henry albert
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 p.27 #4 · UPDATE - Nikon D5/D500 Dynamic AF Issue | |
So here's what I'm on about. I like the old dynamic because of the length of time between drifting off the selected target, and the camera's selection of a new target (whatever is under the selected focus point). In some situations, I have been unable to keep the selected focus point continually on the target, and the delay in acquiring a new target has given me a chance to reorient the focus point as I desire. And here is an actually, honest-to-gawd, real-world example of said situation.
I shoot a lot of hockey. My favorite spot from which to shoot is behind the goal line and through the glass, at the last pane of glass before the corner curve. My preferred shot is an open ice check on the puck carrier at center ice and/or coming across the blue line. (If you don't know or shoot hockey and are wondering what that might be, go to YouTube and search for "scott stevens hits paul kariya.") I also like to shoot up the boards in the same area, because that is a common site of contact.
To get my shot, I survey the scene to see where the action might go, track the puck carrier coming toward me, zoom backwards to keep the frame, and try to anticipate the play. The play can be anything from a quick pass to a player out of frame, to a slick poke check from a defending player's stick, to body-to-body contact and prized facial expressions. The shooting might become extended, if more players enter the frame and begin jousting for control of the puck. If a hit has been applied to someone, you might linger on the scene after the puck has left to record any extracurricular activity that occurs: exchanged glares, shoves, stick jabs, slashes, discussions about the relative sexual attributes of the opposing players' mothers, that sort of thing.
Are there complications? you ask. Why, yes, there are a few.
1. This all can happen very quickly because skaters are often very fast. Even at the high school level in a hockey obsessed place like Minnesota, where the players have been on skates since they were four years old, that puck carrier can really be hauling ass. These are usually, as they say down at Moe's bar, bang bang plays.
2. The players are shifty and can make startlingly fast lateral movements.
3. The area can be crowded. There can be 10 skaters and one referee jammed inside the blue line, and every single one of them has been tasked by satan to wreck your shot.
4. Once you pull the trigger, the mirror blackouts come hot and heavy.
So, to summarize, the play is fast and coming at you, the target can move laterally without warning, a lot of traffic is conspiring to get into the frame, you are tracking the puck carrier AND zooming backwards, and 10-12 times a second your view of all this is obstructed.
It isn't difficult to see how easy it can to let the focus point slip off the target in that scenario. So it is also easy to see why the old dynamic mode, with it's generous delay before switching targets, is the photographer's friend. Dynamic as constituted in the D5/D500, switches targets far too fast. So fast that in use it functions simply as single point, which negates the reason to have dynamic modes in the first place.
I don't have a D5, but I'm an early adopter of the D500 (also use a D750 and D4). I had begun to use the D500 a lot because several of the local rinks have very good lighting, but I stopped because of the large numbers of OOF frames it generated. Before this thread I assumed that either I had a bad copy of the D500, or the much ballyhooed focusing system wasn't as advertised. After this thread began I discovered that I can control the amount of time the dynamic mode delays it's acquisition of a new target using the blocked shot menu. In fact, I think dynamic is just a further development of the blocked shot routine.
One final point. Some folks like group mode and wonder why us dynamic mode whiners don't just use it instead. Well, group mode sucks for hockey because it focuses on whatever is closest, and whatever is closest is often a helmet or stick or number of a player you don't want to focus on. In fact, I don't use group mode at all for the same reason: it focuses on what it sees as closest to the camera and not necessarily on what I want.
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