PLEASE bring back eye-control AF!

kfreels wrote in post #14781466
Here's an interesting bit of artwork for everyone...
http://nomadphotograph​y.com.au/Poub/3dec.jpg

K, I just noticed this link...I will dream well tonight...An EOS 3D...What a beauty!...Complete with 40mm f1.2L lens sporting umbrella reflections...Did you craft this lovely work of art?

rrblint wrote in post #14807238
K, I just noticed this link...I will dream well tonight...An EOS 3D...What a beauty!...Complete with 40mm f1.2L lens sporting umbrella reflections...Did you craft this lovely work of art?

Nope. Wasn't me, but it sure is a beauty. It's kind of distracting really as I have come back to look at that shot a few time. That's a 3De by the way.

kurt segers wrote in post #14573999
I didn't know it has existed either but now that I know it's possible I want it, no more messing with that dial or forgetting I moved it away from center for some reason and wondering why I'm getting OOF shots.

you can not say it is free from OOF shots

a friend tells a story,
his friends are shooting models in bikini,
all the image are blurred and focussed on her beautiful part

funny though, if you can't control on what you look at, hahaha

tongki wrote in post #14809753
you can not say it is free from OOF shots

a friend tells a story,
his friends are shooting models in bikini,
all the image are blurred and focussed on her beautiful part

funny though, if you can't control on what you look at, hahaha

...EC is probably NOT the best choice for glamor/nude photos...One good reason to have back button control of EC on demand...Focus first, then turn it off and look where you wish.

Right. I don't know why so many have such a tough time understanding this. The default settings on a new properly implemented eye control AF would work exactly as the focus select system works now. You push a button now when you want to change the AF point. Then you use the wheels to select it. Here you would push the AF select button and simply choose it with your eye.

The next option would be an active eye selection where it chooses based on the select point you are looking at at the moment of focus.

Then you could do other things to integrate it into the servo mode.

The question is - if you use the newly developed system that uses your eye to determine distance for the instant focusing, would we then see AF points go away altogether? Does that allow us to focus on the outer edges of the frame? If so, how do lens distortions affect the focus distance? Even if they weren't necessary, would we still keep AF points for reference points, or would they be optional (my guess since we have the option to turn them off on the newer cameras like the 7D, 5DIII, 1DX, etc)

You have to look at a focus point to focus, even with eye control, since the AF optics in the camera sends the necessary light rays to the different parts of the AF sensor for focus evaluation. If there is no AF sensor in a certain location, it's not possible to focus there either. Thus having references to where the points are in the viewfinder may be a good idea.

It's also not physically possible to have AF sensors near the edges of the image, not with today's technology. How you select them will not make any difference, since the problem is that they don't work too far out.

apersson850 wrote in post #14858168
You have to look at a focus point to focus, even with eye control, since the AF optics in the camera sends the necessary light rays to the different parts of the AF sensor for focus evaluation. If there is no AF sensor in a certain location, it's not possible to focus there either. Thus having references to where the points are in the viewfinder may be a good idea.

It's also not physically possible to have AF sensors near the edges of the image, not with today's technology. How you select them will not make any difference, since the problem is that they don't work too far out.

Absolutely right, assuming you are using a traditional focus system. What I was referring to was the more recent patent Canon has on a system that uses a camera/laser system to look at the eye itself and determine focus distance based on how far the eye is focusing. In this case, it doesn't matter where you look. It is simply going to look at the lens of your eye and see how much the lens itself is flexing and then set the distance on the lens based entirely on what the lens of your eye does. This system uses no detector on the subject as the subject is irrelevant. In this case, the amount of light coming through the lens is irrelevant as well. As long as there is enough light for your eye to focus, the camera will focus the camera lens as your eye does. It would be nearly instant since it doesn't have to hunt back and forth to isolate the contrast. Flat blank surfaces wouldn't be a problem either.

Of course I do have to wonder how the eye focuses differently depending on the focal length of a lens. I really don't know if that would differ with lenses or not.

I just found this thread. I LOVED my Elan 7e. I wear glasses and that camera was great to use. I shot many weddings with it using the eye control. The other thing I really enjoyed about it was how quiet the shutter was. Just a great all around camera.
I would definitly buy a new camera to have this feature.

kfreels wrote in post #14858419
Absolutely right, assuming you are using a traditional focus system. What I was referring to was the more recent patent Canon has on a system that uses a camera/laser system to look at the eye itself and determine focus distance based on how far the eye is focusing. In this case, it doesn't matter where you look. It is simply going to look at the lens of your eye and see how much the lens itself is flexing and then set the distance on the lens based entirely on what the lens of your eye does. This system uses no detector on the subject as the subject is irrelevant. In this case, the amount of light coming through the lens is irrelevant as well. As long as there is enough light for your eye to focus, the camera will focus the camera lens as your eye does. It would be nearly instant since it doesn't have to hunt back and forth to isolate the contrast. Flat blank surfaces wouldn't be a problem either.

Of course I do have to wonder how the eye focuses differently depending on the focal length of a lens. I really don't know if that would differ with lenses or not.

But with a conventional SLR, the eye focuses on the screen, not the subject, hence the need for dioptre/diopter adjustment. With a viewfinder camera, there is obviously no problem but how would this system transfer to an SLR or EVF camera?

JohnB57 wrote in post #14858629
But with a conventional SLR, the eye focuses on the screen, not the subject, hence the need for dioptre/diopter adjustment. With a viewfinder camera, there is obviously no problem but how would this system transfer to an SLR or EVF camera?

You got me there. I don't know the answer. I only assume that Canon figured it out for the patent.

JohnB57 wrote in post #14858629
But with a conventional SLR, the eye focuses on the screen, not the subject, hence the need for dioptre/diopter adjustment. With a viewfinder camera, there is obviously no problem but how would this system transfer to an SLR or EVF camera?

Wow!...This is getting very complicated now.

I took a closer look at that patent(please recall that this patent was filed in 2003 and much more research has probably been done in the years since) and nowhere does it mention a "DSLR" but merely a "digital camera".

I'm thinking now that this system may only work with an optical viewfinder such as found in a rangefinder and not with SLR or EVF type cameras; both of which use the camera lens(already in focus) to render an image on either a focusing screen or an LCD screen. The eye of the photographer would then be focused on that screen, not directly on the subject in the actual scene...Good catch JohnB57.

Perhaps there have been major technological advances since this patent was filed and this shortcoming has been overcome(I do hope so). I do think that this IS the future of auto focus, but it may not work in the traditional SLR or EVF format.

Unless this problem has been solved, for now at least, I'd still like my traditional EC back.

With an SLR camera of traditional design, the eye is focused on infinity all the time. You can see that if you open both your eyes. The viewfinder and the surroundings will be sharp at the same time.
Those who are near-sighted will need a correction lens, or use their glasses while shooting. Otherwise they can't see the viewfinder information properly.

apersson850 wrote in post #14860611
With an SLR camera of traditional design, the eye is focused on infinity all the time. You can see that if you open both your eyes. The viewfinder and the surroundings will be sharp at the same time.
Those who are near-sighted will need a correction lens, or use their glasses while shooting. Otherwise they can't see the viewfinder information properly.

Hi Anders

I don't think that's correct. I'm far/long sighted, am able to focus on infinity without problem but I need approximately +2 dioptres adjustment to focus on the screen, which is my normal reading prescription, so I think the viewfinder is calibrated for that in unadjusted position. If you move the camera away from your face, naturally the focus distance is longer as the screen is further away.

Unless I have read different documents than what you seem to be debating, the goal isn't to use the eye for autofocus, but to be able to replicate what our eye/brain does.

And then, it has nothing to do with the eye measuring any distance to the subject. What have been researched is figuring out how our brain performs image analysis to compute the likely distance to a subject without our eyes having to hunt around changing the focus distance.

So a camera implementation would then use the direction we look to figure out what to focus on, and use the image sensor together with advanced image processing to compute how much the lens should focus forward/backward from current position. So it would be similar to the contrast detection used in P&S, but instead of having the system perform many intermediate focus steps in front of and behind the true target, it should be able to (similar to the phase detection) compute how much off the lens is and send an optimal command to the lens.

You would then get a camera that wouldn't need a phase detect sensor but would use the image sensor instead - so just as a P&S camera, you could point at the image to specify where to focus. With your finger on a touch screen or with your eye in case the camera have eye-control. Or maybe with a cursor moved by a joystick.

The traditional contrast detection can only measure better/worse. It doesn't know how good the current solution is. And it doesn't know if it is behind or in front. So it always requires lots of iterations - and these iterations will fail if the subject moves. So in the end, there are many lens refocus operations and in-between there are waits to get out more readings from the sensor.

A phase-detect system can compute how much the lens is in front of, or behind, the subject, unless the focus is too much off or there are too much repeating features that gives false matches. So it basically perform two readings. One to decide how much to refocus. Then after the lens have been given that refocus command, the phase-detect system makes a second check to verify that all went ok. That allows the lens to use the maximum focus speed to make the full jump, and are the reason for the extremely fast focusing speed of a DSLR when fitted with a lens with a quick focus motor.

YES!!! canon .... please, please ... PLEEEEEEASE bring back ecf!!!!