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7d focus discussions (1 Viewer)

For Barn Owl shots have a look in the galleries of my 2 sons Paul and Adam (Jaff). Pauls was taken largely with his 30D and a 300 f4 and many in early morning or evening. Adam uses a 40D with a 100-400 F5.6. But they do sometimes use their 200mm. It is not just a question of equipment.
 
Nikon Kid said:
Frank, do you want me to be frank, just a bun.............

I just don't think this image is very good what ever ISO you took it at, and especially if you are singing the praises of the 7d, the IQ is bad, theres loads of noise, and theres no detail and its not sharp.

Sorry but I think its the truth.
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Nope, that's cool. How's about this one...
 

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Roy C said:
The reason it worked Mike is because the lens itself does not have the necessary pins to report a converter even thought the converter does. I expect the exif to show f5.6 (and not f8) because the camera did not see the converter and because it could not see the tc it attempted to AF.
Had you used the same converter without taping the pins on a lens like the 100-400 or 400/5.6 there is no way it could possibly AF. This is because these lenses have the pins to report a converter to the camera.

Hope that makes sense.
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Yes Roy I checked and you are right it does report f5.6 but now I do not understand why it is happy to focus with full area focus points but not zone or spot if the camera merely thinks it is a bit dim and the 40D and 20D I had would not focus with that lens/converter combo at all. That remains the case no matter how bright and contrasty the subject is so there must be something else going on, after all every one of the three cameras are fine in dim light.
 
What I think Frank's shots have shown us is that the 1600 ISO on the 7D still isn't quite there for birds IMO. But I think it was also OTT in this scenario as Barn Owl's aren't the quickest birds so any shutter speeds betwen 1/1000-1/2000 should be plenty. I had sharp shots with far less.

But it looks like the 7D's AF has come up trumps in that last image though Frank. A promising sign for all concerned. :t:
 
Yes Frank, Thats looking good, the background seems to tell there was not alot of daylight left, 800 ISO and of cause you were using a 2xTC the detail is there as well, I would be pleased with that shot.

This non AF with TCs on the 400mm f5.6 is this because Canon don't want it to work to make us buy more expensive lens ?
 
Does the 7d have predictive focus

On another forum I was reading that when in Video mode you can take still image, it interrupts the video slightly
 
this BO was taken from a moving car (I was driving) with a 40D and 3002.8 + 1.4 at 500 ISO, 1250 sec -- all of the sequence were sharp but its not a great test; if someone can do some flight shots on some waders with a 7D we might get some better impressions of just how well it can track birds that fly fast with a bit of erratic movement
 

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graham catley said:
this BO was taken from a moving car (I was driving) with a 40D and 3002.8 + 1.4 at 500 ISO, 1250 sec -- all of the sequence were sharp but its not a great test; if someone can do some flight shots on some waders with a 7D we might get some better impressions of just how well it can track birds that fly fast with a bit of erratic movement
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Nice shot, you know that, But them ones that are hard to get have all gone home to South Africa swift and swallows.........
 
Here is a link to one of the better 7D AF for flyers threads that I have seen thus far. You need to read the whole thread rather than just gander at the pics IMO.
 
Roy,
thanks for that, thats an informative set of shots. from this it appears the centre focus point expansion works fine. I have seen a few decent threads so far on the 7d's focusing caperbitities and have only seen sharp sequences from the 7d's central focus point and with centre point expansion activated (5 points). I hope the central focus zone (9 points) works properly as this would be an attractive camera for me if it does.

Kev
 
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kevindurose said:
Roy,
thanks for that, thats an informative set of shots. I have seen a few decent threads so far and have only seen sharp sequences from the 7d's central focus point and with centre point expansion activated (5 points). I hope the central focus zone (9 points) works properly as this would be an attractive camera for me if it does.

Kev
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From what I have read so far Kev, the central 9 points in zone AF works well on a plain background but is not brilliant when there is a busy BG - we shall see!
 
Thanks John, I have not tried out my own kenko's yet but by all accounts it should not work, maybe give them a try to-morrow. taped and untaped
 
Roy C said:
From what I have read so far Kev, the central 9 points in zone AF works well on a plain background but is not brilliant when there is a busy BG - we shall see!
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Something with CF settings might solve this. on my 1ds I use CF 20 Al servo tracking sensitivity - I have disabled the function that prevents autofocus from being thrown off by any obstacle passing between the camera and the subject. In otherwords sensitivity is set to max. its obvious to us the obstacle is actually the the bird! and anyway how can the camera possibly know what your subject is. It certainly isn't the bushes behind that the camera is happily tracking its the bird, or in canons language the obstacle in front of the subject!

Does anyone know if there is a similar focus sensitivity custom function on the 7d.

Kev
 
kevindurose said:
Something with CF settings might solve this. on my 1ds I use CF 20 Al servo tracking sensitivity - I have disabled the function that prevents autofocus from being thrown off by any obstacle passing between the camera and the subject. In otherwords sensitivity is set to max. its obvious to us the obstacle is actually the the bird! and anyway how can the camera possibly know what your subject is. It certainly isn't the bushes behind that the camera is happily tracking its the bird, or in canons language the obstacle in front of the subject!

Does anyone know if there is a similar focus sensitivity custom function on the 7d.

Kev
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Yes, C.Fn III-1 is AI Servo tracking sensitivity. And I've set it towards the 'Slow' end. From what it says in the manual it shouldn't affect anything to do with the background as long as you keep the focus point(s) on the bird. It will help stop the focus switching if the bird flies behind a tree or another bird.

The camera know what the subject is because that's the thing that you originally lock the focus onto. You can see in the series of shots in the link that Roy posted that AF is pretty good, but you need to keep the bird in the target zone. As long as it stays in that zone it seems to ignore the background. I refer back to these shots I took some time ago.
 
That was well worth reading Roy thanks for the link, from that test it would seem Canon got it right in the Price range for the 7d better than the 40d 50d but not as good as the 1D's, and would imagine as time goes by it will take the top spot on the APS-C Cameras.

Could not get out to-day, but hope for good weather in the next 2 days to give the 7d a good work out.
 
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