Even the 1Dx suffers when it's snowing

[nigpd]

I was at Wigan v Chesterfield yesterday and the conditions turned out to be challenging to say the least.

It was snowing during the whole game to varying degrees and the 1Dx was struggling to get focus lock as quickly as it would normally. As users of this camera will know, focus lock happens in an instant, but yesterday it was hunting for what seemed like ages but was probably less than a second, but still enough to miss that exact moment now and again.

Interestingly, I found focus lock harder to achieve when taking shots of the managers, who were wearing black. I'm not sure of the science behind why this should be the case.

Anyway, I was shooting using case 4 as normal, but wondered if one of the other cases would be more suitable when shooting while it's snowing??? Does any other 1Dx user have any experience or recommendations?

 

[Graham W]

Trying to lock onto falling snowflakes?

 

[Toggerman]

I think it's just because of the size of the snowflakes are enough to register on the AF sensor which will lock onto the closest subject (whereas rain is usually smaller although I've also had it interfere before), and against something black it's got the perfect contrast.

I'm not sure there's a lot you can do about it. When I've had problems before I've increased the tracking sensitivity, which although meant it may have lost focus more often it didn't take as long to try and refocus on the subject.

 

[KIPAX]

Try facial recognition...iTRAF .. purple 3.1

 

[davidy233]

Tell me about it - yesterday was an adventure

 

[nigpd]

Snow didnt settle at wigan, but it was bad enough till it hit the ground

http://www.telephotoimages.com/#!/index/G0000FZy4t0M1ZZI/I0000P0dlOgwAabw

 

[nigpd]

Try facial recognition...iTRAF .. purple 3.1

Always have that on, Tony (PS Its purple 4.1)

 

[KIPAX]

Always have that on, Tony (PS Its purple 4.1)

for football ? I havent tried for footy.. too jumpy... have it on for athletics especialy long jump type events.. are you sure you ahve it set up for face recognition? sorry just not sure if you ahve it on or on with other setting so it does recognise faces ?

 

[nigpd]

for football ? I havent tried for footy.. too jumpy... have it on for athletics especialy long jump type events.. are you sure you ahve it set up for face recognition? sorry just not sure if you ahve it on or on with other setting so it does recognise faces ?

I just have it on. Do you think under "normal" shooting conditions, it would be detrimental to performance?

 

[admirable]

From Canon;

Like the flagship EOS-1D X, the EOS 7D Mark II features EOS iTR AF, which improves autofocus tracking by recognising faces and subject colours in addition to looking for subject contrast. When shooting with the EOS iTR AF function enabled, you may find the AF is actually slightly slower and the maximum shooting speed in continuous high speed AF is slower than expected. This is especially likely in low-light shooting and is due to the extra data being processed from the metering system before a subject can be tracked. If you need the fastest AF possible and want to achieve the maximum frame rate and do not need to make use of the colour and face tracking, switch the EOS iTR AF setting to ‘disable’.

 

[KIPAX]

I just have it on. Do you think under "normal" shooting conditions, it would be detrimental to performance?

yeagh I dont know the ins and outs.. its somehting i looked into a long time ago and people much more knowledgeable than me said TURN IT OFF

However in conjunction with other settings it does do proper facial recognition. (you obviously havent got that setup). which works quite well.. so for some demanding situations i have it set up as a custom mode and switch to it when needed..

hence why i suggested but never tried.. to have facial recognition to bypass the snow...

 

[KIPAX]

This is especially likely in low-light shooting and is due to the extra data being processed from the metering system before a subject can be tracked. If you need the fastest AF possible and want to achieve the maximum frame rate and do not need to make use of the colour and face tracking, switch the EOS iTR AF setting to ‘disable’.

It works quite well indoors when i am doing indoor athletics.. i presume the notes about faster AF is aquiering af.. if you have that extra second to find focus it does latch onto a face and tracks it.. ether subject moving or if you move camera side to side it stays locked on face

 

[admirable]

I have tried it and if there is no obvious face to lock onto it will struggle to lock the 1st frame

 

[Toggerman]

I just have it on. Do you think under "normal" shooting conditions, it would be detrimental to performance?

iTR only works if you're in Zone or 61-points modes, anything else such as single point or expanded and the system isn't active anyway so there shouldn't be any impact if using those modes.

 

[Pick]

Had the same problems myself, had to use manual focus at times.Bring back summer football

 

[davidy233]

Had the same problems myself, had to use manual focus at times.Bring back summer footballView attachment 54897

Not far from where I was - you'd have had an early finish with St Mirren v Raith getting called off at last minute - I had one last night - Forfar v Linlithgow being abandoned due to floodlight failure after 6 minutes.

 

[bigrob]

I always had iTR AF turned off.

 

[nigpd]

Turned it off for Saturday's game. wish I could have turned the rain off too