AF Point selection for sports

[jonathans9]

Can anyone suggest an AF Point selection for shooting sports (football) with 300 mm lens in high burst mode using AI Servo. Sometimes I will frame the quarterback in focus and another player moves into the foreground and the camera focuses on him/her.
Or is this experience typical of the beast?
JS

[DwightMcCann]

What body? That's where the AF points are. I've 45 in one body and nine in the other. Oh, and Welcome to the forums.

[subtle_spectre]

Dwight...no show tonight or too early yet?

[DwightMcCann]

Subtle, thanks for asking ... I usually shoot Thursday or Friday but I don't usually shoot comedians which is what was going on last week. I will shoot Antonio Marcus Solis on Thursday and an all day Texas Hold 'Em Saturday. I actually have some images from a private Heritage Celebration on Tuesday at the casino, but have been very busy and now have a headache, sigh, and will be taking Advil and a nap. I would like to get new images from the Tuesday gig up tomorrow ... some very interesting native American dancers, both traditional and modern, along with Brule.

[jonathans9]

I am new to the forums here. I have been a film photographer untill very recently. I used to be very anti-techno, shooting only full frame B/W, no crop, no darkroom magic and no flash with a Nikon F3.
Anyway, now that I am techno-man I shoot raw/JPEG with a Mark II ID and a 20D
Thanks,
JS

[robertwgross]

It is not clear whether your question is about the autofocus mode, such as AI, or whether it is about the autofocus point selection, such as center-only. I hope you are not trying to do auto point selection.

If the wrong subject steps in front of the right subject, then just about every autofocus system is going to get fooled.

---Bob Gross---

[jonathans9]

I am asking about focus point selection. I use the button to select the center point but do I also have to get into a custum function to deselect auto focus point selection?
Thaks,
JS

[DwightMcCann]

Bob, can you point jonathans9 to the EOS section to threads about AF in 1D MII? I can't manage that right now.

[TheObiJuan]

for the 20D, the wheel is the fastest, atleast for me.

[J Rabin]

This gets asked a lot from new 1-D Series body users. Different users will have differing opinions from experiences depending on the sporting events they shoot.

This first thing is to read Chuck Westfall's "Getting the most from your 1-D series dSLR" pdf file that's a sticky somewhere on this Forum site. He's the technical evangelist for Canon, wrote that, and it answers your Q because he explains how a few sport shooting Custom Functions interact.

There are two or three Custom Functions that interact and affect focus tracking, like CF 20, etc.

My opinion? For most events, when in Servo Focus Mode, I do NOT select the Center FP, I leave all 45 active, and make sure I ACQUIRE the subject first with the CFP. Then the Servo hands the subject off to surrounding points as needed. Then I set the expand 1 Focus Point CF, depending on event. You can combine this with CF 18-3 to ONLY switch to the Center while Assist button is pressed.

If your shooting football or soccer, where a crossing player draws off the Servo Focus by crossing center of the viewfinder, you need to adjust the Custom function 20 for the length of time it does not respond.

Read Westfall's piece. He's the Pros guru. The focus system on 1-D is mind numbing, but does it get the job done!
Jack

[ScottE]

With my 20D I use only the centre focus point for most purposes except sports. For sports I usually activate all points. I start tracking the subject with the centre point and the move off centre for composition before shooting. I also watch the screen to ensure it tracks focus properly. If I can see any tracking problems I switch to the centre focus point, or another one if I can predict composition and track the subject with the selected point. (My camera is set on AI autofocus with focus assigned to the * button.)

[jonathans9]

I can't seem to locate the Chucl Westfall PDF sticky. Anyone have any ideas where to locate it?
Jonathan

[J Rabin]

EOS Forum, here:

http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showpost.php?p=318390&postcount=1

[chell]

[quote=chell]Hello there. I'm completely new to sports photography and had my first go last night. Crikey at difficult! I had the same problen with focus. Every time a player crossed the path of the one I was watching, I lost focus! I was using a 20d and a 300mm f4 l. The light was quite low so I bumped up the ISO to 800 to keep my speed up. Mosd of my shots were either blurred or focused on the wrong thing. I was using the same settings as you so please tell me what I 'm doing wrong. I watched the goalie when the action was close and the tried to focus on moments of drama but it was so fast moving I found it hard to keep up. Here are two examples. If you wouldn't mind giving me some tips and CC I'd be grateful. Thanks very much.

[tim]

Those pics are good! Use ISO1600 if you need to, or ISO3200.

[SkipD]

For all of you who are having problems like "Every time a player crossed the path of the one I was watching, I lost focus!", try setting the camera (the 20D and others) so that the * button needs to be pressed to activate autofocus. This feature puts auto focus IN CONTROL by YOU. To do this, set the Custom Function 4 value to 1.

The beauty of this feature is that you can press the * button anytime you want to have autofocus work for you, but you can take a whole string of shots without pressing the * button and the focus will not change (unless you twist on the focus ring on the lens). I use lenses that allow full time manual adjustment, and will sometimes choose to use manual focus adjustment rather than touch the * button.

There are some very lengthy threads about CF4=1 on the forums here. Once you do this - and leave it that way long enough to get used to it - you will never turn back to using the shutter release button to trigger both autofocus and exposure adjustment.

[primoz]

In case of 1 series cameras easiest solution for this kind of problem is setting Cfn 20 to 1 (AI Servo sensitivity set to slow).

[chell]

Those pics are good! Use ISO1600 if you need to, or ISO3200.
Ta Tim. I just think the could have been sharper and less noisy, I think I'm correct in saying that they were shot at 1600 as these were later in the game when the light was really low. Need to get Noise ninja I think. Thanks for the encouraging words though pet!

[chell]

For all of you who are having problems like "Every time a player crossed the path of the one I was watching, I lost focus!", try setting the camera (the 20D and others) so that the * button needs to be pressed to activate autofocus. This feature puts auto focus IN CONTROL by YOU. To do this, set the Custom Function 4 value to 1.

The beauty of this feature is that you can press the * button anytime you want to have autofocus work for you, but you can take a whole string of shots without pressing the * button and the focus will not change (unless you twist on the focus ring on the lens). I use lenses that allow full time manual adjustment, and will sometimes choose to use manual focus adjustment rather than touch the * button.

There are some very lengthy threads about CF4=1 on the forums here. Once you do this - and leave it that way long enough to get used to it - you will never turn back to using the shutter release button to trigger both autofocus and exposure adjustment.

Skip you are indeed a wealth of knowledge! Gonna try that right now!! Thank you!:)

[LMP]

Hi Chell,

I just had a look at the EXIF on the 2nd shot...if you shoot wide open next time at f/4 instead of the f/5.6 you used for that shot you'll have more chance of freezing the action. If needs be you could underexpose the shots to increase the shutter speed, if you shoot in RAW then you could tweak it back up in PP.

Bear in mind that you were shooting a night game with an f/4 lens (an f/2.8 is more the ticket) and it's a very respectable effort. If you can try getting along to an afternoon KO, it's going to be an easier base to start from than a night game.

I'm sure others will chime in with their views ;)

[chell]

Hi Chell,

I just had a look at the EXIF on the 2nd shot...if you shoot wide open next time at f/4 instead of the f/5.6 you used for that shot you'll have more chance of freezing the action. If needs be you could underexpose the shots to increase the shutter speed, if you shoot in RAW then you could tweak it back up in PP.

Bear in mind that you were shooting a night game with an f/4 lens (an f/2.8 is more the ticket) and it's a very respectable effort. If you can try getting along to an afternoon KO, it's going to be an easier base to start from than a night game.

I'm sure others will chime in with their views ;)
Thanks for that honey. If my pocket could stretch to a 2.8 I would. But as it is I was a very bad girl and found the 4 going for a reasonable price in Chester. I only went there for a polarising filter!!!!!!! Oh I wish I had a cheaper hobby!.....like ....origami perhaps? Where do I find the exif by the way?

[jevidon]

A nifty program i've found is Opanda IExif (http://www.opanda.com/en/iexif/index.html). It's really useful for one-touch viewing of EXIF info, especially on these forums.

[jevidon]

Thanks for that info Skip. I just made that setting change and have yet to employ it, but I can already appreciate the difference it will make for action/sports photography.

[Wilt]

Can anyone suggest an AF Point selection for shooting sports (football) with 300 mm lens in high burst mode using AI Servo. Sometimes I will frame the quarterback in focus and another player moves into the foreground and the camera focuses on him/her.
Or is this experience typical of the beast?
JS

Select center autofocus point, then set your Custom Function to use the * button to focus, letting the shutter button only handle AE and shutter release. That way anyone can run to the frame and not affect focus point, because YOU control when something is targeted for AF or not.