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/...90&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.