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1DII vs 5D one shot focus speed/accuracy

torwinen

New member
Is there any difference in focusing speed or accuracy between 1D and 5D if a single AF sensor is used (not cross type sensor) and one shot mode? I would be interested to hear the differences both in good lighting and bad (like EV3) lighting.

5D is specified to focus to -0.5EV and 1D to 0EV. I think -0.5EV with 5D is due to larger AF sensors. Larger AF sensors would mean faster autofocusing at least when the light or subject is not that good. On the other hand, larger AF sensors might lead to AF errors since more subject area is covered by the sensor. 1D in turn has a lot faster AF processing engine so that should help autofocusing faster and better at least when the lighting is rather good.

I am a 5D user who considers 1DII. 1DmkIII feels a bit too expensive but is tempting because of more and better placed cross type AF sensors.

Marko
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Marko, Hi!

You are one of the first members of OPF and we are glad to have you with us.

This issue is important to me as I like to work with available light until the time that the bats come out sweeping over the ground in the darkness!

Actually in parties or events I use a lot of different tricks to get the shot and mostly put a prime on the camera.

I use both the 5D and the 1DII. Frankly, in very dim light, both the cameras struggle in dim light to some extent if the focus area is low contrast. I guess I should check the EV, but so what, dim is dim!

I often resort to use of the very nearest edge off something to get focus. Or else separate focus from shutter with * on function 4.

Another trick is to move to manual focus and bracket.

There is no doubt that the 5D has been handicapped by Canon.

I expect hte 1DIII will be much better.

I would sell whatever you can to get the 1DIII if your really want the best low light focus.

Camera Mass: The other thing is that the 1D series weighs much more than the 5D, so that at lower speeds, the 1D camera will be sharper because of the inertia of the larger mass buffers vibration of the camera in your hands making things more stable.

I would not be concerned with specs. Try the cameras under your conditions of use!

Good luck!

Asher
 

torwinen

New member
Marko, Hi!

You are one of the first members of OPF and we are glad to have you with us.

This issue is important to me as I like to work with available light until the time that the bats come out sweeping over the ground in the darkness!

Actually in parties or events I use a lot of different tricks to get the shot and mostly put a prime on the camera.

I use both the 5D and the 1DII. Frankly, in very dim light, both the cameras struggle in dim light to some extent if the focus area is low contrast. I guess I should check the EV, but so what, dim is dim!

I often resort to use of the very nearest edge off something to get focus. Or else separate focus from shutter with * on function 4.

Another trick is to move to manual focus and bracket.

There is no doubt that the 5D has been handicapped by Canon.

I expect hte 1DIII will be much better.

I would sell whatever you can to get the 1DIII if your really want the best low light focus.

Camera Mass: The other thing is that the 1D series weighs much more than the 5D, so that at lower speeds, the 1D camera will be sharper because of the inertia of the larger mass buffers vibration of the camera in your hands making things more stable.

I would not be concerned with specs. Try the cameras under your conditions of use!

Good luck!

Asher

Thank you for your kind words and advice.

Actually, I am using exactly the same tricks as you except manual focusing. My subjects are usually children at close range and I like also to have narrow DOF. Also, I dont like to focus-recompose because of narrow DOF. This combination is very demanding for 5D's af system. By dim light I mean ISO1600, 1/30 and f2 or so.

I owned 1D a year before I traded it for 5D so I have some experience with 1-series AF. I remember that 1D had accurate and very fast af (one shot or continuous) when lighting is good. I also remember that in very dim light 1D/5D one shot AF difference is not that big anymore (and I guess that is your experience as well).

Mk3 would be the best camera for my application, there is no question about it.

Marko
 

Anthony Arkadia

New member
Try shooting in AI Servo and setting CF#17 to 1 (Expanded) this will activate the six invisible points. When the cam is setup like this with glass F2.8 or faster i think the focus is real close to the MKIIn. The MKIIn can just cover a larger area.
For one shot though the MKIIn i think is better?
 

Nill Toulme

New member
It might be better on the 5D, but I have not found it so on the 1D Mark II. I experimented with it extensively shooting low light soccer and basketball, and ultimately ended up with the default setting, i.e., no focus point expansion.

Nill
~~
www.toulme.net
 

Anthony Arkadia

New member
It activates the 6 invisible AF points on the 5D.


afpoints.jpg

Anthony,

Could you expand on the AI Servo CF#17 method?

Why should this be better.

Asher
 

Pawel Woj

New member
5d expanded AF area

I shot a marathon using this combo, ai servo was all over the place, i would not recommend it, Switched back to single point AI servo and had much better results.
 

Anthony Arkadia

New member
I would send your camera back then, because my keeper rate is just as good as i get with my N, btw i am curious, what did you have your metering mode set at when using this combination? because if it was set at Evaluative it would have been every were, you should have it set at partial 8% off the center.
I am willing to say that well over 88% of 5D users do not understand their cameras metering modes when complaining about camera focus problems. I am not implying that you do not Pawel Woj

I shot a marathon using this combo, ai servo was all over the place, i would not recommend it, Switched back to single point AI servo and had much better results.
 

torwinen

New member
If you're saying that the metering mode affects focus problems, then count me in the 88%, as I do not understand. Please explain.

I think he thinks 5D's processor does not have time to calculate AF when doing exposure metering.

No, I have not noticed anything suggesting that. I am way too worried about my one shot AF to notice anything else :)

Marko
 

Sean Shadbolt

New member
Away from the subject a little but I think low light focussing is an area where Nikon works better than Canon. I have been a little surprised on moving to the 1 series canons from Nikon f5's and later on a 14nx Kodak that their low light focus isn't better. It seems better when I reduce the amount of active sensors in the custom functions and possibly is faster, and servo af seems to help rather than single shot but I can have trouble at dimly lit functions waiing for the focus to move and lock on something. It could be the lack of cross focus sensors where I believe the new 1d is better in this regard.
 

Nill Toulme

New member
You're absolutely right (at least according to what I've read — my only experience with Nikon is pre-AF). You'll do best by limiting to the center AF point, which is the most sensitive, and probably also to leave CF17 at 0. You'll also do well to turn OFF the AF assist light function on your flash if you're using it because, perversely, it can seriously slow down AF in very low light (which of course is exactly where you need it).

Mind you this is in *very* low light we're talking about here, and comparing the pro bodies. We may hope that the 1DMkIII improves things a bit.

Nill
~~
www.toulme.net
 

torwinen

New member
Away from the subject a little but I think low light focussing is an area where Nikon works better than Canon. I have been a little surprised on moving to the 1 series canons from Nikon f5's and later on a 14nx Kodak that their low light focus isn't better. It seems better when I reduce the amount of active sensors in the custom functions and possibly is faster, and servo af seems to help rather than single shot but I can have trouble at dimly lit functions waiing for the focus to move and lock on something. It could be the lack of cross focus sensors where I believe the new 1d is better in this regard.

Even after 1Dmk3 Nikon has still one shot focus advantage with its multi CAM2000 which has cross type capable AF sensors all the way to f5.6. Of course people are using faster (f2.8 or more) lenses when autofocusing in challenging situations but still..

Marko
 

Alan T. Price

New member
Accuracy - no.
Speed - all depends.

The 1D2 has the faster AF processor but there's more to AF than just processing. e.g. the 5D AF hardware has a better ability to grab focus from a significant defocus, and doing so can be much faster than the 1D2 which at that point can only give up or else tell the lens to do a focus search.

In theory (according to specs) the 5D can AF in less light so presumably it can focus faster when it gets dark. However, from a photographer's viewpoint there is probably a fine line between too dark for just the 1D2 and too dark for either camera, so the 5D advantage may not be very obvious.

That's my answer to the question about single AF sensor performance. However, it is quite feasible for AF to improve when using closely-grouped multiple AF sensors. It depends greatly on the actual subject and its relationship with unintended subjects, but activating more sensors may allow AF to work with one of the sensors when the primary selected sensor has failed to achieve focus. This will speed AF if it actually happens, but in some cases it may just grab focus on the wrong thing.

Using the hidden AF sensors on the 5D or a cluster of any 7 sensors on the 1D2 is likely to be a better compromise of accuracy and speed than using all available sensors, as covering too large an area will more likely grab focus on the wrong thing.
 

Will Thompson

Inactive
In theory (according to specs) the 5D can AF in less light so presumably it can focus faster when it gets dark

I believe the reality is that Canon reduces the accuracy of acceptable low light focus on later non 1 series cameras thus having a better AF spec than the 1 series. If you test focus accuracy at the light level spec. of the 1 series cameras it is much better than the non 1 series cameras. It seems that 1 series AF is disabled at the level that "Pro" accuracy is lost.

This all means that just because your camera will focus in lower light do not expect it to be as accurate. They just lowered the point at which it stops trying.
 
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