why I am sticking to my ancient Sony system). I am a sucker for the grand landscape with a detailed close foreground, and frequently use zone focus to get sharpness from front to back, and even going to zone focus stacking if simple zone focusing won't hack it.
Being something of a geek I actually wrote an app for my Android 'phone to calculate depth of field, zone point-of-focus, and full focus stacking zones, based of frame size and pixel density, not final picture size.
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Post by John Farrell on Dec 12, 2022 19:04:07 GMT
My newly aquired Kiev 4 has a non working rangefinder, so zone focusing is how I've been exposing. Not easy on a Contax style lens mount!
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Post by zou on Dec 12, 2022 19:05:46 GMT
My newly aquired Kiev 4 has a non working rangefinder, so zone focusing is how I've been exposing. Not easy on a Contax style lens mount! Is that with the serrated focus wheel? |
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Post by John Farrell on Dec 12, 2022 19:16:53 GMT
My newly aquired Kiev 4 has a non working rangefinder, so zone focusing is how I've been exposing. Not easy on a Contax style lens mount! Is that with the serrated focus wheel? Yes. |
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Post by steveandthedogs on Dec 12, 2022 19:38:54 GMT
Probably obsolete on modern mirrorless, even with manual lenses. Focus peaking is wonderful.
Tend not to use zone much on film cameras, usually can make a reasonably accurate estimation.
For a given value of accurate.
S
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Post by geoffr on Dec 12, 2022 20:07:24 GMT
As far as I can see AF lenses don’t lend themselves to zone focusing but one can approximate by finding something at an appropriate distance on which to focus before recomposing. Therefore I think it still relevant.
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Post by peterba on Dec 13, 2022 13:43:32 GMT
Is zone focus relevant anymore?
For me, yes it is. I use ZF quite often with adapted lenses, on digital. Focus peaking can be very useful, but sometimes it doesn't work as well as one might wish. That's when ZF can come to the rescue.
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Post by zx9 on Dec 13, 2022 15:42:26 GMT
Probably obsolete on modern mirrorless, even with manual lenses. Focus peaking is wonderful. Tend not to use zone much on film cameras, usually can make a reasonably accurate estimation. For a given value of accurate. S I find it (focus peaking) a bit too slow on the EOS M6 mk2, when using manual lenses I tend to set some expected focus distance similar to how I would walk around with any other manual focus camera. Pre focus and grab the first shot, re focus and take a second shot if time permits so yes it is relevant to me. |
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Post by Ivor E Tower on Dec 13, 2022 20:15:10 GMT
As an "oldie" (I was around before you could buy auto-focus lenses), with manual focus you used to have about 270 degrees or more of rotation on a lens from closest focus distance to infinity, so there was quite a degree of tolerance when trying to focus on something specific. Modern AF lenses tend to have only about 10 or 20 degrees of movement (at least to me, it seems that little sometimes) from closest focus to infinity, so focusing is more difficult and hence zone focusing is largely irrelevant as you have to get focussing spot-on
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Post by petrochemist on Dec 14, 2022 19:45:23 GMT
Surely it depends on the equipment being used, and perhaps on the situation.
Many feel film is no longer relevant, others only shoot film.
I'm not sure if there are any photographic techniques that are totally irrelevant today - I seriously doubt I'll personally ever try Daguerreotypes, but there are those that still make them.
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Post by nickr on Dec 14, 2022 19:59:26 GMT
Surely it depends on the equipment being used, and perhaps on the situation. Many feel film is no longer relevant, others only shoot film. I'm not sure if there are any photographic techniques that are totally irrelevant today - I seriously doubt I'll personally ever try Daguerreotypes, but there are those that still make them. I bought 3 cameras last week - 2 of them only have zone focus. |
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Post by zou on Dec 15, 2022 20:55:05 GMT
Surely it depends on the equipment being used, and perhaps on the situation. Many feel film is no longer relevant, others only shoot film. I'm not sure if there are any photographic techniques that are totally irrelevant today - I seriously doubt I'll personally ever try Daguerreotypes, but there are those that still make them. I bought 3 cameras last week - 2 of them only have zone focus. But you are (I hope you don't mind me saying this) weird, in the grand scheme of things.  It's just a relatively small number of us who still spend time and money on such stuff. |
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Post by petrochemist on Dec 15, 2022 21:58:15 GMT
I bought 3 cameras last week - 2 of them only have zone focus. But you are (I hope you don't mind me saying this) weird, in the grand scheme of things. It's just a relatively small number of us who still spend time and money on such stuff. Weirdo's are not as rare as you might think, judging by the number of people who out bid me on e-bay or browse my favorite charity shop... There are a number of them that I bump into apart from that too. |
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Post by nickr on Dec 15, 2022 22:37:34 GMT
But you are (I hope you don't mind me saying this) weird, in the grand scheme of things. It's just a relatively small number of us who still spend time and money on such stuff. Weirdo's are not as rare as you might think, judging by the number of people who out bid me on e-bay or browse my favorite charity shop... There are a number of them that I bump into apart from that too. Well you're obviously right, Zou, but then I agree that there are plenty of us about. If I think of the cameras I've used in the last few months, my travel mirrorless setup (EOS M system based) has several manual focus lenses, and the 8mm fisheye and 9mm ultrawide tend to be used with zone focus - they're tricky to focus absolutely precisely, and there's generally no need to. My Lubitel I tend to zone focus - not the easiest thing to focus. Aside from that, my big digital cameras tend to be used in AF, except for my MF tilt/shift lens, which I always focus carefully. The 35mm SLRs I've used have all been focused in the standard way, but that's because I'm trying to work out which I like best anyway. What else have I used recently? Can't actually remember. |
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It's just a relatively small number of us who still spend time and money on such stuff.