After somewhat concluding that my MK3 doesn't track well (mostly relating to the processionals of weddings), I changed my CF3 #2 to the fastest sensitivity. What a difference!
I mean it was always sorta OK but nothing to write home about, enough keepers not to warrant a full blown test. It's always been spectacular 1 shot mode, so I didn't worry about the tracking so much, especially since I'm a wedding guy and use 1 shot mode mostly.
So my question is, What have other people found to be the best average sensitivity setting?
This may also relate to my MK2 CF 20., I was never that thrilled with the MK2 tracking, so I'm going to crank CF20 to a higher setting and see if it helps.
Hopefully this will help some other wedding shooters.
Photodan34 wrote:
After somewhat concluding that my MK3 doesn't track well (mostly relating to the processionals of weddings), I changed my CF3 #2 to the fastest sensitivity. What a difference!
I mean it was always sorta OK but nothing to write home about, enough keepers not to warrant a full blown test. It's always been spectacular 1 shot mode, so I didn't worry about the tracking so much, especially since I'm a wedding guy and use 1 shot mode mostly.
So my question is, What have other people found to be the best average sensitivity setting?
As you probably found out, this setting doesn't really change the cameras ability to track subject movement. What it changes is the DELAY between when the camera **thinks** it sees an out of focus condition and when it tries to reacquire focus.
My experience has always been that "IF" you can keep the active AF point on your subject then the "Fastest" setting is usually best. Again, the important point here is the camera "thinking" there is an out of focus condition. Many times the camera can lose focus and it doesn't know it (Why else would you get out of focus shots when in focus priority mode?).
If the subject is moving such that you are having trouble keeping the active AF point on the subject, a slower sensitivity setting can sometimes help.
I prefer the fastest setting for most everything. True, I may occasionally slip off my subject and the camera will grab the wall or a parked car but when I get back on the subject the camera is equally quick to reacquire focus.
elader wrote:
How do you know which the active point is? Is the mkIIi different from the mkII?
Unless I am shooting something with high contrast against a very uniform background, I always manually set my focus point. Even then if there is something like an eye that I want to ensure is focus I manually set the focus point.
jerrykur wrote:
Unless I am shooting something with high contrast against a very uniform background, I always manually set my focus point. Even then if there is something like an eye that I want to ensure is focus I manually set the focus point.
and then once you acquire, the af servo works like it acquired with the center point on 'auto'
IMO, it really depends on (and is a tool to deal with) the subject and whether other moving objects will pass in front of the subject you stuck your active point on (I manually select). Putting it on the highest sensitivity can cause you to lose focus on, say, the subject soccer player in a group.
But I think really in the end what works best for a given shooter is really what matters, and it underscores that the Mk# presents a lot of options for one to choose among. And sometimes come up with the less than optimal setting for a given situation.
Yeah, I had mine set to slower, I select the AF point and put on the tuxedo, usually shooting about f3.5-4. The people are processing so they are going pretty slow, you would think it would focus 90% of the time(MK3), but it doesn't. So that's why I posted. It's one of those questions that "depends on what you shoot", but you'd think people walking slow sensitivity would work and it does but only OK. I'm going to crank it up and see if it helps.
