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Has anyone used "back button focusing" (sometimes called thumb focusing)? The camera is reset to switch focusing from the shutter to the AF-ON button on the back of the camera. I have heard from one published nature photographer that this has several advantages in nature photography. I had never heard of this before, and am not sure what the advantages might be, so I thought maybe someone on the forum could offer some insight. Thanks.
Hello Johnm, I am the new kid on the block. (Joined this morning Feb.27th.) I have used the thumb method on my Canon 40D a few years ago but I disabled it after I was getting too many missed shots. Why? Because I shoot mainly birds, and the branches between me and the bird would be continually throwing off my focus. So I went back to my old method of manual focussing. Also my arthritic fingers could not get used to "finger on shutter" and "thumb on focus". I am sorry I can not give a super technical answer. Regards Jim
I use it for sports. I shoot American Football and it is great when I need to focus on a player without the fear of another player or official coming into the frame thus losing focus on what I wanted. Once I get in focus, I can take my thumb off and get my shot. However, the AF with the Canon 7D and the 5D3 allows for some in camera setting of this type of AF.
When I first heard about this I was quite skeptic but I tried it anyway. I never went back. The ability to tell the camera when to use its AF capabilities and when to take an image separately proved quite useful in a lot of instances. Think low light situations for example or setting hyper-focal distance focusing for landscapes. I feel just so much more in control of my camera and I never had problems with sorting my fingers out.
Thanks for the feedback, friends. Petervdh - Good article. Thanks.
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