Need help. Canon 60D for sports--is it better to pony up for the 7D?

[Orangutan]

I've photographed exactly one (US style) football game, involving adult amateurs.  I used my 60D and 70-200 f/4 in near-perfect lighting conditions.  With this combo, my "technical" hit rate was unbelievable: I think I threw out half a dozen out of hundreds on pure technical grounds (exposure, out of focus, motion blur, etc).  Of course, other photos were thrown out just because they were not interesting.  My one major problem was buffer depth: I tend to shoot raw only, and that would not give me enough frames to follow a play through, or to switch from where I thought the play was going to where it actually went.  I found myself waiting for the highlight of each play, rather than following it through.  (yes, there's a lot to be said for anticipating your shots)  If you stick with the 60D, be prepared to shoot JPEG for the added buffer depth.

I can't speak to the question of shooting sports in low light.  If you plan to shoot in the rain, I suggest getting a rain cover for anything short of a 1-series body.

[Marsu42]

Anyone besides me notice that the OP never replied to anyone after his/her initial question?

Yes, and this happens very often - it's basically longer-term cr members procrastinating or chatting among themselves. Either people with one post (like the op) just read some replies and then leave, or write something after quite a while. Another possibility is him trolling, but it didn't sound like it even though 7d vs. 60d is/was a heated issue.

[RocklandDragon]

Anyone besides me notice that the OP never replied to anyone after his/her initial question? If they are indeed reading the replies here, the money they spend at 'Best Buy' would be foolishly wasted compared to buying online at B&H or Adorama. Talk about retail markup!

Fear not.  I'm reading the replies.

Actually Best Buy had the better price on the Canon 60D during the President's day sale.  I got it there and the prices on the 60D and 7D with the 18-135 lens is in line with many of the big online retaliers.  Only one that I saw that had a better deal than Best Buy by a decent margin was buy.com (or rakuten or whatever it is now.com).

[RocklandDragon]

The way I would look at this would be...... are you being paid for the photographs you take or are they just for yourself, friends,  family maybe the local high school? if you are being paid maybe it's worth considering an upgrade if not then the 60D will be more than enough, apart from the frame rate and auto focus, they have the same M.P. and sensor and will produce a quality shot. get a better lens  with more range, the 70-200's are great for this sort of thing, you bought the 60D for a reason what were those reasons?

I would like to post them on a site eventually.  It will be a high school football site kept up by me and it is not for pay but I do want other people to freely look through the photos and enjoy shots of the games I see across the state of Texas.  I also hope to take video clips (nothing too long) of scoring plays.  I really appreciate how the 60D and 7D can handle video and a good lens can even make recording that even better.

I got the 60D because it was a great price, had good reviews, it felt comfortable in my hands, the shutter speed, and decent video recording.  The 60D was my second choice because the 7D was just out of reach.  I said I had got it last week.  That was my fault.  It was two weeks ago.  The sale at Best Buy and the opportunity to get the 60D in hand pressed me to get it.

Don't get me wrong.  So far, I like the 60D and many of the shots I have taken during the day are nice.  I have been just trying the camera out for outside shots and a soccer game during the day.  I want to take some more shots with it at a baseball game this week, if the game is played at night.  There should be a soccer game for high school during the evening this week as well so I could try it more.  Like I said, I think the night shots I had were off due to me still learning the camera. To be honest with you, I've been using manual focus for the shots I have taken.  I'm used to messing with manual focus from the Sony digital camera I once had.  I'll take some more and I'll try to post them here later this week, if I can.

I plan to have this camera for at least two years.  I can still return the 60D and get the 7D at Best Buy with the 18-135 lens for around $1448.  I'm very apprecitative of the lens recommendations and I can work extra to get a good lens around July or August.  Maybe by June if all goes well.   I'd only sell the 60D or 7D if the 70D and the 7D Mark II are signifigantly better and can get a decent price (not likely to happen for a while).

I got a couple of weeks before the 30 days is up.  I'm going to stay with Canon.  I have nothing really against the Nikon but I feel more comfortable with the Canons.  I'll keep absorbing all the information y'all have provided and I really appreciate all the info that has been provided.

Thanks!

[jasonsim]

If all you have is the 18-135mm kit lens, then the 7D will be of little value.  Do yourself a big favor and keep the 60D, but get a lens with USM.  The 70-200mm f/4L USM is around $600 or less and you will get killer action shots.  Just my two cents.

The way I would look at this would be...... are you being paid for the photographs you take or are they just for yourself, friends,  family maybe the local high school? if you are being paid maybe it's worth considering an upgrade if not then the 60D will be more than enough, apart from the frame rate and auto focus, they have the same M.P. and sensor and will produce a quality shot. get a better lens  with more range, the 70-200's are great for this sort of thing, you bought the 60D for a reason what were those reasons?

I would like to post them on a site eventually.  It will be a high school football site kept up by me and it is not for pay but I do want other people to freely look through the photos and enjoy shots of the games I see across the state of Texas.  I also hope to take video clips (nothing too long) of scoring plays.  I really appreciate how the 60D and 7D can handle video and a good lens can even make recording that even better.

I got the 60D because it was a great price, had good reviews, it felt comfortable in my hands, the shutter speed, and decent video recording.  The 60D was my second choice because the 7D was just out of reach.  I said I had got it last week.  That was my fault.  It was two weeks ago.  The sale at Best Buy and the opportunity to get the 60D in hand pressed me to get it.

Don't get me wrong.  So far, I like the 60D and many of the shots I have taken during the day are nice.  I have been just trying the camera out for outside shots and a soccer game during the day.  I want to take some more shots with it at a baseball game this week, if the game is played at night.  There should be a soccer game for high school during the evening this week as well so I could try it more.  Like I said, I think the night shots I had were off due to me still learning the camera. To be honest with you, I've been using manual focus for the shots I have taken.  I'm used to messing with manual focus from the Sony digital camera I once had.  I'll take some more and I'll try to post them here later this week, if I can.

I plan to have this camera for at least two years.  I can still return the 60D and get the 7D at Best Buy with the 18-135 lens for around $1448.  I'm very apprecitative of the lens recommendations and I can work extra to get a good lens around July or August.  Maybe by June if all goes well.   I'd only sell the 60D or 7D if the 70D and the 7D Mark II are signifigantly better and can get a decent price (not likely to happen for a while).

I got a couple of weeks before the 30 days is up.  I'm going to stay with Canon.  I have nothing really against the Nikon but I feel more comfortable with the Canons.  I'll keep absorbing all the information y'all have provided and I really appreciate all the info that has been provided.

Thanks!

[greger]

The settings I posted before are a good place to start and can be altered as needed. Here's a post on cr that you might
find of interest. I found it by doing a google search of 60D and AI Servo.

http://www.canonrumors.com/forum/index.php?topic=956.0

From what I have read an upgrade to 7D is not needed. The 60D is quite capable of satisfying your needs.

[Pieces Of E]

I do stand corrected. RocklandDragon, I appreciate your responses and am surprised at the deal at Best Buy. Cool beans for you. Good luck with which ever body you do choose to keep and like everyone says, good glass can make a good camera a great camera, limitations aside of course. Cheers! 

[RocklandDragon]

I do stand corrected. RocklandDragon, I appreciate your responses and am surprised at the deal at Best Buy. Cool beans for you. Good luck with which ever body you do choose to keep and like everyone says, good glass can make a good camera a great camera, limitations aside of course. Cheers! 

Thanks.  It has been an interesting and informative discussion.  Now, I'm looking at the lenses that were mentioned on here.  A questio I have is if I get a good lens on the 60D--a 200mm lens--and it looks better than the kit lens on the 7D, would that 200mm lens have even better quality on the 7D or would the differences be relatively insignifigant?  It's nice to save money if I can great shots on a 60D but since I plan to have the camera for a while, then if the 7D can do better with great glass then I'd go with that. 

I guess I have it ingrained in my head about the 7D being a great sports camera.  Review after review would say how great the 7D is for sports.   The new Sony cameras even caught my eye with their impressive shutter speed and good video recording capabilities but it came down to the 60D and 7D because they can handle both and the 60D's good price.

 Speaking of price, Best Buy still has a deal going on for the 60D and 7D.  If the prices of the 7D and 60D had gone back to their regular prices like they did inside the stores then I would be settled with the 60D and learn it to get great sports shots.  Since the 7Dgame is on sale again and has a low price guarantee, then I'm reconsidering because I now have the rest to cover the 7D's cost.  Believe me, Best Buy are doing these deals because they absolutely have to.  You're right about their markup during back in the day when they toppled Circuit City and even Wal-Mart didnt hurt them bad.  Amazon, BPphoto, and Buy.com sure did, though.  Why would I pay $1600 for a 7D when Amazon has it for $1300?   Best Buy is losing money and I dont know if they are going to come back to black.  They have to stay competitive with the online shops but it could be too late (hope not, though).  But that's another story.

Back to the topic. When I was researching about the 60D in particular, online reviewers, CNET, and a couple others were kind of harsh to the 60D.  They liked the performance of the 60D (but not as much as the Nikon D7000 in most cases) but took issue with the button layout.  CNET still gave it four stars out of five.  On digitalrev, the Nikon got better marks than the 60D but still stated that the 60Dautofocus is a good camera as well. Now the 7D did outshine the D7000 as a better overall camera due to its video, shutter speed, feel, and responsiveness.

The D60 was being used with the kit lens for the reviews as well as the other ones, and as you all have stated, putting on a good lens for the D60 can really help getting great night shots of the football games.  I wish Digitalrev or someone could review a great lens on a D60.  They did do a review for a EF 200mm lens with a 7D and did it look nice!  That's exactly what I'm looking for and seeing that a 7D can handle that is impressive....but maybe not practical since the lens is $6,000 on Amazon and that's a sale price.

 

Canon EF 200mm f/2 L Hands-on Review	Small | Large

It may not be tomorrow, but in a few months, I could invest good money in a great lens.  Maybe not $2200 for now but a great lens would do wonders for my photo and video shots on a 60D or 7D.  Looks like Canon's got me hooked line and sinker and once I get this lens, I'm going to be with Canon for quite a while...and that's going to be a good thing.

[TeenTog]

I would wait for the 70D to come out. It will have to fil a gap that the 7D will leave when it updates to the MkII, so in that respect should be better frame rate and AF wise for sports.

[greger]

You say you have a couple more weeks to trade up to a 7D. In 2 weeks Canon may announce something that will change
this debate into a whole new direction. If they come out with a 70D as hoped for by many, it may eclipse both the 60D
and the 7D which I think is a one trick pony. I used the settings I posted earlier on my 40D and 70-200 F4 IS USM and
1.4 ll Extender and got some really nice pics of BIF. The 2.8 ll is probably even better because it's a fast lens and even
with a 2X extender at F5.6 I think it would automatic focus using AI servo on any canon camera that has AI Servo
capabilities.

[Rienzphotoz]

Between the 7D & the 60D ... 7D is the camera of choice for sports photographers, period!
Digitalrev is selling the 7D for $1100 with free shipping

[RocklandDragon]

You say you have a couple more weeks to trade up to a 7D. In 2 weeks Canon may announce something that will change
this debate into a whole new direction. If they come out with a 70D as hoped for by many, it may eclipse both the 60D
and the 7D which I think is a one trick pony. I used the settings I posted earlier on my 40D and 70-200 F4 IS USM and
1.4 ll Extender and got some really nice pics of BIF. The 2.8 ll is probably even better because it's a fast lens and even
with a 2X extender at F5.6 I think it would automatic focus using AI servo on any canon camera that has AI Servo
capabilities.

Yes, that is correct.  I have a 2 more weeks left.  The last couple of days have me leaning with the 60D and I'll likely stick with it if I can get assurances that good glass on a 60D can give me just as good images or close to the 7D.  I think the shutter speed should be fine and since I'm unfamiliar with the autofocus features, I wonder if shooting with manual focus is just as good with the 60D compared to the 7D.   Maybe I should learn the intricacies of the AF systems of both.  It might be better for me to use it in sports since it could save me steps or the af can get better results than what I can do.

The camera is going to be used overwhelmingly for sports and it will be for football.  The football pics are going to be public.  I want them to be good. Baseball and wrestling are the other sports and I might post the baseball pics on facebook or something like that.  If the 60D can handle it and a good lens can make it better, that'd be great.

I'm definitely not expecting a good lens to suddenly change my camera to get 5D Mark III results.  I know the 60D and 7D will have limits.  Shoot, I'd love a 1DX but not just yet.  Maybe in a few years.

So, I've been looking at lenses and yes, they cost a few pretty pennies, but there is the older EF 70-200mm f/2.8 USM lens, and it is signifigantly less than the awesome II.  It doesnt have IS but if I can get a good tripod or monopod and use the lens manually, would it be worth getting?  Hear great things about it and since I could save $500 sticking with the 60D, I defintely can use that money towards this lens. 

Sorry for being so inquisitive but the only way I could get answers for these is if I ask people that have used either the 7D or 60D. 

I'll be looking forward to the 70D and 7D Mark II announcements.   

[RocklandDragon]

Between the 7D & the 60D ... 7D is the camera of choice for sports photographers, period!
Digitalrev is selling the 7D for $1100 with free shipping

Hmmm....that's not bad.  Not bad at all.
 

[RMC33]

In all honesty, I shot sports for the last two years with a 7D and 5DII (upgraded to the III when the price dropped). The 7D is amazing. It slammed out perfect shots every time and was very durable. I was shooting a pair of 30d's prior and I can't tell you how much of an upgrade the xD series is over the xxD.

If you want to get serious get the 7D, a 70-200 f/2.8 II (save to get it.. the lens is far more important then the body), a good monopod, Grip, 2 extra batteries and a MkIII 1.4 TC. That will give you a wide gamut of reach with one lens and give you very very good IQ. I did 99% of my shooting prior to making a few big sales of photos with a 70-200 MkI on my 7d and a 24-70 on my 5dII. Also what sort of sports are you planning on shooting?

[RocklandDragon]

In all honesty, I shot sports for the last two years with a 7D and 5DII (upgraded to the III when the price dropped). The 7D is amazing. It slammed out perfect shots every time and was very durable. I was shooting a pair of 30d's prior and I can't tell you how much of an upgrade the xD series is over the xxD.

If you want to get serious get the 7D, a 70-200 f/2.8 II (save to get it.. the lens is far more important then the body), a good monopod, Grip, 2 extra batteries and a MkIII 1.4 TC. That will give you a wide gamut of reach with one lens and give you very very good IQ. I did 99% of my shooting prior to making a few big sales of photos with a 70-200 MkI on my 7d and a 24-70 on my 5dII. Also what sort of sports are you planning on shooting?

High School football.  Baseball and wrestling are going to be also but those will be for my family because I have nephews that play those two sports also.