R5 AF and needed shutter speeds

Dec 13, 2010
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The 85 might have the worst AF for birds out of all the lenses though. I do like the 85 but it would not be my first choice for anything wildlife.
I was shooting the birds parallell to the camera so could’ve used manual focus. If the ducks were coming straight at me and it missed a little I wouldn’t be bothered. But, focus did hit as far as I can tell with the duck, it’s motion blur that ruins it for me. I’ll try a lot more (y)
 
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Bert63

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The shot of my Milo was sharp yes, but I took 12-14 shots of him walking in that situation and had a 25-30% hit rate. In and out of focus..


Viggo,

I’m sure you know what you’re doing but this sure sounds like some kind of a settings problem.

I’m not having any issues shooting my little bugger (kitty as well). I”m shooting the 70-200L f2.8 in decent light. Not great light - like ISO 1000 and around a 1/500 shutter in animal eye tracking and it’s, not exaggerating, spot on.

I also use SERVO AF, both mechanical and electronic shutter, from f2.8 to f6.3, and it just works. I did adjust tracking from 0 to -1 and then back and it didn’t seem to make a difference for me.

Now I have to figure out what to do with 1,000 photos of my pussy.
 
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Aussie shooter

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It shouldnt be motion blur at a decent shutter speed. On my 7d2 which has slightly more pixel density than the R5 I usually find 1/1000 fairly acceptable for BIF as long as you are panning a bit. 1/2000 should never really be an issue unless you are dealing with extremely fast subjects
 
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Joules

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I use mechanical shutter , I try to use the 8 fps to keep my 14 bit files, but some where taken at 12 fps, none with electronic shutter.

I used auto tracking with Aninal eye AF, Case 4. Tried others, made no difference. I have ECO mode on, and I tried both 60 and 120 fps in the EVF. 1/1000s and 1/2000s.
I tried the switch subject setting at deactivated and 0. I used auto iso and f1.2 and f2.0, also makes very little difference as the miss is way more than the change in dof.
Just to add another shot in the dark: is. Your firmware up to date on the body and lenses? There were reports earlier about IBIS causing blurry shots at specific shutter speeds.
 
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Just to add another shot in the dark: is. Your firmware up to date on the body and lenses? There were reports earlier about IBIS causing blurry shots at specific shutter speeds.
Around 1/100-1/160s was more blurry, not too sure that has been fixed yet. I haven’t seen any firmware updates for either of my lenses, RF50 and RF85..

i shot all action with IBIS off. I’ve tried to find out if there is a panning mode for the IBIS, if it’s auto or whatever, haven’t been able to clear that up..
 
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Dec 13, 2010
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It shouldnt be motion blur at a decent shutter speed. On my 7d2 which has slightly more pixel density than the R5 I usually find 1/1000 fairly acceptable for BIF as long as you are panning a bit. 1/2000 should never really be an issue unless you are dealing with extremely fast subjects
I used 1/1000s with my 1d4, had to increase to 1/1250s at minimum for the 1dx and 1dx2. Not that weird I need 1/2000s with the R5, but that 1/2000s was too slow even if ducks are proper fast, is a surprise.
 
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YuengLinger

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If you're using 85mm at wide F stop, that could be bokeh instead of movement blur, no?

85/1.4 at 4 meters would give 18cm of focus depth, F1.8 would already give 23cm. What's the wing span of a duck?
These are really good questions, but I also wonder if the duck was just taking off? Maybe the trailing edges of those wing feathers were going so fast as the duck tried to gain some lift? But it does look like bokeh mixed in there too!

As for the black bird gliding, the far wing looks out of the focus plane to me, and the eye, that's pretty black on black!
 
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I think your issue with the duck photo is a combination of possibly the DOF of the lens, but mostly the shutter speed used. Duck wings beating aren't as fast as a hummingbird's, but especially when they are taking off, they beat pretty darn fast. A few years ago, I took a nice sequence of several shots of a pintail taking off. As the lighting gradually changed when it took off, my shutter speed went from 1/2500 to 1/5000 over the sequence since I was in aperture priority. At the slower 1/2500 speed, the wingtips were slightly blurred much like yours. At the faster shutter speed, they were much sharper, even with the same bird. I don't necessarily think the bit of blur is a bad thing, in my opinion. It helps to convey the impression of movement.
 

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Ozarker

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Hi everyone!

I’ve used my R5 plus RF85 and RF50 a few times now and wondered if someone shares my experience .

I find shooting ducks that 1/2000s is not nearly enough and the shots have visible motion blur. I haven’t seen this even at 30mp and didn’t think 45 would absolutely need at least 1/4000s with the fastest movements like ducks, kind of limiting...

regarding AF I’m not as impressed as many others, perhaps mostly surprised;
I’ve shot my cats as the easiest access to action, and I find Eye AF to only work occasionally, and I’ve shot a few sequences with them running and sometimes it tracks beautifully, but then when they’re just walking it misses 60% of the shots. I’ve tried a lot of settings and can’t seem to get any different results.

with birds it has been more impressive, but still some motion blur I don’t understand. IBIS both on and off

I know that the 85 isn’t the fastest, but it’s better with faster than slower movements. The RF50 is worse.

my question is; Have you found the same results with the same setup? What are you best AF settings for cats and kids running an walking? Every little detail is much appreciated. Wish Canon would release an AF guide for the R5 like they did for the 1-series.


on the plus side the IQ is pretty epic. I didn’t think I would see the difference in DR, but when I expose and know by experience what is clipped, it just isn’t. Good stuff.
Off topic, but we need a downloadable tip sheet that you and other knowledgeable people write. Participants can vote for what needs to be on the sheet based on whether or not the tip actually works and also the cons of that setup. ;)
 
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Ozarker

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I think your issue with the duck photo is a combination of possibly the DOF of the lens, but mostly the shutter speed used. Duck wings beating aren't as fast as a hummingbird's, but especially when they are taking off, they beat pretty darn fast. A few years ago, I took a nice sequence of several shots of a pintail taking off. As the lighting gradually changed when it took off, my shutter speed went from 1/2500 to 1/5000 over the sequence since I was in aperture priority. At the slower 1/2500 speed, the wingtips were slightly blurred much like yours. At the faster shutter speed, they were much sharper, even with the same bird. I don't necessarily think the bit of blur is a bad thing, in my opinion. It helps to convey the impression of movement.
Wonderful photos. Really nice!
 
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If you're using 85mm at wide F stop, that could be bokeh instead of movement blur, no?

85/1.4 at 4 meters would give 18cm of focus depth, F1.8 would already give 23cm. What's the wing span of a duck?
It’s not the wings I’m concerned about, but the head. Each wing is outside of my dof, but not the head, it’s dragged like motion blur, and since both wings are pretty equally blurred and the head is right between them, it should be sharp. Focus locked and tracked the head.
 
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These are really good questions, but I also wonder if the duck was just taking off? Maybe the trailing edges of those wing feathers were going so fast as the duck tried to gain some lift? But it does look like bokeh mixed in there too!

As for the black bird gliding, the far wing looks out of the focus plane to me, and the eye, that's pretty black on black!
The black and white bird is very very sharp, no issues there.
 
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Joules

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Maybe this is better.
So, what shutter speed is this? Do you recall if IBIS was on or off? Is this maybe a shot from a series, where you could share with us if all shots from the series look like this?

What it reminds me of, is the blur I get when leaving OS on with my Sigma 150-600 mm ca and using shutter speeds over 1/1000 s. It seems that under such circumstances, the OS becomes a source of motion blur itself, so I always end up with slightly less sharp shots compared to using no OS when I shoot moving subjects. That's on an 80D, without any customization of the OS through the dock. So maybe IBIS does something similar for you. But in your OP you specifically mentioned that it doesn't impact your issue with blur...
 
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Dec 13, 2010
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So, what shutter speed is this? Do you recall if IBIS was on or off? Is this maybe a shot from a series, where you could share with us if all shots from the series look like this?

What it reminds me of, is the blur I get when leaving OS on with my Sigma 150-600 mm ca and using shutter speeds over 1/1000 s. It seems that under such circumstances, the OS becomes a source of motion blur itself, so I always end up with slightly less sharp shots compared to using no OS when I shoot moving subjects. That's on an 80D, without any customization of the OS through the dock. So maybe IBIS does something similar for you. But in your OP you specifically mentioned that it doesn't impact your issue with blur...

I’m 85% sure the IBIS was off , I’ve always had a habit of turning it off for ducks. Shutter speedwas 1/2000s. I had a few more in the series, but this was the sharpest, and it looked spot on in camera of course, so I deleted the others that was obviously not worth keeping.
 
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