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But that hints at the next question. How does the camera know where you want it to focus? Put it another way; how does the camera know what the subject is? Sometimes it’s easy to say. Many cameras now have Face Recognition technology. If they detect one face in their field of view, they’ll focus on it. If you’re shooting a portrait this is probably exactly what you want but for some other shots it may not be. When shooting a climber you might want some shots to focus on fingers crimping a tiny hold, not on the face at all. If cameras detect more than one face they’ll probably focus on the nearest, but again this may or may not be what you want.

The clear implication is that, if you aren’t going to use manual focus, it pays to know how the camera decides where its focus point will be. (That’s if the camera gives you any choice in the matter. Some compacts may insist that you want to focus on faces every time.) This means looking for what may be called AF-area mode, AF Point Selection, or something of that ilk.