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[OM] Re: Manual focusing of the e500?

Subject: [OM] Re: Manual focusing of the e500?
From: Moose <olymoose@xxxxxxxxx>
Date: Fri, 29 Sep 2006 18:36:31 -0700
Joe Gwinn wrote:
> So far, the biggest problem I have with the e500 is focus failure 
> when taking pictures of mechanical things, especially close-ups.  For 
> some reason, such subjects just flummox the autofocus mechanism, 
> despite having plenty of light and the better (f/2.8-3.5) lens.  Even 
> repeated coaxing and coddling failed to convince the camera to focus 
> properly, shot after shot.  This leaves manual focus, which is pretty 
> awkward and imprecise on the e500.  Unless I'm missing something.
>
> Any ideas?
>   
I don't know specifically about the E-500. I do know that many AF
systems have trouble with specular reflections off shiny objects. of
course, it may not be related to that, but just poor AF performance, as
other posts suggest.
> As for Khen Lim's dreamlist of features for a future camera model, I 
> didn't see anything the would help to solve this problem, so it's 
> something to consider for the list.  There was mention of a better 
> autofocus sensor, but one always needs a workable manual focus 
> control, to handle the inevitable cases that are too far from the 
> design center of the autofocus mechanism.  A large part of the 
> problem is that the LCD on the camera cannot have sufficient 
> resolution for one to find the correct focus by eye, so some kind of 
> live magnification mode is required.
You have the wrong E-thingie. The E-330 addresses all these issues
better than any other DSLR in existence. In B mode, there is a 10X
magnification available directly from the sensor that will capture the
image and manual focus can be used with it.

The E-500 is a general purpose consumer grade DSLR, and they will mostly
have similar problems to one extent or another. The really aren't
designed for precision macro use, the viewfinders arent' that great for
MF. The E-330 is the special tool for what you want to do. See the
bottom two images in the section "B Mode Live View ('Macro live view')"
on this page <http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/olympuse330/page7.asp>. In
the next section, you can see how it provides live, of the sensor DOF
preview, another thing crucial to macro and other precision work that no
other camera does.

Moose


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