Common Causes of Focusing Problems

Photography

With today’s technology being so advanced, it’s amazing that there are still some problems focusing. This is not just for the Canon 7D, but for all current cameras Canon, Nikon, Sony… Here are the most common causes:

  • Extremely small subjects. Subjects much smaller that the focusing point
  • Low-contrast subjects such as in fog, or blue sky, or solid colors
  • Many filters, like the dark red #29, will disable the AF
  • Night scenes or points of light
  • Shiny subjects that strongly reflecting light or having the sun, full strength, in the photo
  • Subjects in low light/very low light
  • Subjects outside the focusing area
  • Subjects under low-powered, or old fluorescent lighting, or when the light flickers
  • Subjects which keep moving within the AF point due to camera shake or subject movements1

Tip

The “magic” in focusing is finding and using a contrasty spot to focus on, such as the edge of a shadow…

  1. Which is why Canon/Nikon lenses focus better than Olympus, Pentax and Sony. Canon and Nikon stabilize the image before focusing. Olympus, Pentax and Sony stabilize after the focus has been achieved. ↩︎