With the 50D which one would you use? AF Custom Button Setup

For the 50D and Baseball

Custom Fucntion layouts, menu options, orders, or wording. The EOS 50D pictured here is a typical example. Note the 'translations' below.

Auto Focus Custom Button Which One?

0: Metering + AF start (note: there’s no slash here)

Factory-default setting. You activate camera’s meter and AF by pressing shutter button half-way down. Rear AF-ON button also does same if it’s pressed, so you don’t get the benefits of removing AF activation from the shutter button when this option is set.

1: Metering + AF start / AF stop

AF is still at shutter button. Pressing the rear button will actually LOCK the focus; potentially useful if you shoot a lot of moving subjects in AI Servo AF and prefer to activate AF with a conventional half-press of shutter button. Focus is unlocked by removing thumb from back-button.

2: Metering start / Meter + AF start

Back-button AF activation. Shutter button no longer activates AF, but of course fires the shutter. Metering is continuously updated — if you shoot a sequence of pictures, the camera takes a fresh meter reading for each one. There’s no locking of exposure, unless you separately press the AE Lock button (this last item is not possible on some EOS models).

3: AE Lock / Metering + AF start

Back-button AF activation. Difference between this setting and option 2 directly above is that when you press the shutter button half-way, your exposure is locked and won’t change until you pull your finger off the button entirely. Thus, if you shoot a sequence of pictures in any auto exposure mode, the exposure setting used for the first shot is used for each subsequent shot. Can be useful if you were using back-button AF to easily lock focus and shoot a series of portraits, where you wouldn’t expect lighting to change.

4: Metering + AF start / Disable

Similar to setting “0” above, but now, the camera’s rear AF-ON button is disabled. AF activation is at the shutter button. Convenient if you’re worried about accidentally pressing the back-button and don’t want to use back-button AF.

This is the Menu for C.FnIV-1..you want to choose #2 or #3 depending on how you want to manage the exposure with shutter.

Excellent, a short search turned this thread up because I wondered how to lock the focus. Sometimes it seemed that after I had focused on my subject and then recomposed I would lose focus on the original subject even while I thought I was keeping the shutter button half depressed. I'm heading outside to see if this works!

This is a good read...
"Back-Button Auto Focus Explained"
http://www.usa.canon.c​om …ArticleAct&arti​cleID=2286

I'd read my XTi, 40D, and T1i Owner's Manual several times, but I couldn't quite figure out the nuances between these back-button options until the article above provided this simple clarification...
"anything before the slash mark refers to how the shutter button will behave. Anything after the slash tells you how the rear button will work if that option is selected"

I love back-button focus.

clarence wrote in post #7898779
This is a good read...
"Back-Button Auto Focus Explained"
http://www.usa.canon.c​om …ArticleAct&arti​cleID=2286

I like the back-button AF-ON feature, but the button is too far out for my hand. Can this button be moved to the star '*' button? If so, how is it done?

TIA

Sibil wrote in post #7913844
I like the back-button AF-ON feature, but the button is too far out for my hand. Can this button be moved to the star '*' button? If so, how is it done?

TIA

That C.Fn is a lot simpler.
Do you have the Owner's Manual PDF?
If so, see page 161.

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^^^ Thanks for the info. I have the pdf manual but somehow that little bit at the end escaped my eyes. More and more, I use POTN as the manual for my 40D