Focusing

[ramkuma]

I have some questions on focusing, that I can't seem to answer reading Barry's Book:

1) On the focus switch button: if it is switched to "A" does it go into auto focus even if the Auto Focus is turned "off" in the Menu setting?

2) Under what circumstance would you want to switch to the infinity setting? Is this for a quick change in what your filming, say you want to film Bigfoot who suddenlty appears 100 yards off from a person you are interviewing.

3) Why would you use the "Push Auto" (which you have to constantly hold down) when instead you could just push the switch up to the Auto focus setting. And why would you ever want to invoke the auto focus button anyway?

Thanks.

 

[Barry_Green]

1) Yes. The menu autofocus item is only for when the total auto/manu switch is put in "auto".
2) Well, whenever you want infinity to be in focus. Which doesn't mean that only infinity is in focus, there'll be quite a big swath of distance in front of "infinite" object (infinite being defined as, say, more than a few hundred feet away).
3) Well, again, it's easy access to autofocus without having to physically switch the clunking/locking auto switch in place. If you generally are using manual focus and you occasionally want to ask autofocus for a little assistance, you can just hold that button down, seamlessly, in the middle of a shot, and it'll kick in until you let the button go. I found it pretty handy back in the day when I was doing a lot of event and convention coverage shooting.