What upgrade makes the most sense?

Is the 70-200 f2.8 without IS OK for indoor sports? I would assume so, as the shutter speed will be high

duckster wrote in post #18738490
Is the 70-200 f2.8 without IS OK for indoor sports? I would assume so, as the shutter speed will be high

Yes,

But, if you're truly going to be shooting indoor sports, often, then this is where you would need to consider both a lens & body upgrade. While the 7D is capable of doing it, and you can get F2.8 glass for this, you will be shooting ISO 12,800 pretty often indoors doing sports to maintain a reasonable shutter to stop motion. But this is very specific to shooting action in very low light. You mentioned this wasn't going to happen much, but, if it is, this is where again you may consider a body upgrade to get a lot more ISO flexibility. This is also a good place to consider a faster lens, like an 85mm F1.8 since it's so sharp and inexpensive and gains you over a stop of light.

In decent light, or most sun light outdoors, the 70-200 F2.8 non-IS is a fantastic lens that would be awesome on you 7D for action.

Indoor sports is very hard, even modern cameras struggle without good noise processing routines. Keep that in mind. If you shoot with high ISO in mind, and you're prepared to process the noise without destroying the data, you'll do well. It will be a little easier with a newer body, but again, even an awesome new camera will have a lot of noise with indoor action without good processing of the RAW files. And this is where you consider either gaining +1 stop of ISO performance with a new body? Or simply not needing the higher ISO limit, by using a faster better piece of glass.

Very best,

Going to be a little closer, received an unexpected gift card for taking photos for other parents this fall. Another $200 closer....!

Thinking more about the body upgrade as it seems from reading that the 7D MkII does handle higher ISO than the 7D. Also thought that it may be easier to rent a lens, as there is not really a "learning curve" with a lens like there is with all the functions on a different camera body, which a person could also rent. That would make me think that owning the body, so that you could get very familiar with all the settings might be a smarter choice. I really don't see doing indoor sports shooting more than 5-6 times per year and that would be the time that I would really need fast zoom lenses. With the indoor events, I can usually use my 50mm f1.8 or 24mm f2.8, so long as it is not a fast action event. I have been happy with the 50mm for family events/holidays and such.

Does the Canon 85mm f1.8 have fast enough AF to capture court sports indoors, like basketball?

duckster wrote in post #18742959
Thinking more about the body upgrade as it seems from reading that the 7D MkII does handle higher ISO than the 7D. Also thought that it may be easier to rent a lens, as there is not really a "learning curve" with a lens like there is with all the functions on a different camera body, which a person could also rent. That would make me think that owning the body, so that you could get very familiar with all the settings might be a smarter choice. I really don't see doing indoor sports shooting more than 5-6 times per year and that would be the time that I would really need fast zoom lenses. With the indoor events, I can usually use my 50mm f1.8 or 24mm f2.8, so long as it is not a fast action event. I have been happy with the 50mm for family events/holidays and such.

Does the Canon 85mm f1.8 have fast enough AF to capture court sports indoors, like basketball?

I would think so. it's a lens that you see people recommending for this sort of use all the time. The moment you started mentioning your 50mm lens I thought 85mm ƒ/1.8 would be where I would be looking. Other than that the Sigma 50-100mm ƒ/1.8 Art or the older 50-150mm ƒ/2.8 OS HSM, if you can find a good one, could be very useful on a crop body.

Alan

So putting things together, I could swing a new 7D MkII body and a Tamron 70-200 G2. Maybe that makes some sense. Possibly sell one of the 18-135 lenses.