7D MkII review: This just in from Martin Bailey

I've read good review from Martin in the past; however, in this review he uses the face recognition to track wildlife instead of the new 'wide zone' tracking I've been using. His conclusion is that the tracking is not great. My conclusion; having previously shot BIF with the orig. 7D and 5D MkIII is that this new zone tracking is a game changer. Oh well, to each their own. Still I wanted to share with your guys.

http://www.martinbaile​yphotography.com …-impressions-podcast-453/

New camera that's complex with new features, different from what he's accustomed to.... some features which probably should be avoided for certain situations... No surprise to me that he struggled with the AF a bit initially.

When I moved from 50D to 7D, initially my "keeper" rate when way, way down, too. My mistake was trying to rely upon the automation of the camera, and not taking control of the AF the way I'd done before. There were few other people using the 7D at the time, and none of the books or tutorials were out yet, so I was on my own figuring it out. When I finally sorted it out, learned to use that new-at-the-time AF system, my keeper rate went way, way back up... better than I'd enjoyed with 50D and earlier models. I would expect 7DII to be the same... on steroids since it has even more modes and tweaks and AF points to deal with! Temptation is to fall back on the fancy automation and gee whiz features... but I find Keep It Simple, Stupid still applies most of the time!

I'm deliberately waiting to replace my pair of 7D's with a pair of 7DII's. Let someone else sort out the issues, this time!

I agree. Addtionally, he did use the 'facial recognition' and complained it didn't always create sharp focus on a walking toward him monkey. I would think one would primarily pick facial recognition for a still subject, not a moving one and certainly not one walking directly toward you.

Well, since facial recognition was almost certainly designed and tested to work primarily on people, this is not a surprise!

It's funny - people complain about how Canon is not moving forward with development of their camera features and capabilities, yet when something new and potentially powerful gets added to a camera, they expect it to pick it up and start using it like a point-and-shoot. Every single upgrade I've gone through - from the Rebel to the XX series to the 7D to the 5D3 - has come with the responsibility to learn the camera's subtleties. Sometimes it takes weeks of regular shooting to master a new function. The good news is that once you understand what you're doing, the camera does become more powerful in your hands.