Shutter speed to turn off IS?

At air shows I shoot propeller planes at slow shutter speeds with IS on. Jets at higher speeds where IS is not needed. I don't want to be turning IS on & off all the time, so I leave IS on.

In the 10 years of shooting air shows this has never been a problem.

Perfectly Frank wrote in post #18719002
At air shows I shoot propeller planes at slow shutter speeds with IS on. Jets at higher speeds where IS is not needed. I don't want to be turning IS on & off all the time, so I leave IS on.

In the 10 years of shooting air shows this has never been a problem.

That makes sense. Some events, I would shoot at 1/1250 or higher at 200mm to 400mm, so for me the opposite is true, I don't need IS really for anything, it adds nothing to the shots. In fact having it on actually can cause bad results, for those times where action breaks out, and I quickly raise the camera to shoot to snap a player in the air.

Depends on need and what is being shot and what mode you are in. If one is in Av mode, for example, then shutter speed, being dynamic and controlled by the camera, one would want IS on. However since the OP mentions sports, that wouldn't be the case. Chances are that the shutter is locked at a fast static value, probably a few times faster than the reciprocal of the focal length.

AS_Photo wrote in post #18711254
Why turn off IS?

The general rule is 1/focal length for handheld shots. But I see no reason to disable IS in that situation.

904canon wrote in post #18711259
Just keep IS on until you use a tripod.

AS_Photo wrote in post #18711262
You can even keep it on with a tripod depending on the generation of IS.

Exactly.

Hannya wrote in post #18711265
As I understand it, using IS when you don’t need it at fast shutter speeds slows down the autofocus and for some photography that can be important.

It doesn't seem to slow anything down for me, certainly not AF. Everything is pretty much lightning fast regardless.

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I completely agree with you, Bob.

I leave IS on at all times, no matter what ....... even when panning, and even when on a tripod.

It never slows anything down, never adversely affects results or IQ, never affects autofocus speed or accuracy, and never causes me to miss any shots because of taking time to 'wind up'. . These things just don't happen, at all, regardless of other people saying that they do happen.


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I shoot handheld almost entirely and with Lenses that have IS I just leave it on. But I do tend to turn it off when I am at really high shutter speeds trying to catch fast action that is moving at or away from me. I ran into an instance with photographing motocross with a friend. We were taking shots at a jump as they were coming at us. He seemed to be getting some shots but missing some too. We were going over camera setup and I had IS turned off and he had it turned on. Other than that we were setup almost the same. He turned IS off and was getting more keepers. It seemed to be tracking better. Just my experience though.

Tom Reichner wrote in post #18719133
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I completely agree with you, Bob.

I leave IS on at all times, no matter what ....... even when panning, and even when on a tripod.

It never slows anything down, never adversely affects results or IQ, never affects autofocus speed or accuracy, and never causes me to miss any shots because of taking time to 'wind up'. . These things just don't happen, at all, regardless of other people saying that they do happen.


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Well actually they do. Shooting wildlife is different than sports. I have had to pull up the camera, aim and focus and shoot frames in about 1 sec or less, and have had IS mess up the shot. I get a bit perturbed when people say something isn't true, just because they shoot other scenarios and propagate their conclusions to every other type of shooting. IS does absolutely NOTHING for me during sports shooting. It may help others in some way or another, and others may even leave the IS on all the time cycling on and off, and that is ok, but that doesn't invalidate the fact IS can affect results when it goes on.

On Canon pro grade lenses I have never heard of anyone having issues with IS taking time to spin up. Particularly with with sports where you are always or should be always acquiring focus or subject selection. IS would not go to sleep in the normal usage during a sporting event. Maybe doing nature stuff.... sure..... where shots are literally minutes apart if even that close. But I am almost always acquiring subject during a game... and the IS never spins down and goes to sleep.

Now maybe with cheaper consumer grade lenses that may be the case.... don't own any so couldn't tell you. But a 1D and attached pro lens should never not be ready to take a shot. I've never seen it. I've messed up shots for other reason. I've had the limiter engaged when I shouldn't... etc. Wrong focus mode. But IS holding me up... guess I'm super lucky.

Croasdail wrote in post #18719343
On Canon pro grade lenses I have never heard of anyone having issues with IS taking time to spin up. Particularly with with sports where you are always or should be always acquiring focus or subject selection. IS would not go to sleep in the normal usage during a sporting event. Maybe doing nature stuff.... sure..... where shots are literally minutes apart if even that close. But I am almost always acquiring subject during a game... and the IS never spins down and goes to sleep.

Now maybe with cheaper consumer grade lenses that may be the case.... don't own any so couldn't tell you. But a 1D and attached pro lens should never not be ready to take a shot. I've never seen it. I've messed up shots for other reason. I've had the limiter engaged when I shouldn't... etc. Wrong focus mode. But IS holding me up... guess I'm super lucky.

I could be under the basket, and a player launches into the air unexpectedly. I can raise the camera, hit the BBF, and rattle off a shot. At the time I hit AF, the IS kicks in, but I am also taking a shot. It can and does happen. It doesn't happen all the time, because I might hit the focus button as I am raising the camera and that gives the IS just enough time.

I still haven't seen anyone really post any real important reason to leave IS on during sports shooting. I prefer to leave it off, saving mechanics and battery life, since it does nothing for the results, and never have to worry about any IS impacts on any of my shots for the evening. If there is some sort of advantage (other than habitually leaving it on just because one feels better about having it on), I would like to know. I can try to change over here in a month when the season starts again, I am willing to try new tricks and techniques to improve my results. What sports do you shoot, and what advantage is there to you having IS switched on and shooting sports for several hours?

EDIT: Your point about IS systems certainly is a worthy one to consider. Even Canon lenses, through the years, have different behavior with their IS systems. I started turning IS off back with the MKI of the 70-200 and other lenses, Canon and 3rd party, years back. However I took out my 700-200 II and I see not really noticeable twitch on that lens. So it could very well be that both Canon and 3rd party lenses over the recent years have better IS systems where the IS doesn't really even twitch when it activates, where older lenses did. Even the old 100-400 had a noticeable twitch in the viewfinder when I had one. So this could be the thing that explains why we have disparate views. Still, I see no advantage to leaving it on, for what I shoot, at 1/1250 to 1/2000, unless there was something that was posted I was not aware of.

TeamSpeed wrote in post #18719325
Well actually they do. Shooting wildlife is different than sports. I have had to pull up the camera, aim and focus and shoot frames in about 1 sec or less, and have had IS mess up the shot. I get a bit perturbed when people say something isn't true, just because they shoot other scenarios and propagate their conclusions to every other type of shooting. IS does absolutely NOTHING for me during sports shooting. It may help others in some way or another, and others may even leave the IS on all the time cycling on and off, and that is ok, but that doesn't invalidate the fact IS can affect results when it goes on.

I shoot sports too........never experienced a delay of any kind.

Croasdail wrote in post #18719343
On Canon pro grade lenses I have never heard of anyone having issues with IS taking time to spin up. Particularly with with sports where you are always or should be always acquiring focus or subject selection. IS would not go to sleep in the normal usage during a sporting event. Maybe doing nature stuff.... sure..... where shots are literally minutes apart if even that close. But I am almost always acquiring subject during a game... and the IS never spins down and goes to sleep.

Now maybe with cheaper consumer grade lenses that may be the case.... don't own any so couldn't tell you. But a 1D and attached pro lens should never not be ready to take a shot. I've never seen it. I've messed up shots for other reason. I've had the limiter engaged when I shouldn't... etc. Wrong focus mode. But IS holding me up... guess I'm super lucky.

I have never heard of this either.

It is not the delay, it is the "twitch" or the "activation" of IS. That is what I have seen in the past. I added an edit however to my previous post, since not all IS systems are created equal, brand or years of manufacturing. Still I am waiting for a bonafide advantage to turning on IS on a 200mm lens for 1/1250th or faster. I can understand that others habitually leave it on, but I am still trying to find why it is recommended beyond the "just because it doesn't hurt".

It's like conversations I have with the older crowd when discussing canning. They say they leave the rings on "just because that is how they have always done it", and we, newer generations doing canning, will remove the rings. There are 2 logical reasons for removing the rings, there is no real advantage in leaving the rings on for a year or more on the jars. But still the older folks just shake their head, but despite being given the good reasons for that, they still argue for just leaving rings on after pulling the jars from the canner.

So basically the answer to the OP regarding sports and shooting at shutter speeds faster than the reciprocal of the focal length is :

"Leave the IS on because depending on the year and make of the lens, you should have no negative impacts to your photos. Just be aware there is no real advantage to leaving it on during sports other than less wear and tear on the IS system and longer battery life, however indeterminate that might be. If you see the image jump a bit or twitch when the IS kicks on, then definitely turn off the IS.".

I just studied the IS behavior on my 70-200 2.8 II and 100-400 II and don't any issues when the IS engages. The viewfinder goes from shaky to stable in a split second without getting less stable at any point. If there were any issues with IS lag time, you could always half-press the shutter button as you hoist the camera to eye level.

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Image softness due to camera movement is a very real problem, even when shooting at fast shutter speeds such as 1/1000th of a second or 1/2000th of a second, especially when shooting long lenses like my 800mm.

In my experience, the whole rule of thumb about 1/shutter speed is garbage. . Without IS one needs much faster shutter speeds than that. . That is why I leave IS on at all times - because in many shooting conditions, there is no possible shutter speed that is fast enough to completely and utterly suppress camera movement.


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Tom Reichner wrote in post #18719412
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Image softness due to camera movement is a very real problem, even when shooting at fast shutter speeds such as 1/1000th of a second or 1/2000th of a second, especially when shooting long lenses like my 800mm.

In my experience, the whole rule of thumb about 1/shutter speed is garbage. . Without IS one needs much faster shutter speeds than that. . That is why I leave IS on at all times - because in many shooting conditions, there is no possible shutter speed that is fast enough to completely and utterly suppress camera movement.


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Right. That rule goes back to film and probably assumed an 8x10 print. High resolution sensors and pixel peeping makes it easier to see camera movement than before. Much like DOF, with enough megapixels or a large enough print, anything will look blurry so the old "rules" start to to break down. Of course back then you couldn't just roll a wheel up to 3200+++ ISO to keep the shutter speed up.

Rudy Winston has a good video explaining IS modes but I can't find it. Short answer: leave it on. Canon engineers didn't design it into lenses because they like little switches.

Tom Reichner wrote in post #18719412
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Image softness due to camera movement is a very real problem, even when shooting at fast shutter speeds such as 1/1000th of a second or 1/2000th of a second, especially when shooting long lenses like my 800mm.

In my experience, the whole rule of thumb about 1/shutter speed is garbage. . Without IS one needs much faster shutter speeds than that. . That is why I leave IS on at all times - because in many shooting conditions, there is no possible shutter speed that is fast enough to completely and utterly suppress camera movement.

So sports shooters are shooting with 800mm and moving their cameras all around, vs shorter focal lengths on a monopod or sitting down with very little movement other than lateral tracking of a player? Your last camera is refuted by the fact that this happens ALL THE TIME. Fast shutter speeds indeed do stop the movement of the shooter. If you were right, then so many of us would just have no keepers at all.

TeamSpeed wrote in post #18719437
So sports shooters are shooting with 800mm and moving their cameras all around, vs shorter focal lengths on a monopod or sitting down with very little movement other than lateral tracking of a player? Your last camera is refuted by the fact that this happens ALL THE TIME. Fast shutter speeds indeed do stop the movement of the shooter. If you were right, then so many of us would just have no keepers at all.

Cary,

I'm not sure what exactly it is that you are saying here. . I think that perhaps your grammar or wording is a bit off, causing me to not be able to follow exactly what it is that you mean to say. . I especially have trouble understanding the phrase, "your last camera is refuted by ....." . . As far as I know, cameras are not refuted, although statements and comments might be.

I stand by what I said, because there are indeed times when camera movement will have an adverse affect on critical sharpness, even when shooting at fast shutter speeds, and especially when shooting at extreme focal lengths.

I don't know if sports shooters are shooting at 800mm or not. Doesn't matter to me what focal lengths those folks use to shoot their sports.

I don't understand what you mean with the all-caps part about "ALL THE TIME" and "no keepers at all". . They sound like blanket statements to me, and blanket, absolutist statements are typically incorrect because they allow for no exceptions whatsoever.

If you were willing to re-write your post in a way that is more conducive to me understanding it, that would be helpful.


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