Time on your hands?

[WeLoveNemo]

If so, do you want to teach me about my focus choices? I have a Nikon D50 and my choices in my AF-Area menu are: (1) Single area, (2) Dynamic Area and (3) Closest subject. I am sure my lack of understanding results in some of my most disappointing pictures.

Do you change these often?
What type of situation makes you choose which mode?

Thanks so much I appreciate your help!

 

[YesDear]

I do not have a D50 but I bet I can come close with owning a D300.

The single area is probably the bracketed area you see in the viewfinder. You should be able to move that around the viewfinder with the dial on the back of the camera. You can use that to tell the camera what in the viewfinder to focus on. It could be near or far. You would use that say when you want to focus something in the background and things in the foreground would be normally focused on.

The dynamic area is where you have something moving in the viewfinder and you want to focus on the moving subject. Sports, etc. are where you would use that.

The closest thing does just that.

Someone who owns a D50 will probably correct me but based on Nikons, I am probably close!

 

[handicap18]

I have a D50 that I used for 2 1/2 years. I almost always used Single area. I occasionally used Dynamic when taking pics of DS at baseball.

Then when using Single area I would mostly use the center point in the view finder. Sometimes chosing one of the other 4 boxes to get my focus if I didn't want to have to recompose to much.

The default for the camera is Closest Subject. When I first got the camera I got A LOT of out of focus/mis focus images. I HATED having the camera chose what was going to be in focus. I want that control. Therefor, Single Area was my mode of focus.

Hope that helps.

 

[My2Girls66]

I have a D50 and a D80, I always use single area. Coming from a film slr I am used to focusing in the center then recomposing when necessary. One thing I noticed is 'closest subject' is the default in 'auto' mode. Switch to 'P' mode and it will stay where you set it.

 

[WeLoveNemo]

I am so glad I asked. I now realize I was using "Closest" when what I wanted was "single". I then used "dynamic" to compensate for situations when closest was just not right, thinking this setting was meant to include more of the subject/background. But that took a lot of recomposing.

One thing I noticed is 'closest subject' is the default in 'auto' mode. Switch to 'P' mode and it will stay where you set it.

With regard to the default setting, I do not find that my D50 goes back to closest when using the auto setting. It only does this when I reset the camera to its original defaults. I would like to tell you have I have overridden this, but I haven't a clue.