My SET button has always been set to Subject Recognition on/off toggle. I prefer to do it that way and not have to hold down a back button to have it off. Upper back buttons are a limited resource and I want them used for more useful things.
I only toggle subject recognition off when the thing is grabbing other things in the frame like a knot on a tree or a black mark on the bird that isn't the eye. Don't have to do that often.
The video and suggestion is very specific for swimming and probably makes sense for that unique scenario. I don't think it has much value for a lot of other subjects.
I'd love to have 20mins in a room with that guy who designed the A1II AF. I'd really like to know what possessed them to throw away the best feature of past Sony AF (prioritizing the centre of Wide or Zone) and replace it with the IMO inferior near object priority that just loves jumping to the foreground grass, water etc.
Hmmm....I have been having trouble with the focus grabbing the brighter flower when shooting bees and wasps with insect recognition enabled, I'm going to play with turning it off. (100-400 lens on A1 II)
Doesn't so-called dual back button focus achieve the same thing? i.e. subject recognition only on back button AF-On, regular AF-On on another button or half press. Not saying the video showing isn't a cool trick as well. I might even try it out. Just wondering if I'm missing anything in particular here that would change my hit rate (which is >95% for my purposes).
Dragonfire wrote:
I am certain Canon and Nikon shooters can benefit from this knowledge, if someone were crazy enough to tell them
Nikon is stuck with only 2 dials on some bodies so you have to do alot with buttons. Canon has plenty of button options and 2 BBFs for many years. Everyone keeps adding more and more options, though sometimes they are not always exactly what one wants. I wish we could connect the cameras to computers and assign every button and dial to anything the camera is possibly capable of doing.
EB-1 wrote:
Nikon is stuck with only 2 dials on some bodies so you have to do alot with buttons. Canon has plenty of button options and 2 BBFs for many years. Everyone keeps adding more and more options, though sometimes they are not always exactly what one wants. I wish we could connect the cameras to computers and assign every button and dial to anything the camera is possibly capable of doing.
EBH
Sony comes very close to that. They aren't 100% complete but compared to Canon they are ahead. Nikon is so far behind you can't even see them in the rear view mirror.
mrdan86 wrote:
Doesn't so-called dual back button focus achieve the same thing? i.e. subject recognition only on back button AF-On, regular AF-On on another button or half press. Not saying the video showing isn't a cool trick as well. I might even try it out. Just wondering if I'm missing anything in particular here that would change my hit rate (which is >95% for my purposes).
Any method of having subject detect on or off will do the same thing. Lots of ways to go about it through all of Sony's options and button customization. As I mentioned, I just use SET to toggle Face/Eye Recognition on/off.
I find the information in the video confusing (that itself doesn't surprise me). The way how the AF should work on A1 II is summarized by ChatGPT, as follows:
🔹 "If the face/eyes are not visible (e.g., face turned down, away, or hidden):
The camera cannot detect the eyes or face, so the eye/face AF box won’t appear.
Instead, if Subject Recognition (Human) is enabled, the system automatically falls back to detecting the head or body.
You’ll usually see a larger recognition frame around the head or torso instead of the smaller eye/face frame.
Autofocus will then track the head or body until the eyes/face become visible again."
I might have misunderstood the video, but I believe it suggests that when the face isn't visible then a human subject isn't recognized, and this shouldn't be the case if the head is prominent enough. What is puzzling, how does, and how can, the camera focus on the human subject in the video with the subject detection off, when this doesn't happen with the subject detection on? Without subject detection, I would have expected the camera to focus on the splashed water/droplets in front of a swimmer. Maybe the DoF is sufficient and the subject behind the splashed water is still in focus?
I am sure I am missing something simple here and thus asking silly questions.
ruthenium wrote:
I find the information in the video confusing (that itself doesn't surprise me). The way how the AF should work on A1 II is summarized by ChatGPT, as follows:
🔹 "If the face/eyes are not visible (e.g., face turned down, away, or hidden):
The camera cannot detect the eyes or face, so the eye/face AF box won’t appear.
Instead, if Subject Recognition (Human) is enabled, the system automatically falls back to detecting the head or body.
You’ll usually see a larger recognition frame around the head or torso instead of the smaller eye/face frame.
Autofocus will then track the head or body until the eyes/face become visible again."
I might have misunderstood the video, but I believe it suggests that when the face isn't visible then a human subject isn't recognized, and this shouldn't be the case if the head is prominent enough. What is puzzling, how does, and how can, the camera focus on the human subject in the video with the subject detection off, when this doesn't happen with the subject detection on? Without subject detection, I would have expected the camera to focus on the splashed water/droplets in front of a swimmer. Maybe the DoF is sufficient and the subject behind the splashed water is still in focus?
I am sure I am missing something simple here and thus asking silly questions. ...Show more →
I think there was some comment about the AF locking onto faces behind the swimmer. So while it can track a head that is turned away it has a preference for a visible face farther away vs the nearest head not looking at you. This sounds like what I would want in most cases, but not for the swimming example.
Thanks for this, seems like there are a number of menu options that go unnoticed. Another example of this is following a running back or receiver on the sidelines...eye focus will lock on to eyes on the sideline when it cant lock on to the receiver and you'll get a back focused image. Using this should improve those types of shots.
arbitrage wrote:
Sony comes very close to that. They aren't 100% complete but compared to Canon they are ahead. Nikon is so far behind you can't even see them in the rear view mirror.
Nikon are so far behind they think they are in the lead because they can't see anyone in-front.
duncangr wrote:
Nikon are so far behind they think they are in the lead because they can't see anyone in-front.
Certainly but having shot a festival yesterday where they throw water at the participants I faced the classic issue that the AF of the Z8 is so responsive that it focuses instantly on water droplets. I was using 35mm f1.2 and 85mm f1.2 wide open most of the time.
What did the trick for me was to configure one lens button to mid size focusing area.
Generally speaking I found the ability to configure more buttons to different functions on the a9III convenient but most of that is possible with Nikon bodies. They have added more options on the Z8/z9 in recent firmware updates.
Besides, it raised a fundamental challenge when shooting different types of subjects with different bodies which is to remember how the camera was configured/needs to be configured.
Of course if all you do is to shoot birds then no issue. But only a tiny fraction of photographers only do one thing with their camera.
I have been pleasantly surprised by the A1ii's subject detection. It seems to be a little better at ignoring the grass/branches than either the A1 or the A9iii.
There seems to be a noticeable difference in the subject detection on the A1ii and the A9iii - I get different focus boxes for the two cameras with the A1ii seemingly more often displaying the subject detection box rather than the small focus boxes.
duncangr wrote:
I have been pleasantly surprised by the A1ii's subject detection. It seems to be a little better at ignoring the grass/branches than either the A1 or the A9iii.
There seems to be a noticeable difference in the subject detection on the A1ii and the A9iii - I get different focus boxes for the two cameras with the A1ii seemingly more often displaying the subject detection box rather than the small focus boxes.
Great shots, you mind sharing your AF settings? Still dialling in my personal A1 II and been experimenting with setups from others online to see what and what doesn't work
Rollergold wrote:
Great shots, you mind sharing your AF settings? Still dialling in my personal A1 II and been experimenting with setups from others online to see what and what doesn't work
I haven't changed any of the default settings, just assigned two back focus buttons, one Wide Area and the other Spot:XS and Bird AF.
