Have you ever been photographing snowy landscapes just to realize that your camera made a blue gray looking out of focus image?
The camera operates with something called while balance and there is your first problem. The camera does a best guess when it comes to picking the color temperature.
Moving away from AWB (Auto White Balance) and over to a more representative choice could solve your first problem. A much better choice would be to also shoot in raw. Raw makes it possible to adjust the white balance in post processing. I’m always shooting Raw. The single reason is to keep all the colors.
By keeping more of those colors you will also be able to reveal some more details in under/over exposed images. That often happen because the snow will reflect light and confuse your light meter.
The next issue is the out of focus problem. There might be condensation on your lens so check that when you are out photographing.
The other, and more common, issue is contrast. The camera needs contrast objects to detect focus. So find your self a color change in your image to help that autofocus.
If you are using the camera on a tripod then use your live view and focus with manual focus and magnification. The process takes a bit longer but done properly the results are always better.
