AF Microadjustment (Canon) and AF Fine Tune (Nikon) is a setting on your camera (including most Nikon Z mirrorless cameras) that allows you to make small but important adjustments to your camera autofocus system.
Without adjustment, you're almost certainly not getting the very best from your expensive gear!
When you take a shot, your cameras autofocus system makes measurements and adjusts the lens focus position so the object you want in focus is sharp.
But it's not perfect...
(Image credit: Nikon)
Take a look at the two images below...
Before Calibration
In this image, the camera is front focusing - the focus point through the viewfinder was over Buddy's eye, but in the image his nose is actually in focus, and his eyes are blurred.
After Calibration
After calibration, the focus point over Buddy's eye renders beautifully sharp eyes as we intended.
Here are a few reasons why you might need to tune your camera and lenses:
Cameras and lenses are manufactured and adjusted before leaving the factory, but when you match your camera and lenses together, they may benefit from tuning.
General use of a camera can cause tiny movements in the sensors and mounts. Big knocks and bumps can make checking and tuning with Reikan FoCal a must.
Over time, motors and gears can wear, making the focus position slightly inaccurate. Lens elements can shift fractionally causing slight focus errors.
Adding another device to the camera increases chances of misalignment between the lens and body. Adapted lenses benefit most from fine tuning.
Hot and cold conditions cause mechanical parts to move fractionally, introducing focus issues.
Checking and adjusting gives you confidence you're getting the very best from from all your expensive kit.
FoCal takes control and makes tuning your autofocus simple!
FoCal is a software package that runs on Windows or macOS, takes control of your camera and sorts out your focus issues automatically!
FoCal hides the complexity, letting you tune your Canon or Nikon camera in a few minutes.
Clip your camera to a tripod and attach a FoCal target to the wall. Using the USB cable supplied with your camera, connect the camera and computer together.
Use FoCal's Target Setup utility to check your camera and FoCal target are in the right place, and all the settings on your camera and lens are correct. If not, you'll get helpful guidance on how to get it all just perfect for the next step.
Open the Automatic Autofocus Calibration tool, hit the Start button and follow the instructions.
A few minutes later, you can be confidence you're getting the very best from your camera and lenses!
This video gives a 2 minute overview of FoCal - how to set up, check and calibrate and a brief look at other features:
Take a look at what's on offer with FoCal Pro:
Automatically adjust your camera and lens autofocus at the touch of a button!
Adjusting your autofocus for sharper shots really is simple. Put your camera on a tripod, put the target on the wall then run the Fully Auto calibration.
You'll be able to watch as FoCal controls the camera to captures and analyse shots then locks in on the perfect setting.
With the FoCal Comparison Database, you'll be able to compare your camera and lens against 1000's of other users too to get a real idea of how your kit performs.
Learn more about Calibration...
Those lenses you thought were great... Watch them get even better!
How does your kit compare?
You might have the best copy of a 50mm f/1.8 lens, or the worst copy of a 85mm f/1.2 lens... but how can you know?
With the FoCal Comparison Database, you can compare your results with 1000's of other FoCal users!
We carefully process uploaded results to build profile of typical behaviour of cameras and lenses, and feed this back to you so you can see at a glance how your equipment really compares.
Requires FoCal Pro license and that users be within their included updates period.
Measure Everything!
With MultiTest, you can explore the performance of your camera and lens across two dimensions of focus and aperture.
See where to get the sharpest shots at any aperture, where the best focus points are, and even visualise the shift in focus as the lens stops down.
From FoCal 2021, this test runs on all tethered cameras (not just ones with autofocus adjustment).
Dig Deep with FoCal's MultiTest
How many stops... really?
Analyse the performance of the stabilisation system in your lens or camera with FoCal’s brand new Stabilisation Test.
Compare image quality with stabilisation on and off, handheld and on a tripod to get a full view of how to get the very best from your system.
Find out how many stops your system really gives you.
How repeatable is your autofocus?
When you half-press that shutter button and your camera beeps, where is it really focusing?
The Autofocus Consistency test will automatically defocus and refocus a number of times and show you just how consistent the focus point is.
This tool can highlight camera and lens problems, including degradation of focus drive mechanism. Combined with the FoCal Comparison Database, you can know if you've got problems coming.
Which aperture is sharpest for your lens?
Lens performance changes with aperture. Most lenses are softer at each end of the aperture range, but how much depends on the lens and camera body.
Using the Aperture Sharpness test, you can see exactly where the best aperture is, and how much shooting wide open or stopped down will have on your images.
This tool can highlight lens problems as well, including misaligned lens elements and aperture mechanism issues. Combined with the FoCal Comparison Database, you can see exactly how well your lens is really working for you.
See how dust will really affect your shots.
Dust on your DSLR sensor is a fact of life. But how much dust is too much? Well, that depends on how you shoot... for example portrait photography can often tolerate a lot more dust than landscapes.
FoCal's Dust Analysis tool shows you where all the dust spots are. But more than that - it shows you what apertures they'll affect, what they look like up close and personal, and even how much they're likely to affect your images!
So use the Dust Analysis tool and make sure you don't risk your sensor by cleaning unnecessarily - a bit of dust doesn't always mean you'll see it in your images.
All your results in one PDF.
Once you've run your test, you can save the comprehensive report. It shows all your results, all the image crops that were analysed and all the charts with explanations of how to interpret the data.