Hi,

Just bought a camera body with AFMA, and naturally thoughts turn to using it. I wonder a bit about my new 85mm f/1.8 in particular, though I know that shallow DOF will test one's shooting technique. It seems to "hit" a bit less than my old nifty fifty, so I wanted to just go try to quantify things.

1.) A lot of people advocate the "old school" idea of tacking a newspaper on the wall and using that. Valid?

2.) The Spyder LensCal looks pretty straightforward. (So much so that I wonder if I could make one with a ruler and a shoebox, actually). Has anyone used that, and what do you think of it?

3.) The FoCal "automatic" system looks kind of neat. You have to shoot tethered, though? My computer is set up in a room too small to achieve those long shooting distances. The wife got an I-Pad for Christmas. Maybe I could use that whilst she is not looking. Anyway, are all those multiple shots and the bell curve plots, etc., really useful or helpful as compared to the simpler "manual" method with the Spyder device?


Thanks for any input.