Has anyone else here come across my own focussing problem, which isn't to do with the camera, but with my eyes?
What happens is this: at the start of the focussing process, I see okay, but after a few seconds, there is no way I can see anything crisply anymore without looking away at something else at a different distance (which instantly looks perfect), and then going back rapidly to the camera viewfinder for another quick check, when the whole darn circus starts again. This is worse with my right eye - unfortunately - and I find myself going from the right one to confirm via the left!
With normal situations, such as driving, for example, the process is almost self-correcting to the extent that unless I think about it, I don't even notice a problem. The fact that when in focus everything is still crystal clear and brilliantly crisp, comforts me that nothing is amiss with the eye itself, and that it is something else.
My medic told me it was age: old muscles get incapable of holding focus. I wonder if he's right... or just making a general guess. I even wonder if it's medication taking its toll.
Rob C
a. I spend a lot of time looking through rifle and spotting scopes in addition to cameras and noticed this happening when I approached my mid-40's. In my case if I relaxed my eyes I'd notice fine focus 'cycling' in/out. If I tried to force it then they'd lock on where I didn't necessarily want them. Learning to relax my eyes took some practice.
b. It was explained to me that age was one thing that would bring this on, as your eyes age the cornea gets more hard and this increases the time it takes to achieve focus and can make staying on focus difficult. There are other factors involving age related eye diseases so its always a good idea to get your eyes examined. In my case I've had the original Radial-K corrective surgery with a laser touch-up 25 years later.. and that contributes.
At 50 I notice some issues with focusing so I recently made a few visits to the eye doctors and tried a few different products and have some observations.
1. My eyes measure 20/20 and 20/15 at distance, and 20/20 and 20/25 near. You'd think this would be good enough but it's not. As photographers we know what focus is and we're constantly striving for critical focus and we know what it 'should' look like. So correction is necessary. I was concerned after two surgeries correction might not be possible or perfect.
2. At first I lucked out and got a trainee who did my exam and she recommended progressives. I took them home and immediately recognized they weren't for me. I use dual monitors (2 26.5 inch) and want to see the entire two screens at one time without indexing my head on either the vertical or horizontal plane. With progressives I could only see a third of one monitor in fine focus at a time, to see the rest of that screen I would need to move my head up/down to see the other two thirds. To see the second screen I'd haver to turn my neck to line up on that monitor, and then adjust my head up/down to find the third I could see at one time. I found this very tiring and it just wasn't acceptable.
3. My next visit netted an experienced doctor who spent a lot of time with me and suggested a single focal lens which would allow what I wanted, to see both screens at the same time without moving my head as I've always done. Anyone who has dual monitors knows it takes some effort to tilt them towards each other and move them forward/back to achieve the ideal distance from your eyes. Once there you don't dare move anything. He mocked up some temporary glasses, set up two monitors for me to test with, and after several tries came up with a prescription for single focal lenses that allow me to see both my monitors, all of them, in fine focus and at the same time. A very nice improvement.
4. Through the viewfinder I'm fortunate in that the standard diopter adjustments work great. No issues at all.
5. Where I continue to have issues is with LCD screens on the back of the cameras and especially with low quality LCD's like on the back of my Quantum flashes. I find them very hard to read immediately after looking through a diopter corrected viewfinder and have invented all sorts of compensations that usually involve memory presets where I can adjust them while indoors and I try to avoid changing them when in the field in challenging light. I recently talked to the good eye doc over the phone and he said to bring in these devices and he could work up a prescription that would be just for this purpose and I could hang them around my neck and only wear them as needed while working. It would be really great if this works and I'll know more next week, and I might even stop bothering the engineers at Quantum to make their Pilot or Trio screens output to a tablet..
There is a point where bigger and brighter screens really shouldn't be the solution, but I'm glad we have them available.
6. I had a fairly long discussion with my doctor about the future. Would I always have the 20/20 20/15 far and 20/20 20/25 near? What would change as I entered my mid-50's, early 60's, etc, and how would I know when I need to come see him again. Basically, at this point he said my eyes will remain the same with the exception of possible cataracts which he said everyone gets at some point if they live long enough. He told me so much progress is being made with artificial/replacement lenses that by the time I need them they will be able to implant a lens far better than my natural eyes have ever been. He said the rest of my body will age and get worse with time, but after my future eye surgery (whenever they may be) I'll have the eyes of a young man. Of course I asked the question "why not do the surgery now.." He said while there are very good lenses available, they're not quite there yet. Better to wait.
I don't know how much of the above can transfer to anyone else, but I thought it might be of interest if it does.
