Lack of Auto Focus work around

Just recently discovered a work-around that may be helpful to some...My experience is that I don't really notice the lack of autofocus until I go to take a close up...especially of text. Recently I tried backing up to a distance of two to three feet, and then using trackpad up to zoom in. The picture ends up being much sharper this way. Funny, because I think it's just a digital zoom...which means lower resolution...but still you end up with a clearer picture.

Thanks for sharing your find......... That's what the forums are all about, helping each other out! I would never think of searching the forums for something this simple, and wouldn't even think of this method.

R...

Originally Posted by sulcopete

Just recently discovered a work-around that may be helpful to some...My experience is that I don't really notice the lack of autofocus until I go to take a close up...especially of text. Recently I tried backing up to a distance of two to three feet, and then using trackpad up to zoom in. The picture ends up being much sharper this way. Funny, because I think it's just a digital zoom...which means lower resolution...but still you end up with a clearer picture.

Originally Posted by SaMaster14

This has been discussed extensively countless times. Same exact problem and workaround.

I really don't want to sound like an a**hole, but you could have done a search before.

Here is an example of one of the active threads discussing the camera:

http://forums.crackberry.com/blackbe...-world-638430/

Thanks for bringing everyone's attention to the problem of posters' beating a dead horse by re-posting threads on the exact same subject. I'm not sure this particular posting warrants a public reprimand, though, especially when the tread you cite has 30 pages of posts! Who's got the time to look through that, to solve a problem that only has a loose connection at best to the subject!?

Originally Posted by sulcopete

Just recently discovered a work-around that may be helpful to some...My experience is that I don't really notice the lack of autofocus until I go to take a close up...especially of text. Recently I tried backing up to a distance of two to three feet, and then using trackpad up to zoom in. The picture ends up being much sharper this way. Funny, because I think it's just a digital zoom...which means lower resolution...but still you end up with a clearer picture.

Yep.

For non-closeups, auto-focus will sometimes give you worse results. This is because auto-focus optimizes focus for a certain distance from the lens. So if you're shooting someone who's 15 feet from you, AF will focus on that subject, and if there's someone at, say, half the distance, standing to one side, he won't be in as sharp focus. The EDoF camera of the 9900/PB will give you better results in such cases.

For closeups, the EDoF simply can't resolve the subject if it's closer than a couple of feet. It's an inherent limitation of the fixed lens. But if that lens is of sufficiently good quality to begin with, and there's enough light, then by backing up you're staying where the lens can work right, and the zoom simply enlarges the image. It's not going to be as good as a focused photo at that distance at full resolution, but it's good enough to get a readable image. If you use "text mode", there's a bit of contrast enhancement added, to emphasize the contours of letters, which makes it even more readable.