Autofocusing Off-center Subjects - By Sujith Gopinath
If rules of photography are to be enforced, placing your subject in the center of the frame could get you enough criticism. But with many cameras not offering enough focus points, many photography enthusiasts feel at a loss when they find that their entry-level cameras do not allow AF with off-center subjects. Here’s how you could tackle this.Focusing on off-center subjects can be a pain if your camera does not have many selectable focusing points. Some digital cameras come with user selectable focus points that can be moved around to the desired location in the frame. But what if your camera does not offer you this liberty? For the scope of this article, let us consider a camera with three focal points that can be selected individually since quite a few entry-level D-SLRs are available with three AF points. METHOD 1: SELECT THE RIGHT FOCUS POINT Selecting the correct focus point can help in situations like this
This is the easiest thing to do if your subject lies on one of the focus points. First select the shooting mode that allows you to select the focusing points individually. Generally this feature is disabled in Auto and Scene modes in some cameras. Now select the focus point with the four-way-controller/joystick (read your camera manual to find out how to do it on your camera). Note that when you select the focus point manually, the focus will lock only if the subject is exactly on the selected focus point. So frame your shot in such a way that your selected autofocus point completely covers the subject. This is even more easy if your camera has more AF points. Now shoot normally, without changing the composition.Tip: Focus on the eye in a portrait.