Subfightersandman wrote in post #17693677
I definitely do not need a camcorder, as I said before I just want to dabble a little bit since I have the functionality in my camera. I want something with auto focus so I can utilize the 70D's awesome video auto focus. I will primarily be filming things like my dog, family and friends, outdoor adventures and if the creative mood strikes me perhaps some nature scenes.
I would ideally want a very fast lens, but I will compromise on this to bring the price down. IS is more important to me than speed, since I will be hand holding mostly, but I could also invest in some sort of stabilizer if I were to use a non IS lens.
So I recommend you get on YouTube and search up STM AF speed with 70D and look at a few examples there. You will find that while the 70D has pretty good autofocus for what it is, it will be very difficult to keep up with a dog, or moving people, when the depth of field is shallow (fast aperture). It cannot even keep up with a swing moving back and forth fast enough to keep it in focus at all times, but rather, only at the moments where it slows down and begins to go the other way again does it catch up and achieve focus. So keep this in mind. The AF of the 70D is good, it's way better than previous live view bodies. But it's still not fast enough to keep up with very much movement other than slow things when utilizing shallow depth of field. There's a reason the industry uses manual lenses for cinema/video. People simply focus faster with shallow depth of field. And with extended depth of field, you don't even need autofocus.
If you really just want to play around with STM and F2.8, the only options currently are the 40 STM, 50 STM and 24 STM. They're all inexpensive, so trying one isn't a big deal. Just get your expectations ready and don't expect it to keep up with a running dog and keep it in focus at all times at close range at F2.8 with a shallow depth of field.
Very best,
