Blender Auto Focus Camera Addon

Auto Focus Camera

Auto Focus Camera is a Blender addon that automatically adjusts your camera's focus based on what's in the center of your view. This provides realistic depth of field effects without manual adjustments.

Getting Started

Main Controls

• Enable Auto Focus - Toggle button with camera icon. Activates the automatic focus system.
• Refresh Button - Small refresh icon next to the main toggle. Restarts the auto focus timer if it stops responding.

Focus Transition Settings

• Focus Transition Time - Controls how smoothly the focus changes when looking at different objects.
  • 0.00 - Instant focus change (no smoothing)
  • 1.00 - Slow, gradual focus transition (1 second)
  • Recommended: 0.1-0.3 for natural-looking transitions

Focus Effects

• Bounce Effect - Creates a realistic camera focus bounce effect.
  • Enable Bounce Effect - Toggles the bounce effect on/off
  • Bounce Strength - Controls how pronounced the bounce is
  • Bounce Duration - How long the bounce effect lasts
  • Bounce Frequency - How many oscillations occur during the bounce
• Breathing Effect - Simulates lens breathing (subtle zoom change when focusing).
  • Enable Breathing Effect - Toggles the breathing effect on/off
  • Breathing Strength - Controls the intensity of the zoom effect

Smart Focus System

• Enable Smart Focus - Toggles the advanced multi-point focus analysis system.
• Grid Size - Controls the precision of the focus analysis (larger = more precise but slower).
• Focus Priority Settings:
  • Prioritize Center - Gives more importance to objects in the center of the frame.
    • Center Strength - Controls how strongly the center is prioritized.
  • Prioritize Close Points - Gives more importance to objects closer to the camera.
    • Proximity Strength - Controls how strongly closer objects are prioritized.
• Grid Visualization:
  • Show Grid Visualization - Toggles the focus grid overlay in the viewport
  • Grid Color - Sets the color of the grid lines
  • Point Size - Adjusts the size of the focus points
  • Point Opacity - Controls the transparency of the focus points

Focus Offset and Position

• Focus Offset - Allows you to adjust the focus point forward or backward from the detected object.
  • Z Offset - Adjusts focus distance (positive = farther, negative = closer)
  • Current Focus Distance - Shows the active camera's current focus distance in meters
• X and Y Offset (available when Smart Focus is disabled):
  • X (Horizontal) - Shifts the focus point left or right
  • Y (Vertical) - Shifts the focus point up or down

Keyframe Controls

Five buttons for controlling focus offset keyframes:

• Previous Keyframe - Jump to the previous focus offset keyframe
• Next Keyframe - Jump to the next focus offset keyframe
• Add Keyframe - Add a keyframe for the current focus offset at the current frame
• Remove Keyframe - Delete the keyframe at the current frame (only active when a keyframe exists)
• Clear All Keyframes - Delete all focus offset keyframes

Baking Focus Distance

IMPORTANT: Baking is essential when:

• Sharing your project with others who don't have the addon
• Rendering via command line
• Rendering in the viewport
• Ensuring your renders exactly match what you see while editing

The addon only works in the Blender interface. You must bake before rendering to ensure the focal distance will be the same as what you see in the viewport.

Baking Options:

• Use Scene Frame Range - When enabled, uses your scene's start and end frames
• Start/End Frame - Custom range for baking (visible when not using scene frame range)
• Bake Button - Starts the baking process, creating keyframes for each frame

After baking, a "Delete Baked Keyframes" button will appear at the top of the panel. Use this to remove all baked keyframes if you need to make adjustments.

DOF Settings

Controls for the camera's depth of field:

• Enable DOF - Toggles depth of field effect
• F-Stop - Controls the aperture size (lower values = shallower depth of field)
• Blades - Number of aperture blades (affects bokeh shape)
• Rotation - Rotates the aperture shape
• Ratio - Adjusts the aperture aspect ratio
• Show Limits - Shows focus distance in the viewport

View Settings

• Show Overlay - Toggles the display of focus information text in the viewport

Typical Workflow

1. Enable Auto Focus
2. Adjust Focus Transition Time to your preference
3. Use Focus Offset if needed to fine-tune the focus point
4. Set keyframes for Focus Offset if you need different offsets at different times
5. Set up your DOF settings (F-Stop, etc.)
6. IMPORTANT: Bake the focus distance before rendering or sharing your project (prefer set the viewport in the solid mode)
7. Render your animation with perfect focus in every frame

Troubleshooting

• If auto focus stops working, try the Refresh button
• If baked keyframes don't appear correctly, delete them and bake again
• For precise focus control at specific frames, add manual keyframes to the Focus Offset

Remember: Always bake your focus before rendering to ensure what you see is what you get!