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Is there a M43 body that has excellent continuous AF


elliot1

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<p>Last night I took pictures at a high school football game of my grandson. As is typical of an outdoor high school stadium, the lighting was crappy (no surprise). My EM1 would have been fine in every regard except for continuous AF. While I rarely have an issue with AF for the sports I shoot, this was one occasion where I chose to shoot with my D3/70-200mm specifically because of the continuous AF advantage. And although I used a monopod, at this point the overall weight it just too much for me.</p>

<p>While I am not looking to replace my EM1 (fully satisfied with it), I would have no trouble adding another M43 body (reasonably priced) that had excellent continuous AF. With the expected release of a pro f2.8 40mm-150mm lens, I am now ready to sell my Nikon 70-200mm and get it and then sell my D3 for a M43 body with continuous AF that works.</p>

<p>Any experience/suggestions?</p>

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<p>Continuous AF seems to be µ43 achilles heel from everything I read.</p>

<p>But...</p>

<p>...although I haven't tried it, the Panasonic GH4 (I think) is supposed to be better in this regard.</p>

<p>It still probably won't touch the D3, though. That's just a tall order.</p>

<p>If continuous AF was a key need of mine, no way would I have gone from Nikon to Olympus and sold all the Nikon stuff.</p>

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<p>High school sports are the main reason for many of us to keep at least one Canon or Nikon in the bag of tricks. It's difficult to imagine worse or more challenging conditions than combining the erratic action of athletes and the terrible lighting typical of high school football stadiums at night, and gymnasium/auditorium lighting.</p>

<p>Much as I enjoy my various compact mirrorless and P&S cameras for most of what I shoot, those cameras would be infuriating for typical high school sports. Even the ultra-quick Nikon V1 AF isn't selective enough to do justice to high school sports. Studying many reviews and user comments, none of the mirrorless models appears to quite equal the versatile AF of the enthusiast and pro level Canon and Nikon dSLRs. Yet.</p>

<p>If I still had family members with kids in school I'd strongly consider at least a Nikon D7100 or better. And since you already have the D3 and 70-200/2.8, your problem is effectively solved.</p>

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<p>I have no issues with the AF of the EM1 other than continuous AF. I have not sold my Nikon gear off other than my D800, but if I could find a M43 body that has very good continuous AF, I would. I guess I will have to wait a bit longer.</p>
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" I guess I will have to wait a bit longer"

 

I think that is the only solution if you want to stay with M43 or another mirrorless option. It is likely that continuous AF performance will improve in the next generation of OMD cameras, especially since Olympus is really gearing up to provide additional professional level lenses in the near future. Canon's dual pixel AF technology may provide significant improvement in on sensor continuous AF, but there is no evidence that they are committed to developing a competitive mirrorless product line.

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<p>I have an E-M1 and I am confused about your statement about continuous being useless as I have had very good results. In fact I think it's quite a bit better than my D90 was, it grabs focus and hangs on to it for grim death. I did have problems with it until I a) updated to camera firmware 1.4, and b) adjusted a number of camera settings. I am happy to dig through and list my settings if you wish.</p>
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<blockquote>

<p>I have an E-M1 and I am confused about your statement about continuous being useless as I have had very good results</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Chris I am afraid we have dramatically different expectations, when I talk about fast moving subjects I mean ice-hockey or the like. I love my E-M1, but I believe it can't compare even to my old Canon 450D.<br>

Are you using the E-M1 for sports or birds?</p>

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<p>If continuous mode sucks then I suspect it's in CDAF mode. You want PDAF mode but the PDAF sensors only cover the centre part of the finder. If you track something and it falls outside that zone it drops to CDAF mode and you're hosed. I force PDAF mode by locking AF to the centre sensor.</p>

<p>Make sure you are in Continuous-L mode as it disables AF in the H mode.</p>

<p>Also, make sure you are in C-AF mode not C-AF+Track as the tracking is completely loopy.</p>

<p>Finally, disable face detection and disable release priority mode. I also enable the IS+Continuous mode option otherwise IS won't function, and I avoid shutter speeds below 1/320 due to potential shutter shock blurriness.</p>

<p>HTH</p>

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Locking centre focus is my solution. I heard you can use the centre 9 (?) points but had no luck with it.

 

Also setting the viewfinder refresh rate to high may help your panning.

 

I am sure there are other settings I have forgotten. I will post if I recall them.

 

Oh and because the settings are quite different to normal shooting I assigned them to a myset and assigned that myset to

a place on the mode dial. Then I just click to that mode and it's all set.

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Thanks, Chris for tackling this issue for some shooters who record that kind of continjuous focus action. ( Plan to stick with one camera system at a time) With some Lumix related gear too. I 'thinkl I understand what you said but I am sorry if still get lost in the manual as to where to set the focus for center point pr nine points. and I honestly am not sure I am on board yet. Sorry. Continuous L- what is that for example? Do we use AEL/AFL lock button configured how? YEah,Slow learner or not enough time with this multiplex button /lever /multi tasking machine.....with a crappier manual than I imagined m by this day....

 

Can you actually walk this here admittedly apprentice EM1- shooter through the steps-?. Do I need to go to gears menu? for some settings or just SCP? Where do I make this change? Do I need to construct a pattern smaller than center multi- point focus I currently use, such as spot focus to force phase detect. Since Elliot has got it done, I guess he is more proactive with his camera.....I shoot in S AF w MF and center weighted icon. Specifically what buttons, levers and menu segments do I need to set up for this faster C AF? I too might like to assign same like you to a custom Myset on the mode dial. Maybe it is a matter of terminology got mr....when you get time, no rush. This is the kind of dope we all need that is not in the huge but fuzzy wuzz manal. No, David Busch tries in his book but not that much practical advice given there. We need more sharing of tips and tricks and efficient ways to set up this camera. Even if we choose variations, better to know where to find them and how to access them......Good shooting and mahalo to you for being a helper. Contrast detection has merits and I think we are getting close to best of both focus styles, sooner or later....beats manual in a dark gym...for sure, - have had latest firmware installed btw.

Not any camera can be the ultimo cream de la creme of photo tools but pretty darn nice for what I do. And the fast zooms are a revelation, I went with Panasonic X fixed aperture..a high investment of sorts....but they work well on Oly micro cams and are sharp as hens teeh or a samurai sideburn:_). Thanks for listening.

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<p>Hi Gerry, the biggest issue I have with Olympus is the incomprehensible menu system. It doesn’t need to be anywhere near as complicated, I think, and I am not sure how ‘regular’ i.e. non-nerdy people get on with it. I haven’t had to refer to a camera manual as much as this one since I had my first DSLR back in the dark ages!<br /> Anyway, I should really give you the answers to your questions. When I originally replied I was answering from memory as I didn’t have my camera or user guide handy. Now I do, so what I think I will do is give you a list of settings that I believe help with continuous shooting plus how to set them. Here we go:</p>

<ul>

<li>Continuous AF set to C-AF. Press the AF button on top of the camera and scroll with the rear control wheel to C-AF (next to S-AF, NOT C-AF/TR)</li>

<li>Drive set to Sequential L. Press the button with HDR on it and scroll with the rear control wheel to Sequential L.</li>

<li>AF Point to either single near the centre or 9 point. Assuming your Fn1 is set to AF Area Select, press it and a grid comes up. press Info at that point and use the 4-way selector’s UP button to scroll between all squares lit up, group of 9 points, single point small and single point large. That point can be moved around with the arrow keys but I would avoid that. The group of 9 or single in the centre would be my suggestions.</li>

<li>In the menu under the gear section, in A (AF) section set Face Priority to OFF, set C-AF Lock to High</li>

<li>In the gears in menu C (Release) section set Rls Priority C to OFF, set L fps to 6.5, set [drive] + IS Off to Off, set Half Way Rls With IS to On</li>

<li>In the gears menu in menu D (Disp) section set Frame Rate to High</li>

<li>In the wrench menu, set Rec View to Off</li>

</ul>

<p>I suggest you put the camera in S mode for shutter priority and dial in a speed of no slower than 1/320 to avoid shutter shock as the fancy 0-sec anti-shock only works (at least on my camera) in single shot mode, i.e. the continuous settings are grayed out.<br /> Hope this helps!</p>

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<blockquote>

<p>Hi Gerry, the biggest issue I have with Olympus is the incomprehensible menu system. It doesn’t need to be anywhere near as complicated, I think, and I am not sure how ‘regular’ i.e. non-nerdy people get on with it. I haven’t had to refer to a camera manual as much as this one since I had my first DSLR back in the dark ages!</p>

</blockquote>

<p>So true! :-)</p>

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Chris, I was thinking that enabling "Release mode priority" should not have mattered (as long as one knows that it would mean some out of focus images due to camera not acquiring focus); it would have actually helped so that one would not have to wait for, well, for camera to acquire focus (by definition).

 

Does this mode actually interfere with PDAF use? (I do not have a camera as being discussed here, so I am unable to experiment myself.)

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<p><em>"the biggest issue I have with Olympus is the incomprehensible menu system"</em><br>

<em> </em><br>

I kind of like it (it does take a while to get used to) because just about everything is customizable.<br>

<br>

As far as "Release mode priority", because DOF tends to be larger with the m43 system, especially when stopped down, this issue of exact focus is less critical. I took over 1500 images on Sunday testing the continuous AF with Chris' settings and almost all were in focus, not so much because the continuous AF worked so well, but because it worked well enough and was close enough based on the aperture I was using. I had the aperture stopped down enough that any minor mis-focusing did not really matter. Had I been shooting with a fast aperture lens wide open, many of my shots would have been out of focus.</p>

<p><em>"I am not sure how ‘regular’ i.e. non-nerdy people get on with it"</em><br>

<em> </em><br>

Do regular non-nerdy people use this system?<br>

</p>

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