Problems with eyesight as I am growing old

[mayordomo]

Hi! I am growing old. I am in my early 50s. I use two kinds of glasses: one for nearsightedness, myopic and another one for farsightedness or reading glasses. Each is also attached to two eyeglasses. So one I use for near and another for farsightedness. My pictures are always blurry. I use the ones for farsightedness. This one seems to improve my pictures. But with nearsightedness, the pictures are more terribly out of focus. I felt sure that I got the right focus with my reading glasses but the ratio of good to bad focus is 1:5. How can I solve my problem? Thanks to all advises..

 

[ann]

which camera? Most modern day DSLR's have a built in diopter which you can adjust for your viewing eye. I never use my glasses when shooting, just have adjusted the diopter for my shooting eye.

 

[mayordomo]

which camera? Most modern day DSLR's have a built in diopter which you can adjust for your viewing eye. I never use my glasses when shooting, just have adjusted the diopter for my shooting eye.

I use Nikon D5000. It's my first time to hear of the word diopter. Excuse me for my ignorance. I've taken a basic course in photography but never heard nor read it from my manual unless I missed it. Thanks, ann! Now I know. I think I can manage from there.

 

[SCraig]

Most modern cameras also have autofocus that works pretty well. Much of the time a good bit better than my 60 year old eyes. I've learned to trust it most of the time.

 

[SCraig]

I use Nikon D5000. It's my first time to hear of the word diopter. Excuse me for my ignorance. I've taken a basic course in photography but never heard nor read it from my manual unless I missed it. Thanks, ann! Now I know. I think I can manage from there.

The diopter adjustment is described on pages 25 and 202 of your owner's manual. IT is right beside the viewfinder on the right side.

 

[mayordomo]

I have my own 70-300mm telephotolens but does not work with autofocus. So I always have to adjust it by turning the knob. Who knows anything about wear and tear. I know autofocus used to work on my 300mm. But now it doesn't unless I am the one out of touch. Thanks SCraig!


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dioptre

 

[SCraig]

I have my own 70-300mm telephotolens but does not work with autofocus. So I always have to adjust it by turning the knob. Who knows anything about wear and tear. I know autofocus used to work on my 300mm. But now it doesn't unless I am the one out of touch. Thanks SCraig!

Wear and tear is unlikely. My 70-300 has been used hard for the past 3 years and still works perfectly. There is an auto / manual switch on the lens. It should be in "M/A" or "A" for autofocus. If it isn't the lens won't focus automatically.

 

[mayordomo]

My telephoto has no manual/autofocus button but my macro has. My telephoto 300 mm is made in China while my macro is made in Japan. My telephoto used to take good pictures even from tens and tens of meters away and good contrast even with colors or black and white but now the quality is deteriorating. My macro always takes good or excellent pictures. Is there a difference between those made in China and those in Japan? If my memory served me good, I still remember that once I placed my control knob into autofocus (the one on the right upside corner of the camera), it worked three or four times with my D40X. The lens moved or adjustted by itself and got good pictures. That is if my memory served me right. I still remember, I was in the racetrack then.

 

[SCraig]

Sorry, I just assumed that your lens was a Nikon 70-300. If the autofocus worked on the D40x it should work on the D5000 since both require a lens with an internal focusing motor. I guess you are right and the autofocus motor has failed.

Autofocus has really improved over the years and with good contrast in the scene it works pretty well these days. It will still grab the wrong thing to focus on from time to time, but I still use it a lot.

 

[mayordomo]

Thanks a lot SCraig. Now I know it needs repair.

 

[bratkinson]

It took me good number of years of switching between glasses for reading/writing, glasses for the computer, and "distance" glasses. Finally, sometime in my mid-50s, I finally opted for "progressive" lens glasses. It took a couple of days to finally "adjust" to them, but the difference is like night and day! 1 pair does all!

In my early 40s, I tried a both bifocal and trifocal glasses, with lines at varying levels, and within 48 hours, discarded each pair. I then stayed with multiple glasses for 10 years, give or take. Of course, I never had the right pair with me when I wanted them somewhere "out of the ordinary" setting. Going progressive solved all my problems. The trick is the optician must be very good at picking the true center-point and curvature of your eye to determine exactly where the "progressions" are in the lens. I found out the hard way that not all opticians are as carefull and are more interested in making a sale than getting it right for the customer.

As for photography, I do a lot of shooting on autofocus. Having lenses with image stabilization also helps, too, as these days, I'm not as rock-steady as I used to be.

But there are many situations I encounter in photography at indoor gatherings (I've only done one wedding...my last!) where auto-focus will not select the person I want to focus on when there are multiple people in the picture at different distances from the camera. That's when there's no choice but to go to manual focus and hope I get it right. One thing I do in manual-focus situations where people are generally not moving...seated, for example...is to do "bracket focusing" as I call it...take 2 or 3 shots at progressively slightly less focus (turning ring counter-clockwise) and 2 or 3 shots at slightly more focus (clockwise) from where I first thought was 'in focus'.

Getting old has become a matter of losing everything...slowly --- hair...memory...hearing...vision...<I forget the rest>

And I'm a mere baby at 64! I can't -wait- to see how bad it is at 74!!! NOT!!!

Almost forgot to mention...I shoot with my glasses on at all times. Otherwise, I wouldn't be able to clearly see what I wanted to photograph in the first place!

 

[SCraig]

I grew up with manual-everything cameras. Back when I first got into photography it was all that there was. The older I get the more willing I am to use the tools and features built into my cameras. Back in the bad ole' days we would never have believed that these little techno-marvels would even be possible. These days everyone tries to find ways around the features that are built in. I'm perfectly content to let my cameras do most of the work most of the time, I'm not trying to prove anything, and I only override things when it won't do what I want it to do.

 

[mayordomo]

I like your website, SCraig. To elicit the reasons for my indignation on the d...w... is inappropriate on this thread but what can we do..unrelated..

 

[SCraig]

I like your website, SCraig. To elicit the reasons for my indignation on the d...w... is inappropriate on this thread but what can we do..unrelated..

Thank you, glad you like it. One of the nice things about it being my web site is that I can say what I wish to. My web site, my rules.