If you’re a Canon EOS user and you process your Raw files in Digital Photo Professional (DPP) there’s a feature that shows you which autofocus points were locked onto the subject when you took the photo. Considering that Lightroom is a much more advanced Raw converter, you’d think that it would have the same feature. But it doesn’t! Until now…
Show Focus Points is a free Lightroom plug-in that shows you which autofocus points were used with photos taken from most Canon or Nikon digital SLR cameras.
All you have to do is download and install the plug-in (instructions are on the download page) and you’re set.
I’ve been testing the plug-in with photos taken on EOS 350D, 40D, 60D and 5D Mark II cameras. It works with Raw files but not JPEGs, and Raw files that have been converted to DNG as well as Canon’s CR2 format.
However, it should be noted that the plug-in is still in beta, so it may not work perfectly all the time. At the moment it’s compatible only with Lightroom 5, and the makers are working on a version for Lightroom 4. I assume that once it comes out of beta the makers will start charging for it, so if you want to try it out now is a good time.
Show Focus Points plug-in in action
Here’s a screen shot showing the plug-in with a photo taken on my EOS 350D. It shows that five of the seven autofocus points achieved focus:
The thing I like about this plug-in is that it generates a lot more information than which autofocus points were used. Let’s take a look at the panel on the right of the window:
It tells you the camera and lens, the focal length, exposure and autofocus settings, the hyperfocal distance and some information about the number of autofocus points used. Normally, it shows the distance that the lens focused on as well, although it didn’t with this particular photo.
Here’a an example using a photo taken with my EOS 40D:
A close look at the Focus information reveals the following:
You can see that in this case the plug-in shows the subject distance, the hyperfocal distance, plus the closest and furthest points that are in focus at this aperture setting.
Finally, an example taken with my EOS 5D Mark II:
Here’s the Focus information:
You can see that camera was in manual focus mode, and was focused on a point 83cm from the camera, and that there is only 2cm of depth-of-field at this setting.
When the plug-in lies
Is the information from the plug-in accurate all the time? Not at all. For instance, in the last example, the photo of the glass bottle, I had a 500D close-up lens fitted to the lens. So the lens wasn’t focused at 83cm, the camera was in fact much closer to the subject.
The other time when the information may not be accurate is when you focus, lock focus, then recompose. The plug-in can only tell you which autofocus point achieved focus. It can’t give you any information about recomposed photos because this information isn’t recorded in the Raw file.
Download Show Focus Points
You can download the Show Focus Points plug-in from the dedicated website (click the link). It’s currently a free download for Windows and Mac, and the plug-in works with Nikon and Canon cameras.
Further resources
Learn more about Lightroom with these articles:
Organising Photo Files for Lightroom
How to Improve the Speed and Performance of Lightroom
How to Prepare Photos for the Web in Lightroom
Learn more about your Canon EOS camera with these articles:
How to Choose Your Next EOS Camera
Understanding EOS Autofocus: The EOS 70D
Understanding EOS Autofocus: Phase Detection Autofocus
Understanding EOS Autofocus: The EOS 1D Mark IV
Understanding EOS Autofocus: The EOS 5D Mark II and EOS 1D-X
Photography ebooks
Mastering Lightroom: Book One – The Library Module shows you how to use the Library Module to import, organise and search your images. This important task lays the foundation for the work you do in Lightroom. Mastering the Library module and learning to use Collections to organise and sort your photos ultimately saves you time, which you can spend either in the Develop module or with your camera.
Click the link to learn more, and see the other ebooks in the Mastering Lightroom series.
My ebook Understanding EOS is the perfect guide for anybody who wants to learn how to get the best out of their EOS camera.
Click the link to learn more, and see the other ebooks in the Understanding EOS series.
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