On this Adorama video photographer Mark Wallace shows how to use a fully manual lens as well as how to use the very useful technique of zone focusing.
Wallace, who has been traveling the world recently and recording videos in different countries. This time he is in Colombia and looking at manual focus lenses and how to use them. Now the first thing you need to know is that there are quite a lot of old but still amazingly sharp old manual focus lenses (especially prime ones). Not all those old lenses are great, but some are and they can be pretty inexpensive (depending on the specific lens and its condition).
As for focusing and using the lens in general. First not all cameras support this (typically low end Nikon DSLRs such as the D3XXX and D5XXX will not work perfectly with these lenses) but you will need to check in advance and see if your specific camera-lens combination works. The second thing that you will need to do is learn how to focus manually which is exactly what Wallace tries to explain in this video.
Wallace also shows how to use the zone method for focusing. This method basically allows yo to set us a focus in advance to a predetermined distance and as long as you shoot to this distance your image (should) be in focus. This can be great if you need to shoot movement, very fast action when you know where your subject will be and street photography where you don’t necessarily want to be seen taking pictures.
You can find many more helpful photography tips and techniques on our Photography tips section here on LensVid. You can also check out more of Wallace tutorials here on LensVid.
Iddo Genuth 
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