Canon 50 1.4 vs 1.2 for shooting basket ball indoors, thoughts?

Hi all you fellow sports shooters, I'd love to hear your thoughts on these two lens, pro's and con's of one over the other. I recently purchased a 1.4 and after using it for a couple of games am considering plunking down the extra $$ to get the 1.2. I need to know though if all 50mm lens are just slow to lock and then track/hold focus or if it's just the 1.4. Don't get me wrong, when it hits, the pictures are beautiful, but sometimes I'm missing or am just slightly late because the camera locks up and won't let the shutter release. I know it's the lens change as I normally shoot with a canon 70-200 2.8 mk2, but I wanted a wider shot and a faster Av so I went with the 1.4. Now though I'm thinking that I should have saved and purchased the 1.2. Am I wrong in thinking that the 1.2 will grab focus faster and hold it better when a player is driving up the lane, etc.? All shooting being done with a gripped 5D MK3. Only the lens is changing here. Thoughts, help, insights? I tweak'd on the Auto Focus settings all night and never was happy. Please understand I now have over 100k actuations on this body. I shoot for a local paper and know this camera and the settings inside and out. I just really need to know if the 1.2 is going to give me the extra gains that I'm expecting namely in keepers while the play is coming right at me. I can pull examples where the lens locked well just outside of the free throw line, but by time they got to the boards with the layup the focus is off and gone soft. Soft enough to make the shots unusable. In bigger gym's I can get away with my 70-200 and this simply does not happen. Hope that my question makes sense.

Thanks,
BK

Truth be told I wouldn't use either.

I would get the 85 1.8.

The 50 mm 1.4 is a good lens and the AF is okay. The 1.2 doesn't have faster or lock AF any faster than the 50 1.2 IMHO (I've owned a couple copies of each)......

I agree with your assessment on the 50/1.4, the AF is dodgy.

I use the 50/1.2 for sports when it is the right focal length. Performance is excellent. AF is fast and accurate.

The 50mm f/1.4 will be terrible for sports. The 50mm f/1.2 will be much better.

askydiver wrote in post #17414366
Hi all you fellow sports shooters, I'd love to hear your thoughts on these two lens, pro's and con's of one over the other. I recently purchased a 1.4 and after using it for a couple of games am considering plunking down the extra $$ to get the 1.2. I need to know though if all 50mm lens are just slow to lock and then track/hold focus or if it's just the 1.4. Don't get me wrong, when it hits, the pictures are beautiful, but sometimes I'm missing or am just slightly late because the camera locks up and won't let the shutter release. I know it's the lens change as I normally shoot with a canon 70-200 2.8 mk2, but I wanted a wider shot and a faster Av so I went with the 1.4. Now though I'm thinking that I should have saved and purchased the 1.2. Am I wrong in thinking that the 1.2 will grab focus faster and hold it better when a player is driving up the lane, etc.? All shooting being done with a gripped 5D MK3. Only the lens is changing here. Thoughts, help, insights? I tweak'd on the Auto Focus settings all night and never was happy. Please understand I now have over 100k actuations on this body. I shoot for a local paper and know this camera and the settings inside and out. I just really need to know if the 1.2 is going to give me the extra gains that I'm expecting namely in keepers while the play is coming right at me. I can pull examples where the lens locked well just outside of the free throw line, but by time they got to the boards with the layup the focus is off and gone soft. Soft enough to make the shots unusable. In bigger gym's I can get away with my 70-200 and this simply does not happen. Hope that my question makes sense.

Thanks,
BK

Find television coverage of a NBA game or major college basketball game, and look closely at the baseline photographers. The dominant lens is a Canon 70-200mm f/2.8. Second is a 24-70mm f/2.8. For EF mount lenses, the dominant body is a 1D-X. This combination is frequently used because it's proven to be effective in capturing fast and quick action at close range. There's no reason to reinvent the wheel.

Ok well I have a 1.4 and use it for sports all the time, it's a go to lens for basketball in my bag, but apparently it's terrible and I'm doing my job all wrong.

I'm actually quite happy with it as sports lens. I stop down to f2 most of the time, sometimes I pull that back to 1.6 or 1.4 but f2 is where I find I can get both the eyes and the ball in focus instead of having to choose. If the lens is going to live at f2 shooting sports, then justifying that extra ~$1.3k to upgrade is a tall order for me. And I really would have liked to have the 1.2's build quality, but if it's 5 times the cost then I can without touching on the insurance claim subject I can break and buy 5 1.4s for the cost of one 1.2. So I put $5 into a lens hood leave it on permanently to protect the AF motor and was free to reapply the $1k to other lenses. That can be halfway to a 24-70, or an 85 plus a cheap body or gold line wider prime or 3rd party fisheye, or a good portion of the way toward replacing your 100k actuation body so when it does eventually go (they all will at some point) you'll have cash on hand for an upgrade.

AF speed is not a consideration of mine in that equation because shooting D1 football and D1 basketball with the 50 I have never had the AF not be able to keep up, I've had it be hard to keep the AF point on them, just yesterday I got a charge the basket sequence with the 7D2 at 10fps with the 50 every single frame was in focus, it's keeping up with a player coming at me as fast as it can shoot, having a faster motor isn't going to make a difference with the sports I'm covering.

My keeper rate is almost the same with the 5D3. Which AF case have you been using? Make any changes to it? Which AF point pattern? With the 5D3 my issue is usually that the wider 50 will get the point to drift off the player and land on a nearby player or the seats, so I end up with one where it's jumped to something else and then it comes back for the next image in the drive. I've found more success moving to low center area of points (or expansion) does a better job of not grabbing seats or advertisements) When I can keep the AF where it needs to be it keeps up no problem. The 50 and in particular my 85 are so fast with the AF that I've grown to see the 70-200 as a means to an end more than what I want to reach for because the AF of the zoom is slow by comparison.

Here's a gallery with one such drive to the basket with the AF tracking on a 5D3 50mm 1.4 combo (I know just terrible without at red ring on them), I know this isn't right under the basket, it's just the first one I found, I'm not using the 50 on the 5D as much anymore so it'll take some digging to find a night I got the prime seats, a lack of user error on my part and machine gunning the whole drive (I do usually tend to wait until they're close to shooting unless the pace of the game has had the action taking place further out).
http://www.dcanavanpho​to.com/p50632494

I get it that some people have probably used the 50/1.4 with some level of success. No problem. But in my experience, every Canon lens I've ever used with ring-USM (L lens or otherwise) has been faster, more consistent and better in low light than any lens I've used with AFD, micro-motor, or USM-clutched drive. That's just the way it works. This isn't snobbery or whatever....ring-USM (HSM on Sigma lenses) is just better.

I'm sure folks will be able to give images either way.....I will post a couple 50L shots of sports here. But IMO the basic fact is that when you are asking the most from your AF system, the number one thing you want in a lens is ring-USM.

In answer to a couple of questions.

I use either Zone AF or Expanded AF Area: Surround
I use a slightly modified Case 2 for the AF mode. I have modified the Tracking sensitivity to be -2 vs -1. I.e. I want it MORE locked on and according to the manual that's what that does.
The other two params of Case 2 are the defaults.
AI Servo 1st image priority
Selectable AF point is set to all 61 points vs Only cross-type AF points


I stop down to 2 or 2.2, I shoot in manual, but saved to a C mode. I usually get to the games early and shoot some test shots, set my white balance and find an average ISO that is going to give the best results while allowing around 1/800th of a second shutter speed.

Here is a sequence of what I mean and now in looking back, I am wondering if the focus actually locked on the girl behind and tried to stay with her instead of my intended target. This is only one example of several. Which begs the question, why does a switch to the 50 make it so much harder to acquire and keep lock, where as my 70-200 I never have that issue. I lock with the same AF settings and track all the way to the basket no problem.

Next two

Next two

And last image, you can see the focus still appears to be behind her on the girl in white. Maybe it's just a practice thing with the new lens? Should I tweak the AF settings more to allow it to not stay so hard locked or maybe use the single point AF? What AF modes do you guys use to stay locked?

Lots to digest here... From the looks of your sequence images above, AF is way off... It might be the glass; since you mentioned that you don't have any issues with your camera settings when shooting with your 7-2L II... With regards to the 1.4 vs 1.2, you'll get marginal improvements on shutter speeds with a slight improvement on AF speed and DOF... IMHO, I would not go with the 1.2 version... In addition, if you want to go wider, I'd suggest 35mm or below... 50mm is relatively too close to the 70mm on your 7-2L II...

So where do you usually shoot during the basketball games? From the sequence above, you're standing off-center from the baseline...

I tend to move back and forth on the base line. I don't sit on the floor stationary. I actually move right and left as I get a feel for what plays the coaches are calling. I.e. once I figure out which side of the basket most shots will be getting taken from and in return allow the best action shots that include the ball and face's, etc. Hope that makes sense?

I find the 70mm just slightly to tight in smaller gym's. In gyms where I can step back 3-4 feet without hitting a wall, I'm fine. Though I do like being able to open up to 2 or 2.2 and thus use a lower ISO for cleaner shots. That was my biggest reason for getting the 50mm 1.4, i.e. the smaller gyms.

Do you think that tweaking my AF to say Expanded AF area: (the one with one large square in the middle and then 4 more smaller squares, one top and bottom, one left and right) would improve my accuracy at getting a good lock to begin with? I'm starting to think that maybe my lock is just off and so the camera is tracking the wrong subject instead of my intended one? Of course all that said, I'm still bugged by the lock out issue where I can't take a shot until the camera decides it's ready. So frustrating.

Your positioning makes sense... I understand your point... And yes, I've seen/been at highschool gyms where you have less than 10 feet of real estate between the out-of-bounds line underneath the basket and the padded wall...

With not a lot of space, I still think the 50mm can still be somewhat tight... Even on a full framer... But that's just my opinion, good sir... I'll tend to shoot either a 24mm or 35mm for wide angles... Again, just my preference...

You definitely can tweak your AF settings... For myself, I usually use one AF point... AI-Servo with back-button focusing to track players... When I want the shot, i'll press the shutter button... AF tracking speed is usually at camera default... I may, on ocassion, increase the speed, but mostly keep it at default... I don't use expanded AF area because I trust my 1D-series AF system... If images are blurred, I blame myself 90% of the time...

Hope this helps with the discussion...



PS. 5D3's FPS is very limiting for fast moving sports... The buffer really slows things down...

Yes, high school gyms are certainly hit or miss. I only stayed on a shot to long one time and got smacked into the padding by one of our boys. I was worried sick about him and he came up to me at the half apologizing for hitting me saying he was worried about me. Kids are tough. I like to move around, sitting still just does not suit my style I guess.

I thought that if I use single point (I can't find my manual at the moment to verify) that if the action moves right of left and I don't follow fast enough, but the action stays in my view finder that it would NOT track until I can re-center, provided it does not end up moving outside of the frame in view. I too back button focus everything and then use the shutter release when ready. Have been for years, nothing else seems to make sense anymore, at least not for sports. Where as if I'm in one of the expansion modes, and the subject moves, it will keep trying to track it until it leaves the field of view. Make sense? That was my reasoning for using expansion AF modes. I am in AI Servo for all of this. I will try single point at the next game and see if my keeper rates go up. I'm usually pretty good about keeping the action centered up in front of me.

My dream setup would be a 300 2.8 on a 1dx for long range (basket ball, wrestling, and football) and a 24-70 2.8 on a 1dx for the close up stuff, but right now none of that is in the cards so I must get better with what I have and can afford. Your comments about the 50mm being tight intrigue me. My sports editor either takes my shots and crops in for the paper OR asks that I get tighter. He likes that frame filled and loves the kids expressions, so right now the 50mm is as close to the right tool as I've been able to come up with.

I really do appreciate the input as it's my true desire to keep improving and getting better all the time.