Eye Controlled Focus...

[Johan01]

I had an Elan 7e and loved the feature.
I was driven to the Elan so I could get this feature.

Yes, I miss it.

I now use a single focus point with my 7d and chose where the point is with the wheel.

Man, I wish I had never sold my Elan. Loved the eye control. I even find myself trying to look at my focus points on my 60D expecting them to light up. LoL.

One of those features that sound like a gimmick until you actually get used to it.

It was nice back in the day when all cameras could use the same film and it was more about how the camera handled than anything else.

 

[Alvin Nunley]

I took some pictures of some belly dancers with my 10D, and while most came out OK, there was one with two dancers dancing side by side, where the details in the back ground, between them, were very sharp, but both dancers were out of focus. As I looked at the picture, my thoughts were of my ELAN 7e. I know, I could have gotten the picture right by paying a little more attention to the focus points of the 10D, but things happen fast when taking these pictures and with the 7e I wouldn't have had to do anything but look at one dancer.
--
Taking pictures is easy, making them art is hard. (al nunley)
Try not, Do, or Do Not. (yoda)

 

[Silvex]

... I even find myself trying to look at my focus points on my 60D expecting them to light up....

I find it next to impossible to adjust focus points with my thumb, when shooting moving subjects. Even with stationary subjects, I usually focus and recompose.

For me, the move to digital has been like buying a new car, which is better in every way, except that it has manual door locks, windows with a crank and an analogue stereo with mechanical push buttons. Obviously not the most important parts of a car, but still add a lot of convenience.

 

[Rizzobitz]

I loved eye focus. It was so responsive. With the 85 1.2 and 135 2.0 I could always count on it catching the moment no matter how fast my subject was moving.

I switched from Minolta to Canon because of their eye focus. I waited years to see if Canon would incorporate it into their dslr's then sold all of my Canon gear. The dslrs are just too heavy for me and no eye focus was/is a deal breaker. If Canon would only make a dslr like the Sony Nex and add eye focus I would go back to Canon.

 

[Lemming51]

... If Canon would only make a dslr like the Sony Nex and add eye focus I would go back to Canon.

??? Unclear on the concept. NEX is not a DSLR. Without viewfinder held close to the eye there is no way to incorporate ECF.

--
Unapologetic Canon Apologist

 

[timmer350]

Loved it - especially once I started wearing contacts, it worked like a dream - and you could even get depth of focus by looking in the bottom left corner!

Come on Canon - put it in the next 7D!!

T

--
Gone birding... http://picasaweb.google.com/timothyboucherbirder

 

[victorian squid]

Just stick those suckers in, add a few nanobots and you only have to "think" about where you're going to look. Don't need no stinking viewfinder!

Makes me want to pull my Elan II out of the box again! It's in E+ shape as I hardly ever used it! Was always afraid to and kept beating on my Nikons instead. It made one trip to Italy in '99. Never an OOF shot.

 

[Bob Meyer]

I had both an Elan IIe and an EOS 3 with ECF. It worked well on the IIe with 7 points, but not nearly as well on the 3, with 35(?) points.

But I think the main reason Canon dropped it was that most consumers didn't really care, and weren't really willing to pay extra for it. If Canon could make it more accurate today, I'd definitely be interested. I found I was much more likely to use the extra points rather than just use the center point and recompose.
--

Bokeh is the aesthetic quality of the blur in out-of-focus areas of an image, or the way the lens renders out-of-focus points of light. Bokeh is not the same as depth of field (DOF).

 

[Silvex]

...I found I was much more likely to use the extra points rather than just use the center point and recompose.

Yes. And it makes AI Servo much more valuable.

 

[Rizzobitz]

Oh! I meant Nex-7, small, high quality aps-c, EVF, inexpensive.

So funny Victorian Squid!!

 

[Jerry-astro]

Oh! I meant Nex-7, small, high quality aps-c, EVF, inexpensive.

You had me until "inexpensive". The NEX-7 is many things and by all appearances a very decent camera, but it is definitely NOT inexpensive.

That said, count me among the ones itching to see ECF back in DSLRs. It would be an absolutely "must have" feature for me if Canon were to re-introduce it.

 

[zenit_b]

Just to say - I miss eye controlled focus too

Worked really well on my EOS 50E

Would it cost that much to bring it back ? would help distinguish the XXD line from the XXXD line as well....

 

[Rizzobitz]

It made me feel like a superhuman, someone who sees through walls or shoots laserbeams with their mind; like a robot, linked with mechanical devices, programmed to control . Just a look and it would lock in on my target. It was 'the future' that became the past.

 

[1003mikey]

I still pull the 3 out occasionally and burn a few rolls of film.

Man, ECF on a modern DSLR would be awesome!!!

BTW, my bifocals never got in the way. Always worked for me

 

[KentG]

The EOS-3 was not all that well sealed from my experience. That was one of the trade-offs every pro made when they switched from the EOS-1N. The 3 was just not as rugged. I remember going on an expedition into Central America into the closed canopy jungle. The high humidity caused most of the EOS-3's to fail within a week or so. It was not near as well sealed as the EOS-1N or even the Minolta Maxxum 9.

The other issue was that the ECF sometimes switched AF points on you at random or at least when you did not want it. Most of the pros I knew shooting the 3 switched the AF points down to the 11-point mode because using all 45 caused issues. Sort of made switching to the 3 a waste. However some of the other features kept people using them. The AF was better for one.

And as an aside most people don't know that the foundation patent for ECF was from Pentax. Pentax invented it but Canon developed it.
Kent Gittings

 

[wadia13]

Wow, reading this old thread, I didn't even realise this was offered in the past. If they can make it more precise with less lag now, why not bring it back?

 

[Karl Gnter Wnsch]

Wow, reading this old thread, I didn't even realise this was offered in the past. If they can make it more precise with less lag now, why not bring it back?

Because photographic habits have changed considerably. Today's photographers do scrutinize the background for distracting elements (zap, focused on the background) or check for the expression of the mouth while focusing on the eye (zap), or watch out for lens flare (zap)... IMHO it still looks good on paper (and previously when usability of the cameras for selecting focusing point was awkward to say the least did work better than the standard methods) but doesn't fit the changed habits anymore.

 

[Jerry-astro]

Wow, reading this old thread, I didn't even realise this was offered in the past. If they can make it more precise with less lag now, why not bring it back?

Because photographic habits have changed considerably. Today's photographers do scrutinize the background for distracting elements (zap, focused on the background) or check for the expression of the mouth while focusing on the eye (zap), or watch out for lens flare (zap)... IMHO it still looks good on paper (and previously when usability of the cameras for selecting focusing point was awkward to say the least did work better than the standard methods) but doesn't fit the changed habits anymore.

Interesting. I was also a big fan on this technology and always wondered why Canon didn't reintroduce it. It seems (to me at least) as if it would be pretty easy to condition yourself to only fire the shutter when you've finished "scrutinizing the background" and are ready to take the shot. Like any feature of a camera, it would take a little getting used to, but the convenience and speed advantages would be considerable, particularly for anything that's moving. Do you really think that the process of composing and taking a shot has changed all that much over the years?

I don't think selecting a point is particularly awkward these days, but it does take time. Doing it with your eyes is both intuitive and can be extremely fast, depending on the responsiveness of the ECF system. I still can't really understand why Canon has not decided to update this and put it on one of their higher end models (the 7DMkII would probably have been almost the perfect choice for a feature like this, IMHO).