# Focus point display



## Glenn NK (Nov 25, 2012)

Is there an option in LR to display which focus point(s) was/were used during the capture of an image?


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## Jim Wilde (Nov 25, 2012)

No....has been often requested but hasn't arrived yet.


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## clee01l (Nov 26, 2012)

I think the likelihood this will happen is very slim. Focus points are tracked in the manufacturers notes field of the EXIF. This is a structured field determined by the mfg. and will occur in a different position for each mfg. And Mfgs can moved this field at will. So there is no guarantee that Adobe will be able to track this any better than proprietary RAW formats


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## jimburgess (Nov 26, 2012)

Aperture (maybe others) do a good job at this. LR has opted not to do it. It is possible.


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## dkupers (Nov 26, 2012)

@Cletus: I see no difference between interpreting the RAW-data and the EXIF-data, as both are brand or even camera-specific. Adobe has code for each type of camera in their RAW-converters already.

From my point of view, technically there's no problem implementing the AF-point selection. I guess Adobe has other reasons not to implement it. Maybe missing information in the EXIF, like the distribution/position of AF-points? Or too few camera's offering the AF-point-selection in their EXIF? On the other hand, professional camera's have this info in the EXIF, and Lightroom (and Camera RAW) will mostly be used by professionals.


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## clee01l (Nov 26, 2012)

The analogy that I was trying to make for the focus points and RAW formats is that the RAW format is proprietary and the Mfg Notes field of the EXIF is also controlled by the Mfg and not subject to some published standard like the rest of EXIF. 

While tracking tha focus point field for each mfg can be done, Lightroom might have to produce a decimal release update every time the mfg releases a new firmware version for every camera. And not just to accommodate new camera models as they do now.


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## jimburgess (Nov 27, 2012)

clee01l said:


> ... Lightroom might have to produce a decimal release update every time the mfg releases a new firmware version for every camera.



It's unlikely that a firmware upgrade will change the location of focal point data within the Mfg Notes of a given model of major camera brands. Can you provide specific examples of where this has happened with a firmware upgrade for a camera model produced by a major manufacturer?


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## dkupers (Nov 27, 2012)

Updating the location of the focal point data is highly unlikely, that would also mean that the mfg would have to update their own software (eg DPP for Canon).
One reason Adobe is not offering this feature, I think, could be the lack of some camera-specific information about the focal points. For example, if the EXIF-data only says 'focal point 1 active' without specifying the coordinates of focal point 1. On the other hand, I presume it's impossible to read the RAW-format without some camera-specific information.
Guess we will never get the answer


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## johnbeardy (Nov 27, 2012)

It's something I'd like to see, and I think it would be educational, but I don't see any sign of Adobe doing it.  On a related note, has anyone ever see Capture One's focus mask which shows which areas of images appear to be in focus? So it's actual rather than the intended point of focus....


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## bobrobert (Nov 27, 2012)

I use Faststone to browse my images before importing them to LR. Faststone has this feature,


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## Replytoken (Nov 27, 2012)

bobrobert said:


> I use Faststone to browse my images before importing them to LR. Faststone has this feature,



Could you be a bit more specific?  I also use FastStone for quick previewing before importing, and I do not believe that I am familiar with the feature that you are referring to?

Thanks,

--Ken


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## Roscoe17 (Dec 2, 2012)

johnbeardy said:


> ...has anyone ever see Capture One's focus mask which shows which areas of images appear to be in focus? So it's actual rather than the intended point of focus....


  I have and submitted a request for it on an Adobe forum...that is a great feature for quickly culling out bad pictures.


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## Bigfoot (Jun 8, 2013)

I have seen it in LR4 installed on windows machine but cannot see it on Mac. Help!


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## Allan Olesen (Jun 8, 2013)

clee01l said:


> I think the likelihood this will happen is very slim. Focus points are tracked in the manufacturers notes field of the EXIF. This is a structured field determined by the mfg. and will occur in a different position for each mfg. And Mfgs can moved this field at will. So there is no guarantee that Adobe will be able to track this any better than proprietary RAW formats


Adobe went to great lengths to find the proprietary data for in-camera crop so they could deprive us of access to the area outside the crop.

So Adobe do look in the proprietary fields to find information.


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## clee01l (Jun 8, 2013)

Allan Olesen said:


> Adobe went to great lengths to find the proprietary data for in-camera crop so they could deprive us of access to the area outside the crop.
> 
> So Adobe do look in the proprietary fields to find information.


The crop dimensions are in a standard EXIF field. It is not proprietary. This is the same field LR uses when writing out an exported file that has been cropped in LR.  In the EXIF there is a large structured field called Manufacturers Notes. The structure of this field is defined by the mfg.  And its structure is different for each mfg. some don't even have a sub field for focus point, others do, but in different locations.  Sometimes there can be multiple focus points stored, sometimes only one. The field can refer to a single pixel coordinate or a zone. How this is handled is entirely left up to the mfg.  There are too many camera models with unique definitions to make this special parsing of the mfg's notes field cost effective to reverse engineer by Adobe developers.


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## Allan Olesen (Jun 8, 2013)

If it is not proprietary, then please explain why "Sony" is part of the name of the fields in the files from my Sony a77 when viewed with Exiftool.

And please explain why it is not the same fields you need to change in different camera vendors' raw files to undo the crop.


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## clee01l (Jun 8, 2013)

Allan Olesen said:


> If it is not proprietary, then please explain why "Sony" is part of the name of the fields in the files from my Sony a77 when viewed with Exiftool.
> 
> And please explain why it is not the same fields you need to change in different camera vendors' raw files to undo the crop.


 You can read all about the EXIF Standards here
http://www.exif.org/Exif2-2.PDF
The pertinent information is in Tables 14-18.  There is no field defined for Focus point  There is no field defined for cropped dimensions (sorry if I misled you)  There are fields named  Image width and Image height.  If the Mfg puts the cropped dimensions there then Adobe or anyone else will not know that there is more data recorded even though the sensor is larger.  I do not know particulars for Sony RAW files or how faithfully they adhere to the EXIF Standards. 

There is a large unstructured field:
Tag Name = Manufacturer notes 
Field Name = MakerNote 

In that field the Mfgs can define their own sub fields with data types and lengths that meet there specific requirements.  One or more of those fields could be the focus point(s).  While these fields are only proprietary in that that are defined not by the EXIF standards body but by each individual Mfg.  Because each MFG MakerNote field can be and is different, Adobe does not reverse engineer the  data contained in the "MakerNote" field.  It might be nice if they did, but it would involve a lot of work to define the data to be collected in "MakerNote"  And a lot more work to develop code in LR to parse the data into fields common to all Mfgs and to create a method to share that information with the LR user

There are also Standards for IPTC, and XML These blocks can also appear in the file header.  They may have bearing on the Crop  vs. full sensor issue. 

I don't have a Sony RAW file to parse so I can't tell you what Sony did or what Adobe did to fix what Sony did differently from all of the other mfgs.


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