Replaced D3100 With D7100

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lexman59

Senior Member
Hi all

I have just changed to a D7100 and having spent the last 6 days trying to find my way around it and understand the set up of it, i have been out this morning and taken some landscape shots and i am amazed at the image quality straight out of camera. I would say i'm a novice and struggle to understand all things technical with regards to digital photography. I have set it to shoot 14bit raw and lossless compressed, i'm allright with picture control and white balance etc but sometimes can't decide on focus modes and areas. I am an extremely happy chappy with my new toy and think its money well spent, will post some images later.

Chris :cool:
 
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singlerosa_RIP

Senior Member
I use AF-C 9 point and spot or center-weighted metering. I also use back button focus (Custom Settings - Assign AE-L/AF-L button to AF-ON), which allows you to focus using the AE-L/AF-L button to the left of the rear command dial to lock focus and the shutter button to fire the shutter (only). Lots of articles out there on this and its advantages.

Good luck.
 
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lexman59

Senior Member
Just tried the back button focus and worked fine but what advantage do you gain from it or is it just a matter of personal preference?
 
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Stoshowicz

Senior Member
singlerosa said:
You can lock focus and take your finger off all buttons, then depress the shutter and take a picture. Here's one of the many articles on BBF (Canon related):

Back Button Focusing Made Simple by Lisa Tichane -Clickin Moms
Click to expand...

The article by Lisa Tichane seemed to indicate that the main reason to be doing this backfocusing was that it maintained the focus mechanism during the interval between a half press of the shutter button and lifting the mirror,
Im usually using the D51 mode on the D7100 , and thought that the autofocus was already staying active with predictive algorithms all the way through to activating the shutter.Though it does great , Id love to improve my focus performance since I like to shoot birds and occasionally dragonflies in flight,,but Im thinking it would take some real effort to retrain,, can you explain more, where my understanding is lacking in this respect, about whats happening different in the two modes?
 
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weebee

Senior Member
singlerosa said:
I use AF-C 9 point and spot or center-weighted metering. I also use back button focus (Custom Settings - Assign AE-L/AF-L button to AF-ON), which allows you to focus using the AE-L/AF-L button to the left of the rear command dial to lock focus and the shutter button to fire the shutter (only). Lots of articles out there on this and its advantages.

Good luck.
Click to expand...

Good points. I haven't tried back focus yet. I've blown some shots while in the 51 AF points because the camera kept focusing on things I wasn't interested in. The AF-C 9 point takes a lot of the head ache away. I've used single point as well.
 
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singlerosa_RIP

Senior Member
Stoshowicz said:
The article by Lisa Tichane seemed to indicate that the main reason to be doing this backfocusing was that it maintained the focus mechanism during the interval between a half press of the shutter button and lifting the mirror,
Im usually using the D51 mode on the D7100 , and thought that the autofocus was already staying active with predictive algorithms all the way through to activating the shutter.Though it does great , Id love to improve my focus performance since I like to shoot birds and occasionally dragonflies in flight,,but Im thinking it would take some real effort to retrain,, can you explain more, where my understanding is lacking in this respect, about whats happening different in the two modes?
Click to expand...
I'm a better user than a teacher. Googling back button focus will yield a bunch of articles and videos on the subject. I switched years ago and could never go back. Lock and recompose is great. Also lock and wait (without half depressing a button) is also cool.
 
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Stoshowicz

Senior Member
Thanks, I took that advice , but I havent found one that answers my mechanical centered questions on the subject, I do get the idea that its a handy method of focus locking, and agree that you want to use what works best for you.
Ill probably have to post them up as thread questions.
 
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