Question for street photographers..

I'm hoping to get some advice from other experienced street shooters on here...

I'm still very new to shooting ppl on the street...I'm using a Canon XSI and the 50mm 1.8 lens...I'm still a little confused on how to use the center focus point...So for the other street shooters...When your taking a full body shot of a person, do you focus on the eyes and then recompose to frame them, and then take the shot? Or do you just frame them and keep the center focus point right where it is no matter where it ends up on their body?

I still havent tried the focus recomposing yet, as I think it would take too much time, especially when ur doing candid shooting and need to get the shot...I forgot to mention that I'm usually at 5.6 and iso 200 or 400...

So I would appreciate any feedback and advice...Thanks for reading guys...

If you're shooting at a higher aperture (f/8 or something like that), if you focus on the chest or something, the eyes and such should be in focus.

50 on crop is a little long. great for street portraiture but from personal experience shooting in downtown doesnt work out. if you have the kit lens i would recommend shooting that at 18mm so you could get closer and more of the environment in frame.. shoot however you want though.. just making a suggestion.

to answer your question though, i (and many street photographers i shoot with) dont auto focus. i end up missing too many shots relying on the crappy focus that lower end dslr's have. i normally just zone focus @f/16 or f/11 (which is also why i recommend a wider focal length).

the kit lens doesnt have the focus scale on the lens so what you could do is get around 5 feet from a wall, focus on the it, and then turn your camera to MF and set your aperture to f/11 or f/16 and iso to around 800-1600.

here's a couple examples:

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