I was in an old-time camera shop run by an old-timer who didn't really move past the film era. A lady came in with a higher-end Canon DSLR...5D-6D-7D family. She was asking for help with the camera not autofocusing consistently. The owner was at a loss. I nicely stuck my nose into the conversation, to the relief of the owner. I'm a Canon owner (60D) and tried to figure out her problem.

After puzzling over it a while, I finally noticed it was set for just one of the AF points way-off the center. Of course, the center was where she expected to see good focus. I set it to use all the AF points, and VOILA!! Problem solved, for the immediate term. I explained what was going on and showed her how you change AF points, and why. She had no idea about this functionality or how it got set the way it was.

I should have offered to swap my camera for hers, but I didn't have mine with me. A good example of a beginner buying what someone "recommended" to her with no concern over whether she had any comprehension of its capabilities, and would have been far better off spending a lot less money on a lower-end model to learn with.

Since I started this thread, I will take the liberty of waxing-on.....

Cameras now have so many buttons, modes, features, technical capabilities that they have surpassed the ability of, I dare say, MANY PEOPLE to comprehend them. This includes the ability to determine what button or joystick or option you may have unknowingly manipulated. The 200+ page manuals can be absolutely intimidating!

Call me a dinosaur if it satisfies your ego. I'm 68 years old, been a photographer for 60 of those years. I've taught photography to kids and adults. I collect Canon and Nikon film cameras. I'm a certified computer technician. I don't fear computers , Windows, Linux, Macs etc. I do have a phobia against smartphones. I want a cell phone to make phone calls with. Everything else is more than I have a desire to use. I don't text, and tell people not to text me. Seems like Smart phones don't even get used to make/receive phone calls anymore.

The other thing that disturbs me is the complication of today's DSLRs. Please don't start a discussion on this camera's good and bad, but when Nikon introduced the Df SLR, I thought, "Ahhh-Nikon gets it! Looks like a film camera. You can set aperture-shutter-ISO and TAKE PICTURES." The price was way out of my reach though.

My first digital camera was a Canon Powershot G5, because SLRs were too costly. More features and functions than I needed. I missed lens interchangeability too much so graduated to a Canon 60D, bought only because a smaller-and-$500.00 cheaper-Rebel did not fit my hands well. Between the manual and "Canon EOS 60D for Dummies" book I have managed to learn about how much it can be manipulated, though I will still will never have a need or desire to utilize many of its capabilities.

I am guilty of saying "Read the Manual!", but that is not how some people learn, including my wife. Technical manuals can be imposing and scary and complicated. I did not say "READ THE MANUAL!" to the lady in the camera store. I did wish that I could have spent time SHOWING her more about her camera to make her a more knowledgeable user.

It reminds me of when I was in Las Vegas (for one night) last year. I took my $116 Fuji S8650 to the "Strip" because I didn't want to carry my more expensive Nikons through the seedy area I had to walk through to get there. I set my ISO at 6400 and took decent handheld shots of the various sites. I stood next to a woman with a very expensive Canon; she was taking the shots with her on camera flash popping away. I told her that she wouldn't see anything beyond 13 feet shooting like that. I told her to raise her ISO to around 6400. She handed me a very expensive Canon (like I already mentioned!) and asked me to do it. I told her that she just handed me a very expensive camera and I could probably run faster than her (and the three people with her). Try as I might, I couldn't figure out the Canon menu system for change ISO. I told her to check Youtube when she got back to her hotel and learn how to change the ISO; I reminded her to change it back when she finished shooting at night. She spent a bundle on a great camera which she didn't know how to use!

She might have been fine if she'd only read the manual, bought a book or two about the camera and read those, and/or viewed some of the videos online about the Canon focus system.

BTW, it's super easy to "bump buttons" and change the focus point that way. On the models with a "joystick" (5D-series, 7D-series) there's the option of setting the joystick to directly access AF point selection (no need to press another button first.... which is faster but more prone to accidentally changing AF point selection) AND it's possible to set the joystick so that "clicking" it like a mouse button causes the AF point to immediately return to the center point.

I've haven't used 60D, 6D etc. with their slightly different AF control often enough to know what's possible with them. But I almost NEVER use my cameras set to All Points/Auto Selection (the way you set up hers). That leaves it completely up to the camera to decide where to focus and more often than not it chooses something other than what I want.