Canon 7D Custom Settings Help Requested

[sdrose]

Hi Everybody!!!
I'm a fairly good amateur photographer; I have a Canon 7D, and my main-use lens is a 24-70L. I take photos mostly of my 2-year old son, and friend / family photos, plus 'events' from my volunteer activities as an EMT.

The Canon 7D has settings C1, C2, and C3 on the mode-select dial. I've really never gotten into the Custom Settings. I know, for example, I can change the Auto Focus from the half-way select of the shutter release button to a back button.

But the 'Why' of most of the Custom Functions still evades me, even after reading the Canon manual.

So, I'm coming to you for help!! What are the Custom Functions that are most useful (to you, that you'd recommend to me)?

Also, are they 'Global settings', or just for a C1, C2 or C3? So, would I want to 'Globally' set my auto-focus to a back button, or only under, say, C1 and C2, so I can get back to half-way down on the Shutter Release for C3?

Also, there are different types of photography --- so, would I want to set C1, C2 and C3 for specific Day / Action photography, Night / Flash photography, and Video use?

Thanks in Advance!!
-dave
Shelton, Ct, USA.

 

[Marsu42]

Also, are they 'Global settings', or just for a C1, C2 or C3?

All camera settings including the C.Fn custom settings are individual to C1/2/3 and the rest (Av/Tv/M/...).

Mostly the C dial settings are either used to *quickly* get to different settings (like static/moving wildlife) or for very different settings like normal shooting and tripod macro which would be a pita to manually set each time otherwise.

The C.Fn setting most useful would be of course the af tracking settings and the button assignment while I find most of the others are really set once and forget - at least one the cheaper cameras like my 60d/6d, on the 1d there seem to be lots of more things to customize to your liking part of which is covered by Magic Lantern for the rest of us.

Two settings are important though: C.Fn I-1 (exposure level increments) and C.Fn I-2 (speed setting increments), for stills shooting you'd want to choose full iso stops only and either decide if to use 1/2 and 1/3 ev and stick to it because you'll get used to these settings after some time.

Last not least "autofocus micro afjustment" is buried as a C.Fn setting while it is very important if you're using fast lenses, you will want to check if you need this if you haven't done so already (use either free Magic Lantern dot_tune or FoCal software or a measuring tape).

 

[Valvebounce]

Hi Dave.
I had these set on my 40D and found that I was going to have to resort to sticky labels to know what I had set each C mode for as could not remember what was where when I picked the camera up.
As the first thing I do is remove all sticky labels from technology, like Intel inside Radeon graphics etc there was no way I was going to add them!
As yet I haven't set C modes on my 7D, though I intend to at some point.
Some of the things you can set are ISO range limit, focus modes, drive speed, focus point selection settings, raw, jpeg or raw+jpeg, shooting mode just for a start.

Cheers Graham.