Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="fotonut" data-source="post: 31193" data-attributes="member: 7489">For some reason I am not getting email notifications of responses and just stopped here by chance today.  Thanks for the replies.Observation: OK, I have been studying and experimenting with this camera.   From what I can understand, here is my rendition of how this camera operates based on autofocus experience solely from a Nikon D50, many Canon SD-xxx series and previous SLRs.   With the D7000 the focus mechanism is new and as it is configured and shipped, it functions by default via a 36 point "window sweep" (my term) that occurs when I depress the shutter release button.  At this point the scene is swept with these square flashing dots and the camera attempts to guess what I am focusing on.  If the dancing squares don't find the subject point of focus,  then the shutter will not release, no matter how many times or how hard it is depressed.  Then it's only until the light is changed, subject moves or something causes the program to recalculate (other than repeatedly pressing the shutter release) and then we take the second chance we will have a successful location.   The unresponsive shutter, not respoiding until focus can be obtained can be overridden in the configuration menu, but the question would be what would be the point of forcing the shutter release if the image was not in focus.Editorial: I am confused as to what benefit this feature is.  In a test scenario with outside daylight still shining on my subject through a window in a restaurant (light to camera's back), the performance of this feature was sporadic with a relatively high (and embarrassing) failure rate.  The camera would take approximately 8-10 photos and then when I pressed the shutter, only one small square dot would appear in the viewfinder; the sweeping dots would just seem to go to sleep.Observation:  After reading and studying more, I found procedures on how to hold in the small but not obvious button in the center of  the typical AF-Manual lever on the front of the camera, lower left of the lens.   With this held in, the front wheel can be rotated to reduce the 36 dots down to 1, the back wheel can be rotated to change the AF value to AF-S, and the toggle switch on the back can be flipped to focus selector lock.  At this point, the camera appears to work dependably, much like the older SLRs & D-SLRs have historically, where one can center the focus point over the subject, press the shutter release half way down, hold the focus, frame the shot and complete the depression fully to release the shutter.   So far, this setup produces shots with the correct focus point and I have had none that "hesitate" like occurs when using the 36 dot matrix method as is configured when the camera is shipped.Editorial:  Spending almost no time researching or reading about equipment except every 5 years or so (computers or cameras) and not participating in photo social circles, I have to now ask if this is a correct assessment of the operation of the D7000 as well as the purchase perhaps an incorrect assessment of my needs, looking for a super affordable and super improvement over the D50?   If I am on track so far with describing the focus mechanism that is not 100% dependable, would I do better with a D90 or less, or does the D90 also present this to deal with?   Humor: If my tests are accurate and my D7000 is working as it should, it seems the only fail safe method for a manufacturer to add a "guess where to focus feature" would be once they have the technology to do proximity brain scans.   Otherwise today, I think I just bough a lot of features that don't really work and I don't really need.</blockquote>

Verification