Well you pixel peepers keep going on bashing your heads against the wall trying to reinvent the wheel trying to understand algorithyms and computer processing formula make it as hard for yourself as you can, fill your mind with completely irrelevant info, I like that because that means I'll have far less competition, cause while your trying to work out the speed of the on off button I have just finished another shoot. Once you master the speed of the on off button you can move onto the lens contact system and try and work out how it communicates with the body, that should keep you occupied for ages. All highly important knowledge without it you will fail.
Like I said I've been shooting for 20 years back when the EOS 1n first came out 10 years before any digitial body saw the light of day.
I know how AF is designed to work, yes it can work in other ways if you are skilled at your craft, BUT if your a rank amateur and trust me there are thousands of them on here looking for that magic formula which very few people have. Then read the manual understand how AF is DESIGNED to work not how you want it to work, then complain when your shots are dirt. It aint that hard.
Stop trying to make a camera work the way you want it to work, use it how it is designed to work and you may just start to see improvements in your photos.
Like I said black and white. Anything in between is asking for trouble.
And Dan you sound like a seasoned pro with years of pro shooting under your belt, tell me why am I wrong.
I've done 20 years and know my gear inside out how it works what does or doesn't work and can shoot any sport and get 95% of shots tack sharp, can you??
You guys keep doing what your doing, I'll keep doing what i am doing, and I gaurantee I will never post a thread about front back sideways up down inside out focus or is my lens a dud thread why can't I get sharp photos I have an $8000 camera anda $10000 lens and its dismal, I can get better photos with my P&S. threads.
Program the custom function in your camera body so that the buttons on the end of your 500mm switch between one shot and AI servo focus. That's exactly why this option was created. If you'e shooting a bird in flight, use AI servo. If it is stationary, press the button on the lens to switch to one shot focus and lock the focus. I did this frequently when shooting sports such as baseball where I would need to frequently switch between the two modes.
If you use AI servo on a stationary subject, you will see the focus constantly hunting.
Jim Levitt wrote:
The question is, how well does AI Servo "settle down" if your subject stops moving? mttran wrote:
This is a $4K question between 1 series and other model. Second dedicated CPU/Power/support ICs/etc.. and number line of AF code (RAM) does cost that much. This is why we don't have a high hope for 5D3. cos 5d series are their best defense / offense cam in the current dslr market in term of $
Except that in the EOS 3 they implemented most all of what would go into the EOS 1V and what was the camera running new? $950 if I remember correctly. That got you the 45pt AF and the same metering capabilities plus the eye control focus if that works for you. Then again, the EOS 1V was only $1600 or somewhere around there. It certainly wasn't the price difference we see between the 5D and 1Ds bodies today. Somehow when the digital bodies came along, Canon and Nikon were able to go WAY up market into MF gear level on pricing and carry/force buyers into those higher prices. The AF system cannot possibly cost $4K. The whole EOS 1V didn't cost that much. And by now, full frame production costs are obviously way down from the release of the original 1Ds. The 1DsMk3 and D3 prices just don't make sense based on the pricing we saw in the film bodies that preceded them.
Could Canon build a digital equivalent of the EOS 3 at or near the EOS 5 price point? Absolutely. Will they? Absolutely not if the buyers keep coming for the EOS 1Ds Mk whatever.
Program the custom function in your camera body so that the buttons on the end of your 500mm switch between one shot and AI servo focus. That's exactly why this option was created. If you'e shooting a bird in flight, use AI servo. If it is stationary, press the button on the lens to switch to one shot focus and lock the focus. I did this frequently when shooting sports such as baseball where I would need to frequently switch between the two modes.
If you use AI servo on a stationary subject, you will see the focus constantly hunting. ...Show more →
Finally a knowledgable reply that is 100% on the money from a photographer who knows exactly what he is talking about.
darryn patch wrote:
Finally a knowledgable reply that is 100% on the money from a photographer who knows exactly what he is talking about.
Except only the super-teles have that button on the lens. You're left having to do the button/control wheel dance that darryn described above (easy on a 1D3, very awkward on a 5DMarkII or any of the xxD bodies where the AF mode button is on the same side of the camera as the shutter button), or you keep the camera in servo mode, use rear-button focus, and release the focus button to lock focus if your subject stops moving. This works better on the 1-series than it does on the other Canon bodies, unfortunately. Word has it the 1D4 "settles" better than the 1D3 did, not hunting for focus in servo mode when the subject stops moving. I haven't had the opportunity to test that out personally.
Ben Horne wrote:
If you use AI servo on a stationary subject, you will see the focus constantly hunting.
How you do you expect your camera to focus on something moving if it can't stably focus on a static target? We are not talking about low light here...
One of the first test of your camera AF should be tripod-mount it and after initial focus acquisition, it should focus stably on a static subject, in good light, in AI servo, without continuously hunting...
rocksy wrote:
How you do you expect your camera to focus on something moving if it can't stably focus on a static target? We are not talking about low light here...
One of the first test of your camera AF should be tripod-mount it and after initial focus acquisition, it should focus stably on a static subject, in good light, in AI servo, without continuously hunting...
try this: place your camera on a stable tripod, and point it at a stationary subject. Turn off IS. Place your ear to the lens, and half press the shutter. You will hear the AF motor quietly fidgeting back and forth. This is what I refer to has hunting, not giant swings from foreground and background.
In this age of AF micro adjustments, you don't think that this constant hunting will cause fron and back focusing from shot to shot? The AI Servo algorhythm assumes that the subject is moving, and is improper for a stationary subject.
Feel free to use AI Focus if your intent is to do both. It will switch between tracking and focus lock depending on if it senses a moving subject. However, this is a decision that I prefer to make on my own. I find that it is easy enough just to switch between one shot and ai servo.
darryn patch wrote:
And Dan... tell me why am I wrong.
I think I already explained why I believe you are incorrect, based on the way I understand the AI modes to work in a fashion that predicts focus point based on assumptions about subject motion. These assumptions cannot be valid with the essentially random (and quite small) motions in the situation you describe.
Finally a knowledgable reply that is 100% on the money from a photographer who knows exactly what he is talking about.
Yes. Ben often knows what he is talking about. (Not that it matters, but I described the same point about how AI works earlier in the thread as well - the point I've repeated above in my first paragraph of this post.)
To repeat one other thing I mentioned earlier... "simple" is a fine approach when it is correct, but "simple" is not a good thing when it leads you to misunderstand how your camera works. It is "simple" to shoot everything at f/8, but that doesn't mean that shooting everything at f/8 is a good idea. It helps to understand how aperture works so that you can use this variable intelligently. In the same way, it helps to understand how the AF modes work so that you can select among them intelligently with a goal of producing the photographs you are trying to achieve.
With the 1D4, the AF system is usually so stable it is not necessary to change to 1 shot. I do have a couple lenses that do hunt, when they do I change to 1 shot. With long teles, it has not been necessary. AI servo most of the time for me too.
mttran wrote:
+1, I believe only 1 series offering the AI servo tracking sensitivity so user can fine tune for motion or static subject. This is why fast prime work better with 1 series AF. Hands, fingers and mind will be AF free to compose your subject.
not much about the rule...and we all don't want to count OOF, do we