focusing via hyperfocus or other technique for a RF newbie

ymc226

ymc226

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I just came from an autofocus SLR (non-digital) and love the size and quietness of my M camera. I am losing candid shots of my kids in action because, having used Nikon FE/FM's in the past, I focus everyshot. I do pre-meter with a spotmeter for general light conditions which has worked well on a recent trip and achieved the skin tones I desire.

My goal is to decrease the time or need for precise focusing. Having read in this and other forums about the hyperfocus technique, would the following scenario result in good focus of my subjects:

I just got a 21mm Biogon with it's matching viewfinder which I am taking to Disneyworld and using with my M2. I would want my kids in the foreground ( not having used such a wide angle, I would imagine the kids would be a meter or so away and the rest of the picture would be a scene of interest).

Using the hyperfocal technique at f/11, the hyperfocal distance would be at 1.25 feet. Would the kids be in good focus including such details as the strands of their hair or other important details?

Is there another way to get the focusing more quickly and result in more precise focusing? I think this weekend, it will be bright and sunny in Orlando so using Tri-X, f/8 to f/22 is what I expect to use.
 
ymc226, I just pulled up my VC 21. At f11, it shows the hyperfocal distance to be about 1.e meters -- close to 4 feet, which may have been what you meant anyhow. At that distance, everything from infinity to about 0.7 meters (2.25 feet) is in focus.

In practice, I find it much faster to move infinity next to the far mark for the f stop I am using, and reading the nearest focus point next to the near mark for that fstop, w/o calculating hyperfocal distance and moving that next to the focus mark. Same idea, fewre calculations, and you can just read the hyperfocal distance from the scale.

If you want more sharpness at around 3 feet, you could zone focus. Same idea but different focus point. If you zone focus at 3 ft at f11, everything between 1.8 ft and about 10 feet is in focus, though infinity goes out. Depends on what you want.

You could also use zone focusing with wider f stops if you feel comfortable estimating distances approximately -- for example, at f8, everything from infinity to about three feet is in focus (hyperfocal). If you want quick closer, you can move the distance on the near mark (3ft in this example) to the far mark, and everything from a foot and a half to 3 feet is in focus.
 
ymc226 said:
Using the hyperfocal technique at f/11, the hyperfocal distance would be at 1.25 feet. Would the kids be in good focus including such details as the strands of their hair or other important details?
Click to expand...

At the hyperfocal distance for a given aperture, the DOF will extend from half that distance to infinity. So, for a 21mm lens on 35mm film:

@f8, hyperfocal is 6.1 ft -- everything from half that to infinity will be in the DOF
@f11, hyperfocal is 4.33 ft - everything from half that to infinity will be in DOF

HTH.
 
I usually go by the focusing scale on the lens body. By stopping down to f8 on any wide angle lens (wider than 35mm) I find that its easy to use the scale to get everything in focus from a couple of meters to infinity. Strictly speaking I suppose this is scale focusing rather than hyperfocal focusing but it works on the same principle. The advantage is that by presetting the lens in this manner its very quick to use the camera which effectively becomes a point and shoot. As long as you are shooting well within the parameters set by the nearest and furthest points of focus (the latter is easy if the furthest point is infinity) you should find that your subject is well in focus.
 
I'd echo what Peter says. I'd add also that you should think about your shooting style. If I'm shooting manual focus RF, it's almost always out and about around town. What this means practically is that it's one shot in twenty (if that) where I care about focus beyond about 8-10m, and even rarer that I care about, say, 30 meters out.

So I tend to pre-focus at something a little closer than the hyperfocal distance, and further compress it by opening up a little for selective focus. It's a different technique, with a different use, than the hyperfocal, but it can be a useful complement depending on your needs.
 
And do note Roger's "Word of caution" ...

I was hacked off when I first got a rangefinder and used the lens distance scale to focus, only to find that on nearly every print, regardless of the lens used, the subject was blurred.

Naively - but understandably - I assumed that the distance scale was correct: the manual says so, as do many textbooks and the online depth of field calculators.

Roger's note is a bit brief, and there's more info on my website (scroll down to "That's not the whole story..." - ignore the stuff above unless you use a digital camera). Zeiss themselves acknowledge this: http://www.zeiss.com/C12567A8003B8B6F/EmbedTitelIntern/CLN01e/$File/CLN1.pdf (see article on p 3).

I'm still surprised in this age of scanners and digital cameras that the inaccuracy of the lens scale isn't mentioned more.

The Zeiss PDF (published in 1997, a few years before digital took off) states that the distance scale is fine for 6 x 4 inch prints, and that this size represents over 90% of all prints made. I didn't start photography until 2005, when the digital revolution was in full flight, so right from the start I never bothered with small prints - all my scans and digital images are printed at A4 (10 inches) or A3 (20 inches).

Anyway, because I've always had a digital workflow and made large prints, the lens distance scale showed itself as inaccurate immediately I saw the blurred, out of focus prints. Perhaps the reason the innacuracy isn't mentioned more is that most film users still make small prints - this is supposition on my part: perhaps Roger and others can comment...

To summarise, if you make prints larger than 6 x 4 inches, use an f-stop marking at least an f-stop larger than that to which the lens is set: for example, if you your aperture is f/8, read off the distances adjacent to the f/5.6 marks. If using hyperfocal focusing at f/8, the distances adjacent to the f/5.6 mark will of course indicate that your photo will no longer be sharp to the horizon - you will have to alter the focusing so that the infinity mark aligns with f/11, the next smallest aperture.

However, two things to bear in mind:

1. What I consider "sharp enough" may not match someone else's standards, and vice versa.

2. As we know, lenses have their individual fingerprints, and how they handle out of focus areas can affect our perception of sharpness.

So, you really need to experiment to find out how to use the lens scale to best suit you. For me, because I make large prints, I use aperture marks two f-stops larger than marked, so f/4 instead of f/8.

Lastly, two tips:

1. Try and keep your focusing ring roughly set for the shooting conditions (zone focused, hyperfocal distance), as then you may only need a slight nudge of the focusing ring to get the focus bang on your subject.

2. Preset your focus on a point where you know your subject will appear, e.g. on a point that your kids will run across, or if on a slide, will zoom pass.
 
Hi.

First I must announce that I came from digital but I shot analog when I was a kid many years ago. I'm starting again but the difference now is that I'm trying to make photography instead P&S.
So I'm very interest in this theme (Hyperfocus) and I have a question that is making confusion to my head 🙂

In practical terms what is the difference in doing Hyperfocusing if we can select f11 for example ? Doing f11 shouldn't have the same depth of field that we get by doing HyperFocus ?

Sorry about my ignorance but I'm in the first roll ;-)

Thanks in advance.
 
Good thread people
I started years ago with scale focus (as a kid no money for RF). Later on allways focussed on the main subject and never thought about it. I am talking about RF and SLR cameras the GG screen on bigger gear is another matter alltogether. Autofocus on the DSLR's have led me far away from the earlier years tho from time to time still use RF's, they ARE slower than a modern DSLR !.
Now the point to all this, am using a G9 to carry around and do "street" stuff, too slow on autofocus brilliant on MF, mainly use f4.5 and 10ft. Its made me realise just how quick and easy it all is. The zone of sharpness depends of course on print size/ viewing distance.
For a RF (or for that matter SLR with no autofocus) I reckon to set the F stop number on the DOF point at infinity so the camera is instantly ready and better to get the shot and suffer slight lack of sharpness than nothing, of course if I have time focus ,then, afterwards reset the gear as above.
For example on my 50mm RF lens F11 on the DOF scale at inf = 4.5m zero focus 2.3m near focus, setting camera to inf F11 = 4.8m near focus so if the subject is around 4m or 12ft from a practical point of view you will "get" the shot if its fleeting regardless of setting the lens to inf or hyperfocal. In the Contax/Kiev camera with a locking inf maybe better to have it locked than set on the hyperfocal which is subject to accidental movement ? Dunno !

ron
 
The honest answer it depends. Depends on where I'm going and what I'm shooting. While I might carry both odds are I'm only shooting one or the other when it comes to film. If I have a digital then that will often do duty for color...
 
WIth a wide angle lens (in my cast 28mm) I generally set the aperture to as small as possible and still get a decent shutter speed. So, for example, for city shooting with an ISO 400 film in the daylight I'd use f8 500, f11 250 (or 1000/500 depending how shaded my subjects are). I then set the lens focus for approximately the subject distance; 2-3 meters in general. When I actually shoot then I do a small adjustment of the focus. Anywhere from 1-5 meters, and shoot. This generally results in well focused images. The focus error is covered up by the DOF by using f8/f11 or f16. The larger the aperture, the more precisely I try to focus the camera.
 
The distance scales on lenses are not generally inaccurate. It's just that the lens doesn't know how big you are going to blow up the image. There is only one distance (when focused on an image at that distance) that the image is actually perfectly in focus, regardless of the DOF at that aperture. The bigger you make the print, the more obvious that reality becomes. There ain't no free lunch.
 
I recommend at least trying the wide angle before taking it on a first trip.
Usually wide angle lenses have considerable DoF, so you shouldn't worry if you want my opinion, just set to minimum aperture and hyperfocus like you said, should do the trick
 
you can't go wrong if you use a lens size of between 3mm to 5mm and focus to infinity. the further something is in the distance, the more it will be affected by diffraction. so a lens size closer to 5mm will tend to reduce that diffraction, however it will slightly decrease what is rendered sharply in the foreground. alternatively, if you go for a lens size closer to 3mm, your foreground objects will appear sharper, but diffraction will limit the size of objects rendered in the background. so it is a balancing act and you need to decide for each shot what is important...there is no 'silver bullett' when it comes to dof. lens size is focal length/aperture. so for a 35mm lens set to f11, the lens size is 3.2. usually on my 35mm, for max dof, i have my aperture set at 9.5, which gives me a good lens size for most of landscape/scenic shots (3.6mm).
 
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