Day 9: Focus Issues

Photo: Bryant Park Fountain
Date: January 26, 2011
F 4
SS 8
FL 25mm
Shot with: Canon Rebel XL DSLR

I have a little bit of a focus issue with my new lense. Its a 50mm fixed lens which is a little bit of a zoom lens. Most of our standard lenses are 18-35mm minimum lens. Its also a F1.4-F22 aperture range so i can get some great Depth of field shots in the right light. Most DSLR cameras have a setting on the camera for those of us who wear classes to adjust the vision in the view finder. It can be difficult shooting with your glasses on so there is dial that allows you to set your viewing to your eye.

With a 1.4/50mm lens, your area of focus is very small... So if you were up close on an object, like the coffee & phones image on Day 8, the camera would pick one small area to focus on, maybe a centimeter to an inch of the entire field of view. It often takes a while to get the focus where you want it. When you add bad vision to the mix, your focus with the camera can take a little work. What looks in focus to you, might not be in focus to the rest of the world, especially to your camera. The above picture wasn't shot with my 50mm lens but the same problem arose. What i thought i was focused on, wasn't. I was attempting to focus on the fountain but my focus is actually on the background which makes my desired object just slightly out of focus. You actually might not even be able to tell with the size as is. It isn't until I get the picture on the computer that i see just how out of focus it is. Its hard to see when in the tiny view finder on my camera or in the small image size above, but its very obvious when enlarged.

Sometimes i find life like that. I know its a cheesy correlation, but stay with me. I have been struggling lately with being able to see things as they are. Whether its work, church, family, friends, home, I have been finding myself just slightly out of focus. A word is said completely innocently, and i find a meaning just left of center then its intention. Someone does something, and i create a reality that is just slightly away from the intended goal. Now i am not saying that i blow things completely out of proportion. But i choose to see things slightly out of focus. So slight, that I could probably talk someone else into seeing what i see. The danger in that is.... its still not true. It might be slightly off, but its still off. Its not until i step back and see the bigger picture or the view is enlarged to 10x its current size that i see just how out of focus i have gotten.